Giant Dragon Lord: Starting from Daily Intelligence

Chapter 664: Chapter 474: The Letter Left by Legendary Alchemy Master Phillips

Raylo opened the entrance.

As the two Legendary Mages stepped into the tunnel, which was constructed from a single, seamless piece of metal, the composure on their faces began to crumble.

”Incredible... This forging technique...”

”Look at these runes. They aren’t engraved—they’re fused into the metal itself! Heavens, how did he do it?”

When they finally arrived inside the massive, futuristic workshop,

the two Legendary Mages were utterly captivated.

One moment they were rushing to the shelves filled with rare materials, marveling at a bottle of the long-extinct ”Tears of the Stars.”

The next, they were running over to the bizarrely shaped Alchemy Instruments, stroking the cold metal, studying its structure and the Energy Circuits on its surface, and fiercely debating their purpose and principles.

Raylo didn’t disturb them.

He simply followed quietly behind, watching as these two legendary figures, who were like gods in the eyes of the world, now resembled a pair of Magic Apprentices, thirsty for knowledge.

Just then,

a hunched figure appeared silently at the workshop’s entrance.

It was Grand Elder Gu.

He gazed at everything inside the workshop, a complex look flashing in his cloudy eyes.

He walked to Raylo’s side, not even glancing at the two Legendary Mages who were lost in their frenzy, and fixed his gaze on Raylo instead.

”Boy,”

he began to speak slowly.

”Elder.”

Raylo bowed.

”It’s time for me to go,”

Gu said.

Raylo’s heart sank.

”Elder, you...”

Grand Elder Gu waved his hand, cutting Raylo off.

”The storm has arrived. Both your world and ours are caught within it.”

He turned his head back to look at Raylo again.

”I will return to the Giant Dragon Realm first.”

”Three months.”

He held up three fingers.

”After three months, you will bring Kado and the others to find me in the Giant Dragon Realm.”

His voice grew serious.

”It’s time we talked about how you’re going to repay that ’favor’ you owe me.”

Raylo’s heart skipped a beat.

’A favor?’

Raylo knew he would have to repay it sooner or later.

He just hadn’t expected it to be so soon.

”I... understand.”

Raylo nodded solemnly.

”In three months, I will be sure to bring Kado and the others to the Giant Dragon Realm to see you, Elder.”

”Hn.”

Gu nodded.

He said nothing more, nor did he bid farewell to anyone.

He simply turned, and with faltering steps, slowly walked out of the Alchemy Workshop, melting back into the deep darkness of the night outside.

His figure quickly vanished from sight.

Raylo stood rooted to the spot, speechless for a long time.

...

For Mages immersed in research, time is the most meaningless of concepts.

When Master Delin carefully took a thick, heavy notebook bound in some unknown Beast Hide from a dusty shelf, his breath caught in his throat.

On the notebook’s cover, a line of text was written in flamboyant Common Tongue.

_Thirteen Conjectures on the Core Rune Matrix of the ”Furnace of All Things”_, by Phillips.

”Wendel! Get over here and look at this!”

Master Delin’s voice trembled with excitement.

On the other side of the room, Master Wendel, who had been bent over a massive piece of Alchemy Instruments studying its internal energy conduction lines, snapped his head up at the sound.

He teleported to Master Delin’s side in a flash, his gaze locked onto the notebook.

”The Furnace of All Things... He was actually researching that legendary artifact!”

A light more fervent than ever before erupted in Master Wendel’s eyes.

The Furnace of All Things! The supreme Alchemy Divine Artifact of legend, capable of breaking down any substance into its most primordial energy and Elements, then reorganizing it into any form according to the user’s will!

It was the ultimate dream that all Alchemists pursued their entire lives!

And Phillips hadn’t just pursued it; he had even put it into practice and left behind such precious research notes!

The two Legendary Mages felt as if they had discovered an unparalleled treasure.

They didn’t even bother to find a table, simply sitting on the floor and spreading the thick notebook open on their laps, devouring it word by word as if starved.

The notebook’s contents were obscure and profound, filled with both wild, imaginative conjectures and deductions of the most rigorous logic.

In its pages, Phillips elaborated on his understanding of material composition, his hypotheses on energy conversion, and the mind-numbingly complex Rune Matrix models he had designed one after another to achieve ”the Decomposition and Reorganization of all things.”

The two Legendary Mages would at times furrow their brows, lost in deep thought.

At other times, they would clap their hands in praise of a clever design, their eyes glinting with contemplation.

They would even get into heated arguments over the use of a certain rune or the path of a particular Energy Circuit, spitting and red-faced, completely devoid of their usual lofty, legendary demeanor.

Raylo didn’t disturb them.

He took a quick tour of the workshop.

This place was like a massive, fully-equipped research base.

Besides the core Alchemy experiment area, there was also a dedicated materials storage area, meticulously categorized and organized.

In the living quarters, Raylo found Phillips’s bedroom.

