"Haha, I won't keep you any longer. I still need to carefully reflect on the insights I've gained these past few days."
"Once I finish summarizing everything, I'll go and advance to become a Level 6 Enchanter."
Kanzaki Rei nodded and stepped back toward the doorway.
"Thank you, Uncle Eizen. I wish you a smooth advancement."
The door closed.
Rei gripped the black staff in his hands.
It was a massive, elongated staff.
With his current physique, he needed both hands to hold it properly.
Of course, with the strength of his body now, he could still hold it with one hand if necessary.
It was just slightly inconvenient to grip.
It seemed the staff had been designed with the expectation that he would continue using it as he grew older.
Rei slightly enlarged his hand using [Flesh Reshaping], making it roughly the size of an adult's.
Now he could grip it perfectly.
Sure enough—it had been designed precisely for an adult's height and hand size.
"They really planned far ahead."
As for the necklaces and bracelets:
The necklaces each served different functions—protection, perception shielding, and resistance to mental interference.
The bracelet, however, was somewhat special.
It was a storage bracelet, but it also possessed the ability to rapidly launch stored items outward.
After leaving the City Within the Circle, Kanzaki Rei's body shot forward like a streak of flowing light.
[Source Body · Instant White Flash]
His entire body released itself like a burst of instantaneous white light.
The permanent effect allowed Rei to maintain an extreme velocity.
The speed could be adjusted—fast or slow.
At his current pace, it could be sustained indefinitely.
His speed had likely reached 2 kilometers per second.
At full burst, however, the speed would instantly become ten times faster than this.
How fast he could go depended on how deeply he converted his body into magical form.
Whoosh!
In less than a minute, Rei had already arrived at the Thousand-Cavern Far Domain.
Swoosh!
A moment later, he landed.
His descent was as light as the wind.
Before him stood a Tier-4 Dungeon.
Right now, he couldn't even be bothered to go to the Adventurers' Guild to accept quests.
The rewards offered by those commissions were barely worth a fraction of what he needed.
"Sigh…"
He had started with 20 million gold coins, but had already spent over 8 million.
Although most of it had gone to that Diviner, having only 12 million left somehow made Rei feel slightly uneasy.
Rei extended his hand toward the dungeon before him.
[Sacrifice — 50,000 Souls]
Upon entering the dungeon—
The sky was blood-red.
Tens of thousands of monsters roared and surged across the land.
There were twelve Tier-4 Nation-Destroyer-class monsters.
Rei gathered magic at the tip of his staff.
"Resonant Thunder Zone — Quadruple Cast."
BOOM!
The entire space suddenly shuddered violently.
Centered on those twelve Nation-Destroyer monsters, a 15-kilometer radius erupted into violent shockwaves.
BOOOOOOM—RUMBLE RUMBLE!
Thunder exploded outward.
Massive waves of monsters collapsed like mountains crumbling into the sea.
Even the twelve Nation-Destroyer monsters trembled violently, letting out agonized roars.
All monsters King-rank and below were instantly killed.
Among the Nation-Destroyers—
Three died immediately.
The remaining nine were already critically weakened.
"So strong…"
This was Rei's large-scale area-destruction spell.
The larger the area, the lower the damage normally became.
Yet even so—
It had instantly killed Nation-Destroyer monsters.
Back when Rei used to kill these creatures, he needed 5,000-soul Spirit Explosions, constantly blasting their weak points.
It took 20 shots to kill one.
With Triple Casting, that meant 60 blasts in total.
And now…
A four-chain AoE skill had instantly wiped them out?
"Incredible power."
Rei could clearly feel that this staff had amplified his spells by at least six times.
The enchantments themselves provided roughly a two-fold increase.
Meanwhile, the staff's inherent trait—scaling with proficiency level, improving power, range, and distance—provided roughly three times more.
So…
Perhaps each level of proficiency increased the bonus by 1%?
For most people, raising a spell to Level 10–20 would grant about 10–20% total bonus, which was already quite good.
But not outrageously broken.
However, for Rei…
That translated to a 300% total bonus.
And as his Mage class level continued to increase, that amplification would only become even greater.
"The remaining nine…"
"Armored-type… worm-type… multi-legged-type…"
After studying monster classifications, Rei realized he could now recognize these monsters instantly.
Their weaknesses were also glaringly obvious to him.
Even though he hadn't specifically seen them in a bestiary before, based on his knowledge—
Rei raised the staff.
He aimed at the creature covered entirely in armored plating.
