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Hearing what the teenager had said, Village Head instantly got angry: “Kyle, if you don’t know anything, don’t say anything, shut up and sit to the side.”

Its no wonder why Village Head is so angry. He is very clear that for spellcasters, magic is the expertise they are proud of, it is what support their arrogance. His grandson asking to use money to exchange for their pride is no different from asking a n.o.ble beauty to have a one-night stand for some money…… It is roughly that kind of feeling. Anyone with a bit of self-esteem, not to mention spellcaster who are known for being mysterious and scary, will definitely beat the s.h.i.t out of the one who says such brainless words.

Seeing his grandfather suddenly flaring up, Kyle already knows he said something wrong, he gives Liang Li Dong an apologetic smile and runs to the side and sits, not saying anything carelessly again.

“Respectable Lord Priest, Kyle is still young and clueless, he doesn’t mean it!” Village Head is observing Liang Li Dong’s expression while saying: “3 years ago, Kyle almost died from an illness and it’s a bishop who saved him. Since then, Kyle looks forward to spellcasters. He always dream of learning magic. That’s why he is so agitated and offended you.”

Liang Li Dong shakes his hand: “It’s alright!”

Old man and teenager are relieved.

If it is any other spellcasters, they will most likely be angry hearing what the teenager says just now. Even if they do not punish Kyle, they will definitely leave straight away. But Liang Li Dong is unlike those traditional n.o.bles or traditional spellcasters, he is only a player. On the contrary, he quite admires Kyle’s straight-forwardness. At least, it is easy to understand and will not harm others. He looks at teenager and continues saying:”Your name is Kyle, right. I heard from your grandfather you are still practicing swordplay, why are you thinking of learning magic too?”

“Training swordsmanship can strengthen the body, learning magic can enrich the spirit!” Kyle stands up and says with excitement: “This is what my ancestor, Legendary Hero Kite – Reed said before and has always been part of our family precepts. I feel that what he said is very true, I can learn swordsmanship from the manual left by our ancestors but the problem is magic. Supposedly, he left behind magic tome but it’s been lost since long time ago.”

It seems that this family really believes that Legendary Hero is their ancestor. Liang Li Dong smiles while saying: “Actually, Legendary Hero is right, swordplay can strengthen the body, magic can enrich the spirit but the problem is this rule is only applicable to those geniuses. Ordinary people finds it difficult to attain success in 1 field even if they spent their whole lives, not to mention 2 fields. I can tell that you feel magic is very powerful but essentially, swordplay is not any weaker. Top swords-master, for example Blademaster,  their killing efficiency is not any lesser than Legendary Mage and in terms of survivability, Blademaster is much stronger than Legendary Mage.”

Kyle’s eyes shines but he still has doubts: “But I heard, mages with a wave of their hands can summon meteor showers and destroy a city with ease, Blademasters does not have such capabilities.”

“True, Blademasters is weaker than mages in this aspect.” Liang Li Dong smiles: “But the problem is, ordinary large-scale magic is useless against Blademaster. They possess the special ability Legendary Toughness. If the strength of the magic is not enough, even if magic flames burn them for a night, they will not suffer any damage. To deal with Blademaster, it is a must to use single-target, high potency magic like Concent Big Fireball. But sadly, Blademaster’s speed is fast, very agile and they know Dash Cut,  Leap Cut. If mage of the same level goes against blademaster, without any special ability, they will normally end up losing. The combat style of the two is different, blademaster specialize in dealing with legendary creatures like dragons while mage specialize in group combat. They are more specialized in controlling the flow of the battle and letting them deal with legendary creatures like dragons is like letting them die.”

Kyle’s eyes shine even more. In this village, he is the only one practicing swordplay, dreaming of becoming mercenary and traveling the world. This distanced him from other kids of the same age in the village. He is always talking about how many slashes he did with his sword and which mercenary destroyed how many goblins and dug up what treasures while other kids are talking about how many firewood they picked, where they went to shepherd their goat and whether there is still bread to eat the day after tomorrow.

Different living environment, different height of dreams caused Kyle to have no close friends in the village. Only Behring is able to chat with him because Behring is willing to listen to his dream and ideal while others are not that willing. They would rather spend their time on filling up their stomachs.

Kyle asks again: “Since Blademaster is so powerful, why, in reality, Mage and Warlock are stronger?”

“Firstly, magic of Mage and Warlock have higher practicality, for example” Liang Li Dong waves his hand and an oak cup placed on a table not far away floats shakily and drifts to his hand. Playing with the cup in his hand, he smiles: “Magic not only is used to kill but also used to change terrain, weather, heal the injured, create fortune, pursuit the truth of the world. It can also take care every aspects of everyone’s lives. A Mage that only knows how to kill is not a qualified Mage. Only those that can apply magic to daily life can truly be called a Mage. While Blademaster…… Although powerful, they are merely executioner. Do you think executioner is respectable or a Mage that can help everyone is respectable?”[1]

“Another reason is  Blademaster’s growth is harder, he needs to kill non-stop, fight non-stop and requires talent to have the chance to become a Blademaster.” Liang Li Dong sighs: “Many people failed to become Blademaster and fell on the road of their dream and many people upon seeing this scene escaped the road of Blademaster out of fear.”

