How come this arcanist is invincible?

Chapter 241 Third Order and Shadow Spell Feat

Under the overt management of the temporary security committee and with the private material support from the Law Academy, the inner and outer court areas of the entire city have basically returned to order.

The lives of ordinary people seemed to continue as usual, but a hint of bewilderment appeared on their faces. Soldiers patrolled the streets everywhere, and the atmosphere was much more somber than usual.

Not long ago, an assassination attempt was carried out against the mage accompanying the Third Army Corps. Although the suspect was quickly apprehended, he committed suicide on the spot by taking poison and refused to divulge any information, thus completely cutting off the trail.

With the intervention of a vice chairman, who was also the former commander of the corps, the security committee quickly arrested a large number of suspects.

They then summoned a second-tier mage to use mantras for interrogation. Although more than ten people were eventually convicted, mantras were not omnipotent, and not long after, another poisoning incident occurred in the royal court.

Fortunately, the poisoning did not cause any casualties, but the series of attacks still led the royal court to impose a curfew from top to bottom: starting at the ninth hour of the night, all civilians were prohibited from going out without a valid reason.

The turbulent situation made many people sense danger, and wealthy merchants and some ordinary people began to leave with their families, recreating the scene before the fall of Twin Harbors.

The security committee did not stop these people from leaving, but forcibly purchased the necessary supplies they could not take with them at market price before letting them go.

However, despite the various measures taken to maintain stability, the royal court is still much more desolate than before.

On the other hand, Kane delegates his daily work to his deputy.

At the top of the mage tower of the Prophecy Division of the Mage Academy, Kane, dressed in a gray-white dean's robe, stood in the tower master's room with his eyes closed.

From the notes left behind by the royal mage, combined with the existing arcane tomes in the academy, he successfully mastered all the knowledge required for advancement.

The vast amount of experience accumulated through repeated battles allowed him to break through the bottleneck without any obstacles and officially become a third-tier arcane mage.

This means he is already able to cast third-circle spells, and can directly master any third-circle spell through rune rituals or skill points.

His combat capabilities therefore underwent a qualitative leap.

Now, as long as he learns any third-circle spell, its power can rival the third-tier effect he previously achieved by relying on Shard Scattering in conjunction with Burning Hand, saving him a lot of pre-casting steps.

Large-scale attacks no longer need to rely on near-mutually assured destruction methods like dust explosions.

His newly acquired feat, the Shadow Spell Feat, has opened up another path for him to increase his combat power.

On one hand, his [Shadow Blade], which he had originally modified through meditation with a lot of experience, now possessed the ability to fight beyond its level thanks to this specialization.

On the other hand, the difficulty for him to learn all shadow spells will be greatly reduced.

At this moment, he could even clearly feel the connection between the material plane he was in and another special plane, the Shadow Plane, a mirror projection of the material plane.

"I never imagined I could do this."

Kane extended his right hand, fingers spread wide.

The shadow on the ground rippled like water, coalescing into a scimitar in his palm, then transforming into a shield, and finally into a spear.

With a thought, he plunged the Shadow Spear in his hand into the ground. Almost simultaneously, from the shadows of a table on the other side of the room, the tip of a spear suddenly thrust out, instantly piercing through the thick, solid wood tabletop.

"With the blessing of the Shadow Realm, my shadow attacks can be teleported through the Shadow Realm dimension, appearing anywhere in the material plane covered by shadows to launch a surprise attack on the enemy."

"Once I reach the fourth tier, I should be able to fully enter the Shadow Realm."

"At that time, even if the material plane is destroyed, I can still survive in the Shadow Realm, only at the cost of being completely transformed into a Shadow Being."

"But that's still a long way off. Right now, I need to master more shadow magic as soon as possible and utilize runes—"

Kane's eyes flickered slightly as he suppressed his excitement, sensing two people standing in the shadows outside the door.

"Come in, I'm done."

As soon as the voice faded, the door was pushed open, and two female mages dressed in red robes walked in.

They were Logan Susas and Lenora. Both of them sensed the unusually strong ethereal energy emanating from Kane, and their faces showed surprise.

"Third tier!" The two thought that Kane's seclusion this time was only to consolidate his etheric foundation, but they did not expect that he would break through to the third tier directly.

Even the two top-ranked second-tier elite mages of the Susas Mage Academy could not hide their shock at this moment.

Only Logan's beautiful eyes showed little surprise.

She knew Kane's strength best; even without his current breakthrough, he already possessed third-tier combat power. She was genuinely happy for him.

