Ancient Wizards: A Little Progress Every Day

"The gathering of southern wizarding geniuses has already begun."

Undine said calmly, her voice like the unchanging cold wind outside the tower: "Barker left the French Ring a year ago and went to the ruins of the Fairy City."

The battle for the Isidor Wizards' roster spot is still about four months away from officially starting.

"Four months..."

Dago silently recited the number without speaking.

This is not just a unit of time, but a countdown to death.

In the wizarding world, falling behind often means becoming someone else's experimental subject or a stepping stone for advancement.

Barker's departure a year in advance means that he has already established his own rule advantage there, and may even have already eliminated a number of competitors.

Undine thought for a moment, then turned her spatial ring. As ripples spread through the space, she took out three items and handed them to Dargo.

Dago examined the three things before him. They were not merely objects, but solidified energy and rules.

The first item was a bottle of black, cloudy medicine.

Even through the specially made crystal bottle, Dargo could still feel the chilling energy radiation inside, as if countless wronged souls were howling.

The murky black color is not impurities, but a visual illusion created by highly concentrated negative energy particles in an extremely active state.

The second item was a small, dry, twisted root-like object. Upon closer inspection, it appeared to resemble the casing of some kind of dried animal intestines.

Its surface is covered with fine, naturally formed magical patterns, and it exudes an ancient and sweet-smelling aura, the scent of the residual life essence of a high-level creature.

The last item was a uniquely shaped metal box, its surface covered with a dense array of interlocking brass gears. These gears were not decorative; they were engaged in some kind of endless mechanical calculation.

Inside the box was a small runestone.

Dago picked up the rune stone from the box and examined it. He probed it with his mental energy and was surprised to find that it was a map.

It's a very large map, covering almost the entire southern part of the Upper Ring Continent.

Countless points of light flickered in the sea of ​​consciousness; these were markers for energy nodes.

Two points were specifically marked: one was the Fairy City Ruins, which Undine had mentioned earlier, the actual location of the battle for the "Isidore Wizard Seat".

That point was a strange, blood-red color, like a giant vortex greedily devouring everything around it.

Another point shows the ruins of the Mechanical Heart.

Dago blinked, withdrawing his mental energy. The blue light in his eyes flickered slightly, indicating that he was conducting a rapid analysis and weighing the pros and cons.

He looked up and waited for Undine's explanation.

"These are the follow-up rewards and compensation that the Thorn Ring has given you. The first two items are magical potions that can increase soul power."

Undine pointed to the bottle of black potion, "This is 'Abyssal Howl,' extracted from the core essence of thirty-three kinds of vengeful spirits. After being purified ten thousand times, the impurities of consciousness have been removed, leaving only pure soul energy."

Although the process of taking it will be accompanied by an intense feeling of soul tearing apart, like a storm sweeping through your mental space, as long as you can endure it, your soul power will experience an explosive increase.

She then pointed to the dried intestine, "This is the molted skin of a Void Worm. Void Worms live by devouring free energy in the rifts of the spirit world, and their molted skin has extremely strong solidification and fusion properties."

It can neutralize the ferocity of "Abyssal Howl" and prevent your mental space from collapsing during the enhancement process. Together, they form a top-tier resource for breaking through the third-ring wizard's soul barrier.

In this world, power is never free.

To gain an extraordinary soul, one must endure pain unimaginable to ordinary people.

Dago expressionlessly put away the two treasures that would drive an ordinary wizard mad. There was no greed in his eyes, only a calm acceptance of this "pain-for-power" mechanism.

"The third item is the key to enter the ruins of the Mechanical Heart..."

"The key to the ruins of the Mechanical Heart..."

The key couldn't possibly be a rune map, so Dago's gaze fell on the strange metal box that held the map.

The constantly turning gears made a subtle "click" sound, as if telling a mechanical rhythm.

"The Mechanical Heart is a remnant of the dwarven civilization, and it has been explored many times by southern wizards. Many of the metal magical puppets used by southern wizards today are derived from the legacy of the Mechanical Heart..."

Undine explained, her tone carrying a hint of objective assessment of that lost civilization, "Although the dwarves did not possess the wisdom of wizards to explore the essence of truth, they did indeed forge a unique path in the manufacture of 'tools'."

They attempted to simulate the workings of the laws using sophisticated mechanical structures—a clumsy but effective effort.

Dago frowned, but before he could ask, Costi continued, "However, the most valuable thing in the ruins of the Mechanical Heart is not what those dwarven craftsmen left behind, but Melville's legacy."

"Melville!"

A strange light flashed in Dago's eyes; Melville was the name of the first legendary wizard he had ever encountered.

This name was far more appealing to him than "Isidore".

Because he used the "Phantom Dream Sphere" countless times.

Every time I activate the "Phantom Dream Sphere," I hear Melville's voice repeatedly—young, bright, seemingly forever full of passion and boundless curiosity.

"Welcome, newcomer wielding the Dream Orb, to Melville's dreamlike realm."

That voice transcends time and space, and remains vivid.

That was not just a message from a powerful person, but also a kind of fanaticism for the unknown, a wizarding spirit that regarded the whole world as a playground and laboratory.

"Melville should be the earliest explorer of the Mechanical Heart, and there is even a claim that the Mechanical Heart was built by the Dwarven civilization under his guidance."

That was a crazy experiment, an attempt to graft mechanical civilization onto wizarding civilization.

A hint of awe flashed in Undine's eyes. "Melville left many similar metal boxes inside the Mechanical Heart before he left."

"Some of these boxes contain magical artifacts, some contain rare magical inheritances, some contain rare runes, some contain nothing at all, and some may even contain some bad things."

For example, a sealed curse, or an alchemical bomb about to explode.

Later wizards called these boxes Melville's Wonder Boxes.

You never know whether what's inside the box is a surprise or a shock until you open it...

This is the allure of probability and the unknown, and a microcosm of the wizard's journey to explore the truth.

Every experiment is like opening a box; it could be the dawn of truth, or it could be an explosion in the laboratory.

This perfectly matches Dargo's fantasy of Melville—an unpredictable, mischievous boy who also manipulates the rules of the world.

Undine said, "There's a special connection between the magic boxes; you can try your luck at the Mechanical Heart Ruins."

Dago nodded, his fingers gently stroking the cold gears on the metal box.

Undine's suggestion is good; it's also the optimal solution based on absolute rationality.

During his final days in the meditation room, he devoted most of his energy to combining ice, space, and mirror magic, but he hit a bottleneck.

The integration of rules is far more difficult than the manipulation of a single element; it's like trying to force water and fire together.

If we can't make progress in spatial and mirror magic, we might find a breakthrough in metal magic.

Melville's legacy may offer him a new perspective, a completely new way of thinking about the transformation of "material structure" and "energy form".

Dargo thanked Undine in a calm but solemn tone.

He could roughly guess that the only compensation or reward the so-called Thorn Ring would give him was the final metal magic box.

Because that involves the right to explore a historical site, which aligns with the organization's logic of distributing benefits.

The first two, that precious bottle of "Abyssal Howl" and "Void Worm Molting," might very well have been a personal gift from Undine.

Some things don't need to be said explicitly; in the wizarding world, the exchange of benefits is an eternal theme.

Such investments, imbued with a touch of warmth, require a longer-term return to repay.

Dago remembered it all and transformed it into the motivation to climb the peak of truth.