Chapter 181: Undead And Ruins
Mei Fu kept tilting her head to look at him, her gaze strange: “Meow, are you a wizard, or a sorcerer, or a paladin?”
One person and one cat shared a soul symbiosis, able to roughly sense each other’s class status.
“Mm, wide interests. I’m also mana casting.” Anse thought, and a white feather quill floated out from the spellbook, hovering above the page, spinning and dancing, very lively.
“Meow? Truly rare.” Mei Fu jumped to Anse’s hand side, resting her chin on the edge of the book, squinting at the dancing wizard’s quill.
“Can you sense it? The magic net is chaotic, many spellcasters have lost their casting ability.” Anse explained.
“Meow? Meow!” Mei Fu suddenly stood up, paced two circles in cat steps, then flopped down powerlessly, “I can’t sense it, my arcane power needs to rely on you to exist, whatever you use, I use.”
“That’s not bad.” Anse said while recalling the spell model of alarm.
The wizard’s quill danced rapidly on the page, an abstract three-dimensional model emerged on the paper, with clear trajectories, distinct layers, precise model, every node exact.
Five minutes passed, and the wizard’s quill finally stopped.
At the top of the page was written “Alarm”, below was a complex three-dimensional model, with detailed annotations, filling the whole page.
“A first ring spell fills a page, what about second ring and third ring?” Anse understood transcribing scrolls, knowing that the most important thing for a spell scroll was continuity; without mana flow, even precise transcription was useless.
Spell scrolls had no standard size; the smaller the better as long as it could be cast normally; if made into one meter per scroll, it was inconvenient to carry and prone to damage.
“Meow, one spell per page, the wizard’s quill can write very small.” Mei Fu explained.
Anse understood; 「Book of Castella」 could be mentally browsed during meditation, font size indeed didn’t affect reading.
He didn’t waste time, continuing to transcribe other spells, spending over two hours to copy all eight first ring spells and four second ring spells into the spellbook, each twice, for easy tearing into scrolls.
Flipping through the densely packed content in the spellbook, he still felt a great sense of accomplishment.
He had a flash of inspiration and tried transcribing sorcerer spells, but the wizard’s quill paused for a moment and wrote a bunch of garbled code.
‘It’s not impossible, but I need to figure it out first.’ He wasn’t disappointed; the future was long.
He flipped to the page with vigilance, and tore hard, but the page didn’t budge.
Mei Fu covered her eyes with her paws, as if unable to bear watching.
Anse gave a dry laugh, then realized; while tearing, he issued the command, the page glowed faintly, and detached automatically.
A spiritual light flashed; the spell model on it seemed to gain flesh and blood, every node and line filled with mana, exceptionally vivid.
He rolled up the page and carefully put it into the dragonhide pouch.
‘One per day is not bad, I knew wizards aren’t all diligent!’
After finishing these, he authorized five spells—alarm, mage armor, unseen servant, find familiar, arcane lock—to Mei Fu, so she could help with vigilance, cast armor, and such usually.
Now his wizard spells were too few, not many choices; spells like mirror image, false life, absorb elements couldn’t target others.
Mei Fu’s casting ability and mana were equivalent to a level 9 wizard, but she needed to rely on the spellbook and Anse; she herself knew no spells.
After changing owners, she only retained basic arcana knowledge and language ability, understood spellbook use, and was good at transcribing scrolls.
Anse had high expectations for her, but didn’t rush to assign tasks; better to get along for a while first.
He originally wanted to summon a magic pet, but found he had no high-quality incense; this was a consumable, couldn’t bypass materials.
‘Next level up, for empowering metamagic choose subtle spell; scrounging materials everywhere is annoying.’
He teleported back to Jacqueline Castle; Mei Fu used the spellbook as a mount, floating by his side, curious about everything.
Sometimes she even chased dancing elemental orbs, very lively.
‘She’s not lazy at all.’ Anse thought 「Book of Castella」’s judgment of Mei Fu’s personality might be inaccurate.
He glanced out the window and saw a group of cloaked people outside the castle, one bald head particularly eye-catching.
‘Alchemist Soske? Probably here for the black dragon corpse.’
He hurried downstairs and bumped into Illyas right at the entrance of the hall; she was carrying a large black bag, unknown what was inside.
“Eh?” Illyas looked at Mei Fu, full of surprise and curiosity, “What is this?”
“Companion, her name is Mei Fu.” Anse said calmly; companion was a broad concept, magic pet or friend both counted.
Mei Fu rode the spellbook, hiding behind Anse, peeking out to size up Illyas.
Illyas didn’t force closer upon seeing this, but glared at Anse, saying oddly: “Tsk, you have this hobby.”
“She’s not a druid, she’s a wizard.” Anse quickly added.
“Oh~” Illyas gave him a knowing smile, didn’t pursue, but handed him the black bag in her hand, “This is Soske’s dimensional bag, containing that black dragon corpse.”
Dimensional bag was the general term for dimensional storage items; capacity varied, but ones able to hold a black dragon corpse were extremely rare.
“Pretty fast; he also acquired those werewolf corpses before, can he use them all?” Anse took the bag and walked out side by side with Illyas.
“He has undead aura on him.” Illyas whispered.
Anse instantly understood; no wonder Soske didn’t come in, probably marked by the detect magic array.
He didn’t maliciously speculate; having undead aura wasn’t a big deal, there were plenty of undead near Vehral City ruins anyway.
Still, he quietly cast detect evil and good.
The two reached the castle entrance and saw from afar the pacing bald man, his skin even paler, bloodless.
Soske saw Anse, his face stiffened, but his expression was naturally stiff, so others didn’t notice.
‘Meow, this person is researching undead spells.’ Mei Fu’s telepathic message rang in Anse’s mind.
Her perception was excellent, arcana level very high, able to easily distinguish contamination from spells.
Anse remained calm; Soske was not evil alignment, researching undead spells might be to explore Vehral City ruins.
“Not seen for a few days, you’re getting stronger.” Soske praised; this wasn’t entirely flattery, he could indeed sense Anse’s aura change.
His gaze fell on Mei Fu and the spellbook, expression slightly changing: “You used that wheel of fortune card?”
“Mm.” Anse knew he misunderstood but didn’t explain, just handed him the black bag; thus their transaction was fully completed.
“What a pity.” Soske took the bag, his dry voice full of regret.
A sorcerer getting a high-quality spellbook was quite dramatic.
“How’s the situation in Toothed Forest lately? Have werewolves surged out in large numbers?” Anse asked.
“Heh, werewolf tribe is scattered, some migrated elsewhere; I had no hindrances on the way…” Soske’s voice was hoarse, yet revealed a hint of excitement.
Werewolf tribe was his biggest obstacle exploring Vehral; he hadn’t expected the largest tribe to be scattered by Anse.
“Then you owe me a favor; remember to think of me first for good stuff.” Anse said half-jokingly.
“Certainly.” Soske slightly bowed, “I have matters, leaving first.”
“Then wish you all smooth.” Anse said meaningfully.
Soske paused, then casually led his people away, steps hurried.
“This person… doesn’t really have some discovery, does he?” Illyas mused.
She’d known Soske a long time; lately he seemed rushed, like time was running out, one last gamble.
Before, he’d insist on seeing those magic cannons; now he didn’t even ask.
“I’m afraid he’ll go all out, crash it, and implicate us.” Anse frowned slightly.
“I’ll have someone watch him.” Illyas considered, “Don’t really cause trouble.”
“Mm. I plan to go to Traveler’s Respite this afternoon, check the situation.”
“I’ll guard you.”
