Wind Spirit Moon Shadow

Although Gao De did not yet know much about the world of mages, he could still understand just how outrageous this spell-enhancing ability was.

This was an elevation of a spell's very essence!

"A complete source can enhance one spell of the corresponding rank. If I master more spells in the future and enhance every spell I know..."

Just thinking about it was enough to make Gao De excited.

What was this equivalent to?

It was like everyone else was playing the standard version of the same game, while he was playing a modded version—far more overpowered than any pay-to-win player!

"So this is what you do?" Gao De shifted his attention back to the crescent-shaped gem floating at the very center of his Spell Starsea, marveling inwardly.

By now, he understood that this gem was absolutely an extraordinary treasure—or rather, it should be called priceless.

As he marveled at the Crescent Gem's wonders, Gao De grabbed another Ash-Eyed Rat from the cage. With another familiar snap, he sent it on its way.

He focused his mind inward.

Within the gem, after the set of "Big Dipper" stars representing the Ash-Eyed Rat's source merged into the Repair Spell Model, only a single point of light remained flashing.

This eighth Ash-Eyed Rat had not lit up a new point of light for Gao De.

Source:

Zero Circle—Human (1/7), Ash-Eyed Rat (used)

"One creature can only provide one point of source." Gao De had anticipated this, but speculation was speculation; it still had to be proven through practice.

Clearly, while the Crescent Gem was powerful, it was not without limitations.

Still, even with its many restrictions, even though Gao De did not yet know the upper limit of its spell enhancement or whether it could only enhance Zero Circle Spells, the Crescent Gem still deserved to be called priceless.

Although Zero Circle Spells seemed low-ranked, they had all been created by renowned grand mages throughout history. Rigorous and perfect, they had been passed down for countless years, yet no one had ever managed to innovate upon or enhance them.

One could imagine just how difficult spell enhancement itself was.

"What exactly are you? You followed me into this world, and you possess such an inconceivable ability..." Gao De thought to himself, while quietly becoming more vigilant.

A man may be innocent, but possessing a treasure invites disaster.

If outsiders learned that he possessed such a treasure, greedy people would swarm him in an instant, doing everything they could to murder him and seize it.

Not to mention anyone else—Mage Seda would probably be the first to kill him for it.

"I must be cautious from now on. I absolutely cannot let slip that this treasure exists."

Fortunately, the gem had already taken root within his Spell Starsea. As long as he did not deliberately publicize it, who could possibly imagine that he possessed such a precious treasure?

Moreover, because of the gem, Gao De saw for the first time a faint glimmer of hope for escaping his current predicament.

—Buy spell formulas with offensive power, master new spells, then enhance them through the gem. Perhaps that would give him at least a slight chance of resisting Mage Seda head-on.

Gao De looked at the splendid gem in his Spell Starsea and decided to give it a name.

After all, it was not merely a gemstone, despite looking like one.

Its essence was some sort of miraculous treasure, so it naturally ought to have a name.

Looking at the crescent-shaped "gem," then recalling its miraculous, game-modifying effects, Gao De's heart stirred. Inspiration struck, and a highly fitting name surfaced in his mind. "I'll call you..."

"Wind Spirit Moon Shadow!"

Suppressing the excitement in his heart, Gao De acted as though nothing had happened. He disposed of the Gray Rats' corpses, then went to the dining hall for lunch.

That afternoon was still work time.

The herb garden's routine work mainly consisted of cultivating and processing herbs, as well as preparing some simple potions for Mage Seda.

Though they were called simple potions, only three people were actually capable of doing the job.

—Everything required talent.

And Gao De was the strongest among all the apprentices.

Thus, he was fortunate enough to have his own separate "workroom."

Of course, he had learned all this from Emil. Even Emil had been the one to point out his workroom to him; otherwise, he truly would not have found it.

Gao De's workroom was not large. It contained only a long workbench, upon which lay all sorts of tools needed for potion preparation.

To one side of the workbench stood a foot-operated bellows, a furnace, and several hanging crucibles of varying sizes.

The bellows were used to control the heat. He had heard that advanced Elixirists used spells for heating instead. Not only was that more convenient, but it also allowed for more precise heat control.

