Assignments

Soon, a voice cut through the noisy hall. "Apprentices, quiet. I am Lord Pelaven, and I will now assign your tasks. First, those who know alchemy, stand on the left side of the hall. Those who do not, stand on the right." It was Lord Pelaven who had stepped forward, and his distinctively booming voice drowned out the noise in the hall. The apprentices began taking their places as he instructed. Allen naturally stood on the left. Once everyone was in position, Lord Pelaven spoke again. "Very good. Mage Larz will take those on the left to the back. The rest, come with me." With that, he left the hall, followed by two officers.

After Pelaven left, the hall grew noisy again, and the apprentices began following in an orderly fashion. Allen likewise arrived at a room. There were not many apprentices who knew alchemy, probably no more than ten. Leading them was Larz, the leader of the entire group of mages and its only fifth-tier mage.

Once they arrived, Larz picked up a sheet of paper from the table and told the apprentices, "All right, write down all the potions you can brew. Put your name first, followed by the names of the potions and your success rates. Do not put down arbitrary figures. Write the actual rates, understood? I do not want anyone lying to me."

The mage stepped away and watched the apprentices go up one by one to write down their names and information. Allen went up as well. He stole a glance and discovered that most of the apprentices had written that they specialized in Healing Potions. Though he found this odd, he lowered his own success rate a little to be safe, but it still looked very high among the apprentices. Once they had finished, all the apprentices stood to one side. Mage Larz picked up the list and looked it over, finding it fairly satisfactory, then told them, "All right, come with me."

He then took them to a laboratory area, turned, and said, "This is where you will be working from now on. There are ten laboratories here, one for each of you, and each already has a complete set of standard equipment. Someone will deliver the materials you need for brewing." The mage paused and looked at them. "Any questions?"

At that moment, an apprentice raised his hand to indicate that he had something to say. The mage nodded to him, and he asked, "Lord Larz, will we be paid? How many hours a day will we work, and how long will we be doing this?" His questions addressed precisely what concerned all the apprentices most.

Larz answered at once, "The lord has already set the terms of your pay for brewing potions. He will determine your payment based on your success rates and the number of finished potions. The lord will inform you of the details. Regardless, you must each provide at least three potions a day. If you are willing to brew a few more for him, he will be very pleased. You may also request leave, but you must give a reason. As for how long you will work, that depends on the lord's needs. All right, any other questions?" The mage smiled at the apprentices until no one had any further questions, then left. Before leaving, he reminded them, "Remember, work starts tomorrow."

After the mage left, Allen chose a laboratory near the entrance and went inside to look around. It was not large, only twenty or thirty square meters, and contained nothing but a set of instruments on a table and a chair. After looking it over, he went straight back to his room. Along the way, he considered it carefully. Three potions a day meant ninety a month. If he used the Water Elemental Heart, it would probably fall somewhat short. Fortunately, he could now cast spells with Mental Power, though he still needed some time to adjust. He had understated his success rate earlier, which would serve nicely to conceal what was unusual about him.

In fact, seeing that all the apprentices on the sheet specialized in brewing Healing Potions had given him a suspicion, though he could not be sure. The lord probably required them to brew potions every day because casualties during the expansion of his territory had been too heavy. That would explain it.

Of course, there was no need to think so much about it now. He only needed to faithfully complete the tasks the lord assigned. The first thing he did upon returning to his lodgings was memorize the basic runes.

A week later, Allen had fully adjusted to life here. He brewed only three potions each day, never any extra. He spent the rest of his time on other things. He had now memorized all the runes and begun to understand them, and he could even perform a few minor tricks.

Besides studying runes, he also studied how to cast spells quickly. This was important, particularly in an unexpected encounter. An enemy would never give him time to prepare a spell, so casting quickly was crucial. With his current ability and shallow understanding of magic, however, it was truly difficult to achieve.

Through this, however, he discovered a marvelous use for his soul space. It was a very unusual space where his Mental Power could exist independently without dissipating. As long as he kept prepared runes in his soul space, he could take them out and use them directly during an unexpected encounter or ambush without having to construct them again. This would effectively amount to casting magic instantly.

