Mystical Journey

"I understand now. Many Luminarists specialize in one type of totem generation after generation, and expand that type to a really high level, so it grows stronger and stronger. So unless you’re an ultimate genius researcher, there’s no Luminarist who could catch up to the results of their cumulative studies over generations while being distracted." Garen nodded in understanding.

"As long as you understand. So what you need to do now is first learn how to use these two sets of items. Especially the unit factory, you must make your own unit factory from now on as well. Otherwise, you won’t even have to think about constructing your own totem," Emin advised him solemnly.

"Yes." In that instant it was as though Garen returned to his time on Earth, carefully listening to the teacher speaking.

Emin began to teach Garen how to use the two sets of tools. And the latter listened with unusual raptness as well, concentrating hard.

But after they began practical practise, Emin noticed with some regret that although Garen was terrifyingly talented at making blueprints, he was still slightly slow in understanding how to use the two types of tools.

For that reason he sighed a lot in succession, venting the unhappiness within.

However, he didn’t get to sigh for long.

When it came to using these two tools, the microscope used for research was fine, but the unit factory on the other hand did indeed use up a lot of concentration and energy. Garen crouched clumsily in front of the intricate factory, following the construction process step-by-step. This thing took at least one hour for every cycle. If you followed the mercury ball while even slightly distracted, it would be extremely hard to observe the whole process of creating the factory carefully. At the same time, you needed to understand the actual timings and methods of using it.

"Teacher, I didn’t see this part properly, let’s go again."

"Okay."

An hour later…

"Teacher, please repeat this part again."

"Fine."

Two hours passed."

"Teacher, I used a little too much force there. Please start again."

"No problem."

Three hours passed…

"Teacher, I was slightly nervous just now, so my hand moved too quickly. Once more please!"

"..."

Six hours later…

"Teacher, I was too agitated, I didn’t pay attention at the fourth part. Again please!"

Emin looked at Garen’s excited, energetic face.

The student and teacher stared at each other wordlessly.

Coo-coo… coo-coo…

There was the sound of an owl from outside.

"Teacher, what’s the matter?" Garen blinked, and asked in a low voice.

Coo…

Emin’s stomach made a dull sound.

"Is it this late already…?" Only then did Garen notice that the sky outside was already pitch black.

"Are you… always this energetic?" Emin’s feelings were complicated, as he looked at Garen’s expression of excitement.

"It’s okay, I’m young, and I have stamina."

Garen smiled.

"Forget it, I’ll bring you something to eat, you go ahead on your own. You should have clearly seen how I use it. Is that okay?"

"No problem." Garen nodded. "Sorry, Teacher, I made you stay hungry with me."

"It’s okay, this is your first time in contact with all this. It’s very normal for you to be so curious about it." Emin waved his head, but deep inside he knew. When it came to learning how to use the unit factory, most normal people would start feeling dizzy after two hours of consecutive use, ending up mentally exhausted. This was because the Luminescence caused the human body a certain amount of damage. If one came into close contact with it for too long, their body wouldn’t be able to withstand it.

But Garen had been working on it for more than ten hours, and still didn’t feel any discomfort. This meant that the time Garen could spend on this was several times that of other Luminarists!

When Emin walked out of the lab, he once more harbored deep suspicions towards everything he thought he knew about this world before.

"Looks like I knew too few Luminarists before this." He shook his head and sighed as he went down the stairs, looking as though he aged a lot suddenly.

After having dinner, Emin finally gave in and returned to his room to rest. He left Garen alone in the lab, learning enthusiastically, using the unit factory over and over again. He seemed to have returned to those biology or chemistry classes back on Earth when he listened intently.

Of the three strongest specialties of the terrifying Divine Statue Technique, two of them were recovery power and endurance. This was when they shone the most.

Before Emin went to sleep, he saw the light in the lab shining.

In the middle of the night when he got up to use the toilet, he raised his head to look at the lab, and the light was still on.

Early the next morning, he yawned as he walked out of the bedroom, and the light in the lab was still shining.

"It’s the first time, so no wonder…" He sighed feelingly, listening to the sounds of Garen moving about in the lab, and went downstairs to eat breakfast himself.

Noon.

Emin sat in the courtyard, lazily tanning in the sun.

"The weather sure is great…"

He narrowed his eyes, looking at the cornflower sky. The golden sunlight shone on his body, warming his entire body up.

The little girl Nicol was hanging out the freshly-washed sheets and clothes next to him.

"Is Garen still upstairs?"

"Yes, mister," Nicol replied hastily.

"It sure is good to be young…" Emin sighed deeply. He had always taken good care of himself. If he hadn’t been grievously injured in that intense battle before, there was no way he would end up as old as he was now.

The sky gradually darkened.

After dinner, Emin looked at Nicol, who was washing up the dishes.

"Is Garen still upstairs?"

"Yes, mister," Nicol replied hastily.

Emin touched his beard, and said nothing.

At night.

Emin put down the novel in his hand, and glanced at the second floor.

"Garen still hasn’t come down?"

"It seems so… mister." Nicol was crouching by the fireplace and adding more firewood, and replied hesitantly.

The third day…

The fourth day…

Ker-chak.

The door to the second floor lab finally opened.

Nicol picked up the empty tray on the floor outside the door and was about to leave when she suddenly heard the door open. She quickly turned around.

"Mr Garen?"

"Teacher! Teacher!" A black shadow dashed past her, and raced down the stairs.

