Holy and Foul Stench

Ruger felt his mental power rapidly draining away. Within his Mental Power Space, it was as though an invisible pen were sketching out a wondrous spell model high in the air. His mental power was both the force wielding the pen and the equally invisible ink being forcibly drawn away. All he needed to do now was ensure the ink never ran dry, letting it flow slowly so his mental power would not fluctuate too violently.

A Zero-Ring Spell model generally had only twenty nodes.

Foul-Smelling Skin had nineteen. Just as he began to feel a trace of fatigue, the spell model was finally completed, drifting and endlessly turning through his Mental Power Space like a strange kite.

Upon closer inspection, the spell model, like the runes, continuously shifted within a certain range. Or rather, the spell model was another kind of rune—more complex, but not some peculiar creation artificially manipulated in a single direction of complexity.

Ruger stared at it for a long while before finally leaving his meditative state.

Rapidly formed spell models consumed mental power quickly. The scroll had warned him long ago that he must be in peak condition before unfurling it.

Only after resting enough did he impatiently begin meditating on the runes.

The six runes took shape one after another, incomparably practiced, his mental power steady as a trickling stream.

He sketched them faster and faster, entering a state of complete absorption. Before the first rune showed any sign of dispersing, the sixth had already been perfectly formed.

His Mental Power Space seemed to freeze for an instant, then began expanding outward. An invisible repulsive force existed between the six runes. Their power was stretching the Mental Power Space wider, while the resistance and restraint of the space squeezed them inward. The six little darlings drew closer and closer, and beautiful Light Threads began radiating between the runes. When the threads touched, they became entangled with one another.

The entire Mental Power Space trembled.

Invisible ripples spread outward as the Demonic Mark formed, continuing until the expansion and trembling of the Mental Power Space ceased.

A dark red Demonic Mark rested comfortably at the very center of his Mental Power Space. It resembled a wound left by claws tearing through flesh. Looking closer, it was made of countless tiny runes that constantly changed while maintaining their overall shape, as if those six runes had been broken apart into innumerable little pieces in that instant.

He opened his eyes, wiped the sweat from his forehead, and could not stop a smile from creeping across his face.

The newly stabilized Mental Power Space began flooding him with an indescribable emptiness, a strange sense of something missing, as though his soul were no longer whole.

It was like hunger from the depths of his soul.

The moment that feeling surged forth, he knew what he had hoped for had succeeded.

It was the Zero-Ring Spell Slot created by the meditation technique during the expansion of his Mental Power Space. Located at the very top of the Mental Power Space, it awaited the insertion of his chosen spell model. Only then would he become whole and escape that sense of absence.

That was precisely why stabilized spells were so special, even reaching a level akin to instinct.

He steadied himself and entered meditation once more.

The Foul-Smelling Skin spell model had already been drawn upward.

The process went astonishingly smoothly, which showed that the spell was truly highly compatible with him.

At the moment the spell was stabilized, he fell into a brief daze.

In that instant, his gaze crossed an unimaginable distance and saw an extremely distant place. There stood a gigantic white tree, rising alone. It had five thick branches, not a single leaf upon them. One look at the white tree filled him with a sense of incomparable holiness, and for no reason at all, he felt it was the purest and most sacred thing in the world.

He snapped back to his senses.

The completed spell model settled into that invisible place of absence. A sense of completion from the depths of his soul washed over him, and in an instant, both body and mind were filled with indescribable comfort.

It was as though an additional star had appeared upon the dome of his Mental Power Space.

He raised his head and gazed at it, feeling as though he were creating an illusory heaven and earth. The Demonic Mark was a canyon beneath that starry sky.

He left his meditative state.

As he got up and stretched his limbs, he impatiently began attempting the first spellcasting of his life.

With nothing more than a thought—

The Zero-Ring Spell Foul-Smelling Skin was immediately cast as naturally as an instinct. Everything went smoothly, as if he were breathing. The high compatibility, combined with stabilization in a spell slot, left him without the slightest sense of unfamiliarity or spellcasting expenditure.

