After resolving the issues in the Northern Front, Woohyuk stayed in the Princ.i.p.ality of Croix and tried to get acquainted with the Elven Queen, Ophelia.

She was a skilled person who reached the peak of pure magic in the past.

At that time, their relations.h.i.+p deteriorated due to the difference in their stance on the Holy Aperia Empire, but this time, it was possible to maintain a friendly relations.h.i.+p.

He was able to take a powerful talent at a bargain price.

“But why do you want me? As you can see, I’m just an average, no-name mage…”

“No, you’re a talent who will one day become a great mage,” Woohyuk said firmly to Allen, who was utterly confused.

Allen stared at Woohyuk blankly for a moment.

“Have you said and done this to Reina, too?”

“I convinced Ophelia, so I was able to take Reina fairly easily.”

“If so, I will ask. How do you know I’m going to be a great mage?”

“Just my feeling.”

“…”

At that moment, the expression of ‘this guy is completely crazy’ crossed Allen’s face.

When he finally couldn’t understand, Woohyuk took out the Elixir of the Immortal from his pocket.

“I’ll give you this. This is what I got as a hidden reward from Dreadlore, but if you eat it, you can live an eternal life.

“… Why are you giving me such a good thing?”

“Because if you eat this, you’ll become… impaired.”

In a word, he’d become a castrated eunuch.

However, Allen did not show much agitation.

“The price for immortality doesn’t seem too great.”

“The other guys don’t think so. So, you better eat this.”

Woohyuk handed the Elixir of Immortality to Allen.

Allen went along with the seemingly crazy farce and consumed the Elixir of Immortality.

Hwee-Ahhhhhhhhh!

Red energy soared from Allen’s body.

“… I feel like my mind has cleared up.”

“Congratulations. You will never grow old anymore.”

However, instead, he became ball-less.

Woohyuk tapped Allen’s shoulder and spoke,

“Do you know who Arkain, the Great Sage, is?”

“Of course. I have read his book several times in the library.”

“The tower he built is actually in this Princ.i.p.ality of Croix.”

[High Sage Arkain’s Tower].

It was located on the Celestial Island above the Princ.i.p.ality of Croix.

There was a hidden barrier, so if one didn’t get close, one would never know it existed.

When Woohyuk told him about the tower, Allen tilted his head.

“Have you ever actually been there?”

“Sure. You’ll be attacking that tower in the future.”

“You mean alone? If it’s such a great tower, it’ll probably take me quite a while.”

“Of course, I’ll help you attack it with my elite personnel. Furthermore, you don’t have to worry about time.”

Even if he didn’t use the Hourgla.s.s of Time artifact, the time flowed at -600 times at Arkain’s Tower.

One second here was 10 minutes there.

By training there, high-efficiency growth was possible.

Various loot was also a bonus.

Allen nodded at Woohyuk’s fascinating explanation.

“Not a bad idea. But when do you plan to attack the tower?”

“My va.s.sals will soon come out of the training hall. Then, we’ll have the right personnel to attack.”

However, until then, all information about the tower had to be kept secret.

Only then could Woohyuk be able to monopolize the loot.

When Woohyuk finished explaining, Allen looked at him with admiration.

“It’s a great plan. Are you planning to cultivate human resources and talent for something in the future?”

“Yes. It takes a lot of talent to change the absurd system of this world.”

All of his efforts weren’t just to fill an empty new seat.

Woohyuk dreamt of a new world.

However, he must ultimately challenge the Creator, so he had to have everyone work together.

“If what you said is true, I will serve you as my lord from today. Your ideals really touch my heart.”

“Good. Then it’s settled.”

Having persuaded Allen, Woohyuk felt it was time to return to the Rhine Kingdom.

He had already told Princess Eleanora to buy him some time, so he didn’t have to visit the Holy Aperia Empire for a while.

He was able to focus on cultivating talent, something he had delayed so far.

“It’s so unfortunate that you are leaving, King Rhine. When will I be able to see you again?”

“I’ll stop by again soon. I also bring some lemon jelly next time.”

“Lemon jelly is one of the reasons why I live. Please, please.”

Ophelia waved her hand with a depressed look.

She wanted Woohyuk to be with her, but there was no pressing reason to hold onto him.

When he left the palace, Helena opened her mouth with a tired expression,

“Are we going to go all the way back to the Rhine Kingdom? Just thinking about it is giving me a headache.”

“I think it’s because you ate too much at the banquet yesterday, gluttonous Saintess,” Ibn Rusud commented.

“I didn’t eat that much, you Elf-craving Sage. Why don’t you take this chance to live out your s.e.xual fantasy with the Elf Queen?” Helena retorted back.

The two siblings were bored and started arguing once more.

Maria shook her head with a look as if she still couldn’t adapt to their behavior.

“… May the G.o.ddess’ blessings be with them.”

“So, is the talk with Hildegard over, Maria?”

Woohyuk looked back and asked Maria.

Maria nodded.

“Yes, I will continue to follow the Hero King. Hildegard is not free from her responsibilities as a Paladin, so she will part ways with us.”

“Good. The longer she remains in the Empire, the easier it is to obtain information.”

Woohyuk didn’t have many informants in the Holy Aperia Empire, unlike the other smaller kingdoms across the continent.

Hildegard was a person who he could trust, as she helped him prevent the first catastrophe.

If necessary, he could consider putting her into his inner party later.

As Woohyuk rode his horse, Sieg, who was following him, tilted his head.

“Lord, this isn’t the way to the Rhine Kingdom, right?”

