Chapter 403 Collection

Time slipped away silently during the research.

With less than a day until the meeting time, Jemin looked up from his workbench.

The three staffs floating in front of him were slowly rotating, their bodies shimmering with a dark golden metallic luster. Inside the rhomboid crystal cores embedded at their tips, one could vaguely see points of light compressed to the extreme—the sealed state of the Divine Light of Extinction of Fire.

"That's about it."

Jemin reached out and grasped one of them; it felt slightly warm to the touch.

The energy circuit inside the staff is stable and surging, ready to unleash that destructive beam of light at any moment.

The production process went more smoothly than he had expected.

As a logistics wizard with an alchemy background who also created the rune artifact system, he did not encounter any fundamental obstacles in encapsulating a mature spell model into the traditional artifact framework.

He was quite satisfied with the final product.

Each staff can store and release a full burst of the power of the Extinction Light, and thanks to the level five large elemental pool within its body, the recharge interval is only three minutes.

Although the number of releases per round is limited, it is sufficient as an "emergency trump card" or "tactical surprise attack".

After all, he himself can cast this spell, and the staff is more for those moments when there is "no time to charge up".

"Unfortunately... there still wasn't enough time."

Jemin put away his staff with some regret.

If another defensive spell could be created, such as the "Qian Yuan Protective Divine Aura" or "Xuan Ming True Water Barrier" recorded in the "Great Dao Book Pavilion," then both offense and defense would possess a cross-system trump card.

But after all, this was the first time he had transformed a spell model, and it was a high-end spell of the Nascent Soul Realm right from the start. A hundred years was only enough for him to fully understand the Divine Light of Extinction of Fire.

The models for defensive spells are even more complex, so we'll have to leave that for the future.

He turned and walked out of the laboratory.

For this expedition, he decided to streamline the number of troops he brought.

The reason is simple: the information is unclear, so caution is the best policy.

The time reversal mechanism of the Reincarnation Plane applies to "everything that exists within the plane".

Will his inner world—this small world that is dependent on him but is also a self-contained space—be affected?

If they are not affected, what will be the state of the items that were taken out of the cave before the flow reverses?

Is it acceptable to retain the fact that it was "taken out," or to forcibly "stuffed back" into the cave?

No one could give him an answer.

“We can’t take the risk,” Jemin decided.

Moreover, battlefield intelligence suggests that the individual combat strength of the Scythe-Skull Clan is not outstanding.

The wizard army has an absolute advantage on the front lines. The real problem is that "the game will be reset after the battle", not that "we can't win".

Therefore, in the end, Jemin only brought the Black Giant leader "Molten Mountain" and five thousand level-five elite Black Giants.

These are elites that have evolved through hundreds of years of continuously absorbing energy and undergoing multiple rounds of natural selection.

Their bodies have a denser liquid metal layer, allowing them to manipulate time at the microsecond level, and their physical resistance is strong enough to withstand direct bombardment from conventional level five sorcery.

As for those "Black Giant Priests" who have a one in ten million chance of being born and are extremely intelligent, Jemin didn't bring any of them.

After all, it is a research unit. Although it has strong combat capabilities, sending a researcher to the battlefield is a waste.

After confirming that all preparations were in order, Jemin stepped into the teleportation array.

The coordinates had already been entered into the Magic Network terminal—it was a rendezvous point provided by the military, located in a modified transit plane.

The dizziness from the teleportation only lasted for a moment.

When his vision cleared again, Jemin found himself standing on a dark gray wasteland.

The sky was a somber, leaden gray, devoid of clouds, sun, moon, or stars, only illuminated by a uniformly diffused, cold light source—clearly artificial lighting.

Beneath my feet was a hard alloy floor with regular heat dissipation patterns etched on its surface.

The air was dry, carrying a faint smell of ozone and the scent of cooled metal.

“Ship plane.” Jemin recognized the environment at a glance.

What appears to be a wasteland is actually the internal deck of a dimensional warship.

The standard practice of wizarding forces within the Star Ring Federation is to transform an entire small plane into a mobile war fortress, with its internal space expanded through multiple folds to accommodate a large number of troops.

Disguising itself as natural terrain serves not only as a means of concealment but can also be deployed as a combat platform when necessary.

However, judging from the state of this ship plane, the combat power of that reincarnation plane is indeed not outstanding, just like in the intelligence. The entire shipping plane only serves as a transport ship.

Teleportation lights kept flashing around.

One wizard after another emerged, most of them wearing standard or semi-standard battle robes, with badges of different schools or factions on their chests.

After a quick scan, Jemin judged from their auras that the wizards in this group were generally between level one and level two, with level three being quite rare.

Occasionally, a few level three wizards would appear, and the level one and two wizards around them would consciously give way and treat them with respect.

When Jemin, who clearly exuded the aura of a fourth-level wizard, fully appeared, the area within a hundred-meter radius fell silent for a moment.

A dozen or so young wizards nearby instinctively took a half step back and bowed their heads in greeting.

Several sharp-eyed individuals seemed to recognize the Alchemy Department badge of Norren Academy on his body and the understated yet uniquely made black robe, their eyes flashing with surprise and curiosity.

Ignoring the stares, Jemin simply stood still, observing the entire assembly area.

"It seems the Federation judges this plane to be not very dangerous," he thought to himself. "Most of those they sent are newcomers, or young wizards who have recently been promoted and need to accumulate military merits."

That makes sense.

The strangeness of the Reincarnation Dimension lies in its "mechanics," not its "direct combat power."

As long as the conditions for time reversal are not met, the wizard army can be swept away almost without taking any damage.

For newcomers, this is an excellent training ground for real combat—there are plenty of low-level enemies to practice against, and high-level wizards are there to provide backup.

"As for why I received the invitation..." Jemin stroked his chin.

He didn't consider himself a novice on the battlefield, but he had indeed participated in few interdimensional wars as an "elite combat unit".

All things considered, the only time they truly participated as "elite combat units" was in the war against the just plane.

And it was in that war that he surrendered his first "death".

"Perhaps the military values ​​my experience in unconventional warfare," Jemin thought.

After all, there are very few wizards in the entire Star Ring Federation who can survive the distorted laws and bring back complete data.

Time passed while we waited.

More and more wizards gathered on the wasteland, eventually stabilizing at around 30,000.

The crowd was somewhat noisy.

Having just experienced one or two interdimensional wars, or even participating in an interdimensional war for the first time, the newcomers whispered about battlefield rumors and speculated about the content of this mission.

The veterans mostly remained silent, either checking their equipment or resting with their eyes closed.

Jemin noticed that among this group of wizards, including himself, no more than ten had actually reached level four.

"It was indeed a 'low-risk' configuration." He confirmed his judgment.

Just then, the ground in the center of the wasteland suddenly cracked open.

A circular platform with a diameter of over 100 meters slowly rose up, and three wizards stood on the platform.

In the center was an elderly man dressed in a dark blue star-patterned robe, with eight silver star badges encircling his chest—the mark of an eighth-level archmage.

On either side stood a level seven wizard, one male and one female, their auras as solid as mountains.

All the noise disappeared instantly.

The eyes of three thousand wizards were simultaneously focused on the platform.

(End of this chapter)