After Foul-Smelling Skin was successfully cast, it entered a stage where it had to be maintained through the consumption of mental power. He closed his eyes and sensed it for a moment, feeling as though he could keep the spell running forever.

He grinned and lightly twitched his nose twice.

Gradually, he frowned. The movements grew larger and larger, and the fine hairs on his face were shaken loose one after another.

In this strange and bizarre place, even if the Kobold race did not possess the strongest sense of smell, they were definitely among the best.

"Is it because of the compatibility?" That was the only explanation he could come up with.

He had not felt at all the torment described in the Foul-Smelling Skin spell, the part the caster was supposed to endure.

There was only a faint, indescribable odor.

It was neither foul nor fragrant. It was not pungent, yet it kept drawing his attention to its peculiarity. He could not accurately describe it no matter how many brain cells he wasted, and that sensation seemed not to be limited to smell alone.

Perhaps very few people would stabilize this spell, he thought.

Since so few people used it, there were not many records. The Inheritance Scroll had not mentioned any special changes after stabilization, unlike Mental Boil. His unusual circumstances were partly due to the spell slot stabilization, while the high compatibility had likely also played a role. Together, those two factors had given him a deeper grasp of the spell.

He thought again of the tree he had seen while stabilizing the spell.

Why had a supposedly wicked and foul spell shown him a holy, bizarre tree in some unknown place?

He clicked his teeth and paced in place, kicking away two annoying little stones along the way.

After thinking it over and over, he still felt somewhat uneasy about the spell's effects.

He wanted to go outside and test it, finding a sufficiently strong Kobold for comparison—such as Big Silly Hum, who had already become a guard.

Before that, he decided to deal with the storage pouch first.

After resting for a while and judging his condition, he picked up the Inheritance Scroll of Arcane Imprint and slowly unfurled it.

Amid invisible fluctuations perceptible only through mental power, another Inheritance Scroll turned to dust and fell in a soft shower.

Now that he had officially become a Level-One Wizard Apprentice, his Mental Power Space was more stable and his mental power more condensed. The Arcane Imprint spell model had only fifteen nodes, so the process naturally proceeded without a ripple.

The successfully formed spell model floated in circles above the Mental Power Sea, circling the Demonic Mark suspended in the void.

For ordinary, unstabilized spell models, mental power had to be supplied each time they were cast. Hand gestures and incantations could help adjust mental power, bringing it closer to the spell model's fluctuations and increasing the efficiency of mental power infusion.

Feeling the drain on his mental power, he chose to create his own Arcane Imprint on the back of his hand.

Zero-Ring Spell: Arcane Imprint.

Every caster's Arcane Imprint was unique, accompanying them throughout their life much like their name.

This spell could, according to the caster's will, carve a personal mark visible or invisible to others onto a target's surface. It could be used to expose petty schemes involving forgery, deception, and substitution. It could also be used to track a target, as the caster could sense the mark's general direction within a certain range.

Arcane Imprint was used even more often in all kinds of contracts.

Contracts between wizards, or contracts made when forming magical pet bonds, both required Arcane Imprints. A wizard would not casually leave behind his own name. They generally signed contracts with Arcane Imprints instead, and such signatures would likewise be recognized by the laws.

That was why this spell was included among the three spells that needed to be mastered first.

During the formation of the imprint, the caster could not interfere with its specific design, nor could it be deliberately altered in the future. It was like an abstract representation of the caster in this world.

"Please don't give me a bone. And definitely don't give me some dog-faced mark..."

He watched anxiously as the imprint formed. Only after it was more than halfway complete did he let out a small sigh of relief. Parting the sparse hair on the back of his hand, he revealed a mark of two interlocking rings. Crisscrossing lines filled the center, their blank spaces outlining a flower that had not yet fully bloomed.