Chapter 42: Neighbors?

“Whew~ The difficulty was no joke.” Four days later, Zheng Yichen looked at the Magic Arms placed before him, which emitted a chilly, cold aura. He couldn’t help but show a somewhat proud expression. As for his current location, he was long since not in the castle anymore.

After failing to forge a Magic Weapon on the first day, he was driven out by Loris and even shunned by the Ghost Maids. He originally thought that a failed Magic Weapon would just dissipate and vanish. Who would have thought the result of failure wouldn’t be disappearance but a spectacularly huge explosion.

The blast wave from the explosion swept through the castle’s main hall, leaving it in disarray. Zheng Yichen, who bore the brunt of it, felt at the time like he was hit by a locomotive…

Anyway, he couldn’t currently use high-level Magic, so he had to settle entirely for intermediate-level Magic for now. As for the future, he could always upgrade slowly. There was plenty of time, and this was only the first weapon since truly starting work.

As he added more Magic to the weapon, Zheng Yichen started to feel it was getting out of his control, somewhat exceeding the limits of his abilities. Not his ability to use Magic, but his own ‘Talent.’

Loris’s explanation for this was simple: feeling unable to control it meant his strength wasn’t enough. Even the best Talent required sufficient power to support it.

After four days of effort and several failures along the way, he finally succeeded in making this magically modified version of a Magic Weapon. He imbued it with the Ice Magic Frost and the dark Magic corrosion. The former added frost damage to attacks, while the latter caused targets attacked to suffer dark Magic corrosion. Then there was the Soul Drain technique for absorbing souls and the Soul Binding enhancement.

Soul Binding enhancement was an evil Magic that relied on collecting numerous Souls to empower weapons or armor. After all, Souls were also a form of energy. The defensive or offensive bonuses piled up from many Souls were extremely powerful.

Zheng Yichen even considered adding a Soul Release Impact that unleashed Souls as an attack. This also depended on the number of Souls gathered. Unfortunately, aside from gathering Magic for these enhancements, four ‘enchantments’ were already his limit. Trying to add this fifth one caused at least three Intermediate Magic Weapons to explode, making him experience the feeling of being hit by a locomotive three extra times.

The last time, he wised up. If he couldn’t add it, then he just wouldn’t. Between attack and enhancement, he chose the latter. Frost and corrosion attacks were already pretty decent in terms of attack power. As for Soul Release Impact or similar things, those required a lot of accumulation and couldn’t show results quickly. So he simply ignored it, and thus this Frostmourne took shape.

Zheng Yichen also thought about adding a brainwashing suggestive Magic and a summon Undead Magic to it, but after some consideration, he ignored those too. He wasn’t actually planning to create a Lich King… It definitely wasn’t because his ability was insufficient and he couldn’t achieve those effects!

“So, are you sure that little girl can actually wield this weapon?” Loris held the Magic Weapon that Zheng Yichen was proudly showing off. With three evil Magics added, the sword alone gave off a lingering sense of cold, sinister evil just by being near it.

“Huh, she can’t?” Zheng Yichen was stunned. Damn, he forgot about that. In this world, walking around with all sorts of weapons might be fine, but that didn’t mean there were no taboos. If you ran around with a sinister, ghostly Magic artifact, there would definitely be an Otherworld version of the relevant authorities inviting you for tea.

“The Dark Church would like such a weapon.” Loris commented. Aside from the materials, the power of this Magic Weapon already surpassed many high-level weapons. In terms of potential, it was even more outstanding. It could not only accumulate Mana to strengthen itself but also absorb and store Souls for additional enhancement.

All of this was only possible because of Zheng Yichen’s unique ‘Otherworld Talent.’ Others couldn’t achieve the same effect even if they tried to copy him exactly.

“…Then I’ll make a new one, I guess.” Scratching his head, Zheng Yichen said with some annoyance.

