Translator: AnubisTL
Jieming eagerly retrieved the prototype of the "scouting eye" from the storage box, along with the rare materials he had prepared earlier to enhance the rune-imbued magical artifact.
Fueled by his newly refined mental power and true essence, Jieming's grasp of the runes' properties and intricate details became even more precise.
He modified the rune structure, adjusted the energy flow, and integrated more refined runes into the design.
After refining and reshaping the artifact, the originally crude, transparent crystal transformed into a radiant gem. The runes within seemed to come alive, emitting a faint, restrained glow.
The overall shape remained largely unchanged—still resembling a crystal eyeball—but now it appeared flawless.
"This should work," Jieming murmured, suspending the new "scouting eye" prototype in mid-air.
Deactivating the laboratory's protective barrier, he activated the talisman seal, establishing a mental connection with the artifact.
He walked to the laboratory door, silently placed the scouting eye at the top of the doorframe, and returned to his seat.
This time, the information he received was no longer a jumble of vague, scattered fluctuations.
The scouting eye functioned as a true eye, projecting a clear, detailed view of the surrounding area—spanning several hundred meters—directly into Jieming's divine sense.
He could clearly "see" the apprentices' figures in the corridor, sense the fluctuations of their life force, and even discern the faint energy radiating from the spell artifacts they carried.
This perception was continuous, like being connected to a surveillance camera. As long as the scouting eye remained intact, it would transmit information ceaselessly, while his own mental power consumption was minimal—merely the negligible energy required to maintain the soul connection.
Of course, the prototype still had its limitations.
Its sensing range remained limited, unable to penetrate thick walls or powerful barriers.
In complex environments, such as the energy-saturated battlefields of the Greyrock Realm, its perception effectiveness might be significantly diminished.
Moreover, it could only passively sense, lacking the ability to actively scan or track targets.
"There's still immense room for improvement," Jieming murmured, gazing at the scouting eye floating in the air, his eyes burning with fervor.
In terms of effectiveness, the current scouting eye didn't even surpass the range he could achieve by actively casting alchemy and analysis arts.
However, now that the initial prototype was complete, all that remained was to refine it along this established path.
Jieming ceased further experimentation, placing the scouting eye back on the laboratory table. His expression alight with excitement, he turned his attention inward, delving deep into the depths of his consciousness.
With a clear direction for his research into rune-imbued magical artifacts and his cultivation having reached the late stage of qi refining, it was time to begin his next, and most crucial, plan: artifact forging!
The moment had come to refine his first magic artifact, one that would truly belong to him.
Late stage of qi refining.
According to the cultivation technique, cultivators at this stage had accumulated sufficient true essence and possessed divine sense capable of handling more complex tasks. They could now begin exploring auxiliary skills requiring higher cultivation levels, the most important of which was artifact forging.
While ordinary cultivators could refine small items through various means, the only result that could truly be called artifact forging was the creation of a magic artifact.
Magic artifacts were a unique concept within the cultivation system.
They were not merely powerful objects; they embodied a cultivator's dao, serving as lifebound artifacts connected to their spirit. These artifacts grew alongside their masters, capable of wielding unimaginable power.
This fundamentally differed from wizard artifacts, spell artifacts, or even the small items refined by other cultivators. Wizard artifacts and spell artifacts relied primarily on external energy and intricate structures. Their power depended on the materials, runes, structure, and the level of energy infused into them, with only an indirect connection to the user.
Magic artifacts require cultivators to infuse their true essence, divine sense, and even a trace of their divine soul's origin into the materials. They must then temper the materials' spiritual essence with their True Flame, carve formation arts imbued with the corresponding dao using their divine sense, and ultimately refine a lifebound artifact that resonates with their own qi, can be controlled at will, and even grows alongside their cultivation progress.
In essence, artifact forging is not merely a craft; it is the process of materializing one's comprehension of the dao and understanding of the rules governing heaven, earth, and all creation into powerful instruments.
This concept of imprinting one's essence into an artifact, granting it spiritual essence and the capacity for growth, is what distinguishes magic artifacts from ordinary tools.
For Jieming, refining magic artifacts served not only to enhance his combat prowess but, more importantly, to address the shortcomings in his current combat system.
With his rune-imbued magical artifacts, he already possessed ample offensive capabilities.
His primary motivation for artifact forging lay in the inherent spiritual essence of magic artifacts.
The reason Jieming bypassed the creation of an intelligent assistant machine and prioritized crafting a scouting eye rune-imbued magical artifact was precisely this idea: he intended to use a nascently spiritual magic artifact as an intelligent terminal to assist him in processing information.
Spirituality wasn't a unique attribute of magic artifacts. After all, high-level spell artifacts and Rune Artificial Intelligence not only possessed spirituality but, under the right conditions, could even develop "intelligence."
However, at this stage, magic artifacts were the only option for imbuing objects with spirituality.
Sinking his consciousness deep into his mind, Jieming began sifting through the various magic artifact refinement methods offered by the Great Dao Library Pavilion.
Considering the differences between the Wizard World and the immortal cultivation world, Jieming's requirements for the magic artifact were exceptionally stringent.
First, the required cultivation level for crafting it couldn't be too high. Then came the limitations on crafting tools—after all, some specialized artifact forging furnaces required at least the golden core realm to create.
This left him with only magic artifacts that could be refined using the most primitive methods.
Given the absence of spiritual energy in the Wizard World, the artifact's dependence on spiritual energy had to be minimized.
This effectively eliminated most offensive-oriented magic artifacts, though Jieming wasn't lacking in offensive capabilities anyway.
Considering material constraints, magic artifacts requiring rare materials or special substances were also immediately dismissed.
Fortunately, the immortal cultivation civilization had evolved the ability to extract concepts, so material limitations weren't too restrictive.
Since the primary purpose of this magic artifact was to serve as an intelligent terminal for processing information, the spirituality it possessed after refinement needed to be sufficiently strong.
On the other hand, this magic artifact should ideally compensate for the weaknesses in his current combat system, and if it could also protect his life, that would be even better.
After filtering through all these requirements, even Jieming felt he might be asking for too much. Yet the Great Dao Library Pavilion still presented him with an overwhelming number of options.
Spending several days sifting through the vast sea of magic artifact blueprints in the depths of his consciousness, Jieming finally found the target he desired.
Magic Artifact: Five Aggregates Rainbow Transformation Mirror!
(End of the Chapter)
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