23 Chapter 23: 'Hardwork'
Fritz’s facial expression was as if he had witnessed the most terrifying scene in this world
After a few moments…
“Coughed! Coughed!”
Due to the fear and agitation, Fritz was forced to puke out a mouthful of fresh blood that splashed on the broken table below him
Only then did the magic circles on both Claude and Fritz’s eyes vanishes
However, even then, the Vice-general’s face was still ghastly pale
Claude’s magic might not leave a permanent effect on him since he is still a 5th fusion rank mage but as of right now, he requires more time to recover
“Will you send more reinforcements or not?” Claude questioned harshly
His darkness-type mystic gem hovering on top of his palm as if he would not hesitate to use magic if ever Fritz refuses
“FUCKING BASTARD!” Fritz raged. His face showed a ferocious expression that is not something that a Vice-general should make
Fritz’s fire-type mystic gem flew out of his elixir field but before he can cast any spell, a cold gleaming blade already threatened to cut off his neck
A mage’s cultivation wouldn’t improve their physique that much even if they were to reach a high rank
But that doesn’t mean that there is no way to have a body as strong as those of the magic beasts
It’s just that, it would require a ton of resources and also harsh training
Claude is clearly one of the mages that have a trained and fortified physique judging by how fast he moves from taking his sword out to placing it directly in front of Fritz’s neck
“I repeat, will you send reinforcements or not?” Claude repeated, his tone sounding even more dangerous than before as if a demon from hell was demanding something from a mere mortal but that is when a sudden sense of pressure bore down on the two of them
This pressure was not a physical one but a pressure that attacks their souls
Claude was in a better condition as he merely frowned a bit but Fritz was different
He can feel his soul trembling from that pressure
“Stop causing a scene”
From the office’s door stood a muscular man. The pressure he emits was stronger than mages at the 5th fusion rank
“General Leon” Claude greeted as he took his sword back and only then did Fritz heave a sigh of relief
“Vice-general, if you want to continue holding your post, I suggest you don’t do anything to disgrace yourself” the General said and Fritz can only lower his head in shame
“Captain Claude, I don’t care how famous or strong you are. Even before entering the military, you already know that we have a strict hierarchy. As a Captain, show respect to the Vice-general”
“Understood, General but my request still remains. I need reinforcements in the Ratois Mountain. I fear that if we don’t do anything to resolve the situation as fast as possible, it would continue to deteriorate”
“I understand but although the Vice-general is wrong to send only 20 newbies, with the current situation, the military protocol wouldn’t allow us to send high-level mages. I could only send more ungraded and 1st fusion grade”
In that, Claude didn’t argue anymore since he is also aware of how the military moves
Since the situation still has not caused enough damage, the military wouldn’t send their experts
After all, if in every incident, they send their experts, who could they send if ever a real danger arrives?
“Thank you, General” Claude said before excusing himself while General Leon watched his back
‘He is still young yet his soul already reached the 6th rank…’ The General thought in his head
———
“Fuck… I finally finished cultivating!” Rezen sighed in relief at that but looking outside, he saw the sun is almost rising
For an entire night, the only thing he did was digging holes in his farm to plant the thousands of seeds
After that, he waited until they were fully matured, and only then did he harvest all of them
However, harvesting the crops doesn’t mean that he finally has free time
Since the rainbow clementines are ripe, Rezen ate a thousand of them, and only then did he upgrade his elixir field to a maximum capacity of 4 mystic gems! His stomach was on the brink of exploding many times but who would have thought that the recovery pills would bring him back to full health?
After that, Rezen shook of his sleepiness with the help of more recovery pills to condense two mystic gem embryos with the water element before fusing them into a 1st fusion grade water-type mystic gem
Currently, his comprehension of the water element is the best and Rezen made a major sacrifice (1 sleepless night that was relieved by pills) to obtain a 1st fusion grade mystic gem
When all of his tasks were finished, it was already early morning. If he have chickens on his farm, they would have woken him up already
“Why is cultivating this hard?” Rezen complained although he only pulled a single all-nighter when other people have to spend almost all of their time in cultivation. Not to mention, his pills relieved his sleepiness
“Since it’s early morning already, it would be inefficient to sleep as I have to exterminate magic beasts again later…”
Since sleeping is not an option, Rezen just called his friend
“Are you still holding a grudge with me for thinking that you edited that video? Rezen, you are too petty!” Neil said as soon as he accepted the call
‘The hell? I already completely forgot about that! Just how bad is this bastard’s impression of me?!’
Rezen just called Neil to have him pick up the spirit plants since he has somewhere to go later. What grudge is this bastard talking about?
Because of a sleepless night, Rezen’s mood is already not good and he scowled
“Just come here and take the spirit plants!” He said before ending the call
Since there is still some time before the ‘project magic beasts extermination’ would start again, Rezen decided to scroll the internet for now when he remembered his ‘viral video’ and he checked it on youtube or more like he checked the comments to see what people think about him
[Wow… is it just me or that mage is handsome?]
