The Wizard World

Angele was leaving the wizard area when he saw several wizards with strange appearances entering the gate. One of the female wizards in a green robe was riding a boar slowly down the hill, and it seemed like she was enjoying her time.

Angele walked up the hill and returned to the square. He saw Asuna sitting on a bench, still waiting for him to come back.

"You’re here?" Asuna asked with an excited voice after seeing him walking toward her. She looked a bit tired but she still stood up immediately.

"I thought I asked you to go back." Angele’s brow furrowed. "Why’re you still here?"

"You paid me so I need to finish my job. I haven’t guided you through the area yet."

Asuna blushed.

"Well, find me a place to stay then, please?"

Angele had no magic stones left, so he had to find a place that accepted gold coins.

"Of course."

Asuna nodded.

The square was still crowded and noisy. The apprentices were yelling at vendors as they negotiated the prices. Angele even heard pets making loud noises. The place looked exactly like the markets in the mortal countries.

Asuna and Angele went around the square and walked down the hill using a different path this time. There were many people here, and Angele even saw several mortals on the way.

After about half an hour of going down, they arrived at a suspension bridge.

Under the bridge, it was an endless abyss. The white mist blurred Angele’s sight, but it seemed like the people walking on it had already gotten used to it, only several of them looked nervous.

Angele followed after Asuna with the basket in hands. The bridge was shaky and he was surprised by how many people it could handle at the same time.

On the other side of the bridge, he saw countless caves on the surface of the mountain, and it looked like a honeycomb. The distance between each cave was about eight meters.

"You can rent a cave to stay here. You can also purchase one of the larger caves if you want. The price is fair and the place is quiet," Asuna explained and led Angele to a small stone house by the end of the bridge.

There was a small window on the wall, and a middle-aged chubby woman was sitting inside.

"Talk to her to rent the cave."

Asuna pointed at the window.

Angele nodded and stepped forward.

"I want to rent one of your best caves for four months. How much will that be?"

"Do you have magic stones? If not, what kind of gold coins you have? For four months, it’ll be 10,000 regular gold coins of the empire," the woman answered carelessly.

"Do you take this?"

Angele took out two purple gems from his pouch. He had obtained them from Nancy, and their quality was high.

"Well..." The woman grabbed one of the gems and observed it. "I want at least 10 of them."

Angele spent all the gems and gold coins he had and rented one of the largest caves in the mountain. He searched his bag and put down several other valuable items on the table to purchase the food delivery service for one year. His priority was to craft the Tree Killer Potion, so he could sell things later if he needed more money.

Asuna was a bit confused at to why Angele hadn’t just purchased a cave with a magic stone. The only possibility was that he had used up all his magic stones in the wizard area.

The woman gave Angele a number plate after she received the payment. They walked along the caves and quickly found the one Angele had rented out.

There was a large brown stone door at the entrance of the cave. It was about the size of an average adult, and there were some simple string patterns engraved on its surface.

Angele put the number plate on the door, and the door opened by itself immediately.

A well-decorated living room appeared in Angele’s eyes, its walls painted yellow. There was a total of eight rooms on both sides of the living room. Angele did not expect the cave to be so large before opening the door.

A gray fur blanket covered the floor and some crystal lights were hanging on the walls. The yellow gentle light brightened up the whole cave. The rooms were fully furnished. They were luxurious-looking and cozy, the only drawback of the place being it had only one entrance.

"Worth the price."

Angele nodded, satisfied with the environment.

Asuna stayed by the door. She had not followed Angele into the living room.

"The cave is great, but the wizards or stronger apprentices can easily invade your privacy if they want. People usually only stay here for a short period," she explained.

"You’re right." Angele nodded and turned around. "Also, can you help me sell these? I’ll give you 10% of the profit."

Angele took out a bunch of small glass vials with green liquid inside. They contained a potion he had crafted awhile ago, but it could only cure general physical injuries.

"Ah, high-quality healing gel. I can sell them for you for sure, thank you."

Asuna looked happy, she grabbed the glasses vials and counted the number—there were twelve of them.

