Chapter 185: Trade (2)
Hearing about his mentor's dark history made Lynn want to laugh.
It perfectly matched his mentor's outwardly stoic but inwardly passionate personality.
"Here, here, and here. These three areas are vacant," the wizard receiving him explained. "Normally, wizard towers need to be spaced at least a hundred li apart."
"There are exceptions, of course. If you want to be closer to a certain wizard, you just need to get their permission."
"I'll take this spot." Lynn selected an area closest to Lady Maybetessa's wizard tower. The distance between them was visibly less than a hundred li.
Just as the wizard had said, the areas occupied by wizard towers in this base were only temporary.
Mentor Harlin's wizard tower had already relocated, after all.
Moreover, when wizards left the base, they typically carried their wizard towers with them.
"Just confirming it will do."
The wizard receiving Lynn walked over to a nearby clearing, pulled out a communication conch, and had a brief exchange with Maybetessa to finalize it.
With her permission secured, the wizard quickly processed Lynn's confirmation paperwork.
An empty plot of land less than thirty li from Lady Maybetessa became the territory for Lynn's wizard tower.
"The documents have been uploaded to the academy's internal network. This area belongs to you now, and your information is recorded on your badge," the wizard kindly reminded him.
"Alright, my task is done. You can head straight over."
"But remember, it's best if your wizard tower doesn't disturb the neighboring wizards. If the academy receives too many complaints, there's a chance they'll rule that your tower has to relocate."
The wizard finished his explanation.
After thanking the wizard, Lynn took the internal transport array to the landing point. His guide then hurried away. Nearby, Wizard Xiaoye had already been waiting for quite some time.
He waved warmly upon seeing Lynn.
"I knew I wouldn't be waiting long," Wizard Xiaoye said with a smile. He didn't seem surprised at all, clearly expecting Lynn's breakthrough to official wizard.
"Let's go. Come with me to see Lady Maybetessa first."
Xiaoye led Lynn swiftly toward Lady Maybetessa's wizard tower.
For wizards, cooperation was a very delicate relationship.
Yet for the vast majority of them, it was also crucial.
While a wizard could fight alone, allying with one another undoubtedly produced a result far greater than the sum of its parts.
Not every wizard was a perfect generalist. Some wizard towers might specialize in a specific field, like Alchemy, while others excelled in Potioneering. The gap between two different disciplines was vast. After all, a wizard's energy—or perhaps their talent—was finite, and dedicating oneself to a single subject already demanded an immense amount of effort.
Of course, a wizard skilled in Potioneering wasn't entirely ignorant of Alchemy. Different wizards collaborated and traded with one another, making this cooperative dynamic essential to their kind.
As a result, wizards who excelled in different fields often teamed up to conquer planes together. Before a wizard grew powerful enough to single-handedly break through a plane, multi-wizard alliances offered a fast, efficient method that furthered their own growth.
Lynn met Lady Maybetessa. Compared to years past, time didn't seem to have left a single mark on her.
She had set aside her ongoing experiment to make time to receive him.
After a few pleasantries, she offered Lynn some words of encouragement.
"Little guy, you've grown faster than I anticipated. Reaching the level of an official wizard took less time than I expected, but that's for the best," she said. "Xiaoye, introduce him to the plane we're targeting. I still have an unfinished experiment to attend to."
With those instructions, Maybetessa hurried off.
"Have you heard of the Feilan Continent?" Xiaoye asked secretively.
Lynn glanced at him. He had just returned from the Feilan Continent before heading back to the Continent of Vanquished Gods.
Was the Feilan Continent the plane Lady Maybetessa intended to conquer?
But wasn't that the very place the academy was currently invading?
Which faction did she actually belong to, then?
Lynn voiced his doubts aloud.
Xiaoye chuckled.
"Lady Maybetessa doesn't belong to any faction. Her teacher is the dean of our academy."
Lynn was somewhat surprised.
He understood now. Lady Maybetessa was part of the legendary Royal Faction.
