Chapter 131 - End of the Magic Era

If a Master Alchemist was annoyed enough, he could even sign a contract to sell his services to a major force in order to get his revenge.

Especially now that the Master Alchemist had the power to fight against a High Mage, these forces wouldn’t dare to make a move once they learnt about this…

“Okay, I understand…” William understood after thinking about it for a bit. It turned out that his earlier actions had actually been a good move for the Merlin Family.

Originally, he had been frustrated that he had acted against this cousin before ending up bowing to him.

But he hadn’t expected that bowing would actually secure a deal for the Merlin Family.

Now that he thought about it, if he had insisted on setting himself against his cousin, he would end up like Raven, going back to Okland and perhaps gathering a force to retaliate. And meanwhile, the Watson Family might have been the one having dealings with his Master Alchemist cousin.

William knew that this cousin didn’t have any concept of family relationships. He chose to sell Nether Iron Ore to the Merlin Family purely to prepare for the path ahead of him.

William believed that if the Watson Family had come first, with a proper attitude and a proper price, this cousin of his would have chosen to sell the Nether Iron Ores to the Watson Family.

It would be a completely different situation then…

Thinking back on what a close call it had been, cold sweat trickled down William’s back. ‘Thank god, thank god I gave up, otherwise I might have been the one that got slammed on the ground and burnt…’

“So, Cousin William, you are training those 5th Rank Mages carefully, right? I’ll help them find a special training ground next month at the latest.”

“Special training ground?”

“Yes, a training ground filled with undead lifeforms.” After Lin Yun explained, he planned to leave the Gilded Rose to take a look at the alchemy workshop to check on the mining puppet production.

Lin Yun had stayed in the prince tomb for a bit over a month, and the Planar Path recharging cooldown had already finished. He hadn’t left for it yet because he needed this batch of mining puppets.

“Wait, Cousin…” But William stopped him just as he got up.

“What is it?”

“I came over because I came across a Great Mage named Solon. He said he was the disciple of the Sage Tower’s Solomon. He also said that Solomon is looking for you very urgently and that you must take some time to go over…”

“Solomon is looking for me?” Lin Yun scratched his cheek, thinking of what he wanted. He was thinking of establishing a relationship with the Cloud Tower through Solomon and then borrowing the True Spirit Magic Tool from the Cloud Tower.

He hadn’t expected Solomon to be the one calling on him first.

“Okay, I’ll go over at once.” Lin Yun nodded, but before he left the Gilded Rose, he added, “Oh, right, Cousin William, if you have time, can you take a trip to the alchemy workshop to ask when they will be finished with that batch of mining puppets?”

“Yes, no problem.”

Lin Yun took his leave from the Gilded Rose and quickly arrived at the Sage Tower.

“Great Mage Merlin, you finally came…” Solon had already been waiting for a long time when Lin Yun rushed over, and he still looked very anxious.

“What’s going on?” Lin Yun felt strange. From the times they had met, Solon had always been very calm. He would rarely display his emotions in such a way. Even when Lin Yun advanced to become a Great Mage, Solon only slightly forgot himself. But today, he looked as if he had lost his head.

“Let’s talk while walking, Teacher has been waiting for too long…”

“Let’s go.”

The two entered the Sage Tower and quickly walked through the spiraling stairs.

“Good Morning, Great Mage Merlin.” Solomon got up to welcome Lin Yun when the latter entered his study.

“Good Morning, High Mage Solomon.” After Lin Yun greeted him, he sat down with Solomon. But he was feeling a bit apprehensive.

Lin Yun clearly remembered that during the Black Horn Auction, he had taken out several hundred thousand golds to help Solomon win the Hell Destroyer incantation during the face off. It was tantamount to helping the Sage Tower keep their reputation, but at that time, the High Mage had only invited him to his box with a “please come in” and greeted him with a smile without getting up to welcome him.

But today, Solomon actually stood up to receive him.

In other words, the matter today was more important than the pride of the Sage Tower.

Sure enough, after the two sat down, Solomon didn’t exchange niceties and went straight to the point. “Great Mage Merlin, I won’t hide it from you, I had Solon ask you to come over today because there is a matter I need your help with…”

“I wonder what I could do for High Mage Solomon?” Lin Yun’s sentence sounded very respectful, but it was the same as saying nothing.

