Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations
Following Nausica, Balba also put down his pen. He now felt both surprised and lucky as well as a bit confused.
At the same time, he grew sad for some reason when he saw Angor’s handwriting.
Angor shaped each universal character like a solid square just like his composed temperament, which was unlike how people usually wrote artistic curlicues in this world.
Balba carefully read Angor’s draft and revealed a depressed expression.
“So, it was you…”
…
Angor began working in full swing in the following days.
He managed to finish his Energy Stabilizer on the next morning after the get-together. Before succeeding, he failed three times due to poorly-chosen materials.
The final item came out just like how he designed—small, handy, and easy to carry around. He installed the device inside his lab table while leaving two ducts outside, one for installing magic crystals and the other for output mana.
An Energy Stabilizer had more uses than this, but Angor had no use for the extra functionalities for the moment. So, he simply fixed it inside his table.
He did not rest here. Next, he continued working and finished his new music box.
He already exhausted his mana on the Energy Stabilizer, so he relied on the Energy Stabilizer to provide mana to enchant his music box as a means of testing.
The successfully-made music box did not make him any happier. When Prome mentioned using an Energy Stabilizer to provide stable mana output, he described it as “spending money”.
Now Angor realized what Prome meant first-hand. Each magic crystal contained a decent amount of mana, most of which was unstable, primal mana. After being purified by the Energy Stabilizer, one magic crystal could only give him barely enough mana to cast a level-0 cantrip.
He used 37 crystals to craft the music box which usually did not cost much energy.
Feeling a bit of heartbreak, he took the music box to his bedroom and placed it beside Toby’s tiny bed.
He had not been sleeping for the past two days. When he did and woke up again, he heard City of Sky being played in the main hall.
Angor walked out and saw Toby perched on a guest table peacefully. The music box was playing its music nearby without unleashing the illusion.
The darkness outside suggested that he slept through the daytime. He found some ration and joined Toby.
“Hoot…” Toby moved a wing around slowly. The bird’s usual vigor was nowhere to be seen.
“No worries. The eyeless man was bought by ‘Flaming Lotus’ Lydia. We should grow strong, and I’ll help you get him back… Negotiation, violence, one way or another.”
Angor explained what happened that day while omitting everything about the Nightmare Domain. He only told Toby that Sunders saved them.
“We’re officially enemies of Twilight now. She did agree to make it even if we pay her a hundred thousand, but I don’t believe that woman will let us go so easily. Guess we won’t be going to Twilight Well again,” said Angor. He tried giving Toby a sad look as he added, “I need to collect the money during this half month, so you should sit tight at home. Don’t go cause trouble again, alright?”
Toby moved onto Angor’s shoulder and rubbed against his master’s cheek.
“Tweet!” — **Glad you forgave me.
Next, Angor glanced at the new music box. “And try not to go meet your little partner again all by yourself. Once I’m done paying my debt, we’ll go together and confront him.”
Toby looked pretty sad about this, but he still nodded and agreed. The bird already learned that he was no longer the treasured pet of Greya. Here, neither he nor Angor had what it took to mess around freely.
As Angor said, they had to grow stronger, both body and mind.
Angor had been taking care of Toby, and he just gave the bird a new music box. Toby could understand that despite their weakness, his young master was doing his best to provide him with comfort.
Besides, Angor never blamed him for real.
Toby kissed Angor’s cheek again.
“Tweet.” —You’re the best.
Angor did not fully realize Toby’s change in mind, but he was glad to see the bird so obedient.
“It was selfish of me to keep Lady Greya’s info from you. I’ll not do that again, but promise that you won’t lose control again too.”
Toby became a little stiff when he heard the name of Greya. Then, he nodded.
Angor took Toby in his hand with a smile. “Mister Sunders told me something, that Lady Greya might still be alive…”
He explained how Felicia went to Brilliance Plane and invited a Grand Prophet.
Precisely speaking, Sunders did not tell him about this matter. The gentleman spoke to Flora about it when they thought Angor blacked out, which allowed Angor to seize the valuable information.
