Wizard: My career panel has no upper limit

Time is difficult to judge in this inner room.

Stone absorbs most of the perceived fluctuations.

Any external reference—light angle, temperature change, or one's own physiological perceptions—loses its function as a time coordinate here.

Ron had no idea how long he had been sitting there.

Time continued to pass, yet he hadn't even fully unraveled the first layer.

He placed the Rubik's Cube in the corner of the low table, got up to stretch a bit, and then sat back down to continue.

The puppet didn't leave; it sat back down in the chair, facing away from him.

He neither looked at him nor spoke, but occasionally turned his head toward the entrance leading to the depths of the inner room.

Take a look, then turn back.

Ron suppressed the slight impatience rising in his heart and continued his deduction.

He could sense that the amusement park was collapsing.

The puppet suddenly moved; it turned around from the chair.
“You possess an aura of absurdity, and also an aura of chaos from the deepest abyss.”

“There are many gatekeepers in the inner room, and different gatekeepers are assigned to different visitors.”

It tilted its head, and the scar, following the angle, was facing Ron: "This isn't me deliberately making things difficult for you."

The puppet's tone conveyed a perfectly controlled sense of innocence:

"You chose to bring all these auras in, and by choosing to do so, you must naturally face the corresponding rules."

"That's the rule, so just accept it."

Ron put down the Rubik's Cube that he had been clutching on his knee for who knows how long, and looked into the puppet's eyes.

The puppet tilted slightly to one side, voluntarily giving up a little angle.

A projection appeared on the stone wall of the inner chamber.

It is unclear how it was done, but it briefly connected this enclosed space to the outside world.

The projection showed Eve, standing in the main corridor of the Crown Clan's ancestral land, making communications, with three or four urgent communications being sent simultaneously in front of her.

The black-haired princess looked focused, but beneath that focus lay a deep weariness and anxiety.

Cassandra was in another room, projecting herself onto several high wizards who had come to see her.

She maintained her cold and austere demeanor, but her other hand pressed down on the table, cracking the alloy pen in her hand.

Next to it are even more facets.

In a floating city in the central region, there are areas of darkness within its protective barrier.

The guards were urgently reinforcing the area, and afterimages of magical fluctuations lingered in the air.

In a certain sea area, countless creatures move beneath the surface of the water.

Someone is talking to thin air; you can't hear what they're saying, and their expression is already off.

The puppet stood to the side of the projections, seemingly offering a sincere reminder:
"You must keep going, everyone outside is waiting for you."

Ron frowned. He had to admit that the puppet's wicked personality was indeed quite similar to Hector's.

But the king of absurdity's laughter hides too much.

Compassion or scheming, both are deep observations of this world.

Behind the laughter lies a heavy heart wrapped in mockery.

But there's nothing in the puppet's laughter.

Clean, thin, therefore prickly.

Ron took a deep breath and lowered his head again to work out the Rubik's Cube.

………………

The protective barrier on the eastern wing of the Central Lands was forced to draw additional magical power from three locations for support.

This resulted in blind spots in the marine monitoring system during that period.

During that time, the first batch of Grand Wizard-level prisoners had already settled in the Central Lands.

The old wizard in emergency command looked at the location markers reported in and hesitated on the map:

"While ordering people to stop them, first expand the civilian evacuation radius by two levels."

He neither said "we can stop them" nor "we can't stop them."

Those beings that have been accumulating in the park for hundreds or even thousands of years, no matter what form they take, cannot be completely dealt with by a single emergency plan.

Prolonged imprisonment will not leave behind only hatred, madness, or a yearning for freedom.

Those things certainly exist, but what's more prevalent are distortions that normal wizards cannot comprehend.

The first Dark Sun-level wizard who attempted to intercept the opponent directly discovered that the opponent's magic did not have any systemic characteristics that he could identify.

After countless years of closed loops, the prisoner has filtered out everything from the outside world as background noise and no longer responds to it.

The spell disappeared immediately after it was cast.

It's like a stone thrown into a desert; the sand swallows it up without a sound.

After the spell wore off, the target slowly turned its gaze away, and once again had its head explode into a mangled mess.

Chloe did not immediately join the direct confrontation after arriving at the front line.

She stood on a high point that had been temporarily requisitioned, fully opening up her senses as the Weaver Girl of Destiny.

Let that loom that weaves the warp and weft of time extend outward at a very broad frequency.

In the past, she would look for the fate lines of specific individuals, trace them, and make predictions.

