The entire world was fiery red. Everywhere one could see was boiling lava and a lively sea of fire.
If one was far away, it would feel like they were in a sauna. If one was close enough, it would feel like they were being roasted in a fire. If one really walked in, they would immediately ignite if they didn't bring some fire-resistant equipment and potions.
The sea of fire wasn't calm at all. Numerous fire monsters crawled out of the sea of fire and furiously attacked everything in front of them, including their own species. And when these fire monsters reached the end of their short lives, violent explosions and the sea of fire would be the end of their lives.
Fire monsters, fire lizards, low-level fire elementals, fire rock monsters, and fire wolves were everywhere. They were killing each other, and the victors would be able to devour the elemental cores of the losers in order to rapidly grow stronger.
If one didn't know what had happened, it would be difficult to imagine that this was the Northlands, which was famous for being cold. This was basically a nightmarish scene from the Fire Elemental Plane described in novels. But from a certain standpoint, this was indeed the Fire Elemental Plane that had already been eroded.
And in the middle of all the flames, there was a throne of ice and snow that attracted the attention of all the fire monsters.
This was a throne that was more than ten meters tall. There was an atmosphere of ice and snow all around it. Even the sea of fire would be instantly frozen. Any fire monster that approached this throne would instantly be frozen into ice.
On the throne, a figure wearing heavy ice armor was currently in deep thought. He seemed to be taking a nap on the ice throne, but his bright eyes flashed with the light of wisdom, which proved that he still existed.
Of course, summoning ice in the Fire Elemental World was something that was hated by others. Countless fire elemental creatures rushed over, but were instantly transformed into ice sculptures the moment they got close. In fact, not a single one of them was able to make the ice-armored person personally attack.
There were now numerous ice shards on the ground. These were all the shards of the fire monsters. Although they were still at the outskirts of the volcano, the ice-armored person's ability to kill fire elemental creatures on such a large scale was enough to prove how extraordinary he was.
The ice-armored person remained silent on his throne, ignoring the fire monsters that were roaring at him. He had the attitude of a person in deep thought. It seemed that he was waiting for something, but that something still didn't come. When dusk began to fall, he finally spoke. His words were simple, and his tone was low and deep with a profound meaning …
"… Damn, my butt is frozen again."
Cough — cough — at this moment, I finally understood. No wonder a certain prince was able to sit on the Ice Throne for so long. It turned out that he was probably just like me, and when his home was invaded, he had no choice but to stand up … it must have been quite painful.
After making up my mind that I would never cosplay as that unlucky bastard again and that I would definitely change into a new appearance, I began to summarize my gains. Of course, before that, I threw out a signal flare to send a message to the outside world.
Ten minutes later, two enormous red dragons appeared in the sky and charged towards me at lightning speed.
The red dragons were of the fire element to begin with, so they wouldn't be viewed as enemies by the entire mortal plane. They had incredibly high fire resistance, so they were able to ignore the fire elementals' fire attacks against them. They directly dove down at a low altitude, picked up the throne that had retracted its icy aura, and turned around to flee.
I had been hunting in the outer regions of the Fire Elemental Plane to begin with, so we soon returned to the normal world. The moment that I breathed in the frigid air again, I received my harvest. A tremendous amount of ice magic poured into my body, causing my entire body to be frozen to the point that I almost froze to death. Only after several dozen minutes did I slowly recover.
"… It would seem that I'll have to hunt less next time. I never expected that the Great Snow Mountain Magical Realm would be so generous and give me so much."
Right now, the Great Snow Mountain Magical Realm was the one that gave me ice magic in return. As for the reason, I would probably have to start with the elemental wars and the will of the mortal plane.
Dimensions had their own will. Although this seemed ridiculous, it was actually a fact that all mages accepted. Dimensions were the combination of a series of natural laws. Although they were simple and mechanical, they would indeed act according to the natural laws … The only exception would probably be the will of the Chaos Abyss. That was an unreasonable bastard who constantly cheated.
