After securing the Lightning Emitter, Raymond quickly turned his gaze to the pile of bottles and jars arranged on the wall to his right.
More than twenty colorful bottles sat on the top shelf, each clearly emanating magical fluctuations.
There was no need to ask; these were genuine magical potions.
Those that shimmered with the green glow of life were generally healing potions.
The deeper the color, the more potent their healing effects.
Even a low-level cure light wounds potion could instantly stop bleeding and pull someone on the verge of death back from the brink.
Of course, that only applied to external injuries.
If the internal organs were damaged, higher-grade healing potions were required.
As valuable items capable of preserving his life after an injury and rapidly restoring his combat ability, Raymond did not hesitate to sweep up six bottles and place them in the satchel he carried with him.
He then took two antidote potions, one potion of fire protection, and three speed potions in case of emergencies.
As for the rest, which he had no immediate use for, he directly converted them into energy and stored it in his mana pool.
Once the energy within the potions had been drained, the liquid in the bottles quickly turned murky dark brown or translucent white.
After dealing with the potions, Raymond carefully opened a hidden compartment in the wall of his room and took out a rectangular black wooden box the size of a lunchbox.
The moment he opened it!
A stack of more than a dozen scrolls made from magical ink and parchment lay quietly inside.
This was a scroll case crafted through special techniques and magic.
In theory, it could hold up to twenty-five Magic Scrolls, along with notes, maps, labels, and similar items.
Not only was it waterproof, it could also be secured to a belt like a tool pouch, making it easy to access at any time during battle.
However, due to the restrictions of his class preventing him from casting spells, Raymond had no way to copy scrolls himself.
Scrolls containing low-level spells were manageable enough; he could trade magical items and potions he made himself with other apprentices for them.
But for high-level scrolls, he could only wait for the Necromancer Archmage—Astar—to be in a good mood and casually reward him with one or two.
Moreover, copying Magic Scrolls was an extremely troublesome task.
Copying even a single high-level scroll would often leave mages utterly exhausted and unable to cast any other spells for an entire day.
As a result, most mages did not have the habit of copying scrolls.
After all, they themselves possessed the ability to cast magic, so there was no need to go through all that trouble.
Furthermore, these Magic Scrolls were indispensable consumables for Raymond when crafting powerful magical items and Oddities. The fact that he still had more than a dozen left already meant he had been quite frugal.
One had to understand that the spellcasting classes created by the Aelir, whether mages or anything else, were typical "mana bar" casters.
In other words, once they had mastered a spell, as long as they possessed sufficient magic power, they could cast it anytime and anywhere.
Theoretically, if a level-one mage could learn and cast first-circle spells, then a level-nine mage could cast ninth-circle spells, though only once per day.
That was assuming their Intelligence was high enough for them to learn it.
The Forgotten Realms—Faerûn—on the other side of this portal, where the Weave existed, used an entirely different system.
Although its spell-slot system had been optimized through the Weave and granted more daily spells, one still needed to reach at least level seventeen to learn and master ninth-circle spells.
And before casting, one had to make extensive preparations.
Through repeated reading and chanting, they forcibly memorized the entire spell in their minds in an abstract manner that even mages themselves could not describe.
Once cast, the spell would instantly be forgotten.
The former system, however, required no such complicated process.
As long as one had sufficient mana, one could cast any magic one had learned at any time. It was incredibly simple and convenient.
The two magical systems each had their own advantages and disadvantages.
But overall, the Aelir Magical Civilization's system was friendlier to low-level spellcasters, while Faerûn's magical system was friendlier to high-level spellcasters.
As for the portal hidden at the very top of the entire tower, it was something Astar had created in order to better exploit Raymond's "talent."
It was a gigantic doorframe, five meters tall and three meters wide, forged from magical metal.
The frame was covered in intricate magical patterns and numerous expensive, rare gemstones.
The instant energy was injected into it, it would forcibly tear open space and create a rift leading somewhere unknown.
Raymond only needed to activate the teleportation ability bestowed by his Spark toward the rift to establish a relatively stable passage to another magical world within a short period of time.
Since the Aelir had neither invented nor discovered a way to make themselves immortal, even the most powerful spellcasters here could usually only rely on life-extending potions to live to three hundred and fifty or four hundred years old.
Astar was already more than three hundred and twenty years old.
If nothing unexpected happened, in a few decades at most, he would become a shriveled, lifeless corpse like the other deceased Archmages.
But Raymond's appearance had allowed him to see hope for immortality.
Through their conversations, the necromancer had learned of the existence of the Forgotten Realms—Faerûn.
He had also learned that Faerûn possessed more than one method of achieving immortality.
For example, becoming an undead Lich or Vampire;
Or using Legendary Magic to strip away the lifespans of tens of thousands of people at once and add them to his own;
Or transforming into an elemental, fey, extraplanar creature, or another special life-form without a lifespan limit.
Yet among those many options, Astar most desired to become a Lich.
To achieve this goal, he first ordered Raymond to use his "talent" to help him locate the Forgotten Realms.
After the location was confirmed, he would open the portal at regular intervals.
He would then place treasures and rare magical items on this side of the door, luring adventurers, travelers, merchant caravans, intelligent humanoids and non-humanoid creatures of every sort, and even powerful, terrifying monsters from Faerun.
Once these unfortunate souls were drawn in by the treasure and magical items and crossed through the portal, they would immediately be transported into a dungeon or a special room covered in binding runes and imprisoned.
Through threats, temptation, torture, memory reading, and a series of other methods, Astar soon acquired vast amounts of magical knowledge from the other world.
As for Vermees, the recently matured female Red Dragon in the Binding Chamber, who was specifically used to extract the precious magical material known as dragon blood, she was the sole survivor among those unfortunate souls.
After the others had been drained of the knowledge and experiences in their minds, they would be sent to the dissection table to contribute to the study of necromancy.
In Raymond's eyes, Astar was undoubtedly a typical evil Necromancer Archmage.
Not only did he possess tremendous power, but he was also highly intelligent and exceptionally cautious.
He had not rushed to explore another magical world that was entirely unfamiliar to him.
Instead, he lured in captives first, using them to learn about the situation beyond the portal and gather information.
From beginning to end, he had not left behind even the slightest flaw.
At the very beginning, Raymond had considered waiting for the instant Astar first crossed that door and arrived in Faerûn, then launching a sneak attack while the sudden change in magical environment temporarily deprived him of his spellcasting ability.
But unfortunately, the necromancer had never given him that opportunity. The plan had died before it could even be carried out.
Later, as Astar learned more and more about Faerûn, even mastering how to convert his "mana bar" into "spell slots" by touching the Weave, Raymond realized that he had lost his chance.
But now, Astar had vanished without a trace.
What Raymond needed to do was go to the Binding Chamber and "talk" with Vermees, the imprisoned adult female Red Dragon.
Only with the aid of that powerful dragon was Raymond confident he could deal with the Golems and other Constructs guarding the passage to the upper levels.
Given the evil, greedy, and brutal nature of Faerûn's Red Dragons, he had prepared the necessary "bargaining chips" for this "negotiation" months ago, as well as backup "measures" should the negotiation break down.
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