Emin walked out of his room, yawning.

"It’s so early in the morning, what are you yelling about."

The black shadow instantly trampled upstairs, ran in front of Emin and stood still.

It was Garen, who had lived in the lab for four days.

He frowned deeply, and held up something in his hand.

"Teacher, the lamp oil ran out."

Emin released a long breath.

"If there’s no more oil, go rest. After messing around for so long, what results do you have? Don’t tell me you fell asleep in there?"

"I got it!" Garen grinned, revealing his pearly whites.

"Okay… Four days, that’s still considered normal." Emin nodded.

Garen also released a deep breath.

He already knew that his talent when it came to instruments of high delicacy like the unit factory was only so-so. This thing needed a high degree of concentration and an accurate hand of corresponding calculations at the same time, and he was really not used to it. His body had already regained his reflexes from the peak-level Body Hardening Technique, so if he lost his focus for even a moment, he would emit some miniscule vibrations.

This was the result of his body and spirit not merging fully yet. Although he could already use the Four Major Secret Techniques, he still needed some time to feel it out.

It was just that this didn’t affect how much he could actually use his martial arts. After all, his martial arts didn’t have any delicate moves, they were opened spectacularly and closed large.

For those four days, he basically didn’t sleep or rest, only occasionally eating something. That was how he managed to learn how to control the unit factory in one go.

After eating breakfast, he took a little break.

It was only after Emin confirmed that Garen was still feeling quite good, and didn’t show any signs of insufficient rest, that the teacher agreed to demonstrate the manipulation process.

In front of the lab door, there was a light silver horizontal line, glowing with a faint silver light.

Emin and Garen stepped across the line, and walked into the lab.

"This line at the door is a little device to prevent normal people from seeing the objects inside this room. It’s another application of tactics, one of the practical ones to use in daily life. I’ll teach it to you next time." Emin walked up to the unit factory.

"Now, let me see what method of control you’ve picked up."

Garen nodded.

He stood the furthest-left end of the unit factory, and picked up a small silver ball using the pliers in his right hand. He then lightly placed it on a slanted slope on the factory machine.

Brr…

The small ball rolled down the slope slowly, and dropped into a silver cylindrical container. Soon enough, in the midst of clacking sounds, the three silver pipes connected to the container began to flow with a translucent liquid.

The three paths of liquid split up and flowed towards three directions. When they passed through a small round archways, Garen instantly reached out his hand to press the archways, as though adjusting something.

The three liquid paths instantly became a lot clearer. Passing through the archway, they gathered into one silver pipe, and flowed into a metal device like a merry-go-round. Once the liquid stopped flowing completely, the merry-go-round began to turn slowly, making a melodic sound like wind chimes.

Garen quickly reached out to adjust some small switches and buttons around the merry-go-round, turning the many dials to the optimum numerical degree.

After the wooden horses took two rounds, he counted silently to himself, and reached out again to adjust these dials, his accuracy and speed absolutely on point.

Pak!

The spinning stopped.

A drop of viscous silver-colored water dripped down from the exact center, falling precisely into the neck of a purple curve-necked flask.

Pff!

A flash of purple smoke instantly rose from the curve-necked flask, following the curved neck as it flowed down, darting into a large silver ball the size of a human head.

Garen quickly walked up to the round ball, his fingers pressing rapidly on a panel there, as though he was keying in some data.

In a mere ten seconds, he keyed in twenty numbers, forming several combinations of different lengths. And this was just the beginning.

After a whole half an hour, drops of silver liquid dripped out of the round ball with a smacking sound, falling into the last large beaker.

These silver liquids looked like silver grains of said, flowing slowly. At the same time, they looked like some microorganism, squirming ever so slightly.

"You did it." Emin looked at the silver-colored liquid in the beaker closely, and with satisfaction. "Not bad, there was not a single mistake there."

Garen heaved a sigh of relief, and pulled his hand back from the panel.

"Teacher, I learned how to use the tools. Now what?"

"You learned how to use the microscope as well?"

"That’s a lot simpler." Garen walked up to the microscope with an air of familiarity, and easily set it up. He sucked up a drop of silver liquid, did the preparations, and began to observe.

Emin nodded, satisfied.

"Not bad, not bad. You’ve done all the preparatory work, so let’s begin with the first step."

"The first step?"

"Go out into the wild on your own, and find the totem creature you want. Bugs, beasts, birds, anything works. Go ahead, we’ll start constructing from the basic levels. But you should still choose carefully, this is the direction your potential totem will take, the totem you will rely on for everything. So it’s best to be more careful when choosing the rough direction." Emin smiled. "Although I’m not specialized enough because I study everything and ended up still being a very average, normal Luminarist, the benefit is that my student will have more directions to expand. First, you choose something, anything, and as a demonstration, I’ll show you how to construct a totem, as well as what steps are required in between. In general, which tactics are needed to create organizations, organs, systems. I’ll show you each of them, one by one. Of course, other than the White Bear, which is inherited, I haven’t gotten too deeply into the others. It’s just enough to finish constructing a simple totem. If you want to upgrade it, you’ll have to do the deeper research yourself."

"I understand." Garen nodded.

"There are two types of totems, one is core and the other basic. Now go, find a creature you want to make into a totem in the wild around here. This will be the first basic totem I’ll give you. Basic totems have very weak abilities, but they’ll have a certain benefit for your daily life. Such as reconnaissance, such as cleaning up, such as collecting items, or using it as a tool etc."