Translator: AnubisTL
After venturing deeper into the mountains, Jieming found a relatively spacious cave.
After a heartfelt conversation with the cave's owner, he secured permission to stay and promptly set up a fire to roast meat.
As he watched the enthusiastic cave owner, Jieming lowered his head and retrieved the rune-imbued magical artifact from his bag. Using alchemy, he meticulously examined it.
"Hmm... as expected, there's significant damage to the rune circuits, though the base remains largely intact. It seems that even with increased rune redundancy, excessive release still puts considerable strain on the core structure," Jieming murmured, shaking his head regretfully.
He had pondered extensively on how to prevent damage from overusing rune-imbued magical artifacts, but no satisfactory solution had emerged.
Such problems were rare within the wizard civilization. Ordinary spell artifacts had limited daily usage, and overheating and damage from overuse typically occurred only in the magic formations of floating cities or large-scale stabilization facilities.
However, these massive structures had ample surface area for rune inscription, requiring little technical finesse. The issue could be easily resolved through excessive redundancy.
A more straightforward approach would be to design magic formations in modular units, allowing for easy replacement of damaged components.
However, this solution proved difficult to apply to rune-imbued magical artifacts.
"Making the artifacts larger? That would defeat the purpose of designing them in the first place..."
As for carving the runes with greater precision...
Achieving finer detail required stronger mental power. But for wizards, greater mental power meant greater overall strength, which in turn demanded more powerful spells.
And more powerful spells required more complex runes, which in turn demanded even greater precision in their carving...
"A complete dead end!"
After agonizing over the problem for a while, Jieming, unable to find a solution, decided to set it aside for the moment. Instead, he turned his attention to the issues he'd observed during the recent battle.
"Although that fire elemental beast was quite strong, it managed to withstand so many of my bombardments. It seems that creature has significant damage reduction against attacks of its own element. Next time, I should use more attacks of different elements... Wait a minute!"
A sudden realization struck Jieming.
Why was he so fixated on elemental attacks?
The greatest advantage of his rune-imbued magical artifact lay in its ability to unleash spells rapidly and continuously without draining too much of the user's mental power.
Since his strategy was based on overwhelming quantity, there was no need to fixate on the marginal damage boost from elemental weaknesses.
"I almost hit a dead end... I could have just focused on pure energy blasts as my primary attack method!"
The wizard civilization lacked a specific attribute like "arcane," but they had plenty of attribute-less, purely energy-based offensive spells.
Jieming noted this down: "Second... For enemies who manipulate elemental power in combat, the rapid spellcasting of the rune-imbued magical artifact creates a vacuum of environmental elements. This isn't just a drawback; it could actually become an advantage."
Take the fire elemental beast, for example. Because Jieming attacked so quickly, most of the surrounding fire element had already been drained by the time the beast prepared to retaliate, significantly weakening its counterattack.
"In a sense, this is a form of artificial magic suppression, though I'm not sure how useful this tactic will be yet."
After resting and recuperating, Jieming continued deeper into this plane, where elemental power was abundant.
Having conducted sufficient combat tests earlier, he now focused on finding samples of higher-grade materials.
Since entering the wasteland composed of crimson ore, he had encountered magical beasts with increasing frequency.
There were Thorn Lizards that could spew poisonous mist, Ice Crystal Wolves that unleashed icy blasts, and Rock Giants hidden among the boulders with formidable physical defenses.
With each encounter, Jieming's collection grew, forcing him to discard some of the common beast materials he had gathered earlier.
He also noticed that as he ventured deeper, the magical beasts, while not necessarily stronger, became increasingly cunning.
No longer reckless like the first ones he encountered, they now assessed their opponents' strength and retreated in advance, even employing tactical ambushes.
None of this posed a significant threat to Jieming, merely adding some time to his material-gathering journey.
However, amidst these skirmishes with magical beasts, Jieming began to notice unusual signs.
At first, they were just subtle details.
He discovered several massive boulders with deliberate scratches on their surfaces, the wear patterns appearing more uniform than those caused by natural erosion.
Amidst a seemingly natural rock forest, strange grooves occasionally appeared on the ground, too regular to be the tracks of magical beasts and more akin to the marks left by some kind of tool.
"Man-made traces?"
Jieming stopped, crouched beside a groove, and reached out to touch it.
The groove's edges had been smoothed by time, but the residual energy within differed subtly from the surrounding elemental power.
Activating his analysis art, he probed the grooves with his mental power.
A flood of complex information surged into his mind—a more organized and restrained energy signature, clearly not belonging to the unrestrained power of magical beasts.
Having confirmed this, Jieming's movements grew more cautious as he began consciously searching for similar traces.
Soon, he made further discoveries.
At the hidden entrance of a cave, he found a neatly stacked pile of animal bones, some even roughly polished.
A faint, burnt-out flame scent drifted from the cave's depths—not the natural afterglow of fire elemental power, but the lingering trace of an artificial fire that had been extinguished.
Judging by the surrounding traces, this cave had been abandoned.
Further ahead, he came across a cleared patch of forest. The fresh, clean cuts on the felled trees indicated they had been chopped down recently with some kind of sharp tool.
He even discovered a cleverly disguised trap—not designed for large beasts, but for smaller creatures, or... humans?
Jieming carefully examined the trap.
Its structure was simple yet effective, consisting of twisted vines and sharp stone spikes. Once triggered, it would emit a piercing shriek.
There are natives here, Jieming concluded with certainty.
He wasn't particularly surprised by this discovery. After all, the environment of this plane was highly conducive to life, so the emergence of intelligent beings, even civilizations, wasn't entirely unexpected.
However...
When the wizards took over this plane, they should have purged the local civilizations... Could these be remnants deliberately left behind?
Compared to the possibility that the natives possessed special powers to conceal themselves from the wizards' detection, this seemed more likely.
(End of the Chapter)
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🔓 𝐰𝐰𝐰.𝐜𝐢𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐭𝐥.𝐜𝐨𝐦 — 13 Series (7 Ongoing) | 14+ New Chapters Daily | 7,200+ FREE