End of the Magic Era

But the girl ran off just as Lin Yun turned around…

“Hmm?” Lin Yun looked at the small girl’s back with a thoughtful expression.

“What?” William, who was in front, stopped when he noticed Lin Yun’s situation. He followed Lin Yun’s eyes before saying, “She is Ranya, the child my sister took in. After my sister had an accident, no one took care of her. The family would give her some money every month and she kept living here. After such a long time, she became antisocial…”

“Oh…” Lin Yun nodded but didn’t comment.

The group of three went to the 2nd floor, which held three rooms. They were all clean and tidy, and the furniture was spotless. There wasn’t a single wrinkle on the bed. This was all very surprising… How could such a small girl clean such a big house by herself?

Of course, it didn’t really matter to Lin Yun’s group.

Mages would use meditation to replace sleep most of the time, especially ones like Lin Yun and William, who had already entered the High Mage Realm. Even if they didn’t sleep for a few days, they still wouldn’t feel too tired, and just a bit of meditation would be enough to recover their mana.

Thus, most mages wouldn’t be too fussy about the condition of their resting area. Forests, swamps, deserts… As long as it was safe, they could meditate.

But Lin Yun didn’t start his meditation after entering the room. He fished an item out from his pocket instead. This was the Ten Thousand Spell Wheel he had partly completed in Thousand Sails City.

The Ten Thousand Spell Wheel was very important to Lin Yun.

The Spell Wheel might be only half completed at the moment and couldn’t compare to a Superior Magic Tool, but this was only for now. Although the Ten Thousand Spell Wheel would even reach True Spirit Rank, as a bridge to the ten Magic Arrays, the Ten Thousand Spell Wheel’s complete form would appear when fused together with the Magic Arrays. It would be able to use the power of the ten Magic Arrays anywhere, anytime. When that happened, even if it was ranked as a True Spirit Magic Tool, its power wouldn’t be much inferior to the complete Book of Death.

Naturally, the Ten Thousand Spell Wheel in Lin Yun’s hands was far from being complete…

After closing the door, Lin Yun rested for a bit before starting to pour mana into the Spell Wheel, but he was doing it differently this time. Usually, Lin Yun poured mana into a Magic Tool in order to activate it and thus, it flowed in suddenly and in large amounts.

But now, he wanted to carve magic runes and engrave as many as 200,000 of them in the Spell Wheel.

It was called the Ten Thousand Spell Wheel because Latour Gold Essence had so much storage and could hold an unlimited number of runes; this was very similar to the Magic Array.

Lin Yun even thought of something. Once the Spell Wheel reached True Spirit Magic Tool rank, wouldn’t Enderfa become its Magic Tool Incarnation? At that time, he would have to discuss with Enderfa and see if he could use that property to clone a Magic Array over. With that, the Ten Thousand Spell Wheel wouldn’t just be a bridge to the Magic Array, but rather, another shape of the Magic Array.

Of course, that would be in the future.

The Ten Thousand Spell Wheel was only a partially finished product at the moment, so all that would be a long way off.

All Lin Yun could do for now was to carve the runes.

This was the first step into giving spirituality to a Magic Tool.

Only after completing this step could a Magic Tool have gain a Magic Tool’s Spirit. Only then would the Magic Tool advance to Spiritual Rank.

This was very laborious work, and no mistake could be made or it would lower the might of the Magic Tool and even damage it. Thus, Lin Yun wanted to keep his mana output as low as possible, so he made the mana flow like water and gently pour into the Spell Wheel. One rune after the other appeared on the Spell Wheel. These runes were carved with mana and would fuse with the Spell Wheel to become its true foundation.

One hour, two hours, three hours…

As the hours passed, Lin Yun remained motionless. Even the mana injected in the Spell Wheel didn’t fluctuate once. He was precise like a machine.

He continued up until midnight when he felt the mana injected in the Ten Thousand Spell Wheel meeting some sort of obstruction.

‘Good enough…’ Lin Yun stopped pouring mana in when he felt that obstruction.

Because he knew that after many hours of continuous mana injection, the mana had gradually become less pure. He had to undergo meditation before he could resume his work.

