Age of Adepts

It was impossible to create the equipment to summon a Clay Golem in Greem’s room. So, he left and hurried up to the Alchemy Laboratory, located on the third floor of the tower.

After paying three Knowledge Points and thirty gold coins, Greem was allowed to use the most sophisticated alchemy station available for three hours. This was nearly half of Greem’s saving, so, if it wasn’t that he wanted to have the highest success rate for this first Golem, he would never willing to pay this much money.

The floor was clean and tidy and the walls were smooth and shiny. There were wooden racks against the walls, on which laid all sorts of items. There were labeled containers for all the commonly used magical materials, and there were Elementium sticks, which were used to detect the Elementium characteristics of an item. There was a full set of metal armor, which was used to test the strength of a magical item... besides all these, there were many items of which Greem had no idea what their usage was.

But Greem’s didn’t care about any of these. What he was most interested in was the shining Magical Alchemy Station in the center of the room.

There were metal chains hanging from the ceiling. A brightly glowing stone was hanging on the end of each metal chain. Eight metal chains; eight bright stones. They made a perfect circle around the Alchemy Station. With this, the operator could put all their focus into crafting a magical item without being disturbed by shadows.

These were basically magical versions of an astral lamp!

And the Alchemy Station was, in fact, a magical version of an industrial crafting table.

The Alchemy Station was an 8 x 4 meter object with some raising platforms and indentation on its surface. It was covered with mystical equipment that was beyond ordinary people’s imaginations. To be precise, the surface of the station was divided into sixteen working areas, and each area was capable of accomplishing some specific crafting task.

For a master Alchemist, who was familiar with the process of crafting, they would be fully competent with all this equipment and be able to smoothly accomplished a well-planned experiment. But for someone who was new to this Alchemy Station, perhaps just getting used to this magical equipment would take several days.

However, this was not an obstacle for Greem, who had the help of the Chip.

“Chip, begin scanning this Alchemy Station. Analyze the procedures of a crafting experiment!”

*Beep* “Mission has been created... Beginning scan...”

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As a flashing blue light appeared in his eyes as all the equipment placed on the Alchemy Station, and magical mechanisms and formations hidden within the Alchemy Station, were scanned by the Chip and stored in Greem’s mind.

Combining previously analyzed data and the on-site scanning task, the equipment placed on top of the Alchemy Station was quickly stored in the Chip’s database. Afterward, they were projected into Greem’s retina.

Now, whenever Greem glanced around the Alchemy Station, whenever a strange or mysterious item came into his vision, a clear annotation would appear near them.

To put it simply, the Alchemy Station was an amalgamation of many of earth’s crafting and forging machines, all fused into one convenient platform.

A magnifying glass was mounted on a movable mechanical arm. It was not using the same concave-convex lens, which he had back on Earth, but a glass that had been etched with a special magical formation. Greem had chosen the highest standard Alchemy Laboratory, so this glass could give him a magnifier power of 300-500x. If it was a normal Alchemy Laboratory he chose, perhaps the maximum magnifier power would just be 150x.

This was so important because, when crafting most magical items, a microscopic carving was required. Usually, on a specific region of the magical item, one would need to carve a few independent, yet tightly interconnected, magical formations. For some expert Alchemists, they could even carve more than hundred magical formations on a fist sized ruby crystal.

As a beginner, Greem wasn’t capable of accomplishing this, but he only needed to carve seven magical formations on a thumb-sized demon core.

The Summoning Rune was a must have, as it was the most integral rune, which was required to summon the Clay Golem. It was found in every single magical summoning item.

The formation of Elementium Body Construction was also a must have, as it would weave the magical forces of this world to construct an Elementium body for the Golem. His current project would construct a body of soft clay.

The Mind Control Imprint System was the most important among all the formations, as, during the crafting process, Greem had to leave an imprint of his own soul in the formation. This was what would make the Clay Golem obey his commands.

In order to let the Golem freely control the Elementium constructed body, the necessary energy nodes and circuits would have to be carved as well, because this directly affected the mobility and combat ability of the Golem. Obviously, he couldn’t afford to make any mistakes on them.

Of course, Greem didn’t understand these highly difficult runes at all, but, fortunately, he had the Chip, which helped him complete the design and optimization. Hence, all he needed to do was just followed the plan laid down by the Chip.

But even with this, the difficulty of Greem’s work was still beyond imagination.

In the past six years, Greem had only performed a handful of alchemy experiments, and he had just done some common experiments, such as Elementium purification and extraction. Honestly speaking, he was still a rookie in the field of alchemy.

But today he didn’t have the resources for a test run, because he only had one demon core!

If he failed, his dreams of a Golem army would come crashing to a halt.

............