However, he had heard the dean was currently in a deep slumber.
Xiaoye gave a brief explanation. "The area we are targeting is different from the academy's. We're focused on the western region of the Feilan Continent, whereas the academy is conquering the central and eastern zones."
"Our target is called the Forest of the Elves. Deep inside it, right by the Elven Mother Tree, there is a ladder leading to the Celestial Realm."
"Our goal is to make those elves summon their racial deities to descend."
Lynn remained expressionless. "You told me there would be no danger."
Forcing deities to descend?
A wizard who had never witnessed a deity's power and had only read about it in texts might underestimate their divine might.
But having personally seen Maesys in action, Lynn knew with absolute certainty that a deity's strength existed on an entirely different dimensional level.
The disparity was even more exaggerated than the gap between a human and an ant.
This wasn't just plucking a tiger's whiskers; this was riding on a tigress's back and slapping her rump!
Xiaoye shook his head. "Of course we aren't asking you to personally force the deities down. The Feilan Plane is too volatile and sensitive right now; those gods won't make a move easily."
"Currently, the Forest of the Elves is plagued by internal strife and external threats. In the north, the Orc Empire is constantly encroaching on elven lands. Meanwhile, the elves themselves are split into three factions: the Sun Elves, the Forest Elves, and the Moon Elves."
Xiaoye then shared a hidden piece of intel with him.
Wizards had also been secretly stoking the fires of the war between the orcs and the elves behind the scenes.
"The orcs and elves have a deep blood feud. A thousand years ago on the Feilan Continent, the Elven Race rose to power and drove the orcs into the bitter, frozen lands of the north.
"But no race remains powerful forever. The elves eventually weakened, and the orcs rose again in the north.
"They launched a war of vengeance against the Elven Race. During the conflict, a princess of the Moon Elf royal bloodline was captured by a werewolf prince of the orcs, taken back to his home, and imprisoned for seven months.
"Later, the Moon Elf Queen of that generation led the elven moon riders to rescue her. By the time the princess was brought back to the Forest of the Elves, she was already seven months pregnant. Refusing to abort, she gave birth to the child, who was promptly thrown out by the Elven Race as a stain of disgrace. This incident only intensified the conflict between the two races. Eventually, on the battlefield, the ruling Beast King of the Orc Empire was pinned to death by an arrow fueled by the sacrificed life of the Moon Elf King.
"From then on, a bitter blood feud lay between the two races. The individual prowess of the elves is superior, but orcs breed rapidly. As you know, we wizards actually prefer highly reproductive followers like the orcs; they're much more convenient for research.
"Forty years after that incident, the supreme artifact of the Elven Race, the Bow of the Elves, mysteriously vanished.
"The Bow of the Elves is a divine artifact, and a highly unique one at that. Only someone possessing the Moon Elf royal bloodline can draw its string.
"Witnesses saw the bow being stolen by a silver-haired, half-wolf, half-elf man. Only one person matched that description: the forbidden bloodline born to the Moon Elf princess back then, the half-werewolf, half-elf who had grown up in the Forest of the Elves."
"Wait!!!"
Lynn couldn't help but interrupt Xiaoye.
He couldn't help but press his fingers against his brow.
"What's wrong?"
Xiaoye looked a little bewildered by Lynn's reaction.
"I..." Lynn had a massive urge to roast the sheer absurdity of the story, but he didn't even know where to begin.
"Don't tell me that after stealing the Bow of the Elves, that half-wolf, half-elf guy ran back to the Orc Empire."
"Right, how did you guess? He even became an epic hero recorded in the annals of the Orc Empire."
"..."
"But later on, a wise shaman appeared among the orcs. He took the initiative to mediate and halt this war that had raged for nearly a century."
"In truth, there was divine intervention behind all of this. That so-called elven shaman was nothing more than an avatar sent down by the Orc Race's Goddess of Wisdom."