Although Kane no longer needs to prove himself with the conventional professional ranks, a higher rank will undoubtedly convince more people.

"Why did you two come together?"

The two women exchanged a glance. Lenora, as the deputy, stepped forward and reported in a deep voice, "Dean, there are indeed two things to report to you."

"Two items?"

Kane's eyes flickered slightly: "Speak."

"The Duke's army has completed its assembly and is marching at full speed toward the royal court, only a week's journey from here."

As you instructed, the four vice-chairmen of the Security Council have begun recruiting soldiers, repairing the damaged city walls, and urgently purchasing magic-powered cannons from the Free City-States using the wealth accumulated by the royal family.

At the mage academy, experiments on the large-scale production of iron powder have made some progress, but it will still take some time before mass production can begin, the mage in charge said—

"I understand. I'll go and take a look when I have time."

"Another thing came from Twin Harbor. A mercenary brought a message from Lady Sophia, saying that they had sent men to infiltrate the Duchy."

After losing several personnel, signs of a large-scale population disappearance were indeed discovered.

One of them infiltrated the Duke's army through bribery, but he did not discover any suspicious non-human beings within the ranks.

"This is good news." Kane fell into thought.

Lenora, however, was somewhat worried: "According to your previous speculation, after the Demon Cult cooperates with the Duke, it will inevitably create a large number of demon warriors similar to the Molten Wax Demons."

Could it be that the mercenary didn't notice because his rank was too low to be detected?

"No." Kane shook his head.

"You have a point, but the more likely reason is that the Duke doesn't dare to mix demons with regular soldiers."

Why?

"In the eyes of those demons, humans and elves are merely food. Putting wolves and sheep together will inevitably lead to trouble sooner or later."

Once ordinary soldiers discover that their comrades are cannibalistic monsters, a mutiny is inevitable in the army.

"More importantly, the Susas royal court is now crowded with other powerful nobles, representatives of local councils, and even spies from the other five countries."

If news of the Duke's use of the demon army were to break, he would immediately become the enemy of the entire continent. This was definitely not the outcome he wanted.

"So what we're facing next is still just a conventional army."

Lenora breathed a sigh of relief, but Kane's smiling eyes held a hint of seriousness.

After a series of fierce battles, although some soldiers and apprentices in the replenishment corps have been promoted to professionals and a number of qualified captains have emerged, the royal court can only deploy a maximum of 7 corps for combat, plus the academy guard, totaling less than 4 veterans.

Compared to before the war, they lost the fighting capacity of three corps. These gaps could not be fully filled by conscription before the arrival of the Duke's army.

The duke was clearly aware of this as well. This time, he had only deployed nearly 20 non-demon troops, and the number of third-tier professionals was several times that of them.

Fortunately, we have the advantage of being able to defend the city, and the royal court has an absolute advantage in the number of mages.

"We can't let the soldiers sacrifice themselves in vain. It seems we must speed up the research and development of iron powder. I'll go to the workshop myself later to see if we can solve the problem of large-scale production."

"Given a sufficient quantity, iron powder arrows capable of reaching temperatures of a thousand degrees Celsius would be enough to erase the difference in high-level strength between the two sides."

Kane, recalling his "Crafty Transformation" ability, had some ideas.

Lenora watched his thoughtful expression and stood quietly to the side, saying nothing more. She knew that whenever the dean fell into deep thought, he would come up with amazing solutions.

It was only after a long while that Kane raised his head and looked at Logan Susas.

"Logan, is there anything else?"

'

"Dean Hammond wishes to meet with you alone."

Kane's eyes flickered slightly.

In the central part of the Dharma Academy, between the various departments, there is a lush forest.

Many mages practiced their spells here, while apprentices diligently memorized the key points of connecting with the magic network, as if the turmoil in the royal court had nothing to do with them.

An elderly man with a white beard, dressed in a deep red mage's robe, walked by. Everyone bowed respectfully, and the old man nodded slightly before slowly moving forward.

But the next moment, when the black-haired, black-eyed man in a grey-white robe passed by, all the mages and apprentices who were practicing immediately stopped what they were doing and bowed deeply.

One after another, people called out "Dean Kane" and occasionally "Chairman".

Kane remained calm and nodded slightly. At that moment, Dean Hammond, dressed in a deep red robe, approached, said a few words to the crowd, and the mages and apprentices dispersed, leaving the grove to the two of them.

Hammond looked at Kane, his eyes filled with amazement.

-

Tier 3! Tier 3, just like him! Although Kane's ether concentration was not as high as his, the time he spent at Tier 2 was incredibly short.

