Chapter 127: Future Great Alchemists (Third Watch, Nine Thousand)

The next day after waking up, Li En's studies progressed quite smoothly.

After all, with a teacher of Kuk's caliber providing one-on-one private tutoring from the Si Sect, and learning what is hailed as the simplest spell of the first ring, Magic Missile, if it weren't going smoothly, he could truly change careers.

"First, what must be corrected is the mistaken belief that Magic Missile is guaranteed to hit."

Magic Missile appears guaranteed to hit not because of any causality involved, but simply because it is a super-small sphere like a bullet that flies at high speed with the ability to change trajectory; ordinary people basically cannot dodge it.

The focus of its learning has always been on the missile's "trajectory."

That "bullet model" specifically designed for high-speed flight has already evolved to a point where it cannot be altered by a single fraction.

Therefore, even Archmages find it difficult to increase the power of Magic Missile.

Forcefully pouring in more mana is simple, but once it expands to a certain degree, the spell (bullet) model is lost.

Brute force cannot produce miracles here; once the power goes up, the spell is ruined.

"If it really turns into a tennis-ball-sized missile, it won't be fast, and the power will be just so-so."

It is also for this reason that mages only progress in the quantity of Magic Missiles, firing more simultaneously at one time, but the power remains just so-so.

In most cases, choosing Magic Missile is to borrow its range and speed to interrupt or disrupt the opponent's spellcasting.

Of course, nothing is absolute; Evokers like to modify missiles in various ways, transforming them into elemental magic.

They then use their Evoker specialization and bonuses in elemental magic to indirectly increase power.

"High rings have a similar spell, Arcane Missile Storm; that is a different bullet model, where both power and quantity increase."

After studying all morning, Li En felt his progress was gratifying; he was probably not far from mastering Magic Missile.

But further improvement still seemed to lie in Dragon Speech spells.

Based on Li En's current feeling, the greatest practical advantage of Dragon Speech spells is the speed and swiftness of casting.

"Dragon Speech magic doesn't worry about casting failure; armor-piercing can also be cast freely. After all, dragons are basically heavy units."

The more he learned, the more Li En confirmed that modern magic and Dragon Speech magic not only do not conflict but can fit and complement each other, especially for low-end casters, where learning both allows knowledge to be applied across fields and progress simultaneously.

Kuk doesn't have this feeling; when he could learn Dragon Speech, he was already a Super Archmage.

After confirming Li En was on his own path, Kuk, this very busy person, went off to attend to his own affairs.

Miss Shaliman had promised to return to the city within two days, but it seems she is estimated to arrive the next day.

The scope of this base is not small; emptying it out requires some time.

What Kuk did first was to thoroughly digest the local Machine Clan technology and apply it to the maintenance of Ophelia; in his view, it would be a great pity if such an ancient Machine Clan unit returning to the human world fell due to inability to maintain itself so soon.

Those Machine Clan remains were also reused, transformed into various spare parts to be kept for Ophelia's future use.

Without these parts, Ophelia's survival and improvement would be a major problem.

Missing this opportunity, finding Machine Clan parts again might truly require going to another world.

"You had better learn alchemy yourself, learn to repair and modify yourself. I know previously you were not allowed to do this, but now there is no Creation Clan to perform maintenance and upkeep for you." Judging from Ophelia's continuous records, she had taken her teacher's admonitions to heart.

The other spellcaster who seized the opportunity to learn from Kuk was none other than Miss Shaliman, whom no one expected.

She previously had no lack of famous teachers; her mentor was a quite famous Archmage. But what she primarily studied was still the Psychic, which relies on talent.

And an Archmage like Kuk, who cultivates both Sorcerer and Mage arts, is always extremely rare; Kuk could even guide her cultivation of mental power while teaching her to strengthen her magic with psychic abilities.

"Little Snake Girl, your compatibility with me is quite high, but how did you come to think of advancing to 'Medusa'?"

Not every snake woman has snake hair; most snake women's appearances are not so extreme. It is just that Miss Shaliman mastered an ancient evolution path which, while consuming huge amounts of materials, is indeed very powerful.

This is a standard noble path, so expensive and rare that it has no cost-performance ratio, but its endpoint and upper limit are both promising.

Unfortunately, Miss Shaliman seems not to have developed it very well.

That snake hair, possessing a certain degree of self-awareness and independence, was completely treated as mere decoration; her stone snake skin, which is very hard, has also barely been used.

Kuk pondered for a moment and gave her some guidance on the evolution path; possessing "Mythical Traits" this quickly is enough to prove her potential and evolutionary compatibility, so there is no need to change paths.

But her development level is too low; without supporting combat methods, having excellent hardware without supporting software truly makes it just decoration.

"You could actually dual-cultivate melee combat; it would be very strong." Kuk's suggestion left Miss Shaliman confused.

But speaking reasonably, Medusa has thick skin, can petrify, and has snake hair attacks; not engaging in melee combat is truly a waste.

Facing her mentor's soul's sincere suggestion, she could only murmur her agreement and try it upon returning.

