Back in the woods, Prome only showed mild interest in Angor’s alchemy weapon and nothing else. However, what Angor used during his battle against Mundo in the morning was no ordinary alchemy weapon. He shot more than ten tiered-level alchemy bolts with different enchantments on them!
That totally attracted Prome’s attention.
Prome himself always followed the most correct path of synthesis. In the field of alchemy, synthesis possessed the best potential and possibility to achieve great deeds. On the contrary, enchantment had little such potential. Moreover, many alchemists who believed in ancient rules did not regard enchantment as legit alchemy at all.
The core of alchemy was fusing materials and ideas together, thus creating truth in the process.
However, most alchemists who studied enchantment never figured out the basic meanings of runes. They merely forcefully memorized them to do enchantment. This was completely opposite to the essence of alchemy, so many alchemists did not accept enchantment as a correct way of alchemy.
Yet they must admit that in the early stage, enchantment could create better results compared to basic synthesis.
To enchant something, an alchemist only had to remember a rune and then apply the rune onto the correct material in order to bestow a special effect to a weapon, thus making the weapon a tiered tool.
Those who learned synthesis, however, required a huge amount of time to look into all kinds of data, gain new ideas, and calculate material usage. They usually had to spend years on end before they could finally create something.
Prome had been diligently studying synthesis for 50 years now, and until now, he had only earned a simple glimpse of synthesis. Only when an accidental idea popped up inside his mind could he make a new tiered alchemy item. This was the reason why he only provided something new to the shop once in several months.
Compared to enchantment, synthesis required way more brand new innovations and decades of a learning experience.
Prome, as a “formal” alchemist himself, also regarded enchantment as a petty trick at the beginning. But after spending several decades without gaining much progress, he sometimes would question whether he had chosen the wrong path.
Maybe he would have made a name for himself should he choose enchantment from the start?
This was usually referred to as “Ostrich Mentality”. Instead of admitting failure and accepting the truth, Prome blamed his initial decision.
Still, such a mindset helped him to avoid putting pressure on his mind.
Prome never actually regretted choosing his current path. He believed “synthesis” was the real entrance toward the final truth. Not every alchemist could reach the end of the path, but he should at least had an ambition.
Prome was not trying to find the alchemist who made these bolts because he wanted to set a score between synthesis and enchantment. He had another reason for it.
An old friend who once helped him before wanted him to craft a long-range alchemy weapon. Also, the weapon needed to possess special effects such as “Expel”, “Holy Light”, and “Purify” which were effective against undead creatures.
Prome received the request more than half a year ago. He had made many different alchemy weapons during the time but without finding any inspiration on how to craft something like that.
He learned many material combinations and the effects they granted to items. To create the effect of “Purify” for example, he could use Mass Elixir and a Divine Stone, combined with several minor refinement materials.
Extracting the special properties from these materials could give a weapon “Purify” effect. However, the effect only worked in close range. It would dissipate if the weapon traveled in the air for too far.
For anyone else, Prome could simply postpone the request however he wished. But he owed a big favor to this old friend. Keeping his friend waiting for half a year already embarrassed Prome a lot. Since he still could not get any idea on how to craft the weapon with synthesis, he began to consider enchantment.
Brute Cavern had not seen another alchemist who mastered enchantment for many years… until Angor’s enchantment bolts caught his attention.
…
To satisfy his own goal, Prome was very curious about this unknown alchemist.
Now, Dave’s little friend was the only clue related to this individual. When Dave asked him what had been going on with Angor, Prome explained everything he knew without withholding any information.
Prome acquired every piece of information available to the public in half a day, including Angor’s match schedule, his previous opponents, and so on.
When Dave heard that Angor had been fighting in Sky Tower for more than a month now, he felt really depressed. He always considered Angor as a friend. Also, they met several times during the month, and Angor never mentioned anything to him!
More than anything, Dave was more surprised at Angor’s amazing progress. Heck, Angor had not lost a single match yet!
Dave remained dumbfounded until Prome told him Angor’s title which caused Dave to laugh out all of a sudden.
Now Dave somewhat understood why Angor had been hiding everything. With a title like that, Dave believed he would also keep it from everyone if he was in Angor’s boots.