“Haha…” Solomon chuckled. After standing at the peak of Thousand Sails City for so many years, he had seen all kinds of people. Hearing Lin Yun’s words, he knew that he should first tell him what this was about. Otherwise, the young Great Mage wouldn’t give a positive answer. “I wonder if you remember looking at a book a few months ago in the Sage Tower’s library, it was about the Fanrusen Formula.”

“Fanrusen Formula? Eh? I do remember…” When Solomon brought this up, he recalled that period. He had been at a loss back then so he had gone to the Sage Tower’s library to read books about the current era, and when he was bored, he had done some light reading to pass the time. The book on the Fanrusen Formula was one of the latter.

“About this… I have to give you my apology first.” After saying this, Solomon stood up and bowed in front of the shocked Lin Yun and Solon.

“High Mage Solomon, how could I accept this!” Lin Yun hurriedly helped Solomon to stand up. No kidding, Solomon’s power had shaken Thousand Sails City for dozens of years. In the eyes of many, he was considered Thousand Sails City’s Guardian. It would anger the public if he bowed to someone.

“No, no, Great Mage Merlin, listen to me…” After Lin Yun helped him take a seat, Solomon had a fit of coughing. After a while, he sighed and said, “When Solon told me there was a 1st Rank Mage reading about the Fanrusen Formula, I felt quite interested. And without your approval, I used Temporal Recall.”

“Haha, High Mage Solomon, you are too polite.” Lin Yun chuckled. He was only a 1st Rank Mage at the time, there was no expectation of privacy in front of a High Mage’s eyes. If not for him now having the qualifications to stand on equal footing with Solomon, he might have never heard this apology.

“At that time, from your mouth, I gleaned four pieces of data…”

‘Turns out it was like this…’ Hearing this, Lin Yun suddenly felt it was rather funny. ‘No wonder Solomon paid so much attention to me.’

It turned out that this had started because he had carelessly mumbled about four pieces of data when reading the Fanrusen Formula. This was quite coincidental, as in the future, these four pieces of data would be known to all. Many mages liked to use them to make jokes, and it even reached the point that the jokes had been so overused that they became running gags.

It could be said that LIn Yun had grown up while hearing those jokes, so he carelessly mumbled about those four pieces of data when he read the Fanrusen Formula.

But he hadn’t expected Solomon to have observed it.

“I then wrote a letter to my teacher because I knew that he had always been researching the Fanrusen Formula. Not long afterward, he answered and let me know that the Fanrusen research had made some important progress. And this had all been because of those four pieces of data.”

“Haha…” Lin Yun didn’t feel it was too strange. The key parts of the Fanrusen Formula were those four pieces of data, the others were just details.

“Oh, right, Great Mage Merlin, I forgot to give you an introduction. My teacher is named Jouyi, Cloud Tower’s Star Sage Jouyi.” Solomon saw that although this young Great Mage had always been very respectful and courteous, he didn’t seem to be too interested in this matter.

Thus, Solomon clenched his teeth and spoke of the most important piece of information. “He recently sent me another letter, he hopes you can join the Cloud Tower and participate in the Fanrusen research.”

With these words, Solomon stopped and slowly leaned back in his chair, his eyes staring motionlessly at Lin Yun, wanting to see what kind of reaction would come out from the young Great Mage.

‘Will it be shock and disbelief, or animated ecstasy…’

Solomon waited for a while before Lin Yun straightforwardly answered.

“No way.”

“Eh?” Solomon froze. His gaze was empty as he looked at Lin Yun, and it took a while before he managed to recover.

‘It wasn’t shock, it wasn’t excitement, it was a blunt refusal! How could you refuse?’

Solomon couldn’t understand.

‘That’s the Sage Tower! That’s Star Sage Jouyi! Did you get too excited and mess up your answer? Could it be that you don’t know that the Cloud Tower is one of the two great mage forces of Andlusa? Entering the Cloud Tower is a shortcut leading to the peak of magic. Could it be that you don’t know that Star Sage Jouyi is my teacher, an Archmage towering among the masses? How could you say “No way” like that?’