However, this method failed to work on the prisoners of Paradise for the exact same reason that the Dark Sun Wizard had discovered.

The released individuals, after an extremely long period of confinement, folded themselves into a state of near-complete involution, making it difficult for outsiders to understand them from a conventional perspective.

So she changed direction: instead of looking for their lines, she looked for the seams between their lines and the world.

No matter how long you stay in isolation, once you step back into the main world, you will inevitably leave your mark on it.

Even a light press leaves an indentation.

The Weaver Girl of Destiny begins to spin her loom, and the threads of life, born from the artisan's labyrinth, tremble gently in response...

“Over there.” Chloe’s gaze turned to the north.

The other wizard beside her looked in the same direction.

There was nothing there, only an empty hollow defense line and a few lingering, damaged barriers.

But with the help of this crown of prophecy, they expanded their perception lock and saw an outline.

The other party is traversing those broken barriers in a very slow manner, but without requiring any external assistance.

Each time it passes through a barrier, the runes on its afterimage automatically distort and spread rapidly like a virus.

“I’ll go,” Chloe said.

The wizard instinctively tried to stop him: "For prisoners of this level, your specialty is divination, so why are you going to do this..."

"I'm not alone."

As Chloe walked in that direction, the phantom of the Weaver Girl unfolded behind her.

The thread on the spinning machine began to vibrate, and the object connected to it was responding to her through that thread.

The prisoner sensed her approach and his expression contorted, as if he were being blinded by a light and instinctively squinted.

It has been far too long since it has accepted any initiative from the outside world to approach it.

Chloe stopped about fifty paces away from it, without unleashing any offensive magic.

She gently tossed out the thread that came from the changing life.

The essential structure of the target, and each key node of the structure, is quickly transmitted back.

She saw the prisoner at his most vulnerable moment in the paradise.

The Weaver Girl's loom found the seam, and the spinning needle fell.

The prisoner froze in place, the distortion beginning to neutralize.

His very foundation for existence vanished, and he began to collapse.

Chloe quietly departed, heading towards her next destination.

Over the next few hours, she traveled to many places.

The methodology of the Weaver Girl demonstrates remarkable adaptability.

That thread from the changing life is the key.

Changeable life does not require language or analysis.

It can quickly find the corresponding optimal solution from its own reserves, just like the immune system in the human body.

Chloe's Fate Weaver translates this perception into a usable language.

Different prisoners have different moments of vulnerability, and naturally, different cracks in their skin.

Changes in life provide the answer, and destiny, like a weaver girl, provides the path.

The two cooperated to capture the great wizard prisoners who would have suffered heavy casualties in a direct confrontation.

One by one, they were quietly removed from the battlefield in a way that they had absolutely no chance of preventing.

But these high-ranking wizard prisoners are only one side of the crisis.

On the other hand, the individual strength displayed by those evil god's followers was somewhat unexpected.

The initial warning signals generally used terms like "high-risk threat," "unknown intensity," and "recommendation for patrol teams at the Monday level or above."

Those words created a psychological expectation—that a formidable enemy was coming, and that they needed to deal with it with all their might.

However, the reports issued after the first group of wizards who actually fought against the clans completely shattered those expectations.

"The magical power of these Deep Ones is roughly equivalent to that of a high-level apprentice."

"In a one-on-one fight, any newly promoted official wizard could beat them to a pulp."

This assessment quickly spread within the school alliance, relieving many wizards who had been on edge.

But soon, the second report came out.

"But do not use magic."

But what followed made him swallow his breath again.

The essence of these familiars in the hands of the ruler is that they are material carriers of chaotic energy.

Their bodies, inside and out, were permeated with the aura that seeped in from the outer dimensions.

Every piece of tissue, every blood vessel, every inch of skin is a container for pollution.

Spells have a structure, a path, a direction, and a logic.

When things of order encounter chaos, it's like a finely tuned gear set being mixed with sand.

Although it won't break down immediately, it will constantly wear down, reducing transmission accuracy, and each engagement will be slightly worse than the last.

A Dawn-level official wizard cast the most basic binding spell on the Deep One race.

The binding was indeed established, and the Deep Ones were indeed immobilized.

However, after the spell was withdrawn, the caster sensed a feedback that shouldn't have occurred.

Something has infiltrated his magic circuits.

As fine as a grain of sand, it is difficult to detect with normal magical perception.

The wizard didn't take it seriously at the time. The spell's effect seemed normal, and the spell shield wasn't damaged. It was probably just a slight disturbance during the casting.