Prome sighed in the end. “Your little friend always kept a good distance from everyone. He doesn’t talk much, but his actions are brief and efficient. Of course, he has all the reason to be proud when he has achieved so much at such a young age. What I don’t understand though is how did you become the friend of someone like that?”
Prome inspected Dave with a curious look.
Dave, however, was completely puzzled by Prome’s question. Was his mentor talking about Angor at all? Not some kind of arrogant weirdo who always called himself the lord or the king of something?
Proud? Angor?
He did not talk much? Can’t be. Well, maybe Angor was not a big talker, but he was far from being all silent either.
Dave felt as if they were talking about someone completely different.
“Um, personally, I don’t think the proud and distant man you mentioned is Angor,” Dave stuttered a little.
Prome was surprised too. Then he realized something. “So how does your friend look like normally?”
Dave considered for a long time before he finally came up with something. “He’s… nice. He’s just, sometimes, mischievous.”
Prome quickly understood the situation. “I see now. He always hid under a hood during matches and displayed another character. So he must be trying to hide his true identity.”
“Yes, I agree.”
Prome chuckled. “Good for us then. Countless people out there are now looking for Baron Milk, but none of them knows who he really is. We, however, can find out the mysterious alchemist before everyone does.”
Dave thought in his mind. Mysterious alchemist? That’s Angor himself!
“So um, why are you looking for the… alchemist, Master?”
Prome did not hide his intention at all. “I have something that requires help…”
…
At three in the afternoon, Angor walked out of his soundproofed room feeling fully refreshed.
His match against Twilight of Night would begin in 30 minutes. He went through the participant information he read before.
[Twilight of Night, Real name: Selena Walton, Age: 24, Female. A Bloodline apprentice who will soon break through into level-3. She fused her beast blood five years ago. Origin of the blood is unknown. Conjectures suggest that she used the blood of a phantom beast. She can use very swift moves and is skilled at confusing her enemies by constantly moving.]
There were also descriptions about the skills she learned and those she was good at. Angor did not really pay them much attention. These were only common speed-related spells.
Which were pointless against Angor.
Speed… Angor was confident that no apprentice could move faster than Toby.
Angor put on his robe and called toward the attic, “Toby! It’s time to show what you can do!”
Toby left the attic and slowly landed on Angor’s shoulder. It could be seen from Toby’s glimmering eyes and its puffed-up chest that the bird was also excited about its very first display.
Thirty minutes later.
Angor stepped onto the arena of the Three Levels of Death once again.
He could sense the excitement coming from the audience when walking out of the participant passage.
The audience stands were completely taken up. Back in the morning, when he was fighting Wasteland Warrior who ranked higher than Twilight of Night, there were still lots of vacant seats. Now, everyone had fixed his or her intense gaze on him.
The attention from thousands of people caused Angor to shiver a little as if their sights were throwing needles at him.
At the far end of the audience stand, a braided old man leaned against a stone mound and spoke to a middle-aged, uniform woman who had a coil-up hair bun and a fine body shape.
“You think the kid will win, Melantha?” The old man glanced at Angor.
Melantha usually handled the lottery box at Level 1. Today, she left her post and came to Level 13 instead.
“No idea,” Melantha said after some consideration.
“No idea? I think it’s obvious. He defeated Mundo because Mundo was too careless. Now Selena got to be well-prepared. She’s fast too. Bolts without speed runes can never hit her. And even if the kid has those bolts… they won’t do much damage to Selena’s bloodline-improved body… Not unless the bolt is enchanted with both speed runes and damaging ones.
“That means a composite rune. Composite rune! It’s already a magic array! Even the headquarters don’t have many alchemists who can do that.”
By “headquarters”, he meant the most famous place in the entire southern region for its alchemy capacities—Floating Mech City.
Melantha agreed with him, but she also remembered when Angor came to her asking for faster matches. The boy did not seem discouraged by the danger in the Three Levels of Death. He looked confident and said he had some secret weapon.
Melantha had no idea what weapon Angor possessed. Still, the boy had to have his own reasons for being so.
“Let’s wait and see. Who knows, maybe he has a hidden weapon,” Melantha snickered.
“Oh really?” The old man also smiled. When observed by Truesight spell, Angor’s robe could hide nothing from him. He clearly knew whether Angor brought anything else on his body.