“I guess by land it isn’t.”

For a quicker return, Woohyuk specifically asked Aris to make a custom order, a flying shuttle, designed by Jake the Engineer.

Once one boarded the shuttle, one could easily move around the continent through the sky.

Before long, when they saw a huge shuttle landing in front of their eyes, the group opened their mouths with an exasperated expression.

“Th-This is… isn’t this… a flying shuttle?!”

“Can you fly in the sky with such a piece of metal? I think it would be more convenient to just use floating magic.”

“It looks quite strong, my lord.”

The reaction was that most of them did not seem to understand the principle of flight.

After Woohyuk had his party board, he ordered Aris, who was in the c.o.c.kpit, to take off.

“Go ahead, Aris.”

“Teehee~ Okay~.”

Aris started whistling to herself as she started the shuttle.

Before long, the engine started running, and the engineering marvel rose high into the sky.

“Wow~ we’re really flying!”

“How amazing. To think that stable flight is possible with such heavy metal components. I will have to go through the old doc.u.ments later to see if there were any cases like this in the past.”

“But when did you make it, Lord? Aris must have been busy doing other research.”

“Fiona helped out. As the systems manager for the magic engineering city, Inotia, she possesses a lot of knowledge in this field.”

In other words, when Aris and Fiona joined forces, quite a few magic engineering (Hextech) inventions were easily be created.

Everyone was surprised by Woohyuk’s explanation.

“Woohyuk, then, can we make a car or shower room in our world?”

“In theory, it’s possible, Hong Yuri. The power source may be a little different, but I mean, there are quite a few solutions to solve that problem.”

“Oho! I’ll have to ask Aris to make them both for me later on.”

“However, if there’s no blueprint, it can take a long time to produce.”

Furthermore, now was the time for Woohyuk to focus on cultivating talent rather than technology.

This was because of the systemic problems in this world could not be overcome only by technological progress.

Looking down at the distant ground from the shuttle’s viewing bay, Woohyuk made up his mind.

Now was the time to develop the old guards and talents to a usable level.

The shuttle landed in Inotia, the Hextech City.

Though it was called Hextech city, it only had Neustein Castle, the central area, and was surrounded by wasteland.

Since the elevation was so high, only the Dragon Tribe members could live in such a place.

“You were gone for a long time, Mr. Woohyuk Chun.”

“There was a lot of work to do on the ground, Fiona. Did anything happen while I was gone?”

As soon as Woohyuk returned, Fiona approached and gave a report. She was, after all, the system administrator of the Hextech City.

She continued her report from within a transparent gla.s.s test tube.

“There have been a number of times when some dragon tribe members came down with the contagious/infectious disease. They turned into demonic dragons. We fired particle cannons on the demonic dragons that approached Neustein Castle and intercepted all of them. That is all.”

“… Good work.”

Fiona was originally the Queen of Erendia, but her speech had changed since systematizing herself. She became more robotic and blunter.

Woohyuk spoke again after checking the report she had written on the screen.

“You said you developed a cure for the infectious disease?”

“Yes. Closer a.n.a.lysis revealed that the dragon disease epidemic was caused by the component A7F4HA3.”

The component A7F4HA3 was one of the determinants of the demons.

In other words, the plague on the dragons was caused by the demons.

However, now that the cause was discovered, the occurrence of demonic dragons would decrease.

“Does the cure have a significant effect on individuals who have already turned into demonic dragons?”

“Yes. In addition, this remedy also functions as a preventive agent, so it is good to use as a prophylactic/vaccine for the young.”

Hearing her explanation, Woohyuk thought of Lia and Carnelian.

Woohyuk turned the pages of the report and asked a question,

“The a.n.a.lysis of Qliphoth’s Fruit is still only at 78% complete. Is there something wrong?”

“It takes a long time to find out the unknown ingredients. However, it turned out that the Water of Paradise and the Water of Life are related to this, so the estimated time may be shortened.”

Still, 78% was great progress.

Awakenings will continue to appear in the future, so it would be better to finish the component a.n.a.lysis as soon as possible.

Woohyuk finally took out the Grouse’s Egg from his pocket.

“I didn’t have time the other day, so I just kept it with me, but I have time now. I want you to shock whatever is in this egg and incubate it.”

“Okay. Considering the actual hatching environment native to the Grouse species, I will proceed under similar conditions as much as possible.”

Fiona took the Grouse’s egg from Woohyuk with a mechanical hand.

After that, when she applied electrical stimulation on the Grouse egg for a while in the laboratory,

“Pika?”

The egg hatched and a blue grouse raised its head from the cracked sh.e.l.l.

Woohyuk called on it and gave it a suitable name.

“Your name is Thunderbird. That’s simple enough.”

“Pi-Yak?!”

It seemed that the Thunderbird was quite taken aback by this ridiculous name.

Still, since it was a unique summon, it seemed to have a high level of intelligence.

Woohyuk decided to give it simple instructions,

“Sit down.” 

“Pi-Yak.” 

“Stand up.” 

“Pi-Yak.”

“Pretend to be dead.”

“Kweck.”

“Fly.”

“Pi-Yak.”

It was much smarter than a pretty pet.

Thus, Woohyuk decided to use it to fix Roan’s habit.

“Master! Don’t just stay with that electronic girl, go outside and free your…”

“KyAhhhhhh!”

As Thunderbird entered the entrance, Roan, whose speech went beyond common courtesy, was instantly electrocuted.

Roan started to see stars.

“Eu-Heuk… so strong…”