Chapter 2 Miracle Furnace

Miracle Furnace, an object whose name alone commanded awe.

Standing behind the wizard, Richard cautiously made mental contact with the furnace that had till now shown no reaction.

He needed to figure out what this thing was for, and quickly.

Fortunately, the process was not complicated.

The moment Richard's mind touched the furnace, the functionality of the Miracle Furnace automatically transferred into his brain.

In simple terms, the Miracle Furnace could extract from the 'raw materials' anything that the host could utilize, whether it was some substance from the materials themselves or some information contained within them.

When refining with the Miracle Furnace, the host needed to continuously provide 'fuel', and the amount of fuel consumed varied depending on what was being extracted.

Extracting information required spiritual power, while extracting material required energy.

...

The test proceeded swiftly; in less than an hour, over a hundred children had been tested, but only seven had passed the spiritual power test.

"Alright. Let these children go back," the wizard in the black robe ordered the officer after the last child was tested.

"Yes, Wizard Sir," the officer bowed.

Watching the other children leave one after the other, the remaining seven looked at each other in bewilderment.

Among these seven children, there were a farmer's son, a baker's daughter, a blacksmith's adopted child, a merchant's youngest son...

They almost encompassed all the classes of the entire territory, but now they stood together, awaiting the proclamation of the wizard in the black robe.

"Alright, children. As the qualified ones, you are far superior to the others. You all will now become the four hundred and thirty-second batch of Wizard Apprentices of the Black Tower Wizard Academy, embarking on the path to seek truth at the Academy."

The wizard sounded very pleased, apparently satisfied with the seven qualified children from the Heisen Territory.

He beckoned with his hand, signaling Baron Delis to come over.

"Delis, take these children for a bath and get them changed into fresh clothes."

"And this child," the wizard pointed at Richard, "tend to his wounds. Should he encounter any issues on our journey due to his injuries... hmm."

The wizard didn't complete his sentence, but the threat in his words was clear to all.

"I understand, Sir," Baron replied with definitive resolve.

With that, Baron Delis arranged for the castle's attendants to lead the other children to the lower levels of the castle.

There was a large bathhouse on the lower level of the castle, where a hot spring from beneath the ground had been ingeniously converted into bathing pools by Baron Heisen.

In the bath, Richard's wounds shifted from numbness to pain.

A hot water bath, such a luxurious thing was almost criminal for commoners, for the wood used to heat it could make so many meals.

Let alone a natural hot spring, a luxury only Nobles could afford.

After staying in the water for a while and scrubbing off the mud and dust, Richard quickly got out.

He had less time than the others; he needed to tend to his wounds.

...

After leaving the bathhouse, Richard put on the new clothes prepared by the Maid.

Made of cotton, they were a bit large but comfortably warm.

Standing in front of the mirror, Richard carefully examined his appearance.

With shoulder-length black hair, deep-set eyes, a prominent nose, and a thin, pale-lipped mouth, he looked less like a commoner and more like a noble in distress.

"Sir, you must have Noble blood in you," the maid beside him commented with admiration.

"Do I?" Richard raised an eyebrow and then followed the maid to the second floor of the castle.

The castle's second-floor corridor was lined with portraits, likely of previous Heisen Barons.

At the end, Richard saw the portrait of the first Baron Heisen, depicted in armor, holding a two-handed greatsword.

Beside the portrait, a broken Great Sword hung on the wall.

"Hmm."

As Richard laid eyes on the broken sword, his Miracle Furnace pulsed within him.

"Is this the first Heisen Baron's sword?" Richard felt stirred.

The broken sword was recognized as 'raw material' by the furnace.

"Yes, Sir," the maid responded.

Richard stepped forward and gently touched the broken sword.

[Raw Material: The Count of Heisen's Broken Sword]

[Skill Extractable: Wind Crow Swordsmanship]

[Extraction Cost: 5 Spiritual Power]

[Proceed with Extraction?]

Wind Crow Swordsmanship!

Richard's heart quivered.