Most of the time, the great majority of the mortal plane's residents would be unable to sense the existence of a dimensional will. Nor would they be able to touch upon the natural laws set down by the dimensional will.
Every dimensional will would have different rules. However, the only rule was to treat everyone equally (with the exception of the Chaos Abyss which was controlled by someone). For example, in the Chaos Abyss, where the strong preyed on the weak, the will of the Chaos Abyss would reward anyone who killed an enemy. Demonifying the Chaos Abyss's rapid growth would be the best bait.
Perhaps some people would say that devouring was the true source of growth. However, allowing — no, setting down the natural laws of "devouring" would be the will of the mortal plane.
In the mortal plane, anyone who made a contribution that was beneficial to the mortal plane would also receive the dimensional will's support. For example, when I successfully upgraded Law into the power of Law, the entire dimensional will (the Source of Order) gave me support and rewards. Not only did the power of Law become a part of the power of Order, it even gave Wumianzhe the God of Law's Divine Concept and Divine Concept. This was a tremendous reward that would allow Wumianzhe to ascend to become a God at any time.
The mortal plane's rewards wouldn't usually be any specific items. It would usually be some sort of special privilege or invisible treatment. If you discovered it, you would be able to use it. However, most of the time, you wouldn't even know what you were being rewarded with. Of course, the most common type of reward would be all sorts of mysterious good luck (the will of the heavens). The most obvious punishment for invaders and harms would be mysterious misfortune (another reason why Demon Lords were always defeated).
Cough, I seemed to have finally discovered the source of my E Luck …
The Elemental Planes also had their own natural laws. For example, the elemental devouring law that I previously mentioned. Elemental creatures would attack and devour each other in the Elemental Planes. Through evolution, Elemental Lords would become Elemental Lords. Elemental Lords would then fight amongst themselves to become Elemental Gods.
It could be said that the natural laws of the Elemental Planes were simple and direct. The reward would be the power of the Elemental Plane. This was rather similar to the Chaos Abyss, but there wouldn't be many side effects. As for who was the one who copied who, I had no idea. Considering how ancient the Elemental Planes were, the will of the Chaos Abyss was probably the one who copied this idea.
And when there was a war between the Elemental Planes, what would motivate the elemental creatures to fight so valiantly would naturally be sufficiently attractive benefits. And for the elemental creatures, only pure and powerful elemental power would be the most practical reward.
Doesn't this sound familiar? Two large companies fighting each other for market share, fighting openly and secretly, and finally giving a large share of the profits to the successful salespeople, encouraging them to continue working hard for market share … This is another explanation of the truth of the Elemental War.
Long ago, mages discovered that the natural laws of the Elemental Planes were rather crude. In an elemental war, using an enemy's elemental power to kill an enemy (the rule was that everyone was treated equally) would also result in rewards. For example, right now, the Ice Elemental Plane and Fire Elemental Plane were at war. If I used ice elemental power to kill fire elemental creatures on the battlefield, the Ice Elemental Plane would also give me a portion of the pure ice elemental power that could help elemental creatures rapidly grow stronger. As an ice mage, I was capable of transforming this pure ice elemental power into actual ice mana.
This was also why the Mage Country had residences in all the major Elemental Planes. In the Elemental Planes, elemental mages could use various methods to rapidly grow stronger. However, there would be very few extra rewards for killing other elemental mages. It would still be more rewarding during the Elemental War … For the same reason, a company's salespeople wouldn't encourage or support a company fighting for market share, but they would give a large share of the profits if they fought other companies.
For elemental mages, the Elemental War would be incredibly dangerous. After all, we weren't elemental creatures. Just having powerful elemental power wouldn't mean much. Magic cultivation was the accumulation of knowledge and experience. If magic power surpassed magic control, it would be the equivalent of self-destructing elemental bombs. But for me, the only thing I lacked right now was elemental power.