"Because this blood feud between the two races didn't actually bring much benefit to some of their deities, except for those with war-related portfolios. For gods, they need stable believers. They need the sense of urgency that war creates, but they also need to keep that war within a certain limit."
"However, the deities on the Feilan Continent no longer have the energy to manage that. The war between the Orc Empire and the Elven Race has broken out once again."
"So what do you need me to do?"
"You? Your role is massive." A mysterious smile spread across Xiaoye's face.
"We've prepared an identity for you. You will be a descendant of Mongulas, the half-elf, half-werewolf epic hero who stole the Bow of the Elves all those years ago."
"..."
Lynn remained silent for a long time before speaking, emphasizing every word. "I am human."
"I know you're human, but that doesn't matter," Xiaoye said with a grand wave of his hand. "You can just stop being one."
"You need to use this new identity to infiltrate the Orc Empire, enter their core ranks, and retrieve the Bow of the Elves! After all, the Bow of the Elves can only be wielded by someone with the Moon Elf royal bloodline. In anyone else's hands, it's just useless scrap metal. And within the Orc Empire, only the bloodline of Mongulas can draw that bow."
"Bring the Bow of the Elves back, and your mission will be complete."
With that, the Storage Ring on Xiaoye's hand flashed. The next moment, a pristine White Skin Mask appeared in his grasp. The ring flashed a second time, and a bottle of silver Bloodline Potion materialized beside it.
"This mask is the painstaking masterpiece of a Great Wizard."
Lynn looked down at the mask. It felt cold to the touch, yet incredibly soft and light, like a cicada's wing.
"What does it do?"
"The most crucial function of this mask is disguise. It can completely mask all of your auras and alter your height and body shape, making it impossible for even targeted detection magic to discern your identity."
"Unless a true deity descends in person, not even a divine avatar or a descending sliver of divine consciousness could see through your disguise."
"At the same time, we've prepared a second item for you." Xiaoye pointed at the bottled liquid. "This contains the bloodline essence from the descendants of that epic hero. It has even been heavily purified."
"Don't worry, we aren't asking you to inject this bloodline into yourself. There's a spell called Bloodline Concealment. By using a specific entity's bloodline as a medium, the spell will completely cloak all of your original auras and bloodline. Any detection magic or investigative methods will only register this new bloodline, and you will also temporarily possess the talents and abilities intrinsic to it.
"However, this spell has its drawbacks. It has a time limit, and every casting consumes a portion of bloodline essence. It's a bit wasteful if it's an exceptionally rare bloodline essence, given that it is normally used to permanently transplant a bloodline."
"How long does this potion last?"
"One year."
"This potion will last a maximum of one year. If you can't finish the task by then, your mission fails. After all, we only have this single portion of bloodline essence. The descendants of Mongulas are already completely extinct."
"What a hassle." Lynn rubbed his face.
To him, researching how to turn a sow into a boar would be far easier than this.
"I believe in you. This shouldn't be too difficult for you," Xiaoye said, patting Lynn on the shoulder encouragingly.
"Why don't you go?"
"Me? Do I look suitable for it?" Xiaoye grinned. He pointed at the raven beak on his face and the wings on his back with a helpless expression, indicating that he wasn't exactly a good fit either.
"Fine."
This was a trade he had agreed to back then, after all. Besides, it would take at most a year.
"Oh, right. According to our intelligence, only a few core members of the orc royal family know where the Bow of the Elves is kept. Do not try to use charm spells or the like on them. The core members of the orc royal clan are all protected by the divine favor of the orc deities. Ordinary spells won't work on them, and powerful spells will expose your identity. Plus, that area is the absolute heart of the Orc Empire."
Xiaoye offered this friendly reminder. If not for this specific reason, they wouldn't have resorted to this method to make Lynn steal the Bow of the Elves.
Although there were other ways to accomplish the goal, the price would be far steeper.
Compared to the alternatives, spending a year of time, a magical mask, and a bottle of bloodline essence was a much lower price to pay.