Chapter 356: The Magic of Change

Meteor Burst, a range attack spell in the ninth circle, is theoretically powerful but rarely used in practice.

“The disgrace of ninth-circle spells.”

Theoretically, it pulls a meteor down to earth, delivering a devastating area attack with both fire and physical damage.

But in actual combat, it has several extremely serious flaws.

First, its mana cost is enormous; second, it has a long delay—especially the fall time—and such a huge mana investment is wasted if it misses.

Moreover, pure evocation damage suffers from resistances in top-tier duels; physical damage faces even more specialized defenses, and most importantly:

“Death, Dragon’s Breath, Wail of the Banshee, Modenken’s Blade, Disintegrate—each has hundreds of variants, upgrades, and sibling spells. Do high-tier mages lack attack spells? Why would I use that slow, unstable fire meteor?”

Yet, most casters above the ninth circle still learn this spell first.

After all, as a team caster, you may not excel at—or even disdain—the role of an evocation artillery tower, but you cannot truly lack it.

“Which version of Meteor Burst is this? I want to learn it!”

The senior mage in the party, Ma Dun, an evocation master and Li En’s senior, stared at the apocalyptic scene before him and instantly locked onto it.

He thought if he brought it back, his master would be delighted.

Not just his master, but all evocation fanatics who love explosions adore the sight of falling stars.

“Boom!”

“Boom!”

The entire world plunged into a sea of fire; several magical arrays in midair periodically spat out medium-sized meteors, which accelerated, broke apart mid-fall, and ultimately became vast infernos covering entire regions.

The desert temple and the Spider Mother’s hall were already engulfed in flames; the screams of spider monsters echoed throughout the city.

Yet Li En spotted Kuku’s technical signature at once.

“Although Meteor Burst is the evocation spell with the most variants (the original was too pathetic), this barely resembles the original anymore.”

Li En had studied the records of “Kuku’s Chain Meteor Burst (ninth to tenth circle)” and found it matched the current description exactly—it was a theoretical spell, yet now theory had become reality.

“One layer, two layers, three layers of spell arrays—how did they achieve this?”

Meteor Burst does not directly pull down a meteor; instead, it opens a spatial array, allowing the meteor to emerge from the array before falling and being guided.

In reality, this involves multiple steps and precise control: from spatial summoning to evocation fusion to fall trajectory management—all testing the evocation mage’s elemental control and transformation abilities.

But now, Li En saw three Meteor Burst arrays stacked atop one another, overlapping yet transforming a single mana input into summoning “three dragons,” then further subdividing the mana into a continuous rain of fire.

“Without Kuku’s multi-threaded thinking, how could they simultaneously control three spatial arrays—or is this one array with three spatial rifts?”

Others saw only the spectacle, the explosive power of a powerful spell; Li En saw that Kuku’s technical challenges had been solved in reality—the relentless rain of fire descending made his heart tremble.

Especially the miniature “pattern” at the array’s center: a three-headed dragon—this was Kuku the Sage’s personal signature.

Compared to the array in his memory, this one was far more complex.

“How was such a high-difficulty array precisely controlled simultaneously?”

Li En didn’t believe the caster possessed the ability to focus on three tasks at once to draw an array of this level—that would require stable modular casting.

Li En’s Fire Rain series has never been mass-producible and remains awkward precisely because it was tailor-made for Kuku’s multi-focus ability; without multi-casting or multi-focus specialization, such spell effects are unattainable.

“I want this spell.”

Even though using it was still far off, Li En resolved to obtain its data.

But now, this wasn’t the time to consider such things.

“Don’t get drawn in—procure supplies, then head to the Great Magic Realm.”

“They won’t sell? Then we’ll take it by force. This isn’t crime—it’s striking down evil! First cast Detect Evil, then loot—it’s not robbery.”

While the city’s attention is distracted by these sudden attackers, we’ll handle our own business.