"Dean Hammond," Kane said with a slight bow. Hammond secretly breathed a sigh of relief upon seeing this.

He pondered for a moment, then said, "Dean Kane, your progress is truly astonishing. I thought it would take you a long time to reach this point."

Kane neither confirmed nor denied, only smiled.

Hammond didn't offer much praise either.

After all, third-tier spellcasters are not uncommon in the academy's hundreds of years of history, and the birth of each dean is accompanied by fierce competition among many third-tier mages.

But what Kane did had already far exceeded the scope of an ordinary third-tier mage.

"Since the college hasn't publicly expressed its support but has only provided assistance behind the scenes, don't you think we're being too indifferent, or even unfair?"

"No. I acted first and informed them later, so I'm already very grateful that the academy has gone this far."

Kane answered calmly. Although the academy only sent one third-tier mage, Skeleton, to participate in the battle, it did not utilize the core mage tower's power.

However, the elite second-tier mage teams from each branch were all at the beck and call, and the resources provided were fully supported without reservation, which was enough to demonstrate the academy's stance.

Seeing that Kane's expression seemed genuine, Hammond's eyes revealed a deeper meaning: "You should know why I invited you here, right?"

"Is it the Dean who wants to see me?"

Kane nodded and asked.

"That's right."

"Okay, let's go."

Hammond led Kane to a towering ancient tree and softly chanted a spell.

On the surface, nothing seemed to have changed, but Kane immediately sensed that the concentration of ether in the surrounding area was beginning to rise sharply. Hammond stepped aside to make way: "Go in."

Kane glanced at the ancient tree in front of him, said "okay," and walked straight in, his figure instantly swallowed up by the tree trunk.

Hammond stood still and waited quietly.

Time passed second by second, and before long, the shadow of the ancient tree rippled, and Kane's figure reappeared in the same spot.

Hammond immediately stepped forward and asked, "What did the Grand Dean say to you?"

He only asked me one question: whether I needed his help.

"So what was your answer?"

"I said we don't need it for now." Kane nodded slightly.

Hammond gave a knowing look: "I understand."

Although the conversation was simple, the dean's attitude was made very clear.

Kane seemed lost in thought. After a brief farewell, the two went their separate ways.

Watching Hammond's departing figure, Kane fell into deeper thought.

After entering the hidden area of ​​the ancient tree, he sensed an extremely rich ether, a concentration that was completely incomparable to that of the outside world.

He thus understood the real reason why the fourth-level dean had remained in seclusion.

The current concentration of ether on the mainland is barely enough to support the daily needs of a fourth-tier spellcaster.

After all, mages rely on ether far more than warriors, and are fundamentally different from demons who survive by relying on soul power.

However, judging from the dean's attitude, he was clearly not completely unaware of the demon cult's conspiracy.

Therefore, his eventual death at the hands of an overwhelming demon siege in the original story is probably not as simple as it seems on the surface.

Kane shook his head, stopped thinking about it, and turned to walk towards the workshop in the academy's underground.

Meanwhile, in the wilderness north of Susas, a massive army of nearly 20 men was marching south.

This army was divided into three huge square formations.

At the forefront was a cavalry regiment, with thousands of warhorses advancing slowly in orderly steps. The specially made sabers in the hands of the cavalrymen gleamed coldly, reflecting a dazzling light in the sunlight.

Behind them stretched an infantry square formation for miles. To speed up the march, most of the soldiers wore only light armor and carried spears and one-handed swords, which were quite different from the traditional weapons of Sussas.

The central formation was a mixed bag, including war mercenaries from the Free Cities, Nord free mercenaries, drow descendants from the Dark Forest, and even tribesmen from the Northern Plains.

The final formation consisted entirely of various heavy war machines and was the most noisy part of the entire formation.

Huge carts pulled by dozens of warhorses carried components of siege towers, heavy ballistae, and rows of dark, magical cannons.

In terms of quantity alone, there are nearly a hundred of each type of equipment.

Wherever the army passed, dust filled the sky, and wild beasts and goblin tribes in the wilderness were terrified and fled in all directions.

At the very front of the procession, two horses carried the corpses of two mercenaries, their bodies covered in marks of torture, clearly indicating that they had suffered immense pain before their deaths.

At the center of the formation, a middle-aged pure-blooded elf dressed in magnificent military uniform reined in his warhorse, surrounded by a group of generals.

He gazed at the faint outline of the city on the distant southern horizon, his eyes burning with a fierce ambition.

"The news has been spread. My opponent, you'd better not disappoint me."