That was the famous sword technique that the Count of Heisen had used to claim victory on the battlefields of old.

The fame of this sword technique was such that even Richard, a lowly peasant, had heard wandering bards speak of it.

But it was said that the technique had been lost three hundred years ago.

This was also the reason for the decline of the Heisen lineage.

Faced with such a treasure, Richard naturally didn't hesitate to choose to extract it.

This was an opportunity not to be missed!

As soon as Richard chose to extract it, he instantly felt tired, as if he had been attending a morning's worth of advanced mathematics classes, his head heavy and groggy.

But before Richard could succumb to drowsiness, the scene before him jolted him fully awake.

The broken sword had vanished!

Standing by, the maid was suddenly startled. Where had the large sword gone?

But in the blink of an eye, the maid saw the broken sword reappear.

Was she seeing things?

The maid rubbed her eyes, assuring herself that the broken sword was still in its original place, while the young wizard looked at her quizzically.

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing, sir, let's hurry to the doctor," the maid quickly said.

...

Seeing that he had fooled her, Richard breathed a sigh of relief internally.

He had not expected that the Miracle Furnace needed to consume the physical form as well in order to absorb the information.

The moment he saw the broken sword disappear, Richard's heart skipped a beat.

Fortunately, the Miracle Furnace completed the refinement in an instant, and the broken sword had only disappeared for a moment before returning to its original place.

His gaze returned to the Melter.

Above the Miracle Furnace, a white light was undulating.

When Richard touched the ball of light with his spiritual power, fleeting memories like flashing lights passed through his mind.

He found himself on one dangerous battlefield after another, swinging the sword in his hand to slay one enemy after another.

"Sir? Sir? We're at the doctor's now."

The maid's voice brought Richard back from his daze, his spiritual power was still too weak, and just accepting the battle memories left behind by past warriors could send him into a trance.

"Oh, sure."

Richard came back to his senses and quickly entered the doctor's room.

Half an hour later, Richard, leaning on the wall, walked out of the room weakly.

Having undergone external injury surgery, the doctor did not have any anesthetic, only strong liquor to alleviate the pain.

Fortunately, the doctor was quick with his hands, finishing the removal of the rotten flesh from the wound, stitching it up, and applying ointment in less than half an hour.

It was at that time Baron Delis also arrived on the second floor.

"Wizard Apprentice, the Wizard is ready to depart."

...

Stepping outside the castle, Richard was now dressed in brand new cotton clothes; though his face still showed some signs of malnourishment, his demeanor was completely different from before.

"Hmm, you look good," the black-robed wizard said, looking at Richard with satisfaction and nodding his head.

Then with a wave of his large sleeve, a mysterious force enveloped the seven of them, then floated beside the wizard like bubbles.

"This is Levitation Skill, you'll be able to learn it at the Academy too."

After briefly explaining, the black-robed wizard shot a fireball into the sky.

Bang!

The fireball exploded.

A beam of light pierced through the leaden clouds, shooting through the burst fireball straight down to the earth.

"What is that?"

Richard looked up at the sky, through the thick clouds, a huge grey outline was becoming gradually clearer.

"What in the world is this?"

Richard's voice trembled, he could hardly believe what he was seeing in the sky.

Before him, a Flying Airship stretching hundreds of meters long like a blue whale emerged from the clouds, and the beam that had pierced the clouds was the eye of this immense craft.

For a moment, Richard vividly recalled a legend he had heard while seeking information on transcendents.

The legend told that every ten years, a Giant Beast of the clouds would come roaming from the Northern Barbarian Mountains.

Its shape was as large as a mountain, its gaze as dazzling as lightning.

Now, the legend had shed its cover!

The black-robed wizard spread his arms, carrying everyone towards the column of light to ascend the sky, as if Saints flying to heaven in glory.

Richard saw that the wizard's mouth was moving, and a grand voice filled with joy reached the ears of all the qualifiers.

"Fellow juniors, welcome aboard the Zeppelin Type Magic Airship."