Chapter 438 - Elemental Iron
Lin Li was right. Such careless thrusting would definitely lead to trouble…
Just when Stephen was putting all his attention on turning the iron wire in his hands, there was suddenly an eccentric magical wave that radiated from the metal box. The magical wave was as unusual as one could possibly imagine it to be. There were no signs to tell the source of the magical wave. It was as if the magical wave had appeared out of nowhere.
Furthermore, that magical wave changed very quickly. At the beginning, it was nothing but a trace of magic. Immediately after, it was amplified and changed into a surging tide of magic. It was like a huge wave, and was rushing towards Stephen at top speed!
“F*ck!” Stephen exclaimed. Being a high-ranking Archmage who had good and accurate control over the flow of mana, Stephen could sense the danger when the magical wave rushed towards him.
However, danger came too quickly. A high-ranking Archmage like Stephen could not keep up with the changes happening at the speed of light. It was faster than the speed at which mana usually flowed at. At that instant, Stephen only managed to cast a Water Shield before getting engulfed by numerous beams of light…
Lin Li witnessed everything very clearly. The beams of light were actually numerous magic arrows. Among the offensive spells, the impact of magic arrows was not the weakest, but it was one of the weaker spells. It couldn’t be helped. This was a very simple and shabby spell that did not require any elemental sequencing. One just had to let the magic out for the spell to take effect.
This was the only spell a mage apprentice could instantaneously cast. However, it was not frequently employed by them as it was really weak.
That was the essence of magic…
Only an enchanter’s gold rod could extract the purest source of mana.
However, even Tutankhamun would not have thought that a young mage would open the box with such a technique.
In fact, Geresco actually wrote down the way to open the box when he passed the metal crate to him. It was Tutankhamun who decided to use the box to test the three young mages. Stephen’s failure was within his expectations. How could a metal crate that was made from elemental metal be opened by a normal lock-picking technique?
The elemental iron was also known as a living magical metal. It had very incredible mana that grew with time. As though it had an ability to meditate, the iron could grow in strength every second. There were also elemental iron mineral veins that had been around for a thousand years that were as powerful as an Archmage.
However, that was not the most eccentric part of elemental iron. The reason that made elemental iron known as magical metal was its innate ability to cast spells. The presence of external factors could trigger the iron to cast spells independently, and the way it cast them would be determined by the way it had been forged. During the Dark Age, there were many High Elven Smithing Masters that could forge many weapons with different magical attributes just by using a piece of elemental iron.
Initially, the method that Geresco left behind was to destroy the Magic Suppression spell that was cast on the metal crate. Then, one had to solve three quizzes that required entry-level Inscription knowledge to unlock the metal box to retrieve the Book of Eternity.
Unfortunately, Geresco could not have expected somebody to use such a violent method to open the crate after 1300 years.
The use of a gold rod to directly disassociate the elemental iron was a very unreasonable technique. However, Tutankhamun had to admit that it was a very effective way.
Of course, one had to be a Master-level enchanter and own a powerful gold rod to be able to succeed. Otherwise, such a forceful method would only trigger the elemental iron and get himself submerged in raining magic arrows…
“Hold on…” Tutankhamun commented. He suddenly realized that the young man placed his gold rod during the time of depletion of the elemental iron. This meant that he would never have been harmed even if he’d failed to disassociate the elements. Hence, Stephen had merely become cannon fodder by taking lead so enthusiastically!
Damn, this fella is sly…