Kuk sighed and shook his head; he knew the other party was just going through the motions.

This is not a question of whether to believe Kuk, but rather Miss Shaliman's status and condition left her without the resolve to pursue power at all costs.

For someone who lacks nothing, there is truly no need to force it.

What Kuk was more concerned about was actually the Machine Clan Ophelia and the mushroom person Gu Gu.

The former seems to have perfectly fused with the Lich's phylactery; her talent as a spellcaster is beyond doubt, and the overflowing soul energy offers too many paths to choose from.

And the mushroom person Gu Gu merely proactively combined his Mushroom Alchemy with his own alchemy; this flexibility and decisiveness make Kuk very expectant of his future.

These two are destined to walk the path of Alchemists.

One will likely be a Mechanical Alchemist, and the other is definitely a Potion-focused Magical Potion Alchemist.

Looking at the two diligent and sincere juniors, Kuk felt somewhat gratified.

Compared to "the stupid me" and "the snake without resolve," these two are truly diligent, hardworking, and talented good disciples.

And even while teaching, Kuk did not stop his looting; he perfectly demonstrated the operation of multitasking.

But even so, he spent most of his time on teaching.

This actually isn't neglecting one's duty; after all, Miss Shaliman, Ophelia, and Gu Gu are all candidates for this round.

And with the labor and effort of Gu Gu's mushroom companions, the task of clearing the base also went smoothly.

Some Creation Clan legacies that barely survived the passage of time were found, and books that had not completely weathered away were restored as much as possible.

With the help of Purple Thorn, all knowledge that could be recorded was entered into Kuk's notebook.

This increasingly heavy "pile of legacy notebooks" has already filled Li En's spatial bag.

Now, some of the newly added records and notes have been placed in Miss Shaliman's bag.

If they truly started to intensify their internal competition, time would pass quickly.

For this entire day, the group continued to stay underground, learning while excavating the heritage.

"No rush; we agreed on two days anyway, and tomorrow is the same. Just one day left; surely nothing major will happen." Miss Shaliman was also happy to relax; although she did not intend to pursue the arduous path of melee power, following Lord Lord Lord Kuku would still allow her to learn much.

"Let them wait a bit longer."

As the active party with the advantage in negotiations, Li En's side was actually not in a rush at all.

Leaving the negotiation opponent waiting for a while could also yield more benefits in subsequent negotiations.

Everyone in the embassy delegation was very satisfied; everyone gained something that day.

Even Larry obtained the glory of slaying the undead.

As for whether the Dark Elves were in a rush, what did that have to do with us?

"Let's set off again tomorrow morning."

Finally, at dusk, Li En's side prepared another barbecue banquet.

Although they had specifically built partitions, the smoke still irritated people a bit, but this was actually one of the few places in the Underworld where one could barbecue.

After all, there was no need to worry about the aroma of the barbecue attracting demons and monsters of the Underworld.

As night fell, they entered the third night of the Hall of Heroes.

This time, however, it was a rare calm.

It was evident that after last night's tempering, the candidates' attitudes had become somewhat more proper.

Lord Lord Lord Kuku did not conduct further dream trials; in such a short time, nothing could be cultivated, so he could only let them have a slight sense of determination.

The lessons returned to the first day; Lord Lord Lord Kuku once again used his clone to teach, which made all the candidates breathe a sigh of relief.

Dream trials yielded great gains, but this repeated "death" was truly unbearable.

Facing the lessons that had opened again, even Li En and the other embassy personnel felt a bit numb.

After all, attending classes during the day and continuing to make up lessons in dreams at night was truly too much like being a beast of burden.

The two Dark Elves were still somewhat anxious, but since they did not point it out directly, they probably were not that urgent.

The difficulties left over from what was not learned on the first day were further overcome; everyone gained a lot that night.

The overly calm life made Li En feel somewhat unaccustomed.

Early the next morning, the embassy delegation completed their consolidation (the Mushroom People had already packed the luggage at night) and began to return to Mosodilka.

On the return journey, Miss Shaliman was still simulating the scene of requesting an audience with the City Lord and rehearsing the key points of the negotiation dialogue with Li En.

But very quickly, she discovered that her preparations were probably in vain.

Before even reaching the city, merely seeing the city walls from a distance, the entire group was stunned.

"Boom!"

A giant deer, the size of a mountain, was kicking down the towering city wall with one foot.

Its body was snow-white; its cloud-like hooves struck the ground, and its white fur fluttered in the wind.

At a glance, this was a magnificent giant beast, beautiful as if returning from a myth.

But if one looked upward, that "face" destroyed everything.

Upon the neck, the deformed, swollen brain exposed to the air was too terrifying.

The tentacles extending from within the brain also fluttered in the wind along with the white fur, but no matter how one looked at it, they resembled a supreme demon emerging from a nightmare.

"Uh, didn't we just leave two days ago? If we didn't go to the wrong city, does that mean we've been gone for over a month?!"

(End of this chapter)