Demonskin, a zero-ring spell.
Demonskin was a relatively common zero-ring spell, yet its results varied widely across most spellcasters. Under normal casting, magical stimulation caused the skin to produce a layer of demonic hide, offering the caster a degree of protection. In addition, one could prepare casting materials in advance for targeted spellcasting—such as using the bark of a Blackthorn Treant, the hides of various demons, and so forth. With material components aiding it, the spell's efficacy improved, and the caster could even gain certain extraordinary traits of the corresponding material.
Theoretically, using casting materials that matched the spellcaster's rank would, barring certain exceptions, reduce both the cost and difficulty of casting Demonskin.
By the same token, if a spellcaster selected materials far above their own rank, the casting difficulty would skyrocket, along with a significant risk of spell failure.
Luge held the book on Demonskin open in his hands.
Since Half-Man wanted him to learn Demonskin and had even prepared the casting materials, he naturally had no reason to refuse.
Originally, he had already slotted Demonskin right after Ray of Frost in his mental lineup.
With his puny frame, he could never have too many protective measures. If the opportunity arose in the future, he intended to learn at least eight or ten more spells designed to take a beating from every conceivable angle. Of course, he also needed to hurry up and find the time to expand his shorts into armor.
For now, this was his final cooldown before breaking through Ray of Frost, and casually thumbing through the Demonskin book was just a way to refresh his mind.
Yesterday, when that female elf left, he had planned to drink one of the bottles of Clear Mind Potion Half-Man had gifted him to give his brain a boost. But after thinking it over, he felt his condition wasn't quite right, so he spent another day reading and collecting his thoughts.
He first ate a segment of slightly overboiled grub, then took out the white bottle of Clear Mind Potion and threw his head back to gulp it down.
It was sour and slightly bitter, with a faint lingering sweetness.
In Kaliu's diary, Kaliu always ate something whenever he took a Clear Mind Potion. In his words, consuming the potion plunged one into a transcendent state of hyper-focus, which naturally intensified the body's physical toll. To be interrupted in that selfless, blissful state of thought by petty trivialities like hunger while the potion lasted would be sheer idiocy.
The potion began to take effect.
Luge had never experienced anything like this in his entire life.
Holding the Ray of Frost tome, the places where multi-step reactions had previously led him to misjudge now struck him as thoroughly laughable. At the same time, he grasped a subtle difference regarding spell compatibility: a compatible spell didn't need to be arduously mastered through sheer logical deduction; it was closer to reading, naturally harmonizing with those mischievous little fellows, understanding them effortlessly, and instinctively knowing their rules.
After overcoming several tricky bottlenecks in quick succession, he simply flipped the book back to the first page.
Starting from that very first page he had long since mastered, he read carefully, feeling and reinterpreting every detail, combing through everything from the start.
A flash of that mysterious Light of Spirituality told him this was exactly what he should do.
It was as if something had clicked.
Though he had already mastered the earliest and simplest stages, he didn't flip past them immediately. Instead, the opening chapters became the slowest. Then, page after page turned, and once he passed the halfway mark, his pace grew faster and faster, like a charging beast. This was the exact opposite of his usual habit, where flipping through the book only grew slower with each page.
The rustling of turning pages echoed through the quiet tunnel like a lost traveler.
*Whoosh—*
He lifted both hands and snapped the entire book shut with a crisp *smack*, exhaling a long breath.
Then he tilted his head back and rolled his neck, producing a string of sharp pops.
Wasting no time, he tossed the book by his legs and immediately began meditating to recover his mental energy and steady his state. Right after, he started constructing the spell model for Ray of Frost.
Since he had begun studying this zero-ring spell, he had attempted it countless times.
Yet he had never managed to command the full picture.
Not having fully digested it into unconscious instinct, having to manually deduce every minute detail—that state of being bordered on despair. Luckily, an apprentice wizard's mental power was sufficiently resilient. Otherwise, learning a spell would have produced an army of deranged lunatics.
But this time, he finally tasted the thrill of doing as he pleased. What deduction? Wasn't it crystal clear at a single glance? He could even foresee the chain reactions many steps ahead.
Completing the construction of the spell model in one seamless breath, he found that the potion's effects had not yet worn off.
He immediately underwent a brief meditation to recover, hastily stuffed a chunk of grub meat into his mouth without chewing properly, and opened the tome on Demonskin.
The sheer value of a Clear Mind Potion was evident from how much ink the haughty Kaliu had spent describing it in his diary, and such a potion could not be taken back-to-back. Although Luge still had one bottle left, it was best to wait several days between doses.
Thus, if he wanted to master Demonskin as quickly as possible, this window was his only chance.
Although Demonskin hadn't received spiritual guidance when he originally chose his spells, he felt this spell was far more lovable than Ray of Frost, with several times higher compatibility.
In the blink of an eye, he had thoroughly digested more than half the Demonskin tome.
Just as he prepared to press on, his seated body wavered, and he nearly toppled over.
An abnormal dizziness surged over him in waves.
"That Kaliu... he didn't write a single word in his diary about the backlash after the potion wears off..."
Clutching his forehead, he sprawled out on the ground in an X-shape, utterly unable to move for the moment.
Ray of Frost finished charging. He casually cast it toward the nearest crevice in the rocks, and after a few seconds, he scraped off some shaved ice with his nails and slapped it onto his forehead with a wet splat. When it came to everyday uses for low-tier spells, Luge felt there was a real need to publish a book. Kaliu's diary had mentioned some fools—Kaliu called them fools, at least. In daily life, these people would sometimes forget to use spells, and at other times become overly reliant on them.
For instance, back when Kaliu first enrolled, there was an apprentice who spent all his time studying Ghost Sound. When danger struck and they needed to wake their companions, that apprentice's first instinct was actually to cast a spell. Kaliu, furious, simply screamed at the top of his lungs, breaking the fellow's casting with fright while successfully waking everyone up. There was another apprentice adept in Colossal Strength who, having formerly been a knight, basically only used spells during combat, and the types of spells he chose were severely limited by his rigid mindset.
Now, Luge faced a difficult dilemma of his own.
Should he stay here to master Demonskin before going to meet Half-Man, or stick to his original plan of heading out to hunt for treasure once he had mastered Ray of Frost?
Scavenging legacies was naturally better done sooner rather than later, but this was also the first time Half-Man had summoned him for a meeting. Furthermore, learning Demonskin would make venturing out much safer.
Yet he had a premonition that once he met Half-Man, something was bound to happen.
When that time came, it might be hard to get away anytime soon.
Therefore, after weighing it repeatedly, he ultimately decided that safety came first: he would focus on mastering Demonskin, then head out to gather the nearest legacies—offering his heartfelt blessings to those deceased wizards—before returning to meet Half-Man as quickly as possible.
Chapter 22