End of the Magic Era

“Which two?” Rhett didn’t seem to understand at first, but when he saw the fear in Arthus’ face, his own expression greatly changed. “Let’s go, let’s go… We shall come back when Mafa Merlin is free…”

Rhett and Arthus promptly left.

In fact, Lin Yun truly was dealing with something important. He was focusing his energy on that pulsating heart and wasn’t even aware that Rhett and Arthus had come to see him.

It was the heart of the Hydra they had encountered that day.

Not long ago, a bold idea appeared in his mind… He could implant the Hydra Heart into the Heaven Puppet. Even he was frightened by this idea, it was simply crazy…

Yes, this was indeed crazy…

It might even startle the mages of the peak of the Magic Era. This was something that had never been attempted in history.

But the Hydra Heart was an amazing material.

A legend had spread in Noscent since ancient times: It was said that Hydra Hearts contained boundless mana and could make people extraordinarily powerful, almost immortal.

Naturally, Lin Yun wouldn’t believe such an exaggerated rumor.

He had actually heard of someone that ate a Hydra Heart, and while there were some benefits, they weren’t that extreme.

The Hydra was different from other magic beasts. Their power was focused in their hearts and not in their mana crystals.

Lin Yun wanted to try replacing the mechanical system of the puppet with this heart. He might get huge benefits if he succeeded. The Heaven Puppet might inherit the strength and innate magic power of the Hydra.

That would push the Heaven Puppet to a completely new height!

Although he understood that this method was crazy and had huge risks, after thinking it through, he couldn’t help but want to give it a try.

In the past, he might not have had this kind of thought…

But now that he had bestowed life onto the Doom Staff and reached the Artisan realm in the field of alchemy, he felt that he was qualified to experiment a bit more on the Heaven Puppet.

In fact, shortly after becoming an Artisan, his alchemy skill qualitatively improved, and he discovered that the Heaven Puppet was even more complicated than he had thought. With his insight as an Artisan, he could understand that this wasn’t an ordinary Heaven Puppet.

It should have been above the 5th Rank of the Heaven realm at its peak, the High Heaven realm.

This was incredible…

After discovering this, Lin Yun had many conjectures. That Heaven Puppet seemed to have played a very important role in the puppet civil war, and Lin Yun was even suspecting that the puppet had broken through the limits of alchemy…

This puppet, crafted by the Dark Sage, might have reached the peak of puppeteering. It might be the most formidable one in all of Noscent’s history!

Thus, Lin Yun had to be extremely meticulous when repairing the puppet. In fact, it would be like this even if there were no other factors. After all, this puppet was hiding the clue to a huge secret, only waiting for him to uncover it.

If the puppet hadn’t said those important words, Lin Yun might have not paid attention to the end of the Wailing River, and he wouldn’t have found the clues concerning Ancient God Constance.

After calming down a bit, he realized the difficulty of replacing the mechanical system with the Hydra Heart.

No one had ever tried this in the puppeteering field… It was bound to be very challenging.

Although he was already an Artisan, he only felt qualified to experiment with this and had no certainty that it would be a success.

Perhaps only an existence standing at the peak of alchemy would dare say that they would certainly succeed.

After all, Lin Yun came from 30,000 years in the future, possessed knowledge from that era, and was an Artisan, yet he still couldn’t be certain.

The task seemed quite intimidating.

It was definitely a huge and complicated project that needed extremely refined techniques, and he could barely meet the minimum standard as an Artisan.

Moreover, the amount of data involved was astronomical. Any Artisan would feel numb when faced with the prospect of having to perform such a huge number of calculations.

And because he was treading new ground, everything was blank, filled with unknowns. A moment of carelessness would lead to a failure, which might damage or completely waste this heart that he had obtained with such great difficulty. This would be a huge loss to any mage, which few people could afford.

