Chapter 76 — The First Step of Art
Blade of Dawn · Page 2 of 3
The facts were clear enough. What Rebecca had refined was a little white crystal shard guaranteed to send the enhancement-obsessed into a fit of rage (confirmed).
Casting a disappointed glance at the powdery crystal dust, Gao Yang shook his head. "Maybe someday Rebecca will manage to refine a usable storage crystal... Let's just look forward to that for now. Enough of this—I saw you tinkering with those antique crystals earlier. What have you come up with?"
Hedy perked up, though her tone was rather apologetic. "Forgive me, Ancestor. Many of the magic arrays and rune patterns in that crystal have been lost to time, and they are combined in a manner I cannot comprehend. The precision of present-day crystal resonators is limited, so I have only managed to distinguish a small portion of them and reconstruct them as magic arrays... Please, come this way."
Gao Yang followed her, watching as Hedy took from her desk some array diagrams she had already organized. Besides the various symbols and lines, the sheets bore notes written in elegant script—annotations she had left.
As Gao Yang studied the diagrams, Hedy voiced her thoughts beside him. "The magical system of the ancient Gondorian Empire was vastly different from today's. Their magic arrays were 'layered,' with key nodes connecting each layer, and those nodes, combined among themselves, turned out to be arrays as well—nested layer within layer. With present-day techniques it would be utterly impossible to construct arrays of such a structure. I simply cannot imagine how the Gondorian mages of old stuffed that entire complex of runes into a tiny crystal..."
Gao Yang looked up and smiled. "First they prepared a room with practically no dust or suspended particles. Then, in that room, they built a massive model of the array out of mana-conducting materials. Next they evacuated the air from the room. Finally, they irradiated that array model with the powerful mana of the Deep Blue Well—and at the 'focal point' of that irradiation, they placed a blank crystal awaiting processing. Through a special polarization technique, the mana imprinted the layered array onto the interior of the crystal, layer by layer. Just like that, one pass of mana, one array burned into the crystal. Twenty-seven per minute."
With a clatter, the dip pen in Hedy's hand fell to the floor and snapped in two.
Good heavens—so the ancients were really this formidable?!
"And that's precisely where I differ most from the people of this era. You think of many things as precious and scarce, and take it for granted that masters craft them with painstaking care and hand them down through the generations. But in my view, cheap mass production is the norm for such things. What a pity—with the Deep Blue Well gone and the first generation all dead, it's only natural that you've developed the way you have."
Hedy's expression turned peculiar; she felt keenly that this unworthy descendant had once again disappointed the Xuanmai Sect...
Just then, Gao Song's gaze was suddenly drawn to the magic array on one of the diagrams. "Hm?"
Hedy hurried over, and seeing where Gao Song was looking, explained: "That is the array that controls the crystal's self-detonation. As you know, the final function of these standard crystals when they are on the verge of collapse is to self-destruct. That layer of the array was therefore imprinted at a position independent of the other rune groups, and it is exceptionally simple, which makes it relatively easy to reconstruct. But the friend-or-foe identification portion tied to this detonation array cannot be reconstructed. I still haven't found which runes accomplish that incredible function—I truly lack talent in this area..."