"Arcane Compendium..."
The group stared at the book with a mix of surprise and longing. Upgrading an Intermediate wand to a Master wand had been a nagging concern for everyone. Whenever they had asked Ryen in the past, he would simply tell them to max out their wand proficiency first. Well, they had used their wands long enough that their proficiency was maxed out ages ago. The only thing they had lacked was the final piece of the puzzle. Now, they finally knew the materials required.
But there was only one copy of the Arcane Compendium.
Lumine pursed her lips, looking at Ryen expectantly. "Ryen, we can craft the Arcane Compendium ourselves, right?"
Ryen nodded. "Technically, yes. But my advice is: don't."
"Arcane Compendiums vary in level. This one is the ultimate version, used exclusively to evolve an Intermediate wand into a Master one. To craft an ultimate-level Compendium, you don't just need Spirit Dust and Large Mana Crystals, you need the previous tiers of Arcane Compendiums."
"Let's call this a Tier 3 Compendium. To make a Tier 2 version, you need Spirit Dust, Crystal Blocks, and a Tier 1 Compendium. And for a Tier 1 Compendium, you need Spirit Dust, Mana Crystals, and a 'Magic Missile' spell book."
As Ryen explained, the group realized this was just another layer of incredibly complex, nesting-doll crafting, no simpler than the firearms mod. Moreover, unlike the firearm materials that could be harvested on a massive scale, the materials for this Witchery mod were far more extravagant and rare.
"Crafting isn't impossible, but you have to weigh the harvest against the effort," Ryen said with a shrug. "Personally, I think opening treasure chests is a better use of time than grinding out the craft. It's a waste of resources, especially at this early stage of developing the Witchery mod. Maybe when we start large-scale production later, it might be viable."
Later...
The group fell silent. They couldn't wait another second for their wand upgrades. Besides, given their current progress in Witchery development, who knew how long it would take to reach that "later" stage?
Ryen sensed their frustration and chuckled. "Of course, if you really want to know, you can try, though I wouldn't hold my breath. You all know how to make Mana Crystals, but the difficulty lies in Spirit Dust."
"Spirit Dust has many attributes. While the attribute doesn't matter for crafting the Compendium, you can only get Spirit Dust from dropping it from a Spirit. And to find a Spirit, you have to find an Obelisk."
"Spirits are similar to Vexes, they can fly, pass through walls, and are very hard to hit. They deal high damage, have a decent amount of health, and, most importantly, are immune to most magical damage. This means you really need physical damage to kill a Spirit, but physical damage is hard to land on them. So, an automated Spirit farm is pretty much out of the question."
"The upside is that Spirits only spawn near Obelisks and don't stray far from them. If you're lucky, a Spirit might drop a single unit of Spirit Dust. If you're unlucky, you get nothing. And there aren't many Obelisks to go around."
"Therefore, it's not that you can't craft the Arcane Compendium, it's just not worth it. Spirit Dust is too useful for other things to waste on crafting Compendiums. The best route remains opening chests. Once you get the early-stage Compendiums from chests, you can spend more resources to build farms later."
With that, Ryen dropped the subject. Ningguang rubbed her temples, feeling a bit troubled. If the math held up, an Arcane Compendium required at least a dozen units of Spirit Dust. That was far too costly.
"Honestly, Master-level wands are hard to come by, but they don't have to be upgraded. We still have the Twilight Forest, and failing that, there are plenty of Wizard Towers. We can just raid them."
"Focus on your spell books. If you have an Arcane Compendium, great. If not, don't rush."
The group nodded in understanding. Lumine had already tucked the Arcane Compendium away; it was her treasure, after all. She had also snagged an Intermediate wand, which she might be able to put to use later. Now that they had unlocked the Witchery mod, the wands they found in the overworld weren't just limited to the spells from the Twilight Forest bundle anymore.
Lumine pondered the capabilities of the "Tamer of Thunder" staff and looked at Ryen with anticipation. He smiled, took the wand, and inspected it for a moment, raising an eyebrow.
"Not bad. A solid configuration. It'll be enough to see you through to the Master level. Once you hit that tier, you can swap out some spells if you want."
He continued, "Intermediate spell: Lightning Disc. Decent damage, with a tracking effect. If you're lucky, it can pierce through a target to hit others. Intermediate spell: Thunderstorm Cloud. Calls down a storm in a designated area, dealing continuous area-of-effect damage. Intermediate spell: Rain-calling. This pairs perfectly with your Bottled Thundercloud; in a thunderstorm, many of your Thunder-attribute spells will be significantly empowered."
"Flash. I've mentioned this one before, an Apprentice-level secret art. It's essentially unlimited spatial leaping. And the last spell, an Apprentice-level secret art: Nether Bow."
As he spoke, Ryen waved the wand, and a fluorescent green bow materialized in his hand. There was no need for arrows; as he drew the string, an arrow manifested naturally.
