End of the Magic Era

Lin Yun lost it not because of the power of the Sand Beast.

But rather, because the Sand Beast didn’t belong to this era.

A chill instantly spread through his whole body, cold sweat soaking his robe and dripping down his forehead.

‘Ho-how… How could it be? Sand Beasts shouldn’t exist in this era!’

After all, Sand Beasts appeared one after the other in Noscent at the end of the Magic Era. Once the mana was getting exhausted, Noscent was slowly moving towards its end. Countless powerful godlike mages fell one after the other, countless magic beasts went extinct. In all of Noscent, most areas had turned into deserts, and at that time, Sand Beasts were one of a small number of magic beasts. They lived under the desert and especially attacked humans…

Lin Yun had learnt the power of Sand Beasts back then. Sometimes, he would spend several days in the scalding desert to extract a bit more mana from the atmosphere, meditating without stopping. Just to disassemble puppet parts, he would spend ten days to half a month walking in the desert, and Sand Beasts were undoubtedly the greatest danger the desert had to offer.

Even someone as cautious as him had narrowly dodged the maws of Sand Beasts several times. Now, seeing the Sand Beast once again, those memories all floated back to his mind. He couldn’t get rid of them, because the Sand Beasts had reaped the lives of countless mages at the end of the Magic Era. To someone of that era, Sand Beasts represented death.

A gust of wind whistled past, and suddenly, that Sand Beast rushed towards Lin Yun.

Sand Beasts were able to survive in Noscent at that time because they were relying on their fierce bodies. They couldn’t use magic and didn’t need to absorb mana. They could remain alive as long as they were nourished with flesh. When the Nether Storm came, they still remained, staying hidden underground.

Lin Yun now understood why he had been unable to detect the Sand Beast. Because Sand Beasts spent their entire lifetimes hidden in the desert, their aura was the same as the desert’s. And Sand Beasts relied on their fierce bodies, not having a wisp of mana, so no wonder the Magic Array didn’t sense any…

The Sand Beast pounced at Lin Yun like a gust of wind.

At this time, Lin Yun maintained his composure. He raised his hand and put a Mana Shield in front of him. At the same time, he Instant Cast three Frost Spikes, which flew towards the Sand Beast with a freezing aura. But only three “Cling” sounds echoed as the three Frost Spikes didn’t even put a scratch on the Sand Beast.

In fact, Lin Yun had very little combat experience against Sand Beasts in direct confrontations, because during that era, Noscent’s mana was exhausted and mages had very little mana. They would use it to survive, and no one was willing to use mana unless it was at a critical juncture.

But Lin Yun clearly understood the characteristics of Sand Beasts. Powerful bodies, no understanding of magic; it was this simple.

The three Frost Spikes were only probing attacks. That Sand Beast was roughly level 35, but in the desert, it was like a fish in water, the power it had there was closer to level 36 and was similar to the Lesser Flame Overlord they had met before.

It might have been difficult for the previous Lin Yun to handle a Sand Beast of that level.

“Rumble!”

A Flame Burst was cast. Lin Yun’s strength could only be rated as frightening when he went all out. A few Flame Bursts were enough to drown the Sand Beast in a sea of fire.

The might of Flame Burst never disappointed Lin Yun.

Even the Sand Beast, with its powerful body, could only let out two roars as blood dripped out of a sinister wound and fell on the desert before instantly evaporating.

By relying on Levitation, Lin Yun was able to hover in midair. Seemingly not wanting to lose the initiative, Lin Yun started recklessly expending his mana as one Flame Burst after the other was cast at the Sand Beast. A short twenty seconds later, close to a hundred Flame Bursts had fallen down on the Sand Beast like rain.

This was his first time going all-out ever since his strength greatly increased. This casting speed was something out of his range before. A rain of hundred Flame Bursts in twenty seconds was really terrifying.

Each Flame Burst created a fierce explosion when it landed, lacerating the flesh of that Sand Beast. It kept roaring, but it couldn’t do anything. It took so much damage that it even lost the ability to dash back into the sand to flee.

The vitality of Sand Beasts was extremely robust, at the top among magic beasts. Even when suffering from very serious injuries, they still wouldn’t die and could recover after some rest. Naturally, few Sand Beasts had been killed by humans during the end of the magic era.

Following the final Flame Burst, that tenacious Sand Beast let out an unwilling roar. Those two dark red eyes thoroughly dimming. With a rumble, the Sand Beast heavily fell on the ground, spreading a cloud of sand around.

