Chapter 4: Mage's Cultivation

As soon as Gao De stepped out, a look of undisguised ferocity rose in his eyes.

"In the face of absolute strength, cleverness is useless, even maneuvering for a while is difficult."

He recalled his recent contact with Master Seda; besides the indescribable humiliation, there was also a sense of luck at having survived: "Although I muddled through this time, it was out of luck."

Gao De didn't know the specific effect of Master Seda's magic that made it feel like thorns were growing out of his palm, but he could guess that if he had lied just now, Master Seda would definitely have been able to perceive it.

Fortunately, Master Seda's question was "Do you really feel that your body hasn't changed at all?"—In fact, he really hadn't found any abnormalities in his body after waking up.

It was highly probable that all the effects of the potion had been borne by the predecessor.

It seems the effect of the potion brewed by this old guy is aimed at the mental aspect... Gao De deduced.

Otherwise, having inherited this body, he shouldn't have felt no discomfort physiologically.

Master Seda, who was not tall, brought Gao De a pressure that was greater than anything he had ever experienced in his past or present life.

He touched his neck, which had just been pinched by Master Seda, with lingering fear.

There were no wounds there.

But just now, that unbearable severe pain was real.

This was the miracle of magic.

Even if it was just a cantrip.

This feeling of having one's life in the hands of others at a single thought was not pleasant.

Although Master Seda was just a stranger Gao De had met only once, his hatred for him had reached its peak at this moment.

Gao De also knew that he was too weak now and could not possibly be Master Seda's opponent.

The other party was powerful, so he had to endure and secretly look for opportunities.

The question was, how much time did he have left?

Gao De didn't know that he actually only had one month left.

But he knew that Master Seda valued that unknown potion extremely highly; even though he had never succeeded in brewing it for so many years, he kept trying again and again, which showed his persistence.

Now that Master Seda had discovered that he had survived after testing the drug, he must feel that the brewing of the potion was close to success.

Therefore, in a short time, Master Seda would definitely try to brew the potion again.

At that time, the person testing the drug would likely be him again.

After all, he was the only person who "didn't die" after testing the drug so far.

"Gao De, you're finally back!" When Gao De returned to his room, Amy immediately rushed over and asked: "What did Master Seda want with you?"

Gao De told the truth, "Master Seda asked me about how I felt after taking the medicine."

"I guessed it was that; Master Seda's potion has finally been successfully brewed, and we're going to have a good life!" Amy was very excited.

"Perhaps." Gao De didn't break Amy's fantasy.

"By the way, I just ran into Yilan." He pondered for a moment and said, seemingly casually.

"Why, did he come to trouble you again?" Amy's expression changed upon hearing this, and he asked nervously.

"Something like that, but it's no big deal; he can only make things difficult for me with words at most, and he can't really do anything to me." Gao De said indifferently.

"That's not how you say it!" Amy cared much more than Gao De, "Yilan has been with Master Seda the longest, so he can say a few words in front of Master Seda. I heard that the reason you were the one to test the drugs this time was because of him."

"Really? I don't have any grudge with him, why would he go to such lengths?" Gao De said "in disbelief."

"He is narrow-minded by nature and jealous of talent. He was already unhappy that you are talented, and you don't bother with him, so how could he not hold a grudge against you?"

"And, you picked up potion brewing so quickly; Yilan must be afraid that if this continues, Master Seda will value you more and more, until you replace his position with Master Seda."

"You can't afford to provoke him yet, so you'd better pretend to be on good terms with him on the surface for now." Amy advised tactfully.

Gao De's gaze narrowed, thought for a moment, and said: "I know."

Amy just thought Gao De had listened to his advice and was relieved, "That's good."

"Is Yilan's job to deliver goods for Master Seda?" Gao De asked as if unintentionally.

"Yes, his job is the easiest. He only needs to deliver goods once every four or five days, and he can take this opportunity to go to the city to stroll around. Unlike us, who are tired to death in the herb garden all day." Amy said with some indignation.

"I see..." Gao De's eyes drifted, thinking about something.

Afterward, he intentionally or unintentionally learned a lot of information about the herb garden from Amy through various topics, and had a basic understanding of his current environment.

"Oh no!" Amy slapped his head, seemingly remembering something, and said hurriedly: "Let's hurry to eat; if we go any later, I guess there won't be anything left."

He pulled Gao De to the dining room and didn't forget to claim credit, "I missed the meal time just to wait for you to come back."

It was dinner time now.