Two hours after destroying the nest, while continuing his patrol, he noticed that his spell paths were beginning to experience brief interruptions.

After stopping to check, the wizard found the object in the magic circuit.

It's no longer just sand; it has begun to grow.

It took him most of the day to remove that object from the circuit.

The removal process was comparable to the most complex physiological modification surgery, and even required the intervention of one's own senior, who was of the Moon rank.

The problem is that those lower-level supernatural beings and mortals who have accidentally been tainted by the chaotic aura are not capable of performing this kind of exorcism.

This is what makes all kinds of evil god's followers truly terrifying.

It's not about how many people they can kill; it's about how the places they go change.

Moreover, they don't actually need to hurt or eat people.

A deep-diving lair stands there, and the surrounding air changes after three days.

What's more troublesome is that they can divide and reproduce on their own, just like bacteria.

When their numbers reach a certain level, they will also have a mutually reinforcing effect.

The concentration of the odor increases exponentially with the quantity, and the coverage area expands with the concentration.

As the coverage area expands, more living organisms become contaminated, and these contaminated organisms are then carried to even more distant places by the contamination.

If left unchecked, this cycle will have no natural end.

All of this was pieced together by the third, fourth, and thirteenth reports that came in succession.

Finally, Cassandra spoke first:

"Is anyone going to wipe out the clans? Sign up now, I'll register you."

No one responded.

She waited about ten seconds and continued:
"Let me explain why I don't want to go, and help everyone understand the current situation."

"First, there are no spoils of war when fighting these kinds of things."

"Everyone knows what came out of the collapsed amusement park."

The materials include prisoners and research materials from the previous era, as well as various books and experimental records.

The value of those items would be enough for any wizard to have no shortage of research directions for the next few decades or even centuries.

“There are huge profits to be made from robbing those things. If there are profits, people will go. There is no need for a school alliance to organize it. It will happen spontaneously.”

"But when you fight the kin of these rulers, you get nothing."

"Not only will it not happen, but it might also cause a lot of trouble. At best, the magic circuits will need to be cleaned at great cost; at worst..."

In severe cases, pollution can lead to complete loss of control.

"Secondly, if those things don't go into your territory, why should you send your people to wade into that mess?"

"The main areas where the families of the deceased are currently gathered are in remote settlements along the Salt Fog Ocean."

I looked into that area.

There are eleven officially registered wizard outposts in the School Alliance, four of which are Moon-level. "The major powers over there in the sea area don't have any significant presence in that region."

Their core resources are all located around the central region; the remote seas are not anyone's main battlefield.

"That's how wizards are. What does it matter to you and me how many people die in a certain area of ​​mortal settlement?"

This statement was very sharp, yet no one in the channel refuted it.

The life and death of ordinary people in remote areas are to wizards what advocating for environmental protection on Earth is to them.

Everyone is calling for action, and the whole world is paying close attention to this issue.

The slogans were shouted loudly, and related policies were introduced one after another.

But at the individual level, not many people really care; at most, they complain that disposable tableware is becoming increasingly difficult to use.

Iron Anvil cleared his throat on the channel; his usually loud voice was considerably lower this time.
"Ultimately, the forces we can muster right now are all dealing with those Paradise prisoners and various remnants, who are the ones who pose the direct threat to the Central Land."

Has the Court of Truth issued any statement regarding the Dominators' Families?

“It’s out,” Cassandra said.

"The parties should conduct their own assessments and make their own decisions; they will not force the allocation of resources."

"Translate this," said the anvil. "It means there's no enforcement; they can do whatever they want."

Cassandra did not refute the translation.

There was another silence on the channel, this time longer.

Someone asked a question very quietly:
"What's the situation with those ordinary towns in the Salt Mist Ocean now?"

No one answered the question.

Nobody wants to say that answer out loud on this channel; saying it out loud means admitting it.

Once you acknowledge it, you have to face it; once you face it, you have to make a choice.

That choice, however, comes at too high a cost and offers too few benefits.

Ultimately, Cassandra dropped that question and steered the conversation back to things that could be discussed.

The discussion on the channel returned to the tracking and deployment of the Paradise Prisoners.

Return to the core area of ​​the Central Lands to consolidate defenses against known threats that have names, clear sources of power, and can be tracked and countered.

Those things that have no name, no will, and simply spread outwards.

In that discussion, it gradually faded into the background.

Let's see where they spread first, then we'll talk.