Although he could construct runes within his soul space, keeping them there continuously was difficult. His soul space was also limited, with room for at most the runes of one first-level spell. An instantly cast spell still consumed the same amount of Mental Power, or even more, since he had to maintain the runes unchanged before using them.

Even so, he still felt this was a good way to increase his strength, so he planned to use that sole slot to construct the Wind Blade Spell. It was the spell he understood best and the one he was most likely to succeed with.

That day, he returned to his room after finishing his potions as usual. He had not been back long when the door opened. It was Ruizesi returning. "You're back so early today?" Allen asked curiously. Ruizesi immediately began complaining. "Unlike you, I don't know alchemy, so naturally I can't sit in a laboratory. Apprentices like me have all been assigned to patrol outside. Whatever else, they have to give us some time off."

Allen had learned a week earlier that the apprentices Lord Pelaven had taken away had been assigned to the army. Thinking about it now, Pelaven had probably divided the apprentices into groups with the intention of making the best use of everyone.

"How many days do you get off, then?" Allen asked him. "We get two days off on rotation every week. Today and tomorrow happen to be my turn." After entering, Ruizesi lay straight down on his bed as though he intended to sleep. A little later, he suddenly sat up and said to Allen, "I almost forgot. Allen, Allen. Um, you can brew Healing Potions, right?"

Allen answered in puzzlement, "Brewing Healing Potions is my job. Why?" Embarrassed, Ruizesi said, "Then could you sell me some? My squad heard that you know alchemy, and they all asked me to get a few bottles for them. You know, when we're patrolling outside, if we're unlucky and run into something, there are always some casualties. So, could you?" He grew increasingly embarrassed as he spoke. Allen smiled as he watched him shyly lower his head, then answered, "Of course. But how much are you planning to pay?"

Ruizesi rubbed his nose, unsure how to answer. Finally, Allen told him, "Since we're friends, I don't want to make things difficult for you. Market price." Ruizesi immediately nodded happily. Afterward, he took six Lesser Healing Potions from Allen and hurried out excitedly.

Allen resumed studying his Wind Blade Runes. He had understood nearly all the Wind Blade Spell Runes; all that remained was how to combine them perfectly. He first tried several times in his soul space, but none of the attempts satisfied him. Either construction was too slow, or the resulting structure deviated too much. Constructing a spell was far more difficult than he had imagined, even with his powerful spiritual control. Mages just starting to construct spells probably could not even produce complete runes. This showed that becoming a mage was not so easy.

Although he had a great advantage in control, his disadvantage was equally clear: he had no predecessors' experience to draw upon. He was probably the only Person Who Casts Spells Purely with Spiritual Power in the world. He had to work all of this out himself.

Several weeks soon passed, and he had been in Pelaven's territory for almost a month. This happened to be payday. Wages here were settled weekly. Every week, someone calculated their success rates, assigned a coefficient based on those rates, and multiplied it by their output to determine their wages. Allen's success rate was very high. Compared with when he used the Water Elemental Heart, it had even improved after a brief adjustment to using Mental Power to condense mana. His output, however, was always the lowest, meeting only the minimum each time. As a result, his wages were not particularly high among the apprentices.

He spent roughly two or three hours each day brewing potions and devoted the rest of his time to experimenting with the spell he had just learned. He had mastered it not long ago. With his Mental Power full, he could cast it around fifteen times, but its power was quite ordinary. At most, it resembled a First-Rank Spell; more often, it was about the same as the Charged Staff's Wind Blade. He therefore planned to study how to strengthen his spell. He tried several times, but neither increasing his Mental Power output nor slowing down his casting did anything to strengthen it.

Finally, he turned his attention to the Spell Runes. These were the foundation of everything. Both Mental Power output and mana condensation had to undergo conversion through runes. The runes essentially represented the upper limit of a spell's power; everything else was secondary. No wonder he had found so few runes after searching the Library's second floor for nearly a month and going through the entire floor. Runes were actually this important. Whether a spell was powerful depended on its conversion runes.

The only problem now was that Allen had practically no Spell Runes on hand. His only Runes Book contained individual basic runes rather than ready-designed Spell Runes. After all, even the simplest spell was composed of many individual runes. He had never heard of a spell cast with a single rune. If that were possible, becoming a mage would be far too easy.