Asher Takes An Interest

A few minutes ago…

"Puppets, huh? That's quite impressive." Asher looked at his opponents interestingly.

The four opponents who stood before him were wood brown anthropomorphic puppets hat looked like humans, but lacked detailed features like a nose, ears and hair.

Puppet technology wasn't anything innovative in Asher's eyes as he had seen a lot of new magical technology in his past life. However, Asher was surprised that such advanced technology was available in this world after all, the Great Dawn kingdom and its neighbours were still stuck using only elemental magic.

"It's a horrible sight compared to the puppets of the Olven, but it's still puppet." Asher stroked his imaginary beard.

"I did hear that the Purple Sun scared land has transcended beyond just elemental magic but I never would have guessed that they had delved into magic technology. I always thought that was the domain of the three empires."

In the southern region of the Kilin continent, the major cultivation method was mana cultivation of the lowest grade; elemental mana cultivation. This was a type of mana cultivation where mages only practised elemental magic, and usually the elemental magic which they were born with the highest affinity to. The reason for this practice was due to a lack of appropriate foundation, knowledge and training on the various other methods of mana cultivation.

Nonetheless, there were a few powers that broke this rule and existed as the only exceptions; the three empires and the four sacred lands. These seven powers had the required foundation, knowledge and pathways to go beyond elemental magic. This could easily be seen from the fact that the three empires could make magic airships which aided their conquest and trade; a technology that would take more than one hundred years of research for any of the ten kingdoms to pull off.

Ding.

The bell that signified the start of the qualifiers sounded but Asher ignored it.

'I'll need to see how advanced the puppetry technique of the sacred land is.' Asher smiled as he watched the four mid-rank second stage Guardian puppets rush at him.

Unlike the other competitors, Asher was in no hurry to finish. While it was true that the faster one finished, the better the score they get, which would aid in their overall rank; to Asher, all of that was meaningless. If he wanted to take first place, no one can seize it from him. The same was so if he purposely aimed for any position below. This was the confidence that came from power and strength.

'Mid-rank huh, let's see how well you guys really are.'

Asher suppressed his strength to be at the same level as the puppets before facing them. This wasn't limited to his mana alone but even his physical strength. As a result, Asher was now on the same level as an individual puppet in the truest sense, if his experience was ignored.

It wasn't that Asher wanted to play the underdog or keep his power hidden, because in truth, he didn't care about that anymore. On the contrary, Asher was only interested in the puppets at the moment. He wanted to know how well-made they were and desired to test the limitations of the magic technology in this world.

Seeing magic technology made him feel nostalgic and Asher wanted to enjoy this feeling for a bit longer.

Bam.

One of the puppets charged and punched at him, but Asher blocked with a palm. Even though they were on the same level, their experiences, knowledge and even mana usage were different, and in all categories, Asher exceeded the puppets.

Bam.

Asher launched a counter-attack right away at the abdomen which sunk in response to the attack.

'Low quality bodies, but that's understandable.' Asher analysed.

The puppet wanted to counter but Asher grabbed its arm and flung it towards another. He had injected his ice mana into the puppet so just as it collided with the other puppet, a mini ice 'explosion' blew out freezing the two puppets together, effectively making them useless in a battle.

'Terrible judgement, slow reflexes; only about 5/8th of a true mid-rank second stage mage. Was this purposely done or is there a flaw in the production?' Asher thought as he welcomed an attack from another puppet.

Asher recalled that dean Fogre mentioned the puppets being of the basic rank and based off a template of an average mage of the same level in a typical provincial military corp. However, Asher felt that an average mage in a provincial military corp was faster than these puppets. This was because, unlike most of the other students, Asher had trained alongside such mages and even had some under his command back at Red Maple province.

With his past life's experiences, it was easy for Asher to gauge the strength of the mages and spot the differences and flaws in the puppets.

While the third puppet faced him in direct combat, the last one cast spells at Asher. Nonetheless, all this was child's play to him to the point that Asher could even have his eyes closed and still dodge all attacks flawlessly.

Asher entertained the battle for a while to get a correct judgement of the quality of the puppets before he finally decided to put an end to it.

An ice short sword formed in Asher's right hand which he abruptly used and stabbed it halfway into the third puppet. Right before the puppet went motionless, Asher broke the upper half of the short sword and threw it at the head of the other puppet who was some distance away. Just like its companion, the puppet also went dead right after.

'Although they are of poor quality, it's quite ingenious to change the locations of the core for each puppet.' Asher thought.

There were two ways to beat a puppet; to completely immobilize it and make it useless or destroy its core.

The core of a puppet was its power source and engine. As long as this was destroyed, the puppet would be dead. However, Elder Grandor -the Purple Sun sacred land elder who made these puppets- had a knack for switching the location of the core in each puppet because it added 'variety' to them. In this way, even if one figured out the location of the core in one puppet, attacking the same spot in another puppet wouldn't led to the same end.

'Nonetheless, against an overpowering fighter or an experienced opponent, such tactics are essentially useless, and in this case, I'm both.' Asher smirked.

He glanced at the head on of the two 'glued' puppets and noticed that he had spent three minutes here, which for someone of his level, was too much time. Despite that, Asher wasn't bothered.

'I wonder what's next.'