Chapter 1087: Collecting More Manuscripts, Finally Meeting an Ancient Mage

After the Semi-plane experimental accident, the Mage Tower no longer had a distinction between upper and lower levels, at least not in the eyes of explorers like Xia Duo.

Everything existed on the same plane; one simply had to pass through several areas of Ether Mist that were relatively dense but still allowed for orientation.

The private residence they were heading to this time was located behind a patch of Ether Mist; generally, the denser the Ether Mist, the weaker the presence of the Material Plane.

It could even be said that in the future, these areas might consist entirely of the Ether Plane; by then, areas like this private residence, which still held space from the Material Plane behind the mist, might truly become like isolated islands.

Islands in time and space—perhaps they would only fall back to the Material Plane once the ruin area completely separated from the Ether Plane.

Of course, they might also fall into other Material Planes.

……

Soon, Xia Duo and the other four stood before a private residence. Compared to the Library and the warehouse, this area had significantly more personal touches in its layout.

For instance, there were marks on the wall by the entrance left by anchors used for Constant Magic alerts, and vine motifs that grew from the top of the door frame down along the sides.

Or perhaps the flooring, which was more exquisite than in other areas, the decorative lamps, and so on.

From the Elven books in the Library, one could see that the owner of this Mage Tower had a strong sense of identification with Elven culture, and their personal relationship with certain Elves might have been quite good; otherwise, how could they have obtained so many original Elven books!

As for the overall decorative style inside the Mage Tower, that was secondary; several hundred years ago, Elven culture was mainstream, and even after Netherese Mages abandoned Elven Magic, it remained this way.

Even now, Elven culture is equally popular in Netheril and occupies a large proportion of artistic expression.

The owner of this private residence area where Xia Duo and the others were now located must also have been deeply influenced by Elven culture; Xia Duo felt deeply worried about this.

If humans truly want to surpass Elves in the future, besides the field of Magic, the cultural field must also keep up; otherwise, they will always remain under the spiritual colonization of Elven culture.

"Lord Xia Duo, shall we begin?"

"Mm, let's begin!"

After all, as High Mages of the Seven Towers, Luodite and the others were already able to actively coordinate with Xia Duo after their previous two practices of stripping Element Pool links.

Although Xia Duo did not need them to be overly proactive—being able to follow instructions was enough—the thoughts Luodite and the others shared in the Mind Link regarding the stripping of Element Pool links did bring him quite a few fresh inspirations.

Therefore, Xia Duo did not reject the proactive inquiries from Luodite and the others; in the gaps between Spellcasting to sort and guide the Element Pool energy, he was even happy to exchange ideas with the three of them in the Mind Link.

Stripping the Element Pool link went without incident, and breaking the Protection system was effortless. The only surprise was the door to this private residence; it was not open-style like the one at the Library, protected only by Spells.

Nor was it like the warehouse, where the door was a movable stone sliding door.

The door here was completely integrated with the wall; if not for the door frame and the decorations on it, one would not even consider this a door.

The Tower of Time also had situations like this; it was actually a Spell door, but compared to the Protection method centered on Creation School Spells in the Library, the Spell door here was centered on Transmutation Spells.

In short, while the Mage Tower was intact, the door here would open automatically; if the Protection system failed, it could also serve as a stone wall to provide a certain level of protection.

At least for anyone below a High Mage, it was unlikely they would have any good way to handle this wall.

But for Xia Duo, this wall could only be considered a small surprise to adjust the monotonous cracking process.

"Lord Xia Duo, what should we do now? Should we move to the next one?"

Aibuna's inquiry interrupted Xia Duo's thoughts, but he didn't mind; he just waved his hand and said, "No need. What if the next one is the same? Are we to end this exploration mission just like that?"

"Then... Lord Xia Duo, how do you intend to handle it?"

"Handle it like this—"

As he spoke, Xia Duo unleashed a reversed Petrification Domain, along with a Water Element summoned via Bloodline Power, to infiltrate the stone door.

Almost instantly, the upper part of the stone door began to soften and sag, while the lower part became bloated. A moment later, the stone door, which had been integrated with the walls on both sides, turned into a stone opening filled with mud.

Afterward, Xia Duo didn't care if this mud would contaminate his Personal Space; he directly overlapped his Personal Space with this area and then separated it, collecting the mud and leaving behind a relatively spacious passageway.

In fact, if the stone door hadn't been integrated with the surrounding walls but was an independent structure, Xia Duo wouldn't have needed to soften it first; he could have just collected it directly.

Behind the passageway was the private residence in the true sense. Similar to the Tower of Time, it started with a Reception Room, then led to several rooms.

Xia Duo went in and took a look around; except for the area suspected to be a Spell Laboratory which had completely disappeared, the other areas were relatively intact.

Apart from a few handwritten notes scattered in the Study, he couldn't find anything else of greater value.

Logically, after the Semi-plane experimental accident, the owner of the Mage Tower had given this area special protection, which meant there were people here at the time. Yet now, let alone people, he hadn't even found a single bone.

Xia Duo could only speculate that the owner of this private residence might have been busy with something in the Spell Laboratory, and then when the accident happened, they disappeared along with the Spell Laboratory.

Of course, it was also possible that there was no one here at the time, and the Mage Tower owner had protected nothing, but this possibility was too small to be worth considering.

"Let's go, there's one last place!"

"Mm."

……

The last relatively stable Element Pool fusion area was also a private residence, and the door was still a stone door driven by Transmutation Spells, integrated with the walls on both sides.

This time there was an accident as well, but this accident was far more stimulating than the integrated stone door from before!

In fact, when Xia Duo was breaking the Protection system of the private residence area, he had vaguely sensed that there might be some living creature inside the residence with the same Permission Level as the Protection system.

Once the Protection system was broken and the stone door was breached, a humanoid creature, burning all over with flames and constantly emitting a large amount of fire elements, came charging out while howling.

Xia Duo's expression at that moment was truly spectacular.

He had been prepared to communicate with an ancient Mage who had smuggled themselves from the past to the present, but he hadn't expected to encounter this thing.

Perhaps this was the price of smuggling from the past to the present!

"Xierdalanna, you bitch! Xierdalanna, you whore!"

The roar emitted by this fire-being, suspected to be an ancient Netherese Mage, actually broke into the Mind Link between Xia Duo and Luodite and the others.