Reinforcements Arrive

After glancing over the Wind Blade's stats, Isaac saw that its overall damage was a little lower than Fireball Arrow's, but it excelled in cutting power.

However, Wind Blade was Hamon's own sorcery and could only be cast by Hamon himself. Before Isaac learned the spell, he could not use it. Conversely, any spell Isaac learned could also be cast by Hamon.

Worth mentioning was that both methods used Isaac's own magic power.

But that was the drawback of the magic pet school.

A magic pet was only regarded as a wizard under certain circumstances; it was not truly a wizard.

Still, that did not affect combat power much. A magic pet would not disobey its master's commands.

After briefly checking Wind Blade's stats, Isaac immediately began arranging the next ritual. The core material for Phantom Pattern was a pair of Phantom Butterfly wings—the most expensive material on a Phantom Butterfly. This pair alone cost two hundred Gold Coins!

That was because the Phantom Butterfly had only this one usable material on its body, and it could not be damaged at all, or it would become useless.

Fortunately, Phantom Butterflies were Demonic Beasts that could be bred. Otherwise, their price would have been even higher!

Compared to the core material, the ritual's padding was far cheaper: magic-infused pollen. Every gram increased the success rate by one percent, regardless of quality!

And the lowest-quality magic pollen cost one Gold Coin per kilogram!

When he saw that price, he suspected the stuff could be artificially manufactured, because it was the only powdered magic material sold by the pound!

Without another word, he bought a pound and used some of it to jack the success rate up to two hundred percent.

Isaac was now thoroughly familiar with these rituals. So long as they did not involve higher beings and were merely ordinary ritual magic, a two-hundred-percent success rate was absolutely enough.

Only when dealing with higher beings did one need to pile the success rate as high as possible, because they would constantly lure you into making mistakes, constantly lower your success rate, until your ritual failed—then take your soul or corrupt you into a dog!

That was when one needed enough success rate to ensure sufficient room for error.

But there was no need for that with an ordinary ritual that merely amplified magical effects.

In the end, Isaac succeeded without surprise. Strange multicolored patterns appeared along Hamon's arm. When Phantom Pattern activated, those colored stripes gathered in its palm and formed an eye-like design, unleashing a powerful force of illusion.

After using Phantom Pattern to put a Demon Wolf to sleep and testing its capabilities, Isaac proceeded with the Hand of the Demon God ritual. It too was a great success. Hamon's mysterious attribute received a certain degree of enhancement, while the strength and power of its Demon Claw improved considerably.

It could now lift two hundred kilograms!

Do not underestimate that bit of strength. It might seem far inferior to a knight's strength, but Hamon could fly!

Those two hundred kilograms of force brought far too many possibilities to actual combat!

For example, Isaac could now stand in Hamon's palm and have it carry him, effectively granting him the ability to fly!

And it was not slow, either!

Beyond that, the increase in mysteriousness seemed to have brought Hamon some miraculous changes, strengthening some of its inherent abilities. Unfortunately, after three rituals in a row, Hamon's mind had gone a little sluggish and needed time to recover.

Thus, after barely accompanying Isaac in testing a few tactical concepts—really, just flying around while standing on the Demon Claw's palm—Hamon retreated into Isaac's body and fell asleep.

As Hamon slept, Isaac could sense that the gains from these three rituals had only just begun. Once Hamon woke, its strength would surely improve further!

But before that...

Isaac shook his head, returned to the desk, and began considering ways to optimize Innate Sorcery: Flesh Conversion.

On the third day of Hamon's slumber, Isaac was revising a new version of his spell optimization plan against the data on the panel when a sphere of light suddenly appeared before him, blinking insistently.

Isaac raised a brow. This was one of the fortress's assembly orders. Had the Black Orcs attacked?

He grabbed the light sphere and dispersed it. Not daring to be careless, Isaac headed outside while taking off his white coat, changing into a Wizard Robe, and putting on a Wizard Hat. With a casual toss, he threw out a pumpkin, boarded the Pumpkin Carriage, and flew toward the castle at the center of the fortress.

Before landing, Isaac looked out beyond the fortress and found no gathering Black Orc army. He could not help but breathe a sigh of relief.

He was still dissatisfied with his current three Demonic Beasts. They needed more time to grow.

But if the Black Orcs had not come, what was this assembly for?

As the Pumpkin Carriage flew above the castle, Isaac looked at the several carriages parked in front of it and gradually found his answer—the other lords had arrived.

As an old-established border Viscount, and one soon to be elevated in rank, the Solomon Family naturally had quite a few vassals. Some had branched off from the family in the past, while others had been enfeoffed for their merits.

Most were knights, with only a small number of Barons.

Strictly speaking, knights did not count as nobility. But given the ways of the world, they were still included among the nobles.

Of course, they differed greatly from true nobles. First, they had no fiefs of their own. Though they were allotted some land when enfeoffed, they did not own that territory; they only had administrative rights and a share of its tax rights.

Second, knights could not possess their own armies. Of course, by this day and age, that rule was not so strictly enforced. Many knights formed armies under the name of guard units. So long as they did not go too far, no one generally cared.

So, strictly speaking, although Isaac bore the title of Baron, in terms of actual authority he was only a knight. This was mainly due to the territory's present circumstances. After all, if they truly carved out a barony for him, the territory's promotion in rank would have to be delayed again.

Fortunately, Isaac did not care about that himself. Governing a territory was too troublesome, and if he wanted to develop it, he would have to pour money into it. He did not even have enough money for his own experiments!

Setting aside the knights, there were four Barons holding actual fiefs under Solomon, and judging by the situation, all of them had come.

That was only natural. The Solomon Territory lay on the frontier. If the fortress fell, they would be the next to suffer!

And they would suffer even worse!

Gaia was a High-level Knight. Even if the fortress fell, he could still protect the Solomon Family. Once the storm had passed, at worst they would be badly weakened, but they would still have a chance to start over.

But among the other four Barons, the strongest was only a Great Knight, still unimaginably far from becoming a High-level Knight. Once the Black Orc army arrived, they could only wait for death.

So even for their own sake alone, they had to come!

Not to mention that the Solomon Family had issued them an order!