The Card Apprentice

“Ok, I’ll be right there!” Bogner abruptly raised his voice and prepared to leave as soon as he disconnected. Seeing Bogner so excited aroused Chen Mu’s curiosity, and he rushed to accompany him. Bogner had seen a lot, and anything that could make him excited had to be something good.

He followed Bogner until the two arrived at the riverside.

It was a man-made river that had been dug out by the original owner of the manor. It not only traversed the entire manor, but its winding parts nearly enclosed the entire original residence. The original owner had liked classic-style castles and had deliberately made a moat.

But the river in front of them was completely transformed, being a full 20 meters wide, and—as he had just found out by asking Bogner—a full 15 meters deep.

By that time, there were a few transport shuttles stopped by the riverside.

“Has everything been transported?” Bogner asked.

“Yes, sir. It’s all here. It was all acquired in the Anatoly District.” The young man in the lead looked highly capable.

Bogner pointed to the river in front of them. “Good. Put them all in this river.”

“Yes, sir.” The youth immediately ordered the shuttles to fly above the river. The bottoms of the shuttles suddenly opened, and quite a few things splashed into the water.

Only then did Chen Mu see clearly that they were crocodiles. Those crocodiles had deep green scales and a line of red on their brows about half a meter long. Such crocodiles would be considered young in the jungle, a lot smaller than the mature ones.

“What will these young crocs do?” Chen Mu asked in ignorance.

Bogner laughed. “These aren’t young crocodiles. They are all mature bloodshot crocs. Don’t pay attention to how small they are; this is one of the world’s most ferocious kind of crocodile. They are only produced in the Anatoly District. I once had a job there where I ran into a bask of bloodshot crocs that killed a high-grade card artisan and 12 mid-grade card artisans.”

His tone was understated, though it terrified Chen Mu. His gaze toward those crocodiles changed completely.

“There is no problem so long as you don’t enter the crocodiles’ territory. They like to stay submerged and have never gone onto the bank, so there’s no need to worry. Still, the greatest power comes from the combination of the bloodshot croc with the sucker fish.” After he spoke, the bottom of another shuttle opened and dropped countless thumb-sized fish with a splash.

“Sucker fish?”

“Right. That’s those little fish. That kind of fish doesn’t grow very big, and there is a small sucker along its mouth. They are highly sensitive to energy.” Bogner then threw an energy card into the river.

As soon as the energy card fell into the water, countless gray shadows swarmed into a fish ball, tightly surrounding the energy card. After five seconds, the school of fish churned off. The energy card had already become a blank white card with no pattern to be seen on its surface.

Bogner bared his snow-white teeth, which gave off an eerie feeling in the sunlight. “As soon as someone enters the water, the sucker fish will swarm him. The most marvelous thing is that it will attract the bloodshot croc. In the water, no one can subdue the bloodshot croc. If they use energy, tens of thousands of sucker fish will suck up all the energy within a short time. I’ve seen a card artisan’s energy cloak sucked dry in under ten seconds. Actually, you only need to plunge the apparatus you wear on your wrist into the water, and you’d be dead. Even energy cards that haven’t been activated don’t escape. The bloodshot crocs are extremely sensitive to the smell of any living thing, and they always live in harmony with the sucker fish. They make wonderful partners. Besides being a little bit expensive, they have no other shortcomings.”

Bogner said that with quite a tinge of regret, though Chen Mu didn’t see any sign of heartache in his expression.

But Chen Mu still had his own doubts. “Are there still any card artisans who can’t fly? What use is the river? They can fly right over it.”

Since the boss had some doubts, as his subordinate, Bogner had to patiently explain. “Any gaps in defense are easy to prevent in the air. Flight requires the use of jet stream cards, even among the best card artisans. So long as they use cards, there is some energy fluctuation. There are now many ways to detect energy fluctuations, and they are all perfectly effective. The scariest thing to defend against are the cardless sects, who really give people headaches. They don’t give off any energy fluctuations and are difficult to detect. But it’s a good thing there are now few with that level of ability. The demands on the body are too great, so they have remained rare for who knows how many years.”

