Right now, it was like Merlin was being thrown down a deep abyss and given a death sentence.
The closer he got to the strange eye-shaped rock, the more aggressive these monsters had become. They maliciously revealed their killing intent.
“For there is no other way, I no longer need to consider anything else.”
Merlin resolutely looked at the eye-shaped rock. At that second, he instantly leaped out to catch that strange object.
That was such an insane thing to do. He had no idea if that rock was dangerous or not. But in a critical moment like this, he had to do it.
Whether it would help him survive or not, it was his only choice. He staked his life on this curious piece of rock.
The moment Merlin’s hand touched it, a golden ray shined out brilliantly; it was vivid and luminous. An intense amount of divine aura came out of that light.
Suddenly, the odd-shaped rock disappeared. During this life-or-death situation, a translucent energy wave came into being. A significant amount of magical pressure spread out, painting the whole sky and earth. The sky was dyed golden.
Zooom!
Strange energy waves diffused all over the place, passing through everything around. And it kept expanding endlessly.
The most wondrous thing was that everywhere the energy waves passed through, everything stopped moving as if the scene before him was just a painting that could not move.
These energy waves were robust and strong; they vanquished everything standing in its way.
Merlin beheld what was happening clearly.
The golden giants that were casting attack spells, or even those devastating beams coming his way, were frozen. Then everything froze, even the soil and dust that were splashing in the air. This place turned silent; everything stayed still.
***Ars...pau...li...na***
Right at that moment, an unfamiliar, archaic voice sounded in his head. It was so loud and resounding like it could be heard from heaven or the underworld.
As the voice died, the golden giants floating in the air instantly shattered and turned into golden particles. They disintegrated one after another.
Those particles circulated like a storm.
Right then, that golden storm rushed at Merlin in one direction.
That terrifying whirlwind went into Merlin’s right eye.
He could not move. The pain in his eye spread throughout his body, giving him excruciating agony. The torment was indescribable.
The boy tried to close his eyes, but he could not. He had to accept the pain inevitably.
ARRRRGHHHHH!
In pain, Merlin cried out in his head.
Then his body began to be movable. With the ache he had accumulated, he blasted it all out. His body twisted severely with anguish until he fell down from the monolith’s peak.
BAMMN!
Although he fell from the monolith, he was still lucky to have Xian vital essence wrapped around his body. Therefore, he was not as heavily injured as any normal would have been. But that did not mean he was not feeling any pain.
The pain from falling was incomparable to the pain in his eye. It was the kind of pain that was hard to describe.
All hundred and three giants exploded into golden particles and then darted into his right eye.
Merlin did not know when this was going to end because the golden particles were still moving into his eye nonstop. He was still suffering from the pain.
Although he tried to accept this pain, it was easier said than done.
Almost half an hour later, finally, all the golden particles had completely gone into his eye.
Suddenly, a strange incident took place again.
A golden ray shined brightly out of his right eye.
The power residing in that eye moved straight to his brain in a heartbeat.
A considerable amount of knowledge flowed in like a sudden flash flood. There was too much information—almost unbearable for Merlin.
Merlin used his hands to heavily hit his head. However, that did not help.
Right after the pain in the eye, he now had to endure the pain in his brain.
The little one writhed because of the agony he was suffering from the brain.
Almost an hour later, that bizarre incident stopped.
Merlin was now sitting cross-legged, arranging and balancing the knowledge in his brain.
When he regained consciousness, his wisdom broadened. He could now perceive and make sense of everything in front of him.
When he thought of the maze, the information surfaced in his head.
This maze was a secret place of Solomon, the great emperor. It was the place that kept an item called “Lemegeton,” or in another name, “The Wisdom Key of Solomon.”
Those hundred and three golden giants were seventy-two demons and thirty-one aerial spirits. They are the Great Emperor Solomon’s servants. The strange eye-shaped rock was undoubtedly “Lemegeton!”
“Lemegeton” was a long-sealed wisdom key that accumulated all the knowledge on earth. It had a great deal of power hiding within. Lemegeton comprised of five magic books including:
Book One: Ars Paulina
Book Two: Ars Goetia
Book Three: Ars Theurgia-Goetia
Book Four: Ars Almadel
Book Five: Ars Notoria
An abundance of knowledge Merlin had in his head right now was the ability of the first book “Ars Paulina.”
The great magic’s first book opened then the encyclopedic knowledge was filled in Merlin’s brain.
Granting the user the knowledge that the creator had saved was the ability of this chapter. Merlin now had the ability to know everything on this earth: languages, alphabets, items, or even the meanings of each magical ring.
All he had to do was think about it. Then the information he wanted would come pouring into his brain. It worked like an encyclopedia or a library in his head.
But there was one limitation.
The knowledge he received did not include the learning methods or processes.
