Chapter 276: Phylactery
Ace thought for a moment, pried off a rib, and used the scorching flame to burn it directly into ashes, which he then sprinkled onto the heart.
With the entry of the True Spirit, the sealed heart actually gradually resumed beating.
Ace stuffed the heart into the position of the skeleton’s heart, and a strange Undead with a heartbeat was born. After multiple experiments, Ace finally confirmed that this Undead’s strength could grow slowly, and at the same time, its vital point was no longer the soul fire.
When confirming how to kill it, Ace finally discovered that extinguishing the soul fire would not kill this kind of Undead. As time passed, the beating heart would generate new soul fire.
If the beating True Spirit heart were destroyed, this Undead would completely perish.
Further research by Ace revealed that this True Spirit heart could leave the special Undead. This separation would cause a slight decrease in the special Undead’s strength, but as long as its True Spirit heart was not discovered, it meant this special undead would be truly undying!
“From another perspective, as long as I control their hearts, I will control their lifeline. This new undead is somewhat similar to the lich from my previous life, but the lich is a magic user. To distinguish them, those using a heart will be called Skeleton Warriors and Skeleton Knights, while those using the Soul Sanctuary will be called Liches.”
Ace recorded the conclusions and deductions of the experiment in his grimore. He had not conducted a lich transformation experiment; after all, no ready-made Advanced Wizard Apprentice had volunteered for the experiment, so everything Ace had was just deduction.
In the following time, Ace further perfected this reasearch. By chance, Ace discovered that a pitch-black fruit in the Reflection World had the effect of integrating and coordinating the True Spirit with the heart, and another kind of turbid gray water also had a wonderful effect, capable of melting bone, blood, and flesh without losing their characteristics.
Ace called this fruit the Spirit-Suppressing Fruit, and the turbid gray water the Bone-Melting Water.
Using the water as the soup base and the fruit as the starter, pouring the still-warm heart and ribs mixed with hot blood into it would instantly turn it into a thick blood-red paste. Then, the mutated True Spirit wrapped in residual soul fragments would be poured into the paste.
Roasted by the magical flame derived from the True-Illusion Dream, the paste would transform into the form it had before death. Ace stored it in a special box, weighed the box in his hand, and said:
“This is the box storing the life of the Skeleton Warrior; it can be called a Phylactery. As long as one has the Phylactery, one can easily establish a harsh covenant with the Skeleton Warrior and control everything about it!”
Ace’s eyes shone brightly. This was a true path to immortality. Although much was lost, strength growth became slow, and there were obvious weaknesses, this would definitely become the choice for many Wizards whose lives were coming to an end.
Either leave with regrets or choose to become a Lich and pursue more possibilities in the future.
A week later, Ace went to Warren’s residence in Milne City again to borrow the latest issue of Magic. This time, Caruso, the Vice-President of the branch, also came here.
An article caught Ace’s attention: “Phased Results on the Wizardification of Divine Descendants,” signed by Bayen.
After failing the promotion, Bayen’s Mental Power reached 9.9 unit. Although there was temporarily no possibility of advancing, after adjusting his mindset, he persisted in completing his research.
Seven years had passed since Ace decided to postpone instigating the lower-level Divine Descendant Nobles and let him deeply research the four issues of Divine Descendant Wizardification. During these seven years, he successively used more than ten Divine Descendants of different strength levels for experiments. Finally, the Divine Descendant Haren advanced to become an Advanced Wizard Apprentice, and a phased conclusion was reached.
Ace gently flipped through Bayen’s paper, carefully reading his conclusions.
“This experiment was only conducted on Divine Descendants of three strength levels: Unawakened, Divine Awakened, and Pseudo-Hero. It is unclear whether it applies to existences at the Hero level and above.
“Unless specially marked, the Divine Descendants mentioned in this paper refer to the above three.
“Not all Divine Descendants can switch to the Wizard path. As long as the Bloodline Power is activated and Bloodline Rune structures appear in the heart, one cannot simultaneously cultivate the Wizard’s magic path and can only cast partial pseudo-spells like a Knight.
“That is, Unawakened ones can walk the path of magic, while Divine Awakened and Pseudo-Heroes cannot.
“Perhaps the Knight’s path has similarities or overlaps with the Hero’s path. This research did not delve deeply into their similarities and differences and will not repeat them here.
“Bloodline is both a help and a constraint for Unawakened ones walking the path of magic.
“Because of the bloodline, a Divine Descendant’s Mana Affinity is much higher than that of an ordinary Wizard Apprentice. It is easier to achieve Mental Overdrive. Using certain magic with an affinity for their own bloodline will have bonuses in casting power and casting speed.
“However, also because of the bloodline, Divine Descendants will have casting obstacles with magic that has no bloodline affinity and cannot cast magic that conflicts with their bloodline.
“After advancing to Advanced Wizard Apprentice, this phenomenon becomes more significant.
“Divine Descendant Wizard Apprentices have great limitations in choosing the direction of Level 0 Runes and 0-Ring Spell Models. Constrained by the influence of their bloodline, they cannot freely combine to decide their path and can only choose a path based on their bloodline.
“Divine Descendants are faster than us ordinary people in the early stages of the magic path and have a greater possibility of Overdrive and promotion. However, after the Advanced Apprentice stage, the gap between the two sides disappears. Even because we mortal Wizards have a larger range of free choices, we have greater potential and possibilities in the later stages instead.”
Bayen’s article didn’t state it explicitly, but Ace saw his thoughts. Bayen felt it was time to develop unawakened ones in various city-states, instigate low-level Nobles, and tempt them with supernatural power to become part of the Wizards.
Ace’s gaze was profound, as if seeing a tall building being corroded from the foundation, seeing a majestic dam collapsing bit by bit. He said in a deep voice to Warren and Caruso:
“Bayen’s research can prove that Divine Descendants can also become Wizards and betray their origins because of it. Although Divine Descendant Nobles are powerful and their uppermost layer suppresses the entire human society, the lowest layer of their rule consists of a group of Unawakened ones, commonly known as the Incompetent.
“According to the survey statistics of various branches in the seven city-states of Salia, the Incompetent account for eighty percent of the total number of Divine Descendant Nobles. Although their bodies are stronger than mortals, the vast majority of them can never have supernatural power in their entire lives.
“They are the cornerstone of the Divine Descendant Nobles’ rule and also the group easiest to instigate!”
Warren and Caruso had finished reading Bayen’s masterpiece long ago. They also had the intention to try instigating the cornerstone of Divine Descendant rule, but without orders from the High Tower, they dared not act rashly.
In the five northern states of Salia, the actions of the Punishers organization were completely public, supported by various city-states. In recent years, they had brutally suppressed any potentially discovered desecrator. Even Divine Descendant families, once tainted by connection with a desecrator, could lose their lives.
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