This was the most troublesome part of the Spell Wheel.

Only the purest mana could carve runes in it. It was also for this reason that Lin Yun had only completed a bit over half of the Spell Wheel since returning to Thousand Sails City.

But fortunately, it wouldn’t be too hard to complete it.

Lin Yun took the semi-finished Ten Thousand Spell Wheel and carefully activated it with mana before watching the dazzling runes appear on it. He inwardly calculated that it would take ten days at most before he finished carving the runes. Then, he would have to find a powerful magic gem.

Originally, Lin Yun wanted to use the Spiritual Magic Staff’s Elemental Amber.

But he gave up on it after checking it.

First, the Elemental Amber was already fused with the Spiritual Magic Staff and had been polluted by the Magic Staff’s aura after thousands of years. There might be some unexpected problems if it was used for the Spell Wheel.

Second, the Elemental Amber’s property was mana storage. This in itself decided that if he used the Elemental Amber as a core to make the Ten Thousand Spell Wheel, it would be used more for stocking mana and spells. It wouldn’t be much help in empowering or combining spells, which he considered more important.

‘It seems like I should visit Okland’s alchemy market…’ Lin Yun remembered that when they first arrived at Okland, William told him about the Black Horn Auction happening every three months. From what he heard, the next auction should be within a week.

He felt that he should take a look at it.

He could conduct a preliminary investigation of the condition of Okland’s alchemy market on the way, and when the Gilded Rose expanded to Okland in the future, he would take Faleau and investigate the details.

After making up his mind, Lin Yun put the Spell Wheel back in his pocket.

…

Three hours of meditation later, the sun started setting.

Lin Yun came out from his room and intended to call William and Xiuban to eat breakfast outside when he suddenly smelled a delicious aroma.

“This…” Lin Yun took a deep breath and felt that the smell came from downstairs. When he got down, he saw the young girl precariously carrying trays to the dining table. There was a lot of food on the table, and with one look, it could be seen that she couldn’t have prepared it alone.

“Ranya, this is our breakfast?” William happily asked as he casually grabbed a piece of toasted bread.

“Yes,” the young girl said in a quiet voice while nodding. She seemed to be a bit afraid of William, and she turned and ran back to hide in the kitchen.

“Then I won’t hold back…” William didn’t mind her reaction. He had been busy the whole day yesterday. Fighting twice against Ross made him so famished that he just found a chair and started wolfing down his breakfast.

“Take your time to eat.” Lin Yun shook his head before tearing a piece of bread and buttering it. He ate it as he looked around the kitchen.

“What’s wrong?” It was the second time William asked Lin Yun.

William was too familiar with his younger cousin. He looked approachable, with his ever-present smile, but those who knew him knew that he was extremely cold-blooded. He wouldn’t care about anything unrelated to his interests.

Sometimes, William felt that even if the entire world perished, as long as it had nothing to do with him, his cousin would just watch with a smile.

In fact, William clearly noticed that his younger cousin didn’t pay attention to anyone after entering the Merlin Family Manor. He didn’t even put the Patriarch Ofran in his eyes, let alone Ross, or even Stan Watson, who died in his hands.

Yet…

His cousin seemed to be paying particular attention to Ranya.

“It’s nothing…” Lin Yun shook his head but didn’t tell William that this little girl named Ranya was far from being a simple outsider.

“This kid is quite pitiful…” William glanced at the kitchen and couldn’t help sighing. “She was abandoned by her parents before luckily meeting my older sister. My older sister was very fond of her so she brought her back to the Merlin Family, treating her as her younger sister. Those were good times… But later, my sister had that accident in the Raging Flame Plane and Ranya had no one to take care of her…

“I originally planned on sending Ranya to Okland Magic School to let her study magic and see if she could become a Mage, but I hadn’t expected that she wouldn’t have a single bit of magical talent. She couldn’t complete the most basic meditation. There was nothing I could do, so I could only let her remain here. Even just this put a lot of pressure on me. You should know that those old geezers are inhuman. In their eyes, it would be better to raise a hunting dog than a girl with no magical talent.

“Haha, they’ll regret it later.”