So, it meant that he merely obtained the knowledge as names, meanings, or the benefits of those things. It did not enable the possessor to learn and use all the magics in the world.
Anyway, it was still a great help for the possessor to understand and learn magic easier.
Merlin moved his eyes to look at the messages on the archaic monolith.
Now his brain could read the ancient-language messages on there.
They told the background of Lemegeton and mentioned its five great-magic books. However, these messages were written so roughly that he could not understand the whole thing. The only thing he could make sense of was the message from the first book “Ars Paulina.”
Overall, it talked about the one hundred and three demons and the aerial spirits who had been waiting for the seal to be opened. And only the one that could do so was the person possessing Lemegeton.
With that being said, Merlin was the only one who could unseal these great magics.
After a while, Merlin tried to quieten his mind again.
As soon as he closed his eyes, everything around fell into ruin and turned into dust. Both the rock giants and the maze broke down into particles.
Now, it was like this dimension had tumbled down. Merlin’s body, which had been beaten up, was now completely healed like nothing had ever happened.
So, it meant that the force of this place built up an illusion.
Opening his eyes, Merlin saw the forest again. The sunray washing down told him that it was no longer nighttime.
He did not know how much time he had spent in that world.
Merlin spent a moment trying to keep himself together then headed back to the residence.
His whole-night disappearance might have cost him a nag from Arthur. So, he had to hurry back to do his job.
As expected, after he had arrived in the room, Arthur beat him up.
Merlin just realized that he had been gone for three days.
When Arthur was done punishing Merlin for his shortcoming, his moods became stable again.
These things did not disturb Merlin. It was just a scenario that he had to act in. The little boy Arthur’s assault did not hurt him.
A practitioner at level five of Qi accumulation had a stronger body than normal humans. These things were insignificant for Merlin.
Although Arthur was a self-centered, aggressive son of a powerful nobleman, he somehow had a good side. As time went by, his ferocity faded and he forgot things very quickly.
Arthur was a hot-tempered person who would cool down really fast.
Merlin's life was back to normal again.
His routines were nothing much. When the academy opened, he just had to be a good servant: preparing the bath water, preparing the clothes, and finding food for Arthur. These were not difficult for him.
Besides, he could also use the position of the Aragon family’s help to get in and out of Waldecian Academy as he pleased. So, his status was somewhat better than a lot of people there.
These were the routines he wanted right now.
Disguising as an ordinary to avoid practitioners at the stem-building stage and keeping a low profile would keep him safe.
As a servant, he had a lot of free time because his master had to be in classes. During those whiles, he would spend time cultivating Qi accumulation.
……………….
Almost two years later…
Merlin was now isolating himself to cultivate vital essence in the forest behind the academy.
Arthur was twelve now; he was about to attend a test to become a magic practitioner.
In detail, the wizards would have to prepare to do the prolonged test. The attendees would have to get through burdens and seize back “the magical-seal stones.” Acquiring the stones, those wizards would be able to seal them on their bodies to turn the stones into magical cloaks.
Merlin did not go with Arthur because the test venue was in another secret dimension.
Without all the criteria, he could not attend the test.
Magic cloaks were the magical tools that could increase the users’ magical powers.
When one summoned the magic cloak, his or her body would have a reaction of triggering and boosting magical power inside.
If there was a fight between magic practitioners, the one without a magic cloak would be immediately at a disadvantage. That was why magical cloaks were very important to the wizards.
Plus, they were also an indication of the magical-power levels.
Wizards in different levels would have different colors of magical cloaks. The cloaks changed accordingly to the users' magic auras. Typically, the ones at the magic-practitioner level would have red magical auras.
However, the details varied, depending on the users.
But for a high-ranking wizard, he or she would be able to merge oneself with the cloak and turn it into his or her aura that could empower one’s magical power.
Since Arthur’s test took a long time, it was the chance for Merlin to get away and drill the seventh level of Qi accumulation.
Merlin had been stuck at level six for quite some time. Because the bottleneck period was critical for him, he needed the time and place suitable for bottleneck-drilling.
Getting half way through the zone of Qi accumulation level seven at nine years old, was the news that would make the eyes of people from his past start burning with envy to the point where the fire burned them to death.
After Arthur set off to the test venue, Merlin immediately headed off to the forest behind the academy because he needed to be in isolation to drill this bottleneck.
Even though the distilled magical powers turned into an extremely pure Xian vital essence, so pure that would make the bottleneck-drilling easy, a bottleneck was still a bottleneck. Drillings required a peaceful place suitable for meditation.
Merlin chose a spot in the middle of the forest. He took out his wand and flicked it deftly. A moment later, blue magical alphabets were surrounding him. It was a circle with a five-meter radius.
Magical alphabets!
How did Merlin learn magic?
Did he not say that he would not learn magic until he had reached the stem-building stage?
It was unbelievable that during these few years, Merlin had already learnt about the magical alphabets.