But, Lin Yun felt that he needed to try. After all, undertaking this kind of challenge would greatly improve his skill. He might come to a new understanding during the experiment, and it would bring countless benefits if he managed to succeed, as the power of the Heaven Puppet would reach completely new heights. His most conservative estimate was that the puppet would reach level 39, and more importantly, it was following both paths, the Martial Path and the Magic Path.

Facing such temptation, Lin Yun could hardly give up the idea.

Not long after, Lin Yun put the Hydra Heart aside and took out a stack of paper from his pocket before starting to write countless formula combinations on it. A large amount of data was densely spread out among the papers. Lin Yun, despite already being an Artisan, couldn’t help but frown.

After all, the data involved in the implantation of the Hydra Heart could only be described as astronomical.

The calculations were still ongoing…

As it was quite dim, Lin Yun relied on the radiance of a Light spell to keep writing. Only the rustling sounds could be heard in the quiet environment.

Unbeknownst to him, more than two hours passed…

During that time, Lin Yun didn’t stop working on his calculations at all. Countless sheets of paper filled magic runes were spread around him, the result of over two hours of work.

“Phew…”

Only when his wrist started getting sore did he put down the quill in his hand and wipe the sweat off his forehead. But at this time, he discovered a black mist beside him. Three strange faces were floating in the air, making Lin Yun frown. He had been focused on his calculations and hadn’t noticed Enderfa.

“Merlin, what are you trying to do?” Enderfa’s three faces looked around at the paper scattered on the ground with expressions of bewilderment.

“What is it?”

Thinking that Lin Yun was playing dumb, Enderfa felt exasperated and said in an annoyed roar, “Don’t think I don’t know!”

“What do you know?” Lin Yun rolled his eyes. He then saw that Enderfa’s expression wasn’t good.

Enderfa remained silent for a few minutes, staring at Lin Yun, before powerlessly saying, “Merlin, this kind of taboo alchemy isn’t to be made fun of. It was already confirmed in the middle of the 3rd Dynasty that touching this taboo would create countless disasters…”

Just as Enderfa said those words, Lin Yun froze before looking up in a daze. “The middle of the 3rd Dynasty… Pikeman…”

‘Right… How could I forget Pikeman…’

Enderfa’s voice echoed once more. “If you know of Pikeman, it means that you are no stranger to that part of history. I think you should clearly know what consequences were brought about by that kind of taboo alchemy…”

“Alright, I understand what you are saying…” Lin Yun looked at Enderfa for a moment before adding, “If there is nothing else, I’ll get back to it now.”

“You… You madman!” Enderfa was shocked. ‘This young mage really wants to continue? This… This is insane!’

“Haha…” Lin Yun chuckled. He shook his head and ignored Enderfa, continuing to examine those scattered pieces of paper instead as his frown gradually relaxed.

To be more precise, the words Enderfa had told him earlier had sobered him up.

He recalled a part of history that had been covered up by the 3rd Dynasty’s Royal Family…

That happened in the middle of the 3rd Dynasty, during its golden age, after they had completely broken away from the Chromatic Dragons and Pure-blood Elves.

Someone had to be mentioned alongside that part of history…

He was called Pikeman and was one of the few Artisans of that era. He had dealt with puppets all his life and his accomplishments in the puppeteering field had surpassed all the other Artisans.

Just like this, Pikeman stood at the peak of his era and his name echoed throughout various corners of Noscent, to be revered by countless mages, almost deified.

In Pikeman’s later years, he received an invitation from the 3rd Dynasty’s Royal Family to become the Court’s Chief Alchemist. Ten years later, after investing great manpower and financial support, he would announce new research results and improvements in the puppeteering field.

But a few years later, something strange occurred.

Pikeman remained secluded for a long while as if he had vanished without a trace, not posting any new research results. This had been a very strange thing at the time.

In the end, Pikeman remained silent for eight years.

Ultimately, he returned to the court and announced the results of his eight years of research, claiming it to be a major breakthrough in the field of puppeteering…

The concept he suggested was to implant the limbs or organs of magic beasts into alchemy puppets so that they would gain the characteristics of those magic beasts, making them even more powerful.