Kyle stays silent for awhile: “n.o.body ever tell me these things.”

Village Head takes the opportunity and says: “Kyle, you know how dangerous the profession mercenary is now. One wrong move will cause your life. If something happens to you, how do you expect me to live on.”[2]

Kyle looks at Village Head, he suddenly says with a energetic expression: “Grandpa, bringing back our ancestor’s glory is the responsibility of us descendants. Since the road of Swordsman is so difficult, then I can choose the road of magic. Since our ancestor is a Legendary Hero that knows how to use magic. My body flows with his blood, I believe I can do it too. Lord Priest, can you tell me what is the basic criteria to learn magic?”

“First condition is to have enough Intelligence.” Liang Li Dong sees that the topic is back to magic again, he says: “Whether is it Mage, Warlock or Priest, the first key point to learning magic is to have enough Intelligence. In other words, you have to be smart enough. Mage concentrate on understanding everything in the world so the Intelligence requirement for them to learn magic is higher. Warlock only requires ordinary people’s Intelligence and the next requirement is to have special bloodline. While Priest although Intelligence requirement is lower than Mage, the Will requirement is very harsh, only those with strong Will can be devout to G.o.d and then become Priest and borrow G.o.d’s power to cast holy spell.”

“I think I’m not stupid.” Kyle puffs up his chest: “Maybe I can try to be a Mage.”

Liang Li Dong smiles, he looks at teenager with interest: “I know you’re not stupid, I know your Intelligence does indeed reach the minimum to be a Mage. But before that, I have to ask first, you said you saved a lot of money, how much?”

“17 silver coins!” Kyle says with pride.

Hahahaha! Liang Li Dong laughs with goodwill, he says: “I have some understanding of the cla.s.s Mage. According to my knowledge, if your Intelligence reach Mage’s basic requirement, then you will have to prepare a magic tome to open spell slot, the quant.i.ty of spell slots is related to Intelligence. Do you know one such magic tome requires how much money?”

“How much?” Kyle’s eyes shine, he cannot wait to buy one.

“100……gold coins.” Liang Li Dong hurt the teenager’s frail heart without hesitation: “This is the basic price within the Mage Guild. If it is for selling outside, the price will increase by around 50% which is 150 gold coins.”

“150 gold coins!” Kyle’s eyes still to lose light, he saved his allowance for 7 years and only managed to save 17 silver coins. He cannot even buy the cover of the magic tome. 150 gold coins is already the tax revenue of a small town for a year.

“Even if you are so talented you can conjure spell slots yourself, it will take more than 10 years.” Liang Li Dong’s expression starts to turn ‘malicious’: “The pioneer of the cla.s.s Mage, Magic G.o.ddess discovered the way to conjure spell slots when she was human. Do you know how much time she took to conjure 1 spell slot? 5 years and 6 months, she is the genius of the geniuses, in more than 10,000 years, the only one to become G.o.d with a human’s body. Do you think you can match up to Magic G.o.ddess?”

Kyle’s expression loses confidence: “I……I!”

“Alright, let’s skip that, after conjuring the first spell slot, the spell slots afterward will get faster. Even if you are smart and only takes 15 years to conjure sufficient spell slots. The next step is to learn magic.”

Listening up to here, Kyle’s face to get burn with hope, he is still 15 years old, even if it is 15 years later, he is still only 30 years old. Becoming a real Mage at 30 years old is still not too late.

Liang Li Dong looks at the teenage and smiles: “Learning magic requires magic’s structural model which requires money too.”

Hearing this, Kyle has a bad hunch: “Around how much?”

“Typically, even the worst Mage is able to awaken 5 level 0 spell slots, 4 level 1 spell slots, 3 level 2 spell slots, 2 level 3 spell slots and 1 level 4 spell slots. The most basic level 0 spell structural model has the selling price of 10 gold coins and every spell a level higher is twice as expensive as the spell a level lower. I remembered the worst Mage requires at least 350 gold coins to fill up all his spell slots. But Mage can change the spell in their spell slots to deal with all kinds of different combat environment so a qualified Mage at least have to learn twice the amount of magic compared to their spell slots. Which is to say, you will need to spend 700 gold coins to become a qualified Mage and that is still the worst kind of Mage.”

Kyle’s face starts to turn green.

T/L note 1: I have no idea why Kyle’s question is about strength but Beta answers with respect. Probably because the strength Kyle is asking about refers the power to command people or something.

T/L note 2: Again I have no idea how the gramps can link Blademaster to mercenary being dangerous. Probably because most mercenary are aiming to be blademaster while those trying to be legendary mage are not mercenary.