Chapter 289: Talis-man?!

The crisp morning rays hit the elegant courtyard of the Cloud-Mist Pavilion as the first rays of dawn hit the dark stone floor.

Tony Clark sat casually on a stone bench under a glowing bamboo tree, his standard lazy smile playing on his lips as he enjoyed the thick, refreshing primordial energy of his new home.

A soft rustle of fine silk and the familiar scent of azure herbs suddenly cut through the quiet morning air. Tony didn’t even lift his head from the simple wooden table; his Truth Eye had already perfectly traced the elegant, hesitant footsteps of Lady Selena Faith as she walked through the pavilion’s grand arched gateway.

Selena was accompanied by two high-level, dark-armored guards from the Golden Phoenix Merchant Guild, who were carefully carrying a heavy, beautifully polished silver iron chest between them.

However, as Selena stepped onto the stone platform and met Tony’s lazy, calculating gaze, her usual immaculate, royal composure completely vanished, replaced instead by a deeply awkward and self-conscious demeanor.

The memories of her frantic disbelief from the previous night, combined with the reality that she was now standing inside the private quarters of the academy’s greatest new sensation, made her cheeks flush with a faint, rose-red hue.

"Drop the chest onto the table and wait outside the gates," Selena commanded her guards, her refined voice carrying a slight, nervous tremor that completely amused Tony. The guards quickly bowed and retreated into the mist, leaving the two of them entirely alone in the quiet pavilion.

Selena stepped closer to the wooden table, her violet eyes nervously darting toward Tony’s relaxed frame before she lightly tapped the silver iron lid of the chest.

"Everything you requested is right inside, young master Tony. Exactly one hundred sheets of Blank Spiritual Bamboo Paper, ten bottles of High-Grade Beast Blood Ink, and a premium Runic Carving Pen forged from pure silver iron. My family’s private vaults only carry the absolute highest quality, so you cannot blame the materials if your little experiment ends up exploding in your face today."

Tony let out a low, amused chuckle, his signature villainous smirk curling the corners of his lips as he slowly stood up from the stone bench.

He stepped closer to her, his tall frame casting a relaxed shadow over her rigid posture as he casually reached out his hand, his fingers lightly brushing against her delicate wrist ornament as he took the cold iron key of the chest from her hand.

"Your incredible speed and efficiency are truly breathtaking, my beautiful painting partner," Tony murmured smoothly, his deep baritone voice carrying a playful, teasing edge that made her breath completely catch in her throat. He leaned in just a fraction of an inch, his dark eyes locking onto hers with a sharp, predatory intensity.

"With a magnificent, wealthy lady like you managing my inventory so perfectly, I might just have to make you my permanent companion instead of a simple long-term business partner. What say you, Lady Selena? Don’t you think we make an exceptionally handsome match under this morning sun?"

Selena’s violet eyes violently widened to the size of saucers, her entire face turning a deep, burning shade of crimson at his sudden, shameless flirting. She had spent her whole life surrounded by stiff noble masters who treated her with rigid protocol, so Tony’s casual, villainous audacity caught her completely off guard, making her heart skip a frantic beat against her chest.

"Y-You are truly a completely shameless and ridiculous creature, Tony Clark!" Selena stammered shyly, her royal grace completely evaporating as she frantically grabbed her wooden sketchboard and took a rapid step back into the path.

"Stop spouting such absolute nonsense and focus entirely on your training! I have massive guild transactions to manage inside the central district, and I do not have any precious time to waste on your lazy jokes!" With a final, flustered toss of her beautiful hair, she turned on her heel and ran out of the Cloud-Mist Pavilion at a frantic pace, her heart pounding furiously as she disappeared into the thick mountain mist.

Tony let out a loud, booming laugh that echoed merrily through the quiet valley, completely delighted by her shy reaction. He turned his attention back to the wooden table, his face instantly shifting into a cold, razor-sharp expression of pure, calculating focus as he inserted the iron key and threw open the heavy lid of the silver chest.