If a Magic Sword wouldn’t work, then he should make a more righteous weapon. Let’s think, what would be good… Hmm… How about Azure Wrath?

Recalling the appearance of that weapon, Azure Wrath’s design was also quite a gorgeous sword. That’s it!

“…Does your world have many weapons?” Seeing the new Magic Weapon Zheng Yichen created, its appearance clearly looked designed, definitely not something thought up on the spot.

“Yeah, I’ve seen quite a few.” Stroking this blank Magic Weapon, Zheng Yichen shook his head slightly. Magic was indeed amazing. He could just produce this thing so easily, even if it was just the appearance. Other aspects could be added later.

Without the genuine article present, what he created was the genuine article!

Briefly recalling Azure Wrath’s attributes, it was quite a coincidence; it was also Ice Attribute, with a certain area-of-effect Aura damage against Undead, plus other random Magic attributes… He could just improvise those.

Having a plan in mind, Zheng Yichen immediately prepared to start crafting. But then he was surrounded by a group of little maids. Today’s shift was unusually staffed by several Ghostly Little Maids together. Although they had all lived for over fifty years, their physical forms seemed to affect their mindsets, so their behavior wasn’t much different from children.

Several Ghostly Little Maids, holding custom-sized brooms, surrounded him and shooed him away.

Alright, the last explosion really made these Ghost Maids work hard for a long time. Scratching his head, Zheng Yichen grabbed the still-just-a-blank ‘Azure Wrath’ and left the castle, heading to the spot where he had been working before.

“…Huh?” Before even reaching his destination, Zheng Yichen sensed Human presence ahead. Thinking for a moment, he didn’t approach directly. Instead, he used the Projection Spell he had just mastered. A miniature dragon, only about fifteen centimeters tall, sneaked toward his Magic Weapon forging site. There, it saw a group of people wearing black-and-red patterned robes, doing who-knew-what.

Were they gathering information? Watching these people’s actions for a while, Zheng Yichen wondered to himself. He had seen more than once, through Bona Kaine’s Magic Book, Detection Magic used by others—magic specifically for detecting traces like residual auras at a scene.

Were they detecting things at his Magic Weapon forging site? Could it be that the earlier commotion was too big?

Looking at the several craters, each about a dozen meters in radius, blasted into the site, Zheng Yichen fell silent for a moment. Okay, the commotion was indeed not small.

Recalling his Projection, Zheng Yichen turned back toward the castle. He didn’t plan to contact these people. After all, even through the projection, he could tell that among the black-and-red-robed people present, two seemed particularly troublesome.

“Other people active in this Forest?” After hearing Zheng Yichen describe what he saw, Loris tilted her head in thought for a moment, then simply shook her head. “I haven’t been back here for a long time, so I don’t know.”

Zheng Yichen’s mouth twitched involuntarily. There was a Barrier around the castle. Without the proper method to enter, no one could find this place. Even if a new force had settled here, those without sufficient ability wouldn’t discover the castle. Since Loris returned, she had acted like a shut-in, hardly ever stepping outside.

As for these Ghost Maids, before Loris returned, they merely performed basic maintenance here to prevent the place from getting dusty from neglect.

“If you’re bored, you can investigate it yourself.”

“But this is your home. Suddenly there’s what seems like a neighbor. Aren’t you concerned?” Zheng Yichen asked with some annoyance. After all, those people didn’t look like good folks at all; their auras gave him a feeling like they were Cultists.

“I’m not concerned.” Loris replied even more bluntly, her eyes narrowing slightly. “Any intruder who comes here without permission must die.”

“Tsk tsk, so much killer intent.” Zheng Yichen shrugged beside her. “What if someone accidentally wanders in?”

“There is no ‘what if.'” She affirmed decisively. “Those without sufficient strength won’t find this place. Those with sufficient strength, upon discovering it, will send some form of message unless they harbor other intentions. Anyone who doesn’t do that is an intruder!”