In Master Seda's herb garden, there were three meals a day, namely breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

If you exclude the drug testing, for most apprentices who were just beggars, this was actually a paradise. Because most commoners only ate two meals a day, morning and evening.

Under Amy's lead, Gao De came to the dining room where the apprentices ate.

It was called a dining room, but the space was only slightly larger than their bedroom, with three square wooden tables, each with a candle lamp made of three candle holders, plus a fireplace, and it was called a dining room.

It was already quite late when Gao De and the others arrived, and there were only two or three apprentices left in the dining room.

Amy looked nervously at the large plate placed next to the fireplace and was relieved to see two long black loaves of bread left there.

Next to the large plate was a stew pot made of clay.

Gao De, who hadn't eaten anything except a sip of water since waking up, also felt a little hungry, so he followed Amy over.

There were some tableware stacked next to the large plate; Gao De picked up a small plate, put a long loaf of bread into his plate, and picked up a small bowl, looking at the stew pot.

The stew pot contained pea soup made from a local specialty pea.

After filling himself with pea soup with a spoon, Gao De and Amy chose an empty table to sit down.

Rye bread + pea soup.

This was the daily food for these apprentices.

Meat, don't even think about it.

And although it was called bread, it was worlds apart from the bread Gao De knew.

These rye loaves were not added with yeast, so they were extremely hard when baked, the taste was definitely not good, and they were extremely strenuous to chew.

Of course, it was not without advantages.

Cheap.

A 4-pound (about 1.8 kg) rye loaf only cost 6 round copper coins.

Gao De converted it in his mind, which was equivalent to 3.5 round copper coins per kilogram of rye bread.

And the cheapest meat cost 7 round copper coins per pound (about 450 grams).

The cost-effectiveness of rye bread was self-evident.

Amy used a table knife to cut the long rye loaf into slices, placed them on a plate, then poured the pea soup spoon by spoon over the bread slices, and then stuffed the bread slices into his mouth.

This was the correct way to eat rye bread; while drinking the soup, the bread was also slightly softened, otherwise, if you ate it dry, you would choke! Of course, soaking the bread slices directly in the soup was also a very common way to eat it.

Gao De learned from Amy, picked up the table knife to cut the rye bread into several slices, then soaked these bread slices with pea soup until soft, and then stuffed them into his mouth.

The next moment, he couldn't help but frown.

Even though he had been mentally prepared, the unpalatability of the food was still beyond his expectations.

The pea soup didn't have any seasoning at all, and the bread slices soaked in pea soup were only slightly softer; if the taste had to be described, it was just a little better than wood shavings.

For Gao De, such food was undoubtedly extremely terrifying, but for other apprentices, having this kind of bread to eat was already quite good.

However, Gao De had no choice now, and the hunger in his stomach made him have to frown and swallow the rye bread with difficulty.

So he had one more reason to resist Master Seda.

—If you can only eat such food every day, what is the difference from being dead? After dinner was the apprentices' cultivation time.

The daily routine of the apprentices in the herb garden was very regular.

Busy with their respective work during the day, and fixed three to four hours of cultivation time at night.

After returning to the room, Amy seized the time and soon entered the cultivation state.

Gao De reviewed the cultivation methods of mages in his mind first.

For a mage, the two most important basic indicators: mana, mental power.

Mana is the energy consumed when casting spells, also known as the "blue bar," and is the cornerstone of all a mage's power.

Mental power is related to controlling spells and learning spells; it determines a person's spellcasting technique, the stability of continuous spellcasting, the changes in spells, and even the speed of learning spells. The growth of mana and mental power relies on day after day of boring and repetitive cultivation; there is absolutely no way to be lazy, and there is no shortcut.

"Start guiding, first, enter the meditative state..."

The cultivation method for mana is the guiding method, and the cultivation method for mental power is called meditation.

The two are separate, cannot be cultivated at the same time, and generally, the order is to cultivate the guiding method first, and then the meditation method.

Because the process of cultivating the guiding method also requires the consumption of mental power.

And once the mental power consumption exceeds 40%, continuing to cultivate the guiding method will get half the result with twice the effort.

For Gao De, this is not difficult to understand, just like learning—the learning effect in the first few hours is definitely the best, and later, when the mind is tired, the learning efficiency is naturally lower.

And cultivating the meditation method after the guiding method not only quickly restores the consumed mental power but also has a gain for the growth of mental power.

According to Gao De's own understanding, this is like exercise, constantly repeating: "consume physical strength—restore physical strength," which can better stimulate physical strength growth.

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 5 =====