What Lei Lin practiced was the advanced Meditation Method passed down from the Crimson Great Wizard — the Eye of Comoin.
This Meditation Method had strict requirements for Wizards, permitting only warlocks who possessed the Comoin Giant Serpent bloodline to cultivate it, and it contained merely three layers.
Although the Crimson Great Wizard had vaguely hinted that a continuation existed on the Central Continent, Lei Lin currently had no idea where the Central Continent even was, so he naturally dared not harbor too much hope.
To give himself an additional fallback, Lei Lin had established a task within the Chip from the very beginning — to deduce and project the subsequent portions of the Eye of Comoin.
But unfortunately, due to the lack of a large number of advanced Meditation Methods to serve as templates and a foundational database, the Chip's research had been painfully slow, practically stuck in place.
Later, he did find an advanced Meditation Method called Sacred Light Candleflame that greatly intrigued him, but this Meditation Method was even more incomplete, and came with a heap of nasty side effects that made Lei Lin think twice.
Now, however, completing both of these Meditation Methods finally seemed possible.
"According to Aelin's memories, just the ones he knew of number over a dozen schools. Even if the advanced Meditation Methods of these schools are incomplete, with my abilities, it's highly likely I could get my hands on several of them…"
Lei Lin's eyes lit up.
Although the advanced Meditation Methods here were also tightly controlled, and joining a school as a core member would certainly require signing some sort of contract — possibly even a more binding restriction — Lei Lin had never once considered sneaking in to steal knowledge. He was already a Second-rank Warlock, and with the bonus from his bloodline, his combat power far surpassed that of an ordinary Second-rank Wizard, making him a rare figure even across the entire Dark Pole Domain. As long as he resorted to a few unconventional methods, no ordinary school could stop him in his tracks.
Moreover, he had developed a very keen interest in some of the specialized disciplines of the Underworld.
While both the South Coast and the Underworld studied the knowledge left behind by the ancient Wizards, the Underworld had preserved many of the ancient era's customs and academic disciplines in far more complete form, which was an enormous temptation for Lei Lin.
He certainly didn't believe that everything ancient was necessarily superior to the modern. After all, after so many years of development, the disciplines and foundations that had taken shape on the South Coast were clearly better suited to the growth and learning of modern Wizards. But that didn't mean knowledge from the ancient era was useless.
The power of the ancient Wizards was deeply engraved in Lei Lin's mind, and he was desperate to uncover, from the ancient academic knowledge, the secret behind why those ancient Wizards had been so powerful.
At Lei Lin's speed, he naturally didn't need to spend a full day and a half walking to reach Bert Town as Aelin had described.
In truth, after using just a few acceleration spells and walking for a little over half an hour, a small town already appeared in his field of vision.
The architecture of Bert Town bore no resemblance to any style Lei Lin had seen on the South Coast. It was suffused with an archaic yet weighty character, with most buildings constructed very tall, as if to make use of every last inch of available land.
At the center of the town stood a towering spire that pierced almost straight into the sky, and at its summit, a bright little sun radiated both light and heat.
"So this is the most fundamental resource the ordinary people of the Underground World depend on to survive — a Sunstone. It really does look just like the sun!"
Watching this scene, Lei Lin suddenly felt a twinge of emotion. Though he specialized in dark-attribute energy particles, after spending so many days in the Underground World, catching sight of bright sunlight filled him with genuine joy.
According to the memories he had obtained from Ailin, this radiance did not actually come from a real sun. Its source was a type of high-energy mineral — the Sunstone!
This mineral unique to the Underground World could continuously emit ultraviolet radiation and heat similar to sunlight.
And virtually every town underground had some manner of tower like this one, storing Sunstones of various sizes inside. Day after day, they relied on this method to provide illumination for the surrounding area, as well as energy for crops.
Lei Lin had noticed early on that green plants were exceedingly rare out in the wild here. Without sunlight, photosynthesis was impossible, and things like carbon dioxide were instead absorbed by a type of gray moss, which then completed the conversion into oxygen.
But here, he had finally caught sight of some green.
Adjacent to Bert Town, a large stretch of farmland had been densely carved out. Because the spire's range of illumination was limited, every inch of this land was worth its weight in gold.
The innermost ring closest to the town was planted with an oat crop resembling something from the South Coast, though its growth looked rather poor.
Beyond that, in the broader expanse where sunlight reached, the fields were filled with a type of enormous mushroom.
These mushrooms were massive — nearly as tall as Lei Lin's shins — with a dull gray exterior, yet they grew plump and fleshy.
These mushrooms accounted for roughly eighty percent of the crops surrounding Bert Town, a staggering proportion that strongly suggested they were the staple food of the town's residents!
And indeed, that was exactly the case. This mushroom was called the Gray-Spotted Fungus, a highly productive variety that required very little sunlight. In Ailin's memories, it had always been the staple food of the common folk throughout the Dark Poles Region.
In the Dark Poles Region, the nobility and Wizards feasted on oats, meat, and other precious ingredients, while the ordinary populace had no choice but to survive on this Gray-Spotted Fungus.
Wherever there were people, there were hierarchies — and in a world ruled by Wizards who commanded supernatural power, that was even more so. Lei Lin had no intention of changing anything.