Just then, a squid bit onto Zhongli's fishing hook. Zhongli pulled hard, and the squid flew into the air. Ryen pivoted, fired a shot, and the squid disintegrated instantly.
Zhongli turned to Ryen with a look of quiet resignation. Ryen smiled. "Don't mention it. I know you don't like seafood."
Zhongli stayed silent. While it was true he didn't like seafood... that was his hard-earned catch! He'd spent the whole morning without a single fish, and the one time he finally caught a squid, Ryen had shot it out of the sky.
He had been skunked again. Being skunked was even more annoying to Zhongli than seafood. But with the deed done, there was nothing to say. He sighed, changed direction, and cast his line again.
Ryen twirled the Nether Bow. "This is an Apprentice-level secret art. With this wand, you won't need to carry a bow and arrows anymore. The summoned Nether Bow has infinite arrows and extremely high damage, enough to one-shot most monsters. It lasts sixty seconds with a three-second cooldown. In other words, as long as your mana doesn't run out, you can summon it anytime, anywhere."
"Of course, you can only summon one at a time. Storing it in a chest can stop it from disappearing, but that's unnecessary. It consumes very little mana and has a short cooldown."
He handed the wand back to Lumine. She took it, overjoyed, and polished it carefully. The offensive spells were self-evident, Electro represented extreme destruction. For her, the most useful spell was "Flash." The mana cost was negligible, and the cooldown was short. If she were in a fight, her enemies would never even be able to track her movements. Add in the strong single-target damage of the Nether Bow and the wide-range destruction of the thunder spells, and this wand was already superior to every other Intermediate wand they had, ignoring Lisa's "Thunderclap Wand," which provided a sixty percent elemental enhancement.
"Ganyu's luck is truly amazing. I'll have to borrow it again next time!"
Lumine tucked the wand away, beaming. Aether watched with green-eyed envy. Lumine's original wand was already formidable enough, it didn't have many heavy-hitting spells, but the "Lich Barrier" was more than enough. Now she had the high-spec Tamer of Thunder as well. Aether was wondering if he could use logic and sentiment to convince Lumine to give him her old wand. After all, she had so many, surely she wouldn't miss one?
"Intermediate wand, Arcane Compendium, Bottled Thundercloud, spell duration upgrade scroll, plus the 'Thousand Thunder Roar' spell book." Ryen looked at Lumine with a hint of amusement. "You've got yourself a complete set in one go."
"Just max out the proficiency of this wand and use the Arcane Compendium to upgrade it. Then, pair it with the Thousand Thunder Roar spell and upgrade the spell duration. Everything fits perfectly."
Lumine laughed happily. "Heh! That's exactly what I was thinking! This is the first wand to be upgraded to the Master level."
The group looked at Lumine with envy. If they had known the Ocean Monument was so well-stocked, they would have insisted on going. Even Ei was envious of the wand Lumine had secured.
"It's all good," Ryen said, stretching. He looked at the group, whose moods were a bit complicated, and offered some comfort. "Don't worry. Isn't this trip to the New Continent all about exploring the Witchery mod? Now that we've had such a great start with the Ocean Monument, we'll definitely find plenty more once we reach the New Continent."
"Master-level wands aside, at the very least, we'll be able to gather all kinds of spell books and materials. Once we do, you can all configure your wands however you like."
Hearing this, the group felt relieved. They hadn't even reached the New Continent yet, and they had already found so many good things in a mere Ocean Monument. Surely the New Continent would be even better. With that thought, everyone's anticipation for the New Continent surged.
Ryen glanced at the time, it was nearing noon. He stood up and called for Klee and the others. The little ones, who had been playing with the dolphins for so long, were exhausted. Klee climbed into Ryen's boat with lightning speed, curling up in his arms. Nahida looked on with a hint of resentment, but she simply watched Klee for a moment before turning to Buer's boat instead.
"Did you have fun?" Ryen tapped Klee on the nose. She squinted her eyes and nodded happily. "Fun! Big Brother Ryen! Klee wants to play with the little dolphins again later!"
Ryen chuckled. "No problem. When we get back, we'll dig a huge lake and raise some dolphins. Klee can go play whenever she wants."
Klee nodded excitedly, standing up with her arms around Ryen's neck to wave at the dolphins swimming in the distance. "Dolphin sisters! Klee is leaving now! I'll come play with you again! Thank you!"
The dolphins seemed to understand, nodding in response before leaping into the air one last time, casting a spray of water, and swimming off into the distance. Watching them go, Klee yawned.
"Big Brother Ryen, Klee is sleepy..." She rubbed her eyes and looked at Ryen with hopeful eyes.
"Alright, sleep tight, Klee. When you wake up, we'll be at the New Continent, okay?"
Ryen kissed Klee on the forehead, and she smiled brilliantly. She curled up in his arms, and a moment later, the sound of soft, faint snoring drifted through the air.
"She is just a child, after all."
Ryen stroked Klee's hair and looked at the rest of the group. "Let's set off again!"