"But you already gave me a lot of magic stones and 10% is a lot," Asuna stated honestly after calming down.

"Well, thanks for the help then."

Angele started to like this girl, she was honest and selfless. Asuna reminded him of Tia. The last time he’d seen the young girl was about five years ago, and he wondered how was the situation in Lennon City now.

Asuna left with the twelve vials of healing gel. Half an hour later, a servant delivered food and drink to him, and Asuna returned to the cave at the same time.

There was a small black leather pouch in her hand, and it was full of magic stones.

"24 mid-level magic stones in total."

She handed the pouch over to Angele.

Angele grabbed it, took out a magic stone, and threw it to Asuna.

"That’s the reward for your help. Don’t refuse it, I might need you later."

Asuna put the magic stone back into Angele’s hand with a serious look on her face.

"I can’t. You already paid me well."

"Alright."

Angele put the magic stone back into the pouch.

He closed the door after Asuna left, then sat down in a wooden chair, and grabbed a glowing elephant’s heart.

‘Simulate the process of making the heart bomb for me,’ Angele ordered, and blue light dots started flashing in front of his eyes.

‘Task created... Initiating... Simulating...’

Rows of data lined up on the bottom left corner beside the glowing heart in Angele’s sight.

‘Energy: 56.13 degrees. Category: Fire. Simulation Success Rate: 98.78%. Cost: 2 mentality. Duration: 3 hours. Estimated power: more than 50 degrees, less than 53 degrees.’

There was also information on energy loss, the possibility of structure optimization, material content, procedures, and many other small notices under the main data.

The blue light dots disappeared from Angele’s sight. He raised his right hand and created a sharp silver scalpel.

The tip of the scalpel slowly turned from silver to gray in half a minute.

Angele held the scalpel in hand and stood up. He walked around the room and applied some energy particles to the walls. By doing that, he could prevent some of the invasions, and the energy particles could warn him about unknown mentality waves. However, they could not stop scanning spells.

But he was not trying to hide the process of crafting the bomb, he just did not want other wizards to know how accurate and fast he could do it. Although fighting was forbidden in the area, people still might go after him when he was out on a mission. Wizards would want to know how he could manage to use such small amount of energy to craft an extremely high-quality heart bomb.

Angele started drawing lines and runes on the surface of the heart carefully.

The time flew by, more and more runes were left on the heart until they almost covered the whole surface. Surprisingly, the blood leaking out of the cuts was black.

Black blood was dripping down the heart slowly. Angele finished the last rune and his skin absorbed the silver scalpel. He then quickly pointed at the center of the heart.

*CHI*

The green flame inside the heart flashed and almost disappeared. One second later, the flame was about to explode, filling up the heart. The green glow surrounded Angele’s hand.

He narrowed his eyes and started chanting incantations to activate the runes on the heart.

"Comella, the eternal moon, sink the ice into the abyss, and pour molten lava onto the glacier."

*BAM*

The explosion inside was stopped, bright white glow coating the runes and patterns on the surface of the heart. The white light almost covered the green glow from the inside, and the lines between the runes were pumping.

*CHI*

The white light disappeared and the green flame returned to its original state.

Angele held the heart in hand, satisfied with the result.

‘A heart bomb that can deal 50 degrees of damage. Such high-quality raw materials can only be found in a place like Nola.’

Angele could win a fight against an average Liquid stage wizard because he could surprise the opponent with the signet. However, the signet could only be used twice more, and the enhanced Lesser Fireball could not one shot his enemy. He had tried it on two Liquid stage wizards but neither of them died because of it.

The two Liquid stage wizards were wounded but their injuries were not critical, and without the signet, he could not even land the Lesser Fireball on their weak points.

Angele needed something that was powerful and easier to use for the mission in the ruins. He had purchased a whole basket of high-quality raw materials, planning to make a dozen of heart bombs with the help of the chip. Although he paid a lot of magic stones for the hearts, he still wanted to be fully prepared for the high-risk mission.

He wondered, though, at how strong a Crystal stage wizard was and if he might have to rely on those bombs when necessary.