The room was simply furnished with a bed, a desk, and a wardrobe.

On the desk sat a cup containing the dried-up sediment of some unknown beverage, and next to it was a feather pen and a half-written sheet of letter paper.

Raylo picked up the letter.

The writing on it had faded with age, becoming somewhat blurry.

”My dearest Lin:

By the time you read this letter, I may have already embarked on my journey to the ’Beyond the World.’ Please forgive me for leaving without a word. As you know, the search for truth is my life’s sole pursuit.

I have completed all my life’s research within this Mobile Workshop. I have sealed it, along with all my knowledge, deep within the Black Stone Mountain Range, to await a successor who can understand me and carry on my will.

Perhaps they will never appear.

Perhaps, after a hundred or a thousand years, this workshop will sink forever into the earth as the mountains shift.

But I still hold on to a sliver of hope.

Hope that my knowledge, my understanding of this world, will not be lost forever.

As for the ’Furnace of All Things,’ I regret to say that I have both succeeded and failed.

I created a semi-finished ’Furnace of All Things.’

But in the end, I could not take that final step. I could not truly touch the Domain of ’God.’ Perhaps I was wrong.

Perhaps there is no such thing as ’ultimate truth’ in this world.

Or perhaps, it is simply that I... am not yet enough...”

The letter ended abruptly there.

Raylo put down the letter, his heart filled with a thousand emotions.

A Legendary Alchemy Master who had reached the pinnacle of his era, yet in the end, he became lost in confusion and self-doubt on his path toward a higher truth.

He left this world, embarking on a journey to the unknown ”Beyond the World.”

And this Mobile Workshop, which carried the fruits of his life’s work, became the last and most precious gift he left to this world.

Raylo walked out of the bedroom, his gaze once again falling on the two Legendary Mages, still engrossed in their reading, and on Master Barnaby, who hadn’t left since entering.

Perhaps these pure Mages, walking the path in pursuit of Magic and truth, were the most fitting ”successors” Phillips had been waiting for all these centuries.

As for that semi-finished ”Furnace of All Things,” it hadn’t been found yet. It was probably hidden in one of the rooms that had not yet been unlocked.

From the outside, this Alchemy Workshop was only a few hundred meters wide and long, but inside, a Space Folding Array had been used, making the interior incredibly vast.

The night grew deeper.

Outside the workshop, Black Stone City had fallen completely silent.

Only the bonfires in the square and the footsteps of the patrolling Knights were exceptionally clear in the quiet night.

Inside the workshop.

The two Legendary Mages, Delin and Wendel, seemed to know no fatigue.

They had already turned to the last page of the thick notebook but were still far from satisfied.

They began to rummage around the vast workshop.

Soon, they found more of Phillips’s legacy: research manuscripts on ”Alchemy Life,” experimental records on ”Space Folding Technology,” and various scattered notes on Alchemy, each one glinting with the light of wisdom.

They were completely hooked.

To them, this place was paradise.

...

「The next morning.」

When the first ray of sunlight shone through the window of the Lord’s Mansion and fell upon Avril’s face, she slowly opened her eyes.

Out of habit, she reached for the space beside her.

It was empty.

She sat up, got dressed, and walked to the window, pushing it open.

The cool morning air rushed in, instantly waking her up.

Her gaze immediately fell upon the mountain-like steel Giant Beast in the center of the square.

It stood there silently, reflecting a cold, hard light in the morning glow.

Avril knew that Raylo, and her teacher, were surely still inside.

She washed up quickly and left her room.

In the hallway, she happened to run into Lillian, who had also just woken up.

”Good morning, Sister Avril.”

Lillian yawned, rubbing her sleepy eyes.

”Morning, Lillian.”

”My brother... did he spend the whole night in there again with the Masters?”

Lillian pointed out the window.

Avril nodded with a helpless smile.

”Come on, let’s go check.”

Lillian took Avril’s hand.

”And we can call them out for breakfast. If they keep this up, they’ll starve themselves to death in there.”

The two girls left the Lord’s Mansion together.

When they reached the entrance of the steel Giant Beast, the Sun Knights on guard duty stopped them.

”My apologies, ladies, but without the Lord’s command, no one is permitted to enter.”

The Knight Captain in the lead bowed and spoke, his tone respectful but his stance firm.

”We’re here to see Raylo and the two Masters,”

Lillian said.

The Knight Captain looked troubled.

He was a rigid Knight who only knew how to follow orders.

Just then, the metal door at the entrance slid open without a sound.

Raylo’s figure appeared in the doorway.

His face showed a trace of exhaustion, but his spirits were unusually high.

”Avril, Lillian, what are you two doing here so early in the morning?”

”Brother! How can you even ask!”

Lillian immediately stepped forward and complained, disgruntled.

”Did you and the Masters spend the whole night in there again? No food, no sleep—are you trying to turn yourselves into Alchemy Puppets?”