Chapter 460: Timeliness

Chapter 460: Timeliness

With the thought of not wanting the Red Dragon to come cause trouble, Zheng Yichen worked much more efficiently. He directly finished creating what he wanted well before the required time. As for how to take away this huge bed, well, it seemed this Red Dragon also had a Personal Space… oh, right, it should be a Storage Artifact with very large capacity.

After getting what he wanted, and since there wasn’t much going on in Kaja, Augusta’s main body left the place immediately. As for the Alchemical Avatar, that didn’t need to be taken away; he still wanted to play in Kaja for a few more days. Where he would go afterwards depended on his own thoughts.

After dealing with Augusta’s matter, Zheng Yichen looked over the intelligence sent by Qin. It recorded various strange things that had happened recently, big and small.

“Leave it to me.”

“Uh… okay.” Flipping through the information that appeared in the Magic Weapon Summoning Book, Zheng Yichen heard Loris’s voice. He handed the Magic Weapon Summoning Book in his hand to her and asked, “Is there no problem with the Alchemical Avatar you’re using over there?”

“There’s nothing going on there.” Loris shook her head slightly, looking at the information in the Magic Weapon Summoning Book. “I’ll give you the processed information after a while. You go and do your work first.”

Zheng Yichen nodded and went to another newly opened Laboratory. The scale of this Laboratory was much smaller than the ones he used before, but the equipment inside was more focused and specialized. It was mainly a place for researching Transformation Magic. Annie and Irene were both here. At this moment, the two of them were arguing about something… Zheng Yichen listened a bit blankly; it seemed like in terms of research, these two didn’t have much conflict.

After all, their areas of focus were different. One focused mainly on Magical Structure, while the other focused on transformation structure. Transformation Magic involved not only the level of Magic, but also required relevant parts from the Life Domain. This wasn’t strange; many magics contained power s related to the Life Domain. Those recovery-type magics basically all contained power from the Life Domain.

Especially magic like limb regeneration involved an even greater proportion. Not to mention power from the Life Domain, even parts of Alchemy could be incorporated into the Magic system. The magic Zheng Yichen used to directly reshape materials was one such type, let alone magic that extracted relevant substances from raw materials. So Zheng Yichen had always been puzzled: since both of these could be developed, why was there no Transformation Magic?

Could it be that those two types only influenced rather than altered the original basis of an object or living creature? Unlike the Transformation Magic he hoped for, which directly caused drastic changes in a living body, even changing its appearance to that of another species!?

For power from the Life Domain, this wasn’t too big of a problem. As long as one had the determination, they could change all the parts of the body. However, doing so would basically be a permanent change. Transformation Magic was temporary, allowing one to change back at will. This instantly raised the level of sophistication.

After Annie got involved in this matter, Zheng Yichen, finding he couldn’t help much, went to learn about other things. Annie’s Library was partially open to him. From some books in the Library, he learned that there had been researchers in the Life Domain who thought this way before, but they all ended in failure.

Annie had also been interested for a period, but she felt that researching such a thing alone, especially something that wasn’t much help to herself, was rather unnecessary. She didn’t need to transform herself into some special existence. For fighting enemies? Fighting enemies didn’t require such magic either, and researching it was far too complicated. So Annie simply gave up on this research which had little practical value.

However, now that Zheng Yichen showed great demand for it, she also wanted to see what would happen if a not-quite-right-in-the-head dragon could successfully use such magic and undergo a change in form. That did have some research value. As for the past? Would she have needed to catch a dragon to keep as a pet?

As for the not-quite-right-in-the-head issue, Zheng Yichen, being a Cursed Dragon, was considered not-quite-right-in-the-head among the Dragon Clan. So saying this wasn’t wrong.

Zheng Yichen quietly listened to the content of the two Witches’ argument and quickly understood what they were arguing about. It was nothing more than which stage to start from first. Irene believed the basic structure of the magic was the most important. Without first perfecting the basic structural part of the magic, even if the rest of the research yielded results, it would be difficult to truly succeed. The foundation was the cornerstone; you don’t build the house first and then lay the foundation.

Annie, on the other hand, believed the transformation structure part was more important. After all, it was Transformation Magic. If the basic structure for transformation was lacking, could it still be called Transformation Magic? Moreover, if the Magic Structure was used as the foundation first, the subsequent research direction would be fixed. Starting from the transformation structure part as the entry point would allow subsequent research on Transformation Magic to actively control the direction of development, rather than letting it follow its natural course…

Both had their own views. Zheng Yichen listened for a while, knocked on his own head, and simply left the Laboratory. He had no place to interject. Expressing his own opinion would probably lead to embarrassment. He decided to wait until they argued to a conclusion before coming back. Zheng Yichen’s departure did not disturb the two arguing Witches. He didn’t even consider the possibility of them fighting later.

“Suddenly I feel so useless… Oh, right, go solve other matters.” Zheng Yichen shook his head and returned to his own Laboratory. He pulled out two new Blueprints from the pile of drawings on the table. One of these Blueprints involved a skeleton design. Although it was still a human skeleton, it had new additions and belonged to an upgraded version. This was a skeleton prepared for the Ghost Maids to use. The other was the design for the body part, also somewhat different from the existing Alchemical Puppet designs.

Of course, if possible, Zheng Yichen thought he could consider creating something like a T-series liquid robot version… He would try catching a few Slimes later… For now, he should maintain this research progress; giving up was too regrettable. The second design was something Zheng Yichen improved upon based on the data from Annie’s research on that little homunculus.