As long as it hasn't spread to their own territory, it's not their problem yet.

This is the wizard's logic in dealing with the world: clear, pragmatic, and selfish.

On this side of the Salt Mist Ocean, old Fitz is still in the lighthouse.

His magic reserves were almost depleted, and he only had two magic stones left to replenish them.

There was still some food and water left, but those weren't things that made him anxious.

He tried to send out calls for help dozens of times using the communication stone.

The fact that I can access the School Alliance's channel every time and hear the voices in that channel indicates that the communication is working at the technical level.

But every time he reported the situation, he was met with either a busy signal or a busy tone.

It's either a simple "Received, will keep an eye on it" or nothing at all.

There was no timetable for support, no evacuation plan, and no substantive instructions.

He quickly stopped trying and put the communication stone back.

There are probably very few humans left alive in this town.

He sat at the table and looked at the sleeping watchman across from him.

The other person was sleeping restlessly, with a furrowed brow and occasionally uttering some indistinct sleep talking.

Old Fitz thought to himself, "This kid's luck is neither good nor bad."

It's bad because he encountered this situation;
It's not bad, because he ran to the lighthouse.

He glanced in the direction of the communication stone, then looked away and returned his gaze to the small notebook on the table.

Turning to the bottom of the last line, a new record was added.

"On the thirteenth day, with no reinforcements, continue to hold out."

After finishing writing, he screwed the pen cap back on, closed the notebook, and put it back in his pocket.

Outside the lighthouse, the wind was faint.

There are no lights in the direction of Anchorstone Town tonight.

………………

What Fitz didn't know was that he was actually very lucky.

This mess was quickly taken over by Vinard, who had just emerged from the Craftsman's Labyrinth, and his first stop was Anchorstone Town.

For Vinard, the research data he had was already sufficient; there was no need to compete with those great wizards for kills.

Testing what you get from exploring the Craftsman's Labyrinth is more important than anything else.

He found a remote island near the Salt Fog Ocean that was temporarily unaffected by the storm, and took out the deployment equipment he was carrying from his toolbox one by one, quickly assembling it.

Those world seeds, placed separately in isolated containers, were now being taken out one by one by him.

He arranged the components on the interfaces of the equipment according to the internal logic he had figured out in the seed room.

The first wave of completed creations consisted of a group of small mechanical units, which did not differ much in appearance from his previous designs.

But his two students immediately felt a strong sense of oppression as they approached.

Ella took half a step back.

Vinard glanced back at her: "Don't back down, you won't get hurt."

"This sense of oppression... what did you add to their programming, teacher?"

"It is the fundamental seed of the world, the density of existence generated after it is analyzed and compressed into a mechanical unit."

Vinard stood beside those creations:

"Do you know how the followers of those rulers survive?"

Both of them shook their heads.

"The essence of those things is to exploit the weak points in the framework of the main world order and insert their own chaotic logic."

He turned to the group of mechanical constructs that had already been deployed.

"This batch of things carries with it the very order they hate most."

As they spoke, the mechanical creations began to move outwards.

They moved forward at an extremely steady pace, yet there was an increasingly noticeable heaviness in the air.

The first group of deep-sea divers became disoriented when they came into contact with the edge of that aura.

Originally characterized by disorder and mutation, the Familia were forced to be confined to fixed forms under the pressure of rules.

Then, Vinard's subsequent creations swarmed in, dealing with and cleaning them one by one.

Meanwhile, Salamander landed steadily on the dragon's back.

The first location they arrived at was the third emergency location over the strait.

The fire giant stood up from the dragon's back and steadied himself on the dragon's spine.

The dragon sensed his movement and subtly adjusted its flight posture to keep its back level.

Salamander glanced down without speaking, and gently patted the scales on the side of the dragon's neck.

The Teostra folded its wing membranes and began to dive.

The dive angle is extremely steep, so steep that any normal rider would be stripped away by the airflow.

But Salamander's feet were firmly planted on the dragon's spine, and her hands were released, letting the air rush towards her.

Flame Giants are among the most terrifying heat sources of all extraordinary species.

The fire spewed by the dragon beneath his feet was also the most terrifyingly hot.

The two of them standing together are like two high-temperature systems superimposed.

"burn."

The simple command unleashed the blazing flames of the ancient dragon, amplified by a spell of the caliber of a great wizard.

With a creak, the space itself cracked from the heat.

An erosion zone formed by the passing of the Dominator's Families was completely cleared away under the high temperature.