Not only did I need to make up for the emptiness I felt after using Ice Aeon, but I also needed to establish a sufficient foundation for my next power level. My ice elemental power had already reached the SemiGod level.
This was already the third day of my Elemental Hunt. However, I was still only able to hunt in the outskirts of the Ice Elemental Plane. This wasn't because I wasn't strong enough, but rather because the Ice Elemental Plane was far too generous. They gave me far too many ice elemental creatures every day. I guessed that this was because the Elemental War had just begun, and there were far too few ice elemental creatures here to hunt fire elemental creatures. Perhaps I had even become the Ice Elemental Plane's "number one salesperson", and received the "Greatest Business Champion Gift" every day.
Calculating the time, the ice elemental creatures of the Great Snow Mountain Magical Realm would arrive soon. By that time, the ice elemental creatures would receive a normal share of the profits. I could also consider hunting high-level fire elemental creatures. Hunting fire wolves and fire lizards every day was far too boring. I was so bored that I wanted to find some other way to amuse myself … Wait a moment, let me first think of a way to defrost my butt. It was far too dangerous to forcefully pull it off. It was likely that I wouldn't even be able to ride a mount in the future … Was this the reason why a certain someone would drop a mount!?
Cough, I should be a bit more serious. I had been living quite pitifully these past few days. Hunting during the day was boring to death, and at night, I had to study through the night. The person who taught me was even my ice magic teacher from back in the day …
"… Roland, today, let's first read to Chapter 153 of" The Compound Effect of Water and Ice ". Let's properly talk about the water-ice effect. First of all, you need to forget what I taught you back in the day, because back then, I was always making things difficult for you …"
I felt more and more speechless. What kind of teacher was this? He was actually making things difficult for his students? As expected, I knew that something was wrong. It was all your fault that I failed my ice magic course three times back in the day!
"… No, you're the one who's too stupid. Everyone else has passed. The traps I set up back then were only to make my students take the wrong path. You, on the other hand, took the wrong path before you even left the school."
[I can guarantee that I'm telling the truth.]
Even my System was attacking me at a time like this. Was my magic talent really that bad?
"Trust me, I've seen students who were even worse than you. They couldn't even become acolytes. I really don't know how you became a true ice mage back in the day."
How did I become an ice mage back in the day? I cheated with my System.
And so, when I looked at my System, the reply I received made me feel even more helpless.
[From a certain standpoint, you've never been an ice mage. More accurately speaking, you're more like an elemental magical creature than a mage. Other mages use theoretical analysis to construct magical spell models to control the power of the elements. You directly use your own will to forcefully control the power of the elements. If other mages use their brains, you rely on your instincts … Others use real objects to sketch and recreate the truth one stroke at a time. You use ink and wash to depict your own understanding, projecting what you see. There's a huge difference in the foundational nature of the two.]
At that moment, countless memories flooded my mind. My understanding of ice had traces of my time in the Northlands. My abnormal foundational magic, and Harloys later changed her teaching method. She stopped lecturing me on theories and instead told me to comprehend the foundational nature of ice … Comprehend the hell? Was that something a mage who researched knowledge and did experiments supposed to do? Now that I thought about it, I felt like she was a fraud.
"Of course. You've heard about how a mage who dabbled in magic tried to comprehend it. This isn't magic at all, and the most unmagical part was that I was just trying to trick her, but she actually succeeded … That's why I've been teaching you the same way I teach magical beasts."
Although I was quite displeased, I already had an all-purpose answer.
"Hmph! You science students who only play with data don't understand. I'm a literature student who pursues romance! Theories are the stairs of idiots. Geniuses only need inspiration and instincts. "
"… Then, romantic literature genius, do you need treatment for the frostbite on your buttocks? Perhaps you intend to lie down on your stomach and apply the medicine? I definitely won't take a picture of that and sell it to the fairies and Renée … "
"… Teacher, please continue with the lesson. I can't wait to become an outstanding theoretical mage!"
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