Copying such a complicated mess would be really difficult. From the size of the projection, Angor could tell that it was used on medium to small sized items.
Drawing a rune on a small item such as a golden bolt required Angor to shrink the rune according to equal proportion. A full-sized “Prelude to Elimination” already looked like an ink puddle. Any smaller, and no human eyes or pens would be useful to work on it.
However, that was not a problem for now. First, Angor needed to draw “Prelude to Elimination”.
Instead of doing it right away, Angor picked up Enchantment Cyclopaedia: Advanced and kept reading.
Despite its complicated pattern, the outcome of the magic array was quite simple: when triggered, the enchantment would release a low-frequency sound wave which would then disrupt the already chaotic energy inside undead creatures to eliminate them.
Angor remembered reading about something called “infrasonic sound” before. It defined sound with a frequency of below 20Hz. Such sound had longer wavelengths, which made it persist longer in travel mediums.
He took a guess that “Prelude to Elimination” could create something that resonated with undead energy and it could cause an imbalance, thus destroying undead beings.
Of course, it was only his assumption. He did not have an acoustic spectrum analyzer anyway.
Angor kept reading to see if there was anything else that worked against the undead. Hopefully, it had something easier to draw.
He spent a day quickly going over the book which contained almost ten thousand different magic arrays. Now his vision felt dark even without looking at anything.
The other ones all looked as complicated as “Prelude to Elimination”. Angor could only see their differences when he looked close enough. Otherwise, he would only be seeing “black ink”. In the advanced book, he found a total of 13 magic arrays for dealing with undead creatures. However, some of them were not created just for this reason.
For instance, there was an array called “Mass Brilliance” which meant to purify polluted earth and dispel darkness, but it could also purify the filthy energy inside undead beings and cleanse their souls.
“Mass Brilliance” could be applied to achieve a number of goals. Accordingly, it also consisted of a terrifyingly big number of runes, which was 36. Every single rune looked difficult to draw. According to the book, “Mass Brilliance” was used on large items, and the materials suitable to go with the magic array all cost dearly. A successfully-made item with this particular magic array could well be used as a tactical deployment in a war.
Before even thinking about whether he could draw the magic array, Angor knew he would never find enough money to afford the materials at his current state. It would probably cost the entire centurial income of a small-scale wizard organization. Furthermore, having enough money did not mean the materials could be found easily. Some of the key materials were nearly extinct in the wizarding world as well as the planes nearby. Also, even if he had them, it was impossible for Angor to do anything about the materials.
Perhaps he would have a chance after turning into a wizard.
The other anti-undead arrays were either too difficult to achieve like “Mass Brilliance” or were simply more complicated than Prelude to Elimination.
In the end, Angor had to consider Prelude to Elimination.
He hesitated for a while and decided to open the next folder — Enchantment Cyclopaedia: For Masters .
He had only opened this folder when he was arranging the pictures of books he recorded. This was the first time he actually tried to read its content.
A great number of images were presented in front of him.
A quick look told him that there were about two thousand pictures. One magic array usually took two pictures to explain—one with the picture of the array, and one with explanatory texts. This meant the folder contained around a thousand magic arrays.
It was a smaller number compared to the first three editions. As for the difficulty of the arrays…
Angor opened one of the pictures and quickly closed his eyes in horror.
He was already used to looking at congested lines drawn on a surface, but this one was a different case!
“Is that a magic array or solid geometry textbook?!”
In a sense, this array did not look so difficult since it only contained 16 runes, which were aligned in a pretty loose way. But… the runes were not drawn on a surface this time. They intersected, overlapped or mirrored each other in a three-dimensional space.
Alchemy items were three-dimensional alright… but how did someone draw a three-dimensional picture on stuff?!
“Heh. Hehe… see you later.” Angor tapped the “X” in the upper-right corner and decided not to bother with this folder again. At least not before becoming a wizard.
Now he was back at “Prelude to Elimination”.
The array now looked a lot friendlier to him. Such a “simple” array was already a rare sight comparing to the other ones, and Angor really wanted to cherish it.
Still… how to actually work on it was still a problem.
Angor thought about an idea soon.
Since the 1:1 pattern looks too congested, why not enlarging it?
Making the projection ten times bigger proved to be easy enough. This would be impossible for other alchemists who had not already learned the array. Changing the size of a magic array was only possible for common alchemists on condition that they had already mastered it.
Now, Angor could do it with just a tap of a button. He quickly found a size that was suitable for him to practice on. This would help him learn alchemy way faster than anyone else.
The strokes and blank intervals inside the bigger “Prelude to Elimination” were now clear to see.
Looking at the picture that occupied quite some space, Angor sighed in frustration.
“So much work to do… I probably need a day or two to completely copy it. Aw, hell. I’ll give it a go.”
He only had one thing on his mind by doing the first attempt, which was to see whether he could successfully draw the transition part between two runes.
Due to the special functions of magic arrays, memory alone would no longer do the trick. Alchemists needed to fully comprehend the meanings hidden behind the runes and remember them as well. Angor believed that his memory would not fail since he could do it in an easier way by copying the projection. However, he still had to make sure.
The first try led him to the 69th stroke. He failed when a drop of sweat dripped onto his pen, which caused the current line to stray.
The second try failed at the 419th stroke.
The third, still a failure.
And the fourth, the fifth…
He finally managed to complete a rune on his eighth attempt. Now was the important part, since he must create a smooth transit and keep working on the second rune.
Left, right, turnover, a circle, and a counter-clockwise arc…
The transition cost him half an hour to draw. The last stroke was landed perfectly, which meant he could finally proceed to the second rune.
Angor could not hold back his excitement, which caused his pen tip to tremble again, thus putting a stop to his attempt.
He was still happy though. At least he could keep trying and create a complete magic array in the end at this rate.
But another problem soon appeared. He could draw a complete array alright. However, it only existed on a piece of paper.
Applying a functional enchantment to something asked for a stable and continuous mana output. Drawing the picture alone would take him two days. Suppose Angor could stay focused for that long, could he store enough mana for it?
He could try getting better at drawing the array, but his best speed would still cost him a full day.
Angor did a brief calculation and realized that he could maintain a stable mana flow into his enchantment for… half a day, at best.
Where could he find the extra mana? Also, he had to keep Thaw and Hand of Spell running in the whole process, which would consume more mana.
Before finding a solution, his plan had to be put on hold.
…
After keeping himself shut in his house for a week, Angor came to Prome’s Alchemy Shop again.
He chose a time when there were fewer customers in the market. Upon arriving, he saw Dave cleaning the surface of a chopping blade with a wild design by using some kind of green liquid.
The blade possessed a look that could not be found anywhere in the wizarding world.
A Chinese kitchen knife.
Angor had placed most of his alchemy creations in the shop so Dave could help him sell them. The kitchen knife was his second creation when he tried to make a one-piece item. Aside from its above-average sharpness, the knife did not have any special traits.
Dave applied his green liquid to the entire blade before he noticed someone had come.
“Angor?” Dave put the knife aside. “Finally. Master Prome’s been waiting for you in the shop the past few days, but he left yesterday evening.”
Angor felt a bit sorry upon hearing this. He had been focusing on his training and was not expecting that Prome waited for his answer so diligently.
“I… had too much information to check. Ahem! But I finally found a clue,” said Angor as he coughed and pretended that he was tired from his research.