The premium materials inside were absolutely flawless, the dark red Beast Blood Ink radiating a dense, liquid spiritual energy that perfectly synchronized with his newly acquired Elder Disciple magus foundation.

Tony casually carried the entire chest inside his private meditation chamber, shutting the heavy wooden door behind his back to enter a state of total, isolated concentration.

He sat down cross-legged on the luxurious jade-carved bed, spreading a blank sheet of Spiritual Bamboo Paper before him, and tightly gripped the silver iron Runic Carving Pen between his fingers.

With a brief thought, he fully activated the Primordial Talisman-Making Art that the system had synchronized into his consciousness, and thousands of glowing, intricate symbols and complex runic lines instantly flashed across his vision.

However, despite having the perfect theoretical knowledge of the system inheritance, Tony quickly realized that the practical execution of a Talisman Master inside this higher universe was an extraordinarily brutal, unforgiving task.

The moment he dipped his pen into the high-grade blood ink and attempted to carve the very first line of a baseline Explosive Fire Talisman, his hand experienced a sudden, violent micro-tremor due to the intense primordial density of the room’s air.

PUFF!

The delicate bamboo paper instantly caught fire, turning into a pile of black ash within a fraction of a second as the elemental energy balance completely collapsed.

Tony didn’t show even a single fraction of frustration or internal distress; his villainous pride entirely refused to let a failure break his spirit. He casually wiped the ash away, placed a second sheet of paper down, and began his relentless, grueling practice from absolute scratch.

Puff! Puff! Flash!

The hours of the morning passed by in a complete blur of continuous, agonizing failures. He failed on the second sheet because his internal energy flow was too thick; he failed on the fifth sheet because a wind draft altered his pen trajectory by a single millimeter; he failed on the twelfth sheet because the blood ink experienced a spiritual bottleneck.

By the time the sun reached the absolute center of the sky, more than thirty ruined, scorched sheets of bamboo paper littered the cold stone floor of his chamber, and his fingers were completely raw and cramping from the absolute strain of holding the silver iron pen.

Yet, Tony’s dark eyes remained entirely locked onto the canvas, his strategic mind perfectly memorizing every single error and correcting his muscle movements with the precision of a master machine. He took a deep, controlled breath, utilizing the Storm Breathing Technique to instantly refill his empty meridians with the pavilion’s dense aura, and dipped his pen into the blood ink one final time.

His hand moved with an absolute, fluid perfection that seemed to dance across the paper, his pen carving the final, intricate runic curves of a high-tier Blazing Nova Talisman without a single fraction of delay.

The moment the silver tip left the parchment, the entire sheet violently flashed with a brilliant, blinding crimson light, the dense fire-attribute laws perfectly stabilizing inside the ink lines as a deep, eerie humming power vibrated through the room.

"Yes! I finally did it!" Tony shouted aloud, his deep baritone voice echoing fiercely off the stone walls as he lifted the completed, glowing red talisman into the air, his face twisted into a mask of pure, ecstatic triumph.

To test the absolute power of his first successful creation, Tony walked out into the private, heavily fortified training yard of his pavilion. He targeted a massive, five-ton practice rock made of solid iron-stone, and with a casual flick of his wrist, he violently tossed the crimson talisman straight toward the monument.

BOOM!

An absolute, reality-shattering explosion of blinding white-hot fire violently erupted across the training yard, creating a massive, terrifying shockwave of compressed wind that completely vaporized the five-ton iron-stone monument into microscopic gray sand and ash within a single millisecond.

The sheer destructive power of this basic talisman was enough to instantly flatten an ordinary 9th Class Disciple without any heavenly restrictions.

Tony stood in the path of the residual heat waves, a loud, maniacal, and completely villainous laugh breaking out from his chest as he stared at the empty space where the mountain stone had just been standing.

"HAHHAHA! With this automated system art and Selena’s massive distribution networks, absolutely nobody on this continent can ever stop my rise to supreme power!" Tony laughed like a true madman, his eyes gleaming with a terrifying, predatory brilliance.

"Now, I will easily become the absolute richest man, exactly like in my previous life!!!