chsdbacks Chapter 745 The Gift
Chapter 745 The Gift
When they saw the seventh-level wizard off, the expression on the wizard's face made Jemin take a second look.
It was an expression that was difficult to describe precisely.
Her eyebrows were slightly raised, her eyes were wider than usual, her lips were pursed, but there was a very faint upward curve at the corners of her mouth.
It was as if he had suddenly stumbled upon something completely unexpected, yet it wasn't a bad thing, but it felt utterly absurd. Augusta had probably only intended to offer a few casual words of advice to his junior brother's apprentice, just going through the motions.
Who knew that this kid would actually undergo a visible improvement on the spot, so ridiculous that even this level seven great wizard couldn't help but doubt whether he was seeing things.
After all, the wizarding system is not like the cultivation system, where enlightenment brings about visible changes.
Augusta stared at Jemin for two seconds, then said nothing, simply picked up her teacup, waved her hand, and turned to leave.
Jemin watched the other person walk away before returning to his position beside the flower bed.
However, after his senior apprentice's guidance, the faint unease in his chest completely dissipated when he looked at the banquet before him. The banquet was still the same banquet, the people clinking glasses were still the same group, and the scenes of small talk, probing, and exchanging benefits remained unchanged. But his mindset was different.
After understanding the position of these retired Level 6 wizards in wizarding civilization, and then looking at the power struggles between them, Jemin suddenly no longer felt that it was a meaningless waste of time.
On the contrary, these old fellows are not wasting their time; they are simply continuing to keep this vast civilization running in their own way. The methods may be different, but they are not without value.
He stood beside the flowerbed, maintaining a polite and indifferent smile, his mind replaying the words of the Augusta wizard, but Jemin's thoughts gradually drifted off course:
"I think I've been... scammed?"
He had discovered a data discrepancy a long time ago.
According to publicly available data from the Star Ring Federation military, he had already surpassed the average level of mental and physical strength of a level six wizard thousands of years ago.
It could even be said that his various indicators have far exceeded the six-level average line marked in the data.
In the years that followed, he continued his spiritual practice, his appearance improved, and his spirit and physique grew stronger day by day, leaving the so-called "level six standard" far behind.
Although he does have a gap in knowledge compared to a true veteran level six wizard.
In terms of combat power, the supplements provided by the cultivation system, such as the Divine Light of Extinction, the Armor of Returning to Nothingness, the Divine Transformation of Light, and the True Body of Dharma Form, should theoretically be enough to make him surpass most ordinary level six cultivators in pure combat power.
But the reality is quite different.
Every level six wizard that Jemin has encountered so far, whether friend or foe, has put him under immense pressure.
None of those Level 6 exams are easy to deal with.
Every encounter forced him to give it his all.
Even now, if he were to face the "Hand of Annihilation" that he had once killed, he would still feel that he lost more often than he won.
The Hand of Annihilation excels at large-scale destructive attacks. Its pure destructive power sweeps down from all sides, and even if it has a true body a thousand meters long, it may not be able to withstand a head-on confrontation.
Facing the illusory wizard he had once defeated with great difficulty, he might be able to remain undefeated by relying on the resistance to the fictional laws evolved from his body tempering technique, but winning would be almost impossible.
He was not afraid of the illusory attacks, nor were the illusory attacks afraid of his blows; neither side could gain the upper hand.
Unless the Hand of Illusion and Annihilation is truly foolish enough to give him a few seconds of space to activate the Annihilation Mode of the God of Light.
But how could an opponent of that caliber make such a basic mistake in actual combat?
Therefore, he once suspected that the "sixth-level wizard standard" mentioned in the data might have become invalid because the data was too old.
Even though all his stats are above average, why is he still struggling so much in a fight?
It wasn't until his senior uncle's words that Jieming finally understood.
The so-called Level 6 benchmark doesn't refer to the monsters on the battlefield that can destroy the world at any moment, but rather to these retired Level 6 wizards in front of us. They constitute the vast majority of the entire Level 6 group.
It is this huge base number that has dragged down the average level of the entire Level 6 by more than one grade.
As for those level six wizards he encountered on the battlefield?
That's not a "regular Level 6" at all.
Those were the elite of the elite, selected from this massive pool, who were still capable of fighting.
Those who survive on the front lines of the endless chaotic void are all monsters who crawled out of mountains of corpses and seas of blood.
Their combat effectiveness cannot be measured by the term "standard benchmark".
All of Jemin's previous confusion stemmed from a very simple fact: he mistook the elite for the average.
So Jemin really felt like he'd been tricked.
I was misled by the military's poorly written data that didn't indicate the source, and I was misled by the long-standing survivor bias.
Those monsters who shone brightly on the battlefield joined forces to put on a good show of "we are all just ordinary level six".
Just as Jemin was lost in thought, a low but still barely suppressed gasp of surprise suddenly rose from the crowd.