[+1 to the person above!]
[+2!]
“Psh… what are they talking about? I’m just a bit better than average!”
The compliments of the netizens improved Rezen’s mood to a great extent. His vanity was being satisfied
After all, who wouldn’t want to be famous with people thinking that you are very handsome?
Who would feel bad for receiving these compliments?
However, Rezen’s good mood was soon shattered
[Meh, he’s only so-so]
[Right! He only knows how to use one spell!]
[He might be a pervert that spends all his time learning only one magic spell to show off!]
“You bitches! I worked really hard to learn that spell! How dare you insult me?!” Rezen raged
Do they know all the hardships he went through to learn the [Sun Blast] spell?
His life was literally in danger when fighting those grey wolves and he barely survived!
Moreover, obtaining the mysterious peach has a very low probability!
“Out of all mages in the world, who could be as hardworking as me? They only have to consume resources and calmly sit down to read magic theory books while my back has to suffer every day from my farm work!”
Rezen felt resentful to these netizens that were insulting him when they didn’t know how hard he worked to have even just a ‘little’ bit of progress
“The internet really is an ugly world!” Rezen commented and he exited the youtube app as he felt discouraged by those comments
He just decided to scroll on memes before Neil arrived at his house with bloodshot eyes as if Rezen just killed the seven generations of his family
“What’s up? Why are you looking at me like that?”
“Rezen, you’re too bad! You purposely forced me to come this early, right?”
“Why are you accusing me! I have somewhere to go later and I only have this morning as my free time!”
“Tsk, I don’t believe you!”
“Whatever! Just go take the spirit plants!”
Rezen let Neil enter his house and the man saw the piles of vismian grass, soul-tearing peas, and rainbow clementines on the floor as if they were just useless things
This is really a heartless way to store them but in Rezen’s defense, he was too ‘sleepy’ and ‘tired’ to place them in his Tupperware. Besides, with the quantity of these spirit plants, Rezen don’t have enough Tupperware to store them in the first place
“You bought the Tupperware, right?”
“I didn’t!”
“How are you going to take them then? I already told you last night to use some of the money to buy more Tupperware! Did you hoard them all? I’ll snitch you to uncle!”
“Bah! Who would expect that you would treat these spirit plants that almost became the cause of our shop’s demolition like this?!”
“Just go and fetch Tupperware in the city and come back immediately! I’m really busy!”
“I knew it, you are holding a grudge! You want to make it hard for me!”
In the end, Neil was still forced to drive back to the city before returning to Rezen’s house
Rezen was expecting Neil to return with Tupperware but the man returned with large herb boxes
But since Rezen is happy as long as his goods are picked up, who is he to nitpick?
——-
Rezen headed to the foot of the mountain earlier than the intended time as he realized something
Although he now has a water-type mystic gem, he doesn’t know any water-type spells at the 2nd fusion grade!
Of course, with his comprehension at the 2nd fusion, Rezen can create his own magic spells since magic spells were basically a practical application of the magic theories
However, that would take a bit more time and it would be faster to learn an already made spell
Anyway, he feels like he could easily understand water-type magic spells not exceeding the 2nd fusion grade
“Brother Claude, do you have water-type magic spell books?” Rezen asks, trying his luck
“Water-type spells? Hmm, wait for me” Claude replied as he talked to one of his subordinates
He didn’t think much about Rezen needing those magic books
Anyway, many mages at the lower ranks would try to learn as many types of magic to see which suited them best
Mages with 1 and 2 mystic gems at their level are common since as long as their soul reached the peak of their rank, they could store 2 mystic gems at their level
But of course, most of the time, those two mystic gems are of the same type as two of them are needed to reach the next rank
However, with some effort and resources, a mage’s elixir field could be upgraded to hold 4 mystic gems
But of course, again, those 4 would only have two types. If not, how could the mage advance the gems into the next rank?
As for beyond the 4 slots, not many mages could achieve that
They either have to consume treasures or spend a long time nourishing their elixir field since a mage’s soul power can also be used as a substitute for the treasures. Though using only soul power would not be practical
Mages with no resources could only rely on the automatic mana recovery of their elixir field to condense mystic gems and also the automatic restoration of their soul power to nourish their elixir field
If a mage only relies on themselves alone, although there is hope that they could advance in ranks, their speed would be painfully slow!
Since Rezen received a fortune from who knows where Claude wouldn’t even be surprised if this kid upgraded his elixir field to have the capacity of 6 mystic gems
Claude already saw Rezen having a sun-type and earth-type mystic gem, his third type of mystic gem might have been water-type
After Claude talked to his subordinate for a moment, he received some books that he then handed to Rezen
“Here, you can read them for now but I have to return them since these are not mine. But later, I would have someone send you more books and you don’t need to return those”