After the Sand Beast’s death, Lin Yun didn’t even look at it. He stood there pondering over his location. ‘Sand Beasts in a desert, dusky sky, blood-red sun, as well as that faint Void Storm aura…

In fact, ever since he arrived at this desert, Lin Yun felt that this place was very similar to his memories of the end of the Magic Era. It was almost a perfect copy, and he hadn’t been able to confirm this feeling before the Sand Beast appeared.

Now, seemed that everything here was an illusion based on his memory. It was a simulation based on his own memories of the end of the Magic Era.

The only explanation for this was that this was an illusion and everything was fake.

The fact that Leon was in the Pale Plane confirmed his conjecture. Leon was in the deepest area of the Plane Plane.

Lin Yun chanted an incantation, casting True Sight, the 3rd Tier spell known for seeing through all lies and illusions. Lin Yun’s eyes suddenly flashed with radiance, but his surroundings didn’t change. The dusky sky, the crimson sun, the endless desert, and the scalding sand, everything remained the same.

The result of the detection contradicted his conjecture.

Lin Yun was clearly dumbstruck. He suppressed the shock in his heart and came to the conclusion that the person who arranged this was extremely brilliant. He had arranged a place that was different from the real world but couldn’t be seen through with True Sight.

‘Heiss City! Yes, there should still be Heiss City…’

Heiss City was a city built by the mages when they realized that mana was slowly being exhausted during the end of the Magic Era.

‘As long as I can find Heiss City, I can confirm that this is an illusion and not the real world.’

Lin Yun cast a guiding spell to follow the path to Heiss City he remembered and walked on the scalding sand the entire way.

During the ten days of walking, Lin Yun encountered many magic beasts, with no lack of powerful Sand Beasts. After dealing with them, he finally reached Heiss City.

Heiss City was exactly the same as he remembered. Although it looked magnificent, such a great city was desolate… There was no sign of life. Seeing Heiss City once again made Lin Yun reminisce like an old man. After all, he had once lived there for twenty years. He had watched as many mages had nervous breakdowns one by one due to the environment and left Heiss City, never to come back.

Lin Yun sighed, feeling a lot of emotions.

He walked with heavy steps as he entered Heiss City. He was very familiar with everything here and was observing all the buildings.

He walked aimlessly through that deathly silent street, wandering around randomly. Every time he saw something he remembered, his mind would return to that time when the world shook and darkened, when the buildings collapsed, when there were still people struggling to survive.

There was no one in this illusion apart from Lin Yun. Lin Yun was the only one walking in this desolate city.

After walking for a while, Lin Yun suddenly stopped and looked up, only to see the biggest building in Heiss. The crystallization of Noscent’s civilization, the Shelter Tower!

The Shelter Tower was built at the peak of the magic era. The peak forces of Noscent had gathered, and countless alchemists participated, including several Saint Alchemists, and many Artisans and Master Alchemists. They took several hundred years to build this unprecedented structure.

The most shocking part was that the blueprint of Shelter Tower far surpassed the peak of the Magic Era. Even those Saint Alchemists could only exclaim in surprise at how exquisite the blueprint was. It could only be described as a masterpiece, and one of the Sword Saints who participated in the construction left a note in the decaying library.

It said that participating in the construction of the Heiss Tower was the proudest thing he ever did in his entire life.

But there were no relevant records mentioning the person who presided over the construction of the Shelter Tower. It felt as if that person never appeared in Noscent, as if no trace of his existence could be seen.

But there had been such a person… Someone had taken out the blueprint of the Shelter Tower and had overseen the entire construction of the Shelter Tower, but no one mentioned him afterwards.

Lin Yun stared at the huge building in front of him. It was left behind after the peak of the magic era and protected Noscent for a few millennia as Noscent’s mana was getting exhausted and the world was facing its end. It managed to delay it up until the last wisp of mana was exhausted and the entire world sank in the darkness.

The Shelter Tower seemed ordinary, but it was engraved with the most advanced arrays. Even if Lin Yun could break True Spirit arrays, he couldn’t see through these arrays. The magic materials that the Shelter Tower had been constructed from were the most precious materials in Noscent’s history. Even 30,000 years ago, in the era of endless resources, it was very difficult to find those magic materials.

The emergence of the Shelter Tower completely exhausted the magic materials of the peak Magic Era.