The trapped wizard emerged from the lingering smoke, somewhat bewildered, wondering how he could have survived under such intense heat.

Looking up, the wizard saw the familiar, rugged silhouette on the dragon's back.

He paused for a moment, then instinctively said, "Dean Salamander? Why are you riding a dragon?"

"Hmm." The fire giant poked its head out from the dragon's back, its expression smug. "Is there a problem?"

The wizard thought for a moment, and finally said, "No problem, it's just... a little unexpected."

"What's unexpected?"

"I thought you always preferred to act on your own."

“That was before.” Salamanda straightened up again and glanced at another location in the distance that was also in dire need of help.

"Are you able to go back by yourself now?"

The wizard assessed his condition and nodded.

"Then go find your own team and gather there." The Flame Giant said impatiently.

"I have several more places to go, I can't take you with me."

The Teostra retracted its tail flames, unfolded its wing membranes, and quickly took off.

Salamanda added before takeoff:
"Tell the command that this area is cleared, and have them move the evacuation line back to the two nodes, freeing up manpower to go to the east."

The dragon's shadow soared into the sky, and the clouds above the strait were pushed open by the airflow.

The situation in the southeastern sea area is critical. Seven or eight prisoners have formed a semi-stable node in the shallow sea area under the cover of the polluted area.

They didn't really cooperate; they just happened to settle in the same area and expand outwards in their own ways.

There were originally three floating cities operating directly above that sea area.

Two of them have now been affected by pollution, and the other is barely maintaining its buoyancy, with energy gradually being lost.

The support squadron included two Dark Sun-level wizards and several Moon-level wizards.

They desperately suppressed the attack, barely managing to maintain a defensive line that had not yet been completely breached.

But everyone knows that the defensive line won't last long.

Just then, something unusual happened in the clouds overhead.

That's the change in airflow caused by rapid evaporation at extremely high temperatures.

The clouds are disappearing, pushed outwards from the center in a very violent and rapid manner.

Before the Teostra entered the sea, Salamander had already loosened its spine.

At that height, the fire giant transformed into a mass of extremely dense magma, crashing into the sea with a near-vertical trajectory.

Soon, the huge meteorite fell.

At the same time, Teostra swooped into the sea from another angle.

Ancient Dragon Flame possesses the attribute of "burning essence".

As the flames entered the polluted seawater, they followed the veins of that polluted area and extended inwards.

Burn along the direction where the erosion roots are most dense, all the way down, inward, towards the node where the great wizard's dangerous target is located.

The prisoners who were not powerful enough to become great wizards were all burned to ashes in the hot wind that rose before the flames arrived.

The high-ranking wizard prisoner within the node began to transfer the moment the intense heat reached the outer edge of the contaminated area.

It takes time to transfer.

Ancient Dragon Flame can incinerate the very essence of existence, and when combined with the fire magic specialization of a Grand Wizard.

The prisoner held out for about half a minute.

Salamander rose again from the seabed, its magma form gradually cooling and solidifying back into solid form upon contact with air.

He landed on a reef that had just emerged from the water next to that area and glanced at it.

The water level in the area within sight has dropped by nearly five meters.

At the edge of the still-boiling sea, several sea creatures trapped in the shallow waters were trying to climb ashore.

"Hmm." The Flame Giant was satisfied with the result.

The Teostra emerged from the other side of the sea and shook the water off its wing membranes.

Salamanda walked over and patted its neck.

The communications wizard, who witnessed the entire event, finally regained his voice:
"Dean Salamander, the fisheries in this area..."

"We'll talk about it later."

"...the ecology of the entire shallow water area."

"We'll talk about it later."

The wizard then thought of something else: "The floating city has stabilized, and the people inside are grateful..."

"No need to thank me, let them continue with the evacuation plan."

The fire giant interrupted him, already stepping onto the dragon's back:
"Send the battle report to the command and tell them to lower the emergency response level in the southeast sea area by one level and move personnel north."

"Then here..."

"It's gone, it's all been dealt with."

The Flame King Dragon soared into the sky, shaking up the last remaining drop of water below the reef.

The message spread much faster in battlefield communications than the support formation itself.

Although the situation was extremely urgent.

But due to the wizards' research-oriented nature, they were actually more concerned about the appearance of the Teostra in the main world than about the news that the Archmage Salamander was providing support everywhere.

Many of those rescued were still pondering how to ask for even a scrap of information to use as research material after the war. (End of Chapter)