Chapter 160: Battle Matrices
Translator: Shiraishi Editor: TheAlliance
The discussion between Jouyi and Lin Yun wasn’t complicated.
It was just that the information revealed was too shocking. This was like saying that this 5th Rank Great Mage was equal to a 9th Rank High Mage. This was truly preposterous. The first reaction of any regular person hearing this would be to bursting out in laughter before praising the joke.
Even a fool would know that the gap between a 5th Rank Great Mage and a 9th Rank High Mage could be described as almost unbreachable. This wasn’t something that skills or tactics could make up for. The difference in power between both sides was something set in stone, and there would be no fluke in such a battle.
But no one in the lobby of the Gilded Rose was laughing.
Because the one who said that was none other than the master of the Cloud Tower, the strongest Archmage, Star Sage Jouyi.
Even the one involved, Hoen, could only stand there and grind his teeth. Although there was disbelief on his face, he didn’t dare to say anything.
“Looks like you are still not convinced…” Jouyi laughed after seeing Hoen’s expression.
“Sir Jouyi…” Because of Sir Jouyi’s smile, Hoen regained some courage, and after some hesitation, he clenched his teeth and said, “It’s not that I’m not convinced by your assessment, but…”
“Okay, no need to say anything more.” Jouyi didn’t even let him finish and waved his hand to interrupt him. “Since you aren’t convinced, then let’s show you. Merlin, come with me for a moment…”
After saying that, he ignored Hoen’s expression and gave Lin Yun a pat on the shoulder before finding a table to sit on.
“Weren’t you going to head for Oddrock City?” Lin Yun slowly sat next to Jouyi while hoping to find a way out of this situation.
Unfortunately, Lin Yun’s struggles were ignored by Jouyi. This old man called the most powerful Archmage of the kingdom picked up a piece of paper and then divided it into two in front of Lin Yun. “You are in charge of Hoen, I’ll be in charge of you.”
“Okay…” Lin Yun nodded, resigned to his fate, as he took a quill from his pocket and started writing.
Jouyi and Lin Yun wrote in Nesser Runes as the tips of their quills streaked across the papers, leaving one rune after the other on them, one formula after the other. The two looked extremely focused, and everyone present seemed to be influenced by them, controlling their breaths as they stared at the pieces of paper in front of the two men.
‘Those are battle matrices!’ Cadgar was the first to discover, and that discovery made him feel startled.
To a mage, establishing a battle matrix for combat analysis was an essential skill. But usually, this kind of analysis would only be done partially, it would be at most an exchange of one or two spells, because that kind of analysis needed countless details and possibilities, and the calculations required could only be described as endless.
If a mage could establish a complete battle matrix of a fight lasting thirty seconds, he would already be described as a genius. Even in a place like Okland it would be enough to make a few major forces fight over him.
Furthermore, the difference in rank between both sides couldn’t be too high. If one side exceeded the other side’s rank, the analysis would become incomparably difficult. Let alone a battle analysis, even one spell exchange would have errors that were difficult to predict due to the difference in strength.
But now…
There was no problem with Star Sage Jouyi. As the strongest Archmage of the kingdom, he could establish the battle matrix of any mage. But Mafa Merlin…
Mafa Merlin was only a 5th Rank Great Mage!
How could he establish the battle matrix of a 9th Rank High Mage? Moreover Jouyi had said that the fight would have lasted five minutes!
At that time, Cadgar finally understood why the two would use Nesser Runes…
Because regardless of whether it was Jouyi or Lin Yun, they would reach astronomical figures while calculating. These huge numbers would make countless mages feel despair, and Cadgar felt that if they didn’t use Nesser Runes, their papers would fill half of the lobby.
Only Nesser, that language which mixed Draconic and Elven, praised as characters with mystical mana, could possibly complete this frightening battle matrix.
But could Merlin really do it?
He was only a 5th Rank Great Mage, after all.
Cadgar looked at those pieces of paper spread on the table with worry that was hard to conceal…
And Hoen, who was next to Cadgar, had already put away his disbelief and was now frowning.
At first, Hoen simply didn’t believe that a 5th Rank Great Mage that wasn’t even twenty was able to establish a battle matrix, but the longer he looked, the stranger he felt.
Because the dozen characters and three formulas written on the piece of paper already amounted to seven spells. These seven spells were seven options he had considered back then, but due to the arrangement of elements, he chose the Wind Python spell, and the remaining six spells had naturally not appeared.
Seeing this, Hoen’s frown accentuated. This wasn’t a joke, the remaining six spells never appeared. How could that Mafa Merlin guess them?
‘No no no, this cannot be, this is definitely a coincidence,’ he reassured himself. ‘That’s right! It’s a coincidence!’
