Absurdity, humor, and deep confusion swirled in Lucian's mind. The "Prophet" Maskylin had no reason to lie about the crafting of the "Sun's Crown," but those nine "magics" were undeniably Divine Arts. Combined with the similarity between the Great Cross, the cross pattern at the center of the Sun's Crown, and the emblem of the Church of Truth, the situation only grew more bewildering: "How exactly was the Church of Truth born and rose to power before the Holy Calendar?"
Picking up the Sun's Crown — a pendant roughly the size of a circle formed by pressing one's thumb and index finger together — Lucian followed the method Maskylin had left behind. First, he used his spiritual power to construct a peculiar emblem, then carefully probed into the interior of the Sun's Crown.
Pure radiance, scorching radiance, flawless radiance — the entire interior of the Sun's Crown was like a surging ocean of sacred light.
With the correct method, Lucian easily left his own spiritual imprint and took control of the "Sun's Crown." But those five layers of seals were extremely complex. Lucian could not decipher them on his own and would have to wait until he became a formal mage before using Maskylin's corresponding unsealing techniques to break them.
"This is truly the power of Divine Arts. It possesses a unique aura and operational structure, completely different from the feeling of Arcane Magic — they are fundamentally two separate transcendent paths!" Lucian was cultivating Arcane Magic himself and had once used the Emblem of Truth, so he had sufficient judgment to tell the difference.
Lost in thought, Lucian hung the "Sun's Crown" pendant over his chest, concealing it beneath his clothes.
After leaving his spiritual imprint, Lucian sensed the surrounding black-and-white-gray world through the Sun's Crown. It was so abstract — like the gray background after a character dies in a single-player game. Utterly serene, freezing cold, silent and still. Only the warmth transmitted by the Sun's Crown made him feel like a living person. Moreover, this warmth could be spread outward using his spiritual power — this was the power of "redeeming restless spirits."
As he kept thinking, Lucian recalled the phrase "eternal unchanging silence" that had appeared several times in the notes, and his mood grew heavier with worry. This Maze Lock seemed to involve the most lofty and hidden secrets of this world, seemingly connected to the ancient legendary mages, the Church, and even the Silver White Horn.
"What exactly is sealed behind the Great Cross outside?" Lucian summoned a small flame on his fingertip and burned all the parchment and notes — they had already been recorded in his Soul Library. "The Lord of Silver White using 'Eternal Unchanging Silence' as his title was probably not chosen at random. Was the leak of this manuscript the doing of the 'Silver White Horn'? If so, returning the way I came would be quite dangerous. Was this the danger Master Maskylin foresaw?"
"If I don't go back the way I came, then I'll have to wait an hour for the Maze Lock to begin collapsing and leave through the path leading to the Arcane Garden. I need to make good use of this hour."
As soon as Lucian thought of it, he acted. He left the main hall and walked toward the black door marked with the pale-white number "1."
Inside the room, apart from the shelves holding vessels, there were rows of waist-high transparent storage cabinets. Their original colors were impossible to discern in the black-white-gray world, but now they appeared extremely pale. Each cabinet bore a different label and was inscribed with a different Magic Circle — it seemed each stored its contents in a completely different manner.
Here were strange eyeballs submerged in black liquid, spider-like flowers blooming in a vacuum, floating dark-gray stones, and shriveled corpses wrapped in burial shrouds...
Lucian had no time to examine all the materials. Following the notes' instructions, he found Storage Locker 72 and transferred the moldy "gray" powder inside into the corresponding vessel on the nearby shelf.
When scooping the "Emerald Mold" with a small gray-white spoon, Lucian held his breath the entire time. According to the Atlas and the Book of Astrology and Elements, the smell of this mold would cause one's internal organs to rot and decay from the inside out.
Only after stoppering the glass tube inscribed with a Magic Circle and leaving the room did Lucian dare to breathe again. The world suddenly felt so wonderful.
Next, Lucian went to the other rooms to collect the stone-scale-like Petrified Serpent feathers one by one, the "Shepherd's" Moonflower the size of a palm-shaped silver moon, and finally the Ghost-face Grass, which looked like a baby — each of its leaves bore a different face: weeping, resentful, ferocious, laughing.
"Shepherd's" Moonflower + Ghost-face Grass leaves + Petrified Serpent feathers + Emerald Mold == Silver Moon Potion.
Though Lucian had analyzed the "Arcane Gate" potion in his idle moments, how could it compare to the Silver Moon Potion, which he had been preparing for his own use and knew inside and out? Moreover, its difficulty was several times that of the "Silver Moon Potion"!
Even with a full hour and sufficient materials, Lucian didn't believe he could successfully brew the "Arcane Gate" potion. He would need several days of patient experimentation with ample materials to even have a chance — and if materials were insufficient, it would take over half a year of thorough analysis and familiarization.
...
The spacious alchemy laboratory was filled with all manner of devices and apparatus that Lucian couldn't recognize — metal hands suspended in midair, mysterious gray liquid flowing throughout the entire room, a large platform resembling an operating table studded with various tentacle-like black cords and tubes, and furnaces several people tall... All of these were covered with dizzyingly complex three-dimensional alchemy arrays and Magic Circles that made Lucian's head spin just looking at them.
With nothing else to study regarding these new alchemy devices, Lucian walked directly to the familiar alchemy platform. After spending a few minutes roughly understanding their functions, he activated them.
One by one, the eerie and complex alchemy arrays lit up. Lucian placed a tube of "Emerald Mold" into one of them, waited half a minute, and a fully transparent, head-sized cylinder rose before him. Inside, a layer of gray liquid as thick as a copper-nair was already floating.
This was the processed "Emerald Mold Liquid."
Using the same method, he processed the "Moonflower" and "Petrified Serpent feathers." Then Lucian tossed the "Ghost-face Grass" leaves into another alchemy array.
Countless wraith-like entities materialized within the array, crying out loudly, looking for all the world like small infants denied their toys.
But their voices were entirely blocked by the array's built-in defenses, posing no danger to Lucian whatsoever.