“Cardless sects?”

“Oh, that’s just a way of talking about those who use means other than cards.”

So, that’s how it is! The cardless sects must refer to Wei-ah and the demonic woman. But, as he thought about it, he felt Wei-ah was the more thoroughgoing; although the demonic woman’s body and skills were both outstanding, she would still rely on the card she carried. Still, if it were a matter of sneaking, Chen Mu believed even if the demonic woman didn’t use a card, she wouldn’t fall far short of Wei-ah.

Sure enough, Bogner took a look at the residence and lowered his voice to say, “That bodyguard of yours must be an ace of the cardless sects. Tsk tsk, that day’s moves were really as fast as lightning!” His face was full of praise.

Taking a look at the broad river, Chen Mu felt Wei-ah should have the ability to cross it. That sort of obstacle was common in the jungle.

As though he had seen Chen Mu’s doubts, Bogner laughed. “Of course, those aren’t our only tricks.”

There was something inscrutable in his tone.

* * *

When the second auction had only just concluded, the recordings of the auction hall had already been broadcast from the Elemental Fantasy Platform. Within ten minutes, the Elemental Fantasy Platform’s viewership had grown three-fold. Stunningly, the rate of increase kept soaring.

After only half an hour of broadcast, the viewership had broken the record from when the Desert Camp Gemini Twins had challenged Moon Frost Island. The surge was ferocious, showing no signs of running out. Within a few short moments, they had received countless requests from platforms to rebroadcast, among which was the Heavenly Federation governmental platform.

“The numbered series of cards has given us a hugely pleasant surprise. I do believe everyone is going to remember the number 13, and that card! If there remains any regret from the entire auction, it would be that we haven’t heard the voice of the mysterious card master. Is there some unknown connection to the unlucky 13, which was unexpectedly fatal to its beauty? I am extremely excited! Card 013 has broken the mold of the traditional wavy blade card, and its appearance has opened up a new window in that lethargic card type…”

“Good afternoon to all of our friends in front of their fantasy card receivers. I believe you have all heard the news about the just-completed Yang Clan Auction House’s second auction by now. The high point this time was Card 013. Even though the great Jiao Si’s demonstration was only a brief few minutes, that was enough to make countless people intoxicated with it. The final price of 013 was shocking in the same way. We have had experts provide us with estimations of the value of the materials Faya bid. If they were converted to Oudi, they would place the value of 013 at about 300 million Oudi, which is on the level of the record made by Super 007.”

“What really attracted people was that 013 is actually a wavy blade type of card! I believe this has made quite a few among our friends watching feel perfectly familiar since the wavy blade category of cards is the most widely used. Its ease of operation, accuracy, and low price have made it into the most used battle fantasy card. But what we have seen this time is doubtlessly something different—a wavy blade card full of creativity. We now invite the grand master card master Mr. Ma Chengwen to analyze the depths of its advances…”

“Faya outperformed the Big Six! Good afternoon, friends in the audience. In the just-completed second auction of the Yang Clan Auction House, the low-key and mysterious Faya finally, by virtue of its strength, defeated the Big Six in getting the rights to Card 013 among the numbered series of cards. According to our analysis of the images, among the Big Six attending the auction, apart from the Bitter Solitude Temple not sending anyone to participate, all the other five had someone involved. Among the Big Six, the Bitter Solitude Temple isn’t known for its economic power, so their absence wouldn’t have made any difference to the auction. We can see from this auction that Faya’s power is incomparable. What difference might this all make to the situation of the federation in the end? Will the already turbulent Heavenly Federation begin a new restoration of peace, or is it about to enter a more troubled period?”

* * *

The world once again fell into madness, but Chen Mu just continued with his own training after leaving the riverside.