[Instant White Flash]
BANG!
A massive four-in-one beam of white light blasted forward.
In an instant, it pierced through a gap in the creature's armor plating.
"Excellent feedback as well…"
Rei could clearly sense through the magical feedback that the attack had passed straight through its heart.
The [Void-Spirit Ring Star Staff] truly deserved to be called perfect.
After several rounds of testing—
The spell amplification was at least six times, sometimes reaching 6–12 times depending on spell type.
Casting distance had increased roughly twelve-fold.
The maximum casting range was now 160 kilometers, though shorter-range spells typically reached 80–120 kilometers.
The area amplification was about three times in radius.
But when calculated by surface area, that meant a squared increase.
If calculated by spatial volume, it became a cubed expansion.
In other words—
The increases were absurdly massive.
Beyond that…
Duration, casting speed, projectile speed, and nearly every other property had been significantly enhanced.
Now Rei was experimenting with a new idea:
How to channel spells cast directly from his body through the staff for amplification.
After all, when he transformed his body into magic, the spell didn't pass through the staff.
Equipment in this world didn't simply grant permanent amplification just by holding it.
As for the monster corpses—
Rei didn't bother collecting most of them.
He only gathered the Nation-Destroyer-class corpses.
Later he still needed to visit the Thousand-Army Ant Mountain.
Now that [Death Exchange Technique] had leveled up, even smaller corpses could be used.
Slightly larger black ants would already be sufficient for his exchange requirements.
Rei couldn't perform harvesting techniques himself, so he simply used
[Corpse Seal (Tier-2) (LV: 301)]
to preserve the bodies.
Later he could either sell them directly or have Akasei dissect them.
Earlier today, when passing by the Grand Commerce Emporium, he had noticed they were preparing a major auction event.
They were probably planning to use Nation-Destroyer monsters as a publicity stunt.
There was no way such a large merchant guild wouldn't exploit this opportunity.
Their profits would certainly be far higher than his own.
"Raw materials worth 120 million, and they might turn it into over a billion in profit."
That had been Akasei's exact words.
After leaving that dungeon, Rei explored seven more Tier-4 dungeons.
He killed 96 Nation-Destroyer monsters.
The average value per monster was 200,000 gold coins.
This run earned him nearly 20 million gold coins.
It had taken roughly two hours.
The main difficulty was finding the dungeons.
Clearing them, on the other hand, took less than five minutes each.
Most of that time was spent testing the staff's characteristics and collecting corpses.
If he went all-out for pure speed?
Entering and leaving would probably take five seconds.
The corpses filled two storage bags.
Rei placed those bags inside a [High-Tier Storage Pouch].
This pouch was specifically designed to store storage-type items.
It only had 1 cubic meter of space, yet cost 8,000 gold coins.
It had no other special features.
Its biggest advantage was that it could contain most ordinary storage items.
After finishing the dungeon sweep, Rei returned to the sealed grounds of the Thousand-Army Ant Mountain.
"Time to try it…"
He opened the seal.
Inside, the cavern was filled with piles of black ash.
The corpses hadn't vanished completely.
They had simply crumbled into ash and accumulated.
Rei summoned a powerful gust of wind, sweeping huge amounts of ash out of the cave.
Once everything was cleaned, he walked inside.
After entering, he scanned the surroundings with his senses before resealing the entrance.
"Finally… I can test it."
A bottle of viscous blood appeared in his right hand.
With a slight lift of his hand, a current of wind popped the cork open.
[Demon Blood]
The blood of evil creatures—possibly from undead, vampires, demons, or similar beings.
The sea of fire surrounding the mountain had already been extinguished.
Now massive walls surrounded the Thousand-Army Ant Mountain.
Using [Water Manipulation], Rei suspended the Demon Blood in midair.
In his mind, he recalled the diagram of the ritual formation.
This was his first time performing a ritual.
He had heard that this world contained countless strange rituals.
The defining feature of rituals was simple:
Sacrifice a certain price — receive a certain response.
In theory, rituals could accomplish an enormous variety of things.
But the drawbacks were clear:
They were difficult to construct, and the price demanded might be impossible to pay.
"Clarify the ritual's cost."
"Understand the response the ritual will produce."
"These are the mandatory steps to initiate a ritual."
"If the process isn't followed, you may pay an enormous price… and receive endless suffering."
This was the most important rule of Ritual Studies.
"Kumironi has already verified it…"
Rei smeared the Demon Blood onto the hard black-iron floor, drawing circles upon circles.
