vncnus Chapter 4: If you can find a powerful backer, why bother running around on your own?
Chapter 4: If you can find a powerful backer, why bother running around on your own?
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For a typical novice mage, casting magic involves three steps: meditation, control, and release.
Ordinary people spend a long time just meditating and sensing stardust, and controlling the first star is even more difficult, let alone connecting seven stars into a complete star orbit. Many students may not be able to unleash a complete first-level beginner spell until the end of their first year of high school.
But Su Chen was different.
The system not only forcibly upgraded his level, but also directly helped him complete the most difficult control process during the upgrade!
These seven stars are now like a part of his body, as easy as his own limbs!
"Thunder Seal!"
Su Chen suddenly opened his eyes, and two dazzling purple lights instantly burst forth from his deep eyes!
Within the spiritual world, the seven docile stars seemed to hear the general's command, instantly transforming into seven streams of purple light.
The first one! The second one! The third one... The seventh one!
Without the slightest hesitation or hindrance, the seven stars connected end to end in less than half a second, drawing an extremely beautiful and perfect purple star trail in the spiritual world!
The moment the star trail took shape, the surrounding air seemed to be sucked away. An extremely violent and destructive aura erupted from Su Chen's body!
"Rage Strike!!!"
Su Chen pointed his right hand forward sharply and let out a low shout.
"Boom—!!!"
It was as if a thunderclap had resounded in the night sky!
Thick purple lightning bolts, like raging dragons, instantly shot out from Su Chen's fingertips!
This is no longer the tiny arc of electricity found in the first level of the beginner stage; it is lightning in the truest sense!
The lightning bolt twisted and expanded wildly in mid-air, carrying the momentum to destroy everything, and slammed into a huge abandoned cement slab a dozen meters away!
"Bang--!!!"
The deafening explosion echoed through the deserted suburbs!
Rock fragments flew through the air, dust billowed! The blinding lightning illuminated an area of several dozen meters around as bright as day!
It took more than ten seconds for the dust to gradually dissipate.
Su Chen stared in disbelief at the scene before him, and couldn't help but swallow hard.
The solid cement slab, which was at least half a meter thick and over two meters high, had completely vanished. In its place was a charred crater nearly two meters in diameter and half a meter deep!
At the edge of the pit, the soil had been crystallized by the terrifying high temperature, and wisps of black smoke were still rising from it. The air was filled with a pungent smell of burning and ozone.
"This...this is the power of a low-level, level three spell, Lightning Seal: Wrathful Strike?!"
Su Chen looked at his right hand, then at the huge crater, his heart pounding wildly.
That's freaking amazing!
What's even more terrifying is his casting speed!
From the moment the spell begins to its completion, it takes less than a second! What does that mean?
It's important to know that even those mages who have been working in society for many years and have just entered the intermediate level may not be able to compress the speed of casting a basic spell to within one second!
In the world of martial arts, speed is the ultimate weapon. This is especially true in the magical world. A casting speed of one second means that in battle, the enemy doesn't even have time to chant incantations or connect with star trails before being instantly pulverized by lightning!
"Invincible..."
Su Chen plopped down on the grass, gazing up at the starry sky with a wide grin that stretched to his ears.
"I don't need to meditate and cultivate in a miserable way, nor do I need to be tormented to death by those naughty stars. As long as Fanzi continues to cultivate diligently, my cultivation level will continue to rise."
"Fanzi, oh Fanzi, you must live up to expectations! You take care of saving the world, and I'll take care of being a supportive dad behind you!"
Su Chen lay on his back on the slightly prickly grass, looking at the twinkling stars in the sky, his mind still replaying the terrifying destructive power of the "Thunder Seal - Wrathful Strike" he had just unleashed.
"Awesome! That's fucking awesome!"
Su Chen sat up abruptly, brushed the grass clippings off his backside, and decided to strike while the iron was hot and go back inside to try out the legendary "meditation cultivation." Now that he was already at the third level of the initial stage, could he try to break through to the intermediate stage? Even though the system was bound to Mo Fan, if he could actively cultivate and break through, maybe he could achieve a two-pronged approach?
Back in that dilapidated self-built house, Su Chen sat cross-legged on the hard wooden bed, took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and immersed his consciousness into the spiritual world.
In that void, the purple lightning-elemental stardust resembled a dazzling miniature galaxy, with seven stars frolicking within it. Having reached the third level of the initial stage, the stardust's light was extremely bright, and its edges had expanded to the limit that an initial-stage mage could contain.
Following the meditation techniques he learned during his nine years of compulsory magic education, Su Chen began to try to absorb the magical elements that were floating in the world, attempting to gather them into the stardust in order to break through that invisible "intermediate barrier".
A minute passed...
Ten minutes have passed...
Half an hour has passed...
Su Chen suddenly opened his eyes, veins throbbing on his forehead, and his mouth twitching wildly.
"Holy crap! Are you kidding me?!"
Su Chen couldn't help but swear. He had meditated for a full half hour, and what was the result? He felt that the magical energy he absorbed from the stardust was like dropping a drop of water into the Pacific Ocean with a dropper! Not even a splash!
If the barrier between the beginner level 3 and the intermediate level is an indestructible dam, then his efforts over the past half hour were equivalent to scraping off a tiny bit of cement dust from the dam with his fingernail.
"This cultivation speed is slower than a tortoise crawling! It's harder than an old lady crossing the street!" Su Chen covered his face, falling into deep self-doubt. "Just how pathetic was the original owner's magical talent? If it weren't for the system, I reckon I wouldn't even be able to compare to Mo Fan, that academic failure who hadn't awakened his Little Mudfish Pendant, right?"
Su Chen has finally come to terms with reality.
In this magical world that places great emphasis on talent and bloodline, if Su Chen relied solely on his own efforts, at best he would be a low-level cannon fodder stuck in the early stages for his entire life.
"To hell with all that effort! I'm quitting!"
Su Chen sprawled out on the bed, completely giving up.
There's a saying, isn't there?
If you can find someone to rely on, why bother running around on your own?
He's now the man with the strongest bond binding system!
His lightning element was firmly bound to Mo Fan's lightning affinity. As long as Mo Fan's lightning element leveled up, his lightning element would always be two minor levels higher.
"Fanzi, it's not that I'm not trying hard enough, it's just that my talent doesn't allow it," Su Chen muttered to himself in the darkness, a wicked smile gradually creeping onto his lips.
However, although Su Chen decided to give up independent cultivation, he did not intend to just wait around.
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