This was an experimental breakthrough. He attempted to simulate some characteristics of the homunculus using knowledge from Alchemy and the Life Domain. Even if he couldn’t simulate it completely, partial simulation would do. The part he mainly chose was sensation! In short, after obtaining those research materials, Zheng Yichen had reached a new conclusion. For an Avatar made based on an Alchemical Puppet, it was very difficult to achieve physical sensation unless it involved pure Life Domain research.

However, creating a biological body gave Zheng Yichen a strange feeling… It wasn’t some psychological aversion, but rather the thought of doing so, having his Laboratory littered with arms and legs everywhere, or having many bizarre containers filled with various Eyeballs, hearts, and the like soaking inside. Just imagining the scene was… something else. As for avoiding it?

Avoidance was impossible. Just taking the present situation as an example, many corners of Zheng Yichen’s Laboratory contained numerous limbs of Alchemical Puppets. The difference was that those were non-flesh-and-blood structures, looking like disassembled toy parts. Comparing a room filled with many toy parts to a room filled with many flesh-and-blood arms and legs… which had more impact? Being in such an environment every day, Zheng Yichen felt he would turn into a mad scientist.

Perhaps he was still too young.

Biological bodies made using knowledge from the Life Domain also differed significantly from Alchemical Puppets in terms of strength. The first difference was in sturdiness. Moreover, the biological living bodies created, though similar to cloning on Earth, were primarily products combining Magic power and Life Energy. Things like cell division and growth were all maintained by these two. If any part of such a body had a problem, it would cause the body to age rapidly.

Why did some ‘monsters’ created through Life Domain research like to eat people… or devour large amounts of creatures, raw, not cooked! The reason was to supplement their own Life Energy this way, to instinctively accumulate large amounts of Life Energy. For unnatural creations, Life Energy was generally constant. What was consumed was gone. Unlike normal people whose Life Energy could recover, even continuously increase up to a certain age. Don’t think ordinary people are much weaker than those created ‘creatures,’ but in terms of Life Energy, they have much more!

As for Life Force… well, that’s a comprehensive term. It doesn’t just depend on Life Energy, but also other aspects. Factors like recovery power, willpower, etc., could also be incorporated into Life Force. If recovery power was strong, Life Force naturally became strong. Otherwise, how could there be cases where someone saw a person whose heart was pierced actually stubbornly clinging to life for several more minutes, amazing people with their tenacious Life Force, while another ‘person’ died minutes ago? If both individuals had similar levels of Life Energy and recovery power, then Will Power came into play.

Will Power was also related to Spiritual Power. Strong Will Power could allow Spiritual Power to produce some miraculous effects. Even if it couldn’t affect the outside world, affecting the self was enough. In short, natural biological bodies were very miraculous products because each factor belonging to themselves could create connections and play different roles, like those little toys called magic rulers, with rich form changes, where each segment’s factor could influence the outcome of the form change.

So looking at those monsters or Stitched Abominations created through the Life Domain, although powerful, even having recovery power that could heal wounds in seconds, it didn’t mean they could live long. With sufficient Life Energy, those things generally wouldn’t supplement Life Energy, or if they had characteristics from the initial creation that broke such limitations, their survival cycle was usually within a few months or a few years.

If Zheng Yichen’s type of Alchemical Avatar lacked the Fixation Potion for stabilization and a continuous supply of certain alchemical potions that could supplement Life Energy, it would start to deform and rot within a few months. He still couldn’t create biological living bodies identical to ordinary people. Irene could, of course. After all, she was the Witch of Life. She could directly, with minimal loss, break the Life Energy carrying limit of creations and transfer more Life Energy from other living bodies onto the creation. In Life Domain research, there were methods for Life Energy transfer…

But this method had a high loss rate, and it couldn’t break the Life Energy carrying limit of the donor. As for using this trick to extend life or something? Impossible. Using this method could indeed allow one to live a very long time, but the Life Energy carrying limit would gradually decrease, just like normal human aging. However, in normal aging, the Life Energy limit wouldn’t decrease excessively. To avoid this situation, unless one became stronger themselves, expanding this limit.

Or, use some unique treasures to break this limit. Of course, with repeated use, the effect would also diminish. Such treasures… how many Life Domain researchers would use them on the ‘creations’ they made?

As for consuming his own Life Energy for research, Zheng Yichen, even as a dragon now, wouldn’t do such a thing. Irene, on the other hand, could do as she pleased, since she could use her own ability to easily replenish the Life Energy she consumed.

In short, from normal biological research, breaking through the limitation of tactile sensation, Zheng Yichen now reconsidered and realized he had been overthinking. Having come to his senses, he changed his original research direction. He should proceed from the perspective of Magic. He had been a bit stubborn before, always wanting perfection without realizing that the perfection he wanted in this world with special powers wasn’t the perfection he thought it was.

Once the new research direction was determined, the related research proceeded much more smoothly. A prototype could be made very soon.

“Neural sensation… Tch! I should have thought of this when making the eyeballs before.” Zheng Yichen looked at the information on the Blueprint and added a new design structure with his pen beside it. When making the ‘Magic Eye’ that Oss used, Zheng Yichen hadn’t thought too much about things like nerve connections back then. He relied more on life-type Magic, suppressing rejection reactions, allowing them to autonomously ‘grow’ together. Who knew how that process was perfected…

Could it be that with sufficient Life Energy, even imperfectly connected parts, while ensuring they wouldn’t necrotize and having ample nutrients that could break original limitations, could autonomously fill in the missing parts? After all, Magic could even reattach severed arms. With sufficient Life Energy and a relatively complete structure, as long as the proportion of missing parts wasn’t too high, they could be completed, right?

As for the timeliness issue of the pair of eyes he made before, since they had already become part of Oss’s body, their timeliness naturally matched his lifespan.