And just as he expected, Toby visibly perked up at the news. Soon, the bird returned to being as spirited as always.
With Toby comforted, Angor went back to his alchemy career.
The Energy Stabilizer granted him hope of finishing “Prelude to Elimination”. He needed this device both to fulfill his promise and to make money, so a weapon enchanted with this particular magic array was second on his work list.
Before doing so, he went to Dave first.
Following Dave, Angor came to a cave outside the apprentice town. It was Prome’s personal workshop.
He quickly saw Prome in the brightly-lit cave. The middle-aged alchemist was writing something on his desk while looking through his gold-rimmed glasses.
Angor noticed a pile of discarded alchemy weapons at the corner of a wall. He raised an eyebrow when he saw a “hand crossbow” among them. A simple glance told him that the hand crossbow shared almost the same appearance as his Trigger Crossbow.
He returned his attention to Prome without minding it much. Prome studied synthesis which was quite different from enchantment. His Trigger Crossbow was a product of machine alchemy, which contained a carefully-designed mechanism inside. Meanwhile, Prome’s “hand crossbow” was a… crossbow. There were no special elements on it. Prome’s creation was weaker than his Trigger Crossbow in many aspects.
Prome removed his glasses and smiled at Angor. “What brought you to my place?”
“I have something to discuss with you, Master Prome. It’s about the design of the long-range weapon.”
Prome’s eyes glimmered. “Are you saying that you can draw Prelude to Elimination now?”
Prome carried a chair to Angor using Hand of Spell and signaled Angor to sit down.
Angor complied and continued, “I’m not sure yet. I borrowed an Energy Stabilizer from my professor and am going to try it out. There should be no problem if things go as planned.”
Prome could not hide his great joy at the news. Angor had not given him a sure answer yet, but he sensed the boy’s confidence.
A successful alchemy weapon enchanted with “Prelude to Elimination” meant earning him a great fortune!
Compared to rune enchantment which only granted the items passive effects such as Sharpen, Solidness, Flame, and Frost, a magic array allowed the existence of superior effects as powerful as permanent, built-in spells. Also, as long as there was enough mana support, the effect could be triggered for unlimited times.
Any alchemy item with a magic array on it was always at least a mid-tiered item or beyond!
If Angor really created the weapon, the boy could be well considered an intermediate apprentice alchemist, and one level higher, if Angor could produce such weapons continuously.
But Angor was only 15 years old! Prome was glad that Angor studied enchantment instead of synthesis, or the man would feel that his position was being threatened.
“Ahem… Shall we begin?” Prome suppressed his jealousy and spoke to Angor.
Determining the exterior design of the weapon had nothing to do with enchantment or synthesis. They simply needed to consider the proper materials and ergonomic factors.
Usually, it would take Prome a long time to create a design. Years, even. This time, however, he was shocked by Angor’s terrifying creativity once again.
Since Angor took over the drafting paper, he never stopped his movement. A number of different yet viable styles soon showed up under the tip of his pen, and Prome felt both surprised and enlightened when looking at them.
If Prome would consider their meeting today as a competition of minds…
He lost. Hands-down.
Perfect workmanship, unrivaled wisdom, ingenuity… These words would not usually be used to describe someone’s work, but they now seemed to be good choices to comment on Angor’s designs.
To Angor, some of the designs were directly copied from the weapons from Earth while the others were modified versions he made by combining the ideas from both civilizations.
Of course, Angor kept most of his secret and only presented Prome the overall shapes of the weapons. No alchemist would expose their creations to outsiders openly.
And Prome felt extremely irritated at this. He loved every single one of the designs. Each one gave him room for further imagination. Yet every detail that completed each design was hidden from him, and considering the unspoken rules among alchemists, he could not ask about them. The man’s only choice was to contain his discontent in his mind while gawking at Angor’s scary innovation.
“Your opinions, Master Prome?” Angor put down his pen in the end.
Prome gave the boy a meaningful look.
“None. And… please don’t address me as ‘Master’. I cannot bear that name in front of you.”