He connected lines between various nodes.
That should be correct.
Depending on the ritual, perfect precision wasn't always required.
At least for this one, absolute accuracy wasn't necessary.
Next, he placed several items that might enhance the ritual's effect.
Monster flesh fragments.
Monster blood.
Luminous objects acting as light sources.
"And then…"
"Sacrifice souls… to receive a response."
Rei closed his eyes and touched the ritual array.
The ritual was complete.
He felt a faint pulling force emanating from it.
It seemed capable of drawing in souls.
But the pull was extremely weak—someone without strong spirituality might not feel it at all.
"Sacrifice…"
"1 Soul."
A pure white soul floated out of Rei's body.
It merged into the ritual array.
Inside the sealed cavern, a faint wind suddenly began to stir.
The ritual formation suddenly emitted a powerful suction force.
Rei calmed his mind.
Through his spiritual perception, he saw murky energies gathering.
The Monster Tide was growing denser.
Since reading The Origin of Spirituality, his control over spiritual perception had improved significantly.
Now he could clearly perceive phenomena that ordinary people couldn't see—such as Monster Tides.
"As expected… it's becoming denser."
He turned his perception toward the Thousand-Army Ant Mountain.
The speed at which it produced black ants had increased.
"Next…"
"Sacrifice 2,000 Souls."
Rei increased the number of souls offered.
This time, the ritual produced a vortex-like suction force.
Monster Tides from all directions rapidly converged here.
But it wasn't just drawn from elsewhere—
Some Monster Tide energy seemed to materialize directly from the air.
Immediately afterward, the Thousand-Army Ant Mountain began devouring the gathered Monster Tide like madness.
Black ants erupted in explosive bursts.
Originally, the area had already been extremely depleted due to the Ant Mountain's presence.
Its production had slowed to a trickle.
But now—
The birth rate skyrocketed to over ten thousand black ants per second.
A sea of flames ignited around the mountain once more.
"So fast… but still not fast enough."
Rei's thoughts shifted.
Souls floated from his body.
[Sacrifice Souls — 5,000]
BOOM!
At that instant, it felt as though the entire mountain trembled slightly.
In Rei's vision, thick clouds of murky corruption churned violently.
He expanded his perception.
The mountain had become the eye of a storm, drawing in Monster Tides from every direction.
Just 5,000 souls produced this terrifying effect?
Such a dense Monster Tide…
Rei flicked his right hand.
A strip of white testing paper appeared between his fingers.
Within the dense Monster Tide, the paper gradually turned gray-brown, becoming increasingly polluted.
Eventually, the color stopped darkening.
Rei compared it with a chart.
"Monster Tide Density… Tier 5."
"Within this tide, wild Tier-5 monsters may be born."
Just 5,000 sacrificed souls had condensed a Tier-5 Monster Tide.
The power of this ritual was truly terrifying.
If he sacrificed 50,000 souls at once, what would happen?
Rei decided not to test that lightly.
The consequences might be… severe.
The Monster Tide gathered while the Thousand-Army Ant Mountain converted it into black ants.
In such a dense environment, every hole in the mountain began pouring out ants endlessly.
The growth rate of souls reached a staggering 100,000 per second.
"So fast…"
"But still not fast enough."
Rei extended a hand toward the mountain.
Souls weren't only used for dungeon sacrifices or ritual offerings.
They could also be used to strengthen monsters.
However, for most monsters—
Enhancement only made them more violent.
It didn't increase their production value or turn them into allies.
In most cases, it simply made hunting them harder.
But for the Thousand-Army Ant Mountain—
[Sacrifice — 500 Souls]
[Enhance Monster — Thousand-Army Ant Mountain]
A mournful chorus echoed as countless souls poured into the mountain.
THUMP—
Rei felt the entire mountain pulse.
Its body began beating like a massive heart.
Thump… Thump…
THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP!
With every pulse—
Ants erupted like torrential rain.
From the tens of thousands of holes across the mountain's surface, black ants burst out like popcorn exploding.
Each eruption produced vast swarms.
Every tremor unleashed another ant calamity.
The Monster Tide was consumed even faster.
Rei sensed the previously Tier-5-level tide rapidly thinning.
"It can still increase…"
[Ritual Sacrifice — 5,000 Souls]
Rei continued feeding the ritual.
The formation began spinning wildly.
The Ant Mountain worked even harder.
"Even with 500-soul enhancement, the production rate is still too slow…"