At the other end of the workbench was a larger storage rack. Rows of raw materials needed for potion-making were arranged upon it, each stored in different kinds of containers.

After carefully surveying this familiar yet unfamiliar environment, Gao De took a deep breath. "Then let's begin."

His task that afternoon was to prepare one dose of Novice Spider Venom.

Just as alchemists, artifact refiners, and formation masters were known as the three great auxiliary professions in cultivation novels, this world also had many disciplines related to spells, such as Puppet Studies and Scroll Studies. However, those were minor paths. The three fields with the highest recognition had always been:

Alchemy, Herbology, and the most mysterious of them all, Runelore.

Alchemy could be compared to artifact refinement, while Herbology was even easier to understand—pill refinement.

As for Runelore, based on his predecessor's knowledge, he had no understanding of that field at all.

But in any case, as one of the three major disciplines, Herbology was profound. It was far from as simple as what Gao De had seen in Western films and television dramas—throwing all the ingredients into a pot in sequence and boiling them.

First, before preparing a potion, the required ingredients had to be enchanted.

Enchanting could release an ingredient's properties and, through the Elixirist's precise control, make them better suited to the potion's requirements.

This was an extremely important step, and also an exceptionally difficult one.

Most apprentices who could not prepare potions were stuck at this very stage.

Gao De narrowed his eyes slightly and reviewed every detail in his mind once more.

"One Serpent Tooth Herb, one Mountain Mugwort, one Green Spider Sac."

Following his memories, Gao De took the main ingredients needed for the Novice Spider Venom Potion from the nearby storage rack and set them aside.

He then took out the Serpent Tooth Herb and placed it into a wooden bowl on the table, one that looked ordinary because it was indeed ordinary.

After calming himself slightly, Gao De stared at the grayish-green Serpent Tooth Herb in the wooden bowl and activated his Mental Strength. At that moment, his five senses became extraordinarily sharp.

About two minutes later, he saw something different appear upon the Serpent Tooth Herb's surface.

Spiral ripples like DNA strands, sharp sawtoothed ripples, wavelike ripples—nearly seven or eight kinds of ripples were being released from the Serpent Tooth Herb in a strange yet regular pattern.

Gao De knew that these ripples represented the Serpent Tooth Herb's various properties.

The Serpent Tooth Herb was not a precious medicinal herb, yet it still possessed seven or eight medicinal properties. Naturally, to prepare the Novice Spider Venom, he needed only one of them: its poisonous property.

Gao De's expression turned solemn. He reached out and touched the Serpent Tooth Herb in the wooden bowl. At the same time, the mana within his body extended outward, gathering in his palm before traveling along his fingers, climbing over the herb's surface, and continuously flowing into the sharp sawtoothed ripples as though charging them.

In that instant, all ripples other than the sharp sawtoothed ones representing the Serpent Tooth Herb's poisonous property ceased being released.

It seemed that the stillness of the other ripples gave the sharp sawtoothed ripples more room to expand. Coupled with Gao De's "charging," their size nearly doubled in an instant.

But the stillness lasted only a moment.

Soon, the other ripples began emerging from the Serpent Tooth Herb again, squeezing into space that had originally not belonged to the sharp sawtoothed ripples.

Yet the sawtoothed ripples held overwhelming momentum. The returning ripples could only reclaim a small portion of their territory, while most of it remained firmly occupied by the sawtoothed ripples.

Seeing that success was at hand, Gao De, whose nerves had been taut, finally let out a breath. He knew that the enchantment of this Serpent Tooth Herb was complete, and he silently withdrew his mana.

The entire enchantment process had taken less than a minute from beginning to end, yet it had consumed a considerable amount of Gao De's Mental Strength and mana.

The Serpent Tooth Herb was merely an ordinary herb without any rank. One could imagine how much Mental Strength and mana would be needed to enchant high-grade herbs. No wonder people said that a powerful Elixirist was inevitably also a powerful mage.

Although this was Gao De's first time performing enchantment, his predecessor had done it countless times before. Muscle memory ensured that he made no mistakes.

With this experience, enchanting the remaining ingredients became much easier.

Before long, all the ingredients had been enchanted. The first stage of the work was complete, and the next step was processing the ingredients.