He entered the mysterious card. When he saw that huge, complicated model composed of thousands of energy blocks, his heart swiftly calmed. The clamor of the world outside quickly receded, and his gaze resumed its concentration.

There were still two incomplete models of energy composition in front of him. The difficulty of the fourth type of energy composition model was sharply increased, with the entire energy composition being composed of 30 thousand energy blocks.

Drawing in a deep breath, Chen Mu started back up with the boring “building blocks” project.

Because he was using pure perception to gain knowledge, it depleted that perception quickly. Within four hours, Chen Mu’s perception felt exhausted. If it weren’t for how significantly the sensitivity of his perception had improved recently, no matter how much he consumed, it was a lot less than before. That allowed him to greatly increase the time he could continuously work.

In the state of perceptual exhaustion, one’s control of perception greatly decreased, while the possibility for accidents greatly increased. In that state, it wouldn’t be smart to show off. Like those large-scale models in front of him, if he were to make the slightest mistake, all the work he had done would possibly be wasted in an instant. Chen Mu reckoned that on the basis of his one victory, the completion of the entire model would take about a week. If you were to add his mistakes, the reworking, and a large amount of time for analysis, the time he would have to spend would be a lot more than that.

Chen Mu drilled into the tub and calmly lay sideways in the water, his mind blank.

That was his improved method of extreme training—the true extreme training! There were no protective measures in the water; if something were to happen, the consequences would be quite serious. He was always extremely careful for fear of error.

That was a method he’d invented by mistake, but its results were strangely obvious. Dealing with the level of danger, he normally wouldn’t dare to train too much. After Sue Lochiro told him increasing his perceptual strength could effectively mitigate his symptoms, he had strengthened his perceptual training again. Based on his estimates, if it were to persist over the long term, he would have to form a kind of instinct. By that time, he was still quite far away from instinct. The stimulus of being on the brink of death every day wasn’t such a great feeling, to tell the truth. But the training in the simple water world wasn’t any use to him by then.

The more repetitions he did, the more effective it would be. At the very least, his psychological makeup would be a lot stronger than before.

However, this pool was too shallow, and there wasn’t enough water pressure.

* * *

Bogner was efficient and spent less than three days before the main building of the manor was completed. Of course, the cost to make it was a lot higher than for any ordinary building.

A seven-story building with a footprint extended to a seventh of a square kilometer was comparable to a standard base in the Outer Reaches. Its facilities inside were completely in the metallic style, which filled it with a modern flavor. The basis for Bogner’s plan was modified from the bases in the Outer Reaches and used the same rigorous standards for defensive capabilities. It had a special entryway for shuttle cars and had a completely independent internal oxygen supply system. Even the energy supply system had three spare sets for safety.

In the vicinity of some of the more mature opened cities, there were some Outer-Reaches-style bases scattered about. Those bases were mostly built by the federation government to provide for the rest and resupply of the card artisans in the Outer Reaches. But the prices were a lot higher than in the city. They had some comparatively simple markets inside them, and some merchants would specifically go there to acquire materials.

Because they were in the Outer Reaches, those bases’ defensive standards were extremely high. On top of those, Bogner made quite a large number of changes.

Chen Mu had never imagined he would have such a huge metallic building, though the cost of that building…

He thought again about how that building required the consumption of a four-star energy card every day, which made him heartsick. A four-star power card would be 150 thousand. One hundred fifty thousand a day—for a year it would be more than 54 million! If that wasn’t burning money, then what was?

Then, however, some other matter quickly diluted Chen Mu’s heartache.

The materials from the auction were sent over that day, in addition to a large batch of equipment. More than 20 mighty transport shuttles entered the new base.

Far away from the manor, a man was hidden among the dense foliage. Seeing the transport shuttle teams enter the new base, a strange glint passed through his eyes. He lightly murmured, “So, this is the place!”