Hoen comforted himself to bolster his courage as he kept looking while trembling. The quill streaked across the piece of paper for another ten seconds before his expression changed once again, because those Nesser Runes were now detailing analysis of a few spells he would have chosen after completing his Wind Python. After one glance, Hoen knew that he likely would have used any of these spells.
‘No way…’
The more Hoen looked, the more cold sweat trickled down his back. If he couldn’t see the piece of paper with his own eyes, he would never have thought that he had been thoroughly so analyzed by a 5th Rank Great Mage in the previous fight!
As he thought about it, Hoen felt some lingering fear. ‘Thank god he is only a 5th Rank Great Mage. If he was a 9th Rank High Mage… No, even just being a 5th Rank High Mage would be enough… By controlling 6th Tier Spells and knowing my every move, he would be able to easily kill me.’
‘Fortunately, he is only a 5th Rank Great Mage.’
Hoen secretly wiped the cold sweat from his forehead, and when he raised his head again, he didn’t dare to look at Lin Yun’s piece of paper. He sneakily changed his target and looked at Jouyi’s paper, hoping he could find a tiny bit of self-respect from the Star Sage’s battle matrix.
But after changing target, Hoen froze foolishly.
At that time, Jouyi’s battle matrix had only been half completed, but Hoen could clearly see that although he had overwhelming power, he would have been led around by the nose by that 5th Rank Great Mage, and all that started from that shattered Frost Armor…
At that time, Hoen clearly understood that the shattered Frost Armor had turned into a frightening trap. If not for Solomon’s sudden appearance, that shattered Frost Armor would have made him sink into a swamp, rendering him unable to take advantage of his overwhelming power and ultimately causing him to lose control of the battle.
Seeing the Nesser Runes on the paper, Hoen could only feel a chill down his spine, like a viper was slowly crawling across his back.
Hoen had never even dreamed that the battle could have taken such a direction, but now, through the two battle matrices, Hoen suddenly found out that he might have died together with this 5th Rank Great Mage. Thinking about this, dread finally appeared on that square face as he looked at Lin Yun.
“Right, what did you plan to do in the end?” Jouyi’s battle matrix was almost complete, but there was still a large gap left at the end of the piece of paper. Thus, that Star Sage tapped the table and asked Lin Yun as if they were deliberating.
After Lin Yun looked at Jouyi bluntly, and then he took Jouyi’s piece of paper and used his quill to write another block of Nesser Runes and Magic Formulas.
Jouyi took a look at the paper for a long time before frowning. “If it’s like this, you would need to use at least two Spiritual Magic Tools…”
“Three, Sir Jouyi.”
“…” Hearing those words, Jouyi rolled his eyes at him. The jaws of the people on the side almost fell off. Three Spiritual Magic Tools, a 5th Rank Great Mage actually had such frightening capital? At this time, whether it was Cadgar, Sauss, or Monchi, the way they looked at Lin Yun had changed.
The two completed their battle matrices one after the other. After looking at the battle matrices together for some time, Jouyi walked over to Hoen with his hands behind his back.
“Good, Hoen, do you still have something to say?”
“No… I don’t…” Hoen’s face was devoid of colors at this time. He was in a daze due to fear and dread and didn’t even ask why on Mafa Merlin’s battle matrix there were a few times he used the power of a 5th Rank High Mage.
Because he knew…
That young Great Mage had the qualifications to use that power; this was something Hoen had to acknowledge. He was able to use Nesser Runes to establish a battle matrix and completely analyze five minutes of a 9th rank High Mage’s battle… this wasn’t something a 5th Rank Great Mage could do. Not to mention a 5th Rank Great Mage, even Hoen as a 9th Rank High Mage didn’t have such frightening computing ability. With such talent, it wasn’t strange if he could burst with power in battle.
At this point, Hoen understood why Jouyi said he was saving him.
He truly had saved him.
As Mafa Merlin said, he might not be able to defeat him for sure, but Hoen would definitely die. He hadn’t been talking big, that was a fact!
“Good…” Jouyi smiled as he nodded.
Afterwards, he smacked the piece of paper in Hoen’s face.
“Idiot!” Jouyi then burst forth with the fury he had restrained. “Now fuck off to the Cloud Tower and ask anyone you know why your task of gathering the most basic data in the Pale Plane had suddenly stopped. I’ll tell you this, if not for Merlin, you might have spent another ten years without having been able to return to Noscent. A hundred of you can’t even compare to Merlin’s contribution to the Cloud Tower, to all of Noscent’s mages, yet you dare to make a move against him? Did you think I already died?”
“Because of him?” Hoen had been collecting basic data for the Fanrusen Formula in the Pale Plane. But recently, for some unknown reason, his task had been stopped. By the time Hoen returned from the Pale Plane, he was directly put at the seat of the Head of the Magic Department for his two years of hard work.
From what Jouyi said, him coming back to Noscent and his seat as the Head of the Magic Department, weren’t they both due to Mafa Merlin?