The sound was like a pebble dropped into a calm lake, the ripples spreading outwards and quickly reaching every corner of the banquet.
Jemin keenly sensed that there were suddenly more eyes on him.
It wasn't the awe-inspiring, tentative gaze from before, but a burning intensity born from a mixture of shock, envy, and disbelief. He followed their gaze and immediately understood why.
The wedding ceremony has ended, and the bride and groom are beginning to open the gifts from the guests.
This was originally just a private custom for the newlyweds, not a formal procedure, but there were always a few close guests who would gather around to join in the fun. At this moment, David was holding a silver-gray recording crystal that had already been unwrapped.
The technical instructions inside the crystal were activated, and a pale golden light screen immediately unfolded in the air.
The densely packed runes and formulas flowed slowly, automatically demonstrating the core principles of a certain technology. Next to them, the final effect was clearly marked with an evaluation result: the soul and elemental compatibility of the embryo could be upgraded to level ten.
Level 10!
Those present were all experts and naturally understood what those two words meant.
The maximum level of talent that mortal beings can naturally possess is level ten.
This technology allows users to directly approach or even reach this ceiling in terms of their qualifications.
For small to medium-sized wizarding families that focus on family lineage, what this means is obvious even to a fool.
From then on, family offspring no longer depended on luck or lottery, nor on a difficult selection process after mass reproduction. Instead, as long as there were sufficient resources, every offspring could reliably possess full potential.
This is beyond what the word "precious" can describe.
This is simply defying fate.
David instinctively closed the unfolded light screen, but many guests still caught a glimpse of the technology and the final effect annotations. "Level 10...stable upgrade to level 10?!"
"What about the failure rate? What about stability? None?! A stable version?!"
"Is it enough to just consume the corresponding resources?!"
"Jermin the Wizard... he can even produce this kind of technology?"
Exclamations of amazement rose and fell.
Several level-six wizards familiar with the Colmar family couldn't help but huddle around David, whispering questions about the details, but their eyes kept drifting toward Jemin.
Chief Colmar's smile had long since transformed from a relaxed expression to an almost radiant one.
As he responded to the guests' congratulations, he carefully gestured for David to put away the recording crystal, as if it were not a gift, but a treasure trove that could change the family's destiny.
In contrast, the expressions of the six-level wizards on the other side were much more interesting.
They had just suffered a setback in the confrontation, and now they discovered that the wedding gift casually presented by the rising star of the opposing camp was a full-fledged talent cultivation technique that could benefit an entire family for generations.
The gap is so large that it eliminates even the desire to compare.
It's understandable why the wizards present were so shocked.
The qualification enhancement technology didn't seem particularly impressive in Jieming's hands.
After all, Black Giants are mass-produced through incubation pools, and their qualifications are determined by templates, so they don't need this kind of thing; Dragonmen are still in the basic stage of bloodline optimization, so it's not their turn yet; and Jemin himself is long past the age where he needs to improve his talent in this way.
In a normal wizarding family, this would be a miracle that most people would never encounter in their entire lives.
Wizard families like Colmar are considered upper-middle class among the lower-class families of the Star Ring Federation.
Even so, having a child with a level 10 aptitude still depends entirely on luck.
If you're lucky enough to produce a genius, your family can rise a step up in status.
If a family is unlucky and fails to produce talented individuals for several generations, it will have to reduce its resources.
The rise and fall of most small and medium-sized families is almost a series of combinations of luck.
For them, a technology that can consistently achieve full qualification is no longer considered "precious".
Even Jemin himself was aware of the difficulty of this technology, after all, the initial foundation of this technology was not something he had developed out of thin air. It was something he obtained from the Great Dao Library, a method for improving the aptitude of cultivators, and combined with the research results of the wizarding civilization on elemental spirits, which he gradually localized and modified.
Without the Great Dao Book Pavilion, he wouldn't even be able to get to the starting point.
"Jermin!"
After David turned off the light screen, he immediately looked in the direction of Jemin.
He led his bride through the crowd toward him, his face still flushed with barely suppressed excitement, his hand still tightly clutching the recording crystal. Chief Colmar followed beside him, his old face beaming with a smile more genuine than ever before.
"This gift..." David walked up to him, opened his mouth, then closed it again, as if he was carefully considering his words, before finally whispering, "I really don't know how to thank you."
Jemin smiled and shook his head: "It's nothing, I just hope you're satisfied."
David gratefully opened his arms and hugged him. "Thanks, friend!"
His wife, Eileen, stood quietly beside him, her gentle eyes revealing a hint of undisguised emotion.
Chief Colmar repeatedly expressed his gratitude, saying things like, "The kindness of Wizard Jemin to the Colmar family is immeasurable," and "If needed in the future, the Colmar family will definitely do its best to help."
The other wizards looked in this direction, their eyes filled with such fervor that they seemed to want to ignite the space itself.