Greem stood still in front of the Alchemy Station for nearly fifteen minutes, not moving a bit. In his mind, using a simulation, the Chip was repeatedly showing him the procedure of crafting the Golem core. He only stopped doing that after he could recant every single detail by heart.

Greem after standing still for over fifteen minutes, he finally moved.

From his waist pouch, he took out a bar of Black Magic Iron and threw it into a crucible. In next second, he sent his Spirit energy into the controlling magical formation of the Alchemy Station. A popping sound was heard as an Elementium fire was ignited below the crucible.

If he worked without this magical Alchemy Station, he would need to create his own Elementium fire to heat and melt this Black Magic Iron. Throughout the entire process he had to maintain a stable output of Elementium fire for more than fifteen minutes, or else it wouldn’t melt it correctly.

And now, with the help from this Alchemy Station, he only needed to activate the magical formation hidden underneath it and the equipment would automatically heat up and melt the crafting material according to the temperature and time he set. And while waiting for the Black Magic Iron to completely melt, he could have time for some other preparations.

This alone fully demonstrated the benefits of using a Magical Alchemy Station.

After carefully placing the core took out of Sinbad’s head on top of the Alchemy Station, Greem adjusted the magnifying lens to an appropriate position and correct power level. Only then did he start preparing the equipment for a microscopic carving.

The tool used to perform a microscopic carving was a special magical item. Depending on the strength of magic energy injected into it, this tool could produce a laser-like beam of heat as tiny as a mosquito’s leg. This heat beam was specifically modified and adjusted by master Alchemist. Although it was small, it was excellent at cutting.

Let alone those commonly used magical metals, even the Eighth Degree Gold, Underground Wrought Iron, and Kryptonium Steel, which were all unique metals which possessed a hardness beyond any ordinary man’s imagination, were easily carved by this heat beam.

What Greem needed to do now was to use this equipment to carve the required seven magical formations on the thumb-sized core, one Summoning Formation, one Mind Control Imprint System formation, one Elementium Life Granting formation, four energy nodes, and a few extra energy circuits...

This was all easier said than done. Greem calmed his mind, then he leaned forward and placed his eyes above the magnifier lens, finally starting to work on the project he had been preparing for.

Under the 300x magnifying power, the crystal clear, thumb-sized core had become a massive object with its surface fully covered by coarse pellets. Following the Chip’s instructions, Greem controlled the magical formation, adjusting the core to the perfect position and angle. Only then did he activate the heat beam.

A heat beam, the size of one-tenth an ox hair, hit right onto the core, making the spot red and soft, gradually etching an indentation the size of a quarter of a human hair. After that, Greem moved the heat beam with his Spiritual energy, slowly traversing the surface of the core. As this happened, a straight and narrow line appeared.

Everything, from the position of the beam, to how deep each cut should be, all of these were marked with different colors in Greem’s mind. All he needed to do was control the heat beam with his Spirit energy and draw according to the layout and speed given by the Chip, carefully completing this highly focused task.

One after another, magical runes, which looked like scribbles, were engraved in a crisscrossed pattern and surrounded with magical formations. Leaving all four corners empty so he could carve the necessary energy nodes, and carve an energy circuit in the center to connect all of them...

After an hour and a half hour of concentrated effort, all seven magical formations had been interweaved on the surface of the core, becoming a flawless magical formation as a whole.

The first step had been completed.

The next step was to connect these magical formations, which also required patience and precision.

The microscopic carving only produced the lines of these magical formations. The magical energy would never flow in this indentations by itself, hence a medium that could respond to the magical energy and allowed the energy to flow freely was needed.

And this medium was the Black Magic Iron that had been melted into a liquid form.

Of course, if it was an official Adept who was filthy rich, the medium would be replaced with Mithril. But Greem didn’t have such resources or money, thus, he could only use the Magic Black Iron, which was the lowest grade medium he could use.

Although using it would cause a significant energy loss as it conducted magical energy, for a simple Clay Golem that didn’t require advanced skills to craft, it was more than enough.

Therefore, Greem had to go through another hour of restless consumption of his Spirit energy. Although he was using only a tiny bit of it every second, after an hour of constant consumption, blue veins had started popping out on his forehead.

With help from the magical formation, Greem slowly poured the Magic Black Iron molten into the indentations carved out by the heat beam. He had to be careful not to leave any cracks or allow any to spill out of the carvings. For a Beginner Apprentice, this extremely difficult task was simply a mighty miracle that seemed impossible to achieve.

But, with the help of the powerful Chip, Greem actually turned this impossibility into a reality.

When the last thread of Magic Black Iron liquid merged into the indentation, Greem cut off the magical formation, pushed away the magnifying lens, and quietly stared at the Golem core, which was floating on top of the Alchemy Station. Right at this very moment, his mind was rocking with roaring waves, and he felt himself tearing up.

His first Golem was complete!