From a slave in a mage school… to a mage on the run… to being the weaker party in a one-sided alliance… to finally becoming the present equal partner with a strong magical race such as the Werfurs — Nick’s identity had evolved at a rapid pace in this new world. However, while he understood this world’s basic functionalities, he was still to understand its value and its stakes.
At this moment, Nick was in his office, reading a book to make up for exactly this gap.
Nick already knew about the cities, the continent, and the ruling Empires. The next most important thing for him to learn was how valuable or what kind of things could be done with Ether Stones aka Magic Stones.
Magic stones were used as nourishment for a mage. The more magic stones used, the more magical power a mage wielded, which in turn helped improve the mage’s ability and upped his levels.
The levels indicated what kind of physical and magical power individual mages had. This did not necessarily mean that a lower-level mage could not kill an upper-level mage.
Almost all necromancers that Nick had killed during the Underbroom Cave battle were leveled higher than him and had more magical and physical powers. However, this was of no consequence to him, and he had easily beaten them all using his spells.
Nick learned that one Ether Stone could be exchanged for 10 Golds, and this sum was enough for an ordinary family to survive a year or two without any problems. They can buy a residence in a well-protected city with about 50 Golds.
The weekly payment that the Werfurs had offered to give Nick in their earlier contract was 50 Ether Stones. To put this in perspective, 50 Ether Stones would have amounted to 500 Golds. It would have been enough for more than 50 people to live for five years.
When it came to magic matters, one can buy Level 1 = Imper Level Spells with 10 Ether Stones, and each time the level upgrades, the purchase of the spell upgraded to 10-50X depending on the level of the spell.
Imper Level Spell = 10 to 50 Ether Stones
Prive Level Spell = 100 to 1000 Ether Stones
Provec Level Spell = 1000 to 10,000 Ether Stones
Nick understood that this was just the basic pricing for spells.
“I need to check my status.”
Nick was checking his status for the first time after he had experienced a full-fledged magic battle, his first undead kills notwithstanding. The system once again displayed a screen as per his instructions.
‘Nick’
‘Mage Name = Epsilon’
‘Level 3 Imper Level Mage – Peak’
‘INT = 3.8’
‘Magical Abilities’
‘Life Siphon – Completed.’
‘Energy Bolt – Completed.’
‘Passive Abilities’
‘Iron Blood Energy Shield (+200 Magical Protection Bonus) (Prive Level Spell)’
Nick was satisfied with the progress in his status. Things so far were going well. He had skipped level two of ‘Imper Level Mage’ and became a ‘Peak Level 3 Imper Level Mage’. With just some more practice, it would not be long before he jumped to ‘Level 4 Imper Level Mage’.
“I need to create different kinds of spells for myself.”
Nick had had this thought ever since the Underbroom Cave battle. Using Sonic Bullets, and its several derivatives, was a good idea then, but he needed different kinds of spells to cater to purposes.
He settled down his thoughts, grabbed a pencil and paper, and started listing.
‘Intelligence Gathering Spell’
‘Area Damage Spell’
‘Close Combat Spell’
‘Agility Spell’
‘Horde-Counter Spell’
The more he noted down, the more he realized that there were many things that he needed to do, but he too cannot complete all this at once. It was not the best idea to force growth in his magic levels.
“I need to improve myself fast, but with stability. Moving too fast will affect my future. Creating different kinds of spells after a battle will make me create spells that I learned from on-ground, real battle experiences. This will be more useful than those created theoretically.”
With these observations, Nick first started working on creating a spell that will help him gather intelligence.
Given his own worldly-wise experiences on Earth, Nick knew that information was a weapon in its own right. By Intelligence Gathering Spell, he wanted to create a spell that let him find out more about his enemies — whether it was their location, their movements, plans — essentially a spell that would serve as an additional, well-placed pair of eyes.
After about 10-15 minutes, Nick got up from his seat feeling a sense of excitement.
“Battle and intelligence… considering I am proficient in long-range spells like Sonic Bullet, for the time being, I need a radar!”
Nick was already excited about the direction his thoughts had taken, and he immediately busied himself in creating a new spell.
The creation of the spell should be not too hard.
Considering that he had almost all knowledge created on Earth.
He always knew that the reason for his power did not come from the system alone. The system can be considered a cheat sheet, but he was strong because the system gave him almost all the information on Earth without demanding anything in return.
‘Wave Radar’
‘Imagination’
‘Imagination 1 – Imagine a magical wave like a sea wave pulsing around you and hitting the objects and living beings around you.’
‘Imagination 2 – Imagine the wave pulsing in all directions like a heartbeat, every two seconds.’
‘Knowledge 1’
‘Radar (Radio Detection and Ranging) is a detection system that uses radio waves to determine the distance (range), angle, or velocity of objects. It can be used to detect aircraft, ships, spacecraft, guided missiles, motor vehicles, weather formations, and terrain. A radar system consists of a transmitter producing electromagnetic waves in the radio or microwaves domain, a transmitting antenna, a receiving antenna (often the same antenna is used for transmitting and receiving), and a receiver and processor to determine properties of the object(s). Radio waves (pulsed or continuous) from the transmitter reflect off the object and return to the receiver, giving information about the object’s location and speed.’
‘Knowledge 2’
‘Radio waves are a type of electromagnetic radiation with wavelengths in the electromagnetic spectrum longer than infrared light. Radio waves have frequencies as high as 300 gigahertz (GHz) to as low as 30 hertz (Hz). At 300 GHz, the corresponding wavelength is 1 mm (shorter than a grain of rice); at 30 Hz the corresponding wavelength is 10,000 km (longer than the radius of the Earth). Like all electromagnetic waves, radio waves in vacuum travel at the speed of light, and in the Earth’s atmosphere at a close, but slightly lower speed. Radio waves are generated by charged particles undergoing acceleration, such as time-varying electric currents. Naturally occurring radio waves are emitted by lightning and astronomical objects and are part of the blackbody radiation emitted by all warm objects.’
‘Rule 1 – Wave Radar will use Magical Energy compared to Radio Wave.’
