Sorcerer’s Handbook

Though it was somewhat unbelievable, it was true that Deya had the greatest need for power. Her “Water-born Thread” miracle, being an extension of the Fist-Claw Sect, fundamentally required a strong power base. On the other hand, Ashe and Sonya’s swordsmanship focused more on technique and speed, so Deya took the “ogre gloves.”

As for the “spirit’s coffin,” it could have gone to anyone, but given Ashe’s visible favoritism toward the sword Princess, he decided to give this collection to Vesser.

After consuming two bottles of lightless sanctuary potion, both Ashe and Vesser could use their spellforce to form a sanctuary. However, unlike spells or miracles, a lightless sanctuary seemed like a black box to Ashe, who didn’t understand how it worked and only knew that by inputting spellforce, the sanctuary would rise.

Unless they later joined the Spatial Sect, their sanctuaries would remain at this Beginner stage.

Now that everyone was ready, they officially began to explore the virtual realm!

“…Though that’s what we’re saying,” Ashe scanned the surrounding streets, “how do we explore the Distant Sky Domain?”

“Discover the world’s traits and summarize the corresponding affixes!”

Sonya, who had researched numerous materials, immediately replied, “Every dream phantom has different affixes. If sorcerers want to gain knowledge, spirits, spellforce, or other resources, they need to find these affixes!”

Unlike the Sea of Knowledge or Time Continent, which examined the sorcerer’s ‘path,’ the Distant Sky Domain presented a new evaluative standard: study the world.

“If all affixes within a dream phantom are identified, it becomes stagnant and there’s no risk of it abruptly collapsing; it will only disappear once all sorcerers have left.”

“How do you discover the world’s traits?” Ashe asked, gazing at the nearby town structures, “Is it just slow study?”

“There are generally two methods,” Sonya explained, “The first is using a Reconnaissance Miracle to quickly discern the differences between a dream phantom and the real world. However, this method has low efficiency, as many affixes do not affect the external environment but rather the sorcerer or even the spirit. The second method…”

“Is cause destruction.” Deya pulled out the Water-born Thread, “In a dream phantom, apart from the locals, there are virtual realm creatures and sorcerer projections. If we destroy and pressure them into manifesting, we can extract affix information.”

“Huh?”

Ashe hesitated, glancing at the busy clerk in the nearby bakery, “Isn’t that inappropriate?”

“What’s wrong with it?”

Vesser suddenly reached out and pushed a young man passing by. The young man fell but did not look at them, instead promptly standing up and continuing on his way.

“This is just a dream, and everyone here is meaningless-a projection. Perhaps in the next moment, this dream will shatter, and everything will vanish,” Vesser said, “In dreams, fate is false, and Truth is permitted. The Distant Sky Domain challenges us not only to understand the boundless void but also to perceive the essence of dream phantoms. Sorcerers who cannot grasp this point cannot progress further.”

So, everyone’s just NPCs… Ashe exhaled, tightened his grip on the long sword, and said, “I understand. Is there anything else I should be aware of?”

“By the way,” Deya suddenly said, “the first dream phantom we sorcerers encounter is usually a peaceful scenario, meaning the locals won’t show hostility toward us. However, in many dangerous scenarios, if we stand out too much, we might alert the virtual realm creatures, triggering combat.”

“Even in a peaceful scenario, if we stay here too long, we might still attract virtual realm creatures’ attacks-“

Boom!

A Lava-Scaled Slashing Dragon burst out of the second floor of a building behind them, barreling towards them!

At the same time, a cloaked man passing by suddenly extended his hand toward them, instantly siphoning the air around them to create a vacuum trap, imprisoning them within, as a transparent barrier rose around the cloaked man!

A Lava-Scaled Slashing Dragon! The matured mutant of the Blade Fish Dragon, whose every scale can trigger a small explosion, and if struck by its tail, it delivers a dual critical hit of explosion and slicing!

A sanctuary-level wind spell! Though the vacuum trap created by extracting air could only restrict them momentarily, in that mere few breaths, the wind spell sanctuary could set up a shredding windfield to cut them to pieces… No, Ashe and the others were shocked to find that, despite drawing only the surrounding air, the backfill wind worked like blades, slicing into their soul entities!

If they hadn’t been able to activate their sanctuaries, this alone would have been fatal!

In the blink of an eye, the sorcerer team found themselves in a dire situation!

Even though Ashe anticipated encountering sanctuary-level enemies in the Distant Sky Domain, he hadn’t expected them to be so ferocious!

But that’s to be expected. While two-wing sorcerers might not specialize in combat, as there are ways to sidestep challenges on the Time Continent, allowing them to just absorb spellforce without confronting social creatures.

Yet, given the mechanisms of the Distant Sky Domain, it’s clear that there are no shortcuts here. For sanctuary sorcerers to gather resources from the Distant Sky Domain, they must fight through dream phantoms!

After undergoing such intense battles, all sanctuary sorcerers become tactical weapons!

Therefore, the sorcerer projections left in the Distant Sky Domain are naturally also sanctuary-level ravagers!

While Ashe seemed unprepared, the others had anticipated this.

Vesser’s notebook suddenly flipped open by itself; she had long given herself a mental suggestion to immediately trigger the Defensive Miracle within when faced with unforeseen curse attacks.

The Truth miracle with the core spirit of illusion-“Nothing Happens!”

The moment it activated, she was no longer affected by the vacuum trap’s pull. After a brief hesitation, she also cast this miracle on Ashe and the others.

This is the strength of “Nothing Happens”: it creates the illusion that nothing has affected you at all! It can neutralize the majority of external influences and even deceive death, allowing normal movement when sustaining fatal injuries!

Just a few days ago, in the Food Factory Town, she stepped into a mental sorcerer’s trap, providing Raven Annihilation an opportunity to pierce her heart. Without the death protection from “Nothing Happens,” she would have perished there!

With the help of “nothing happens,” Sonya quickly regained her footing and proactively moved to confront the descending Lava-Scaled Slashing Dragon. Streams of Water-born Thread appeared around her.

Miracle: Meteor Trial!

When the Lava-Scaled Slashing Dragon touched the thread, the trans-spatial strike’s invisible blade sliced it in half!

Simultaneously, Deya pulled on the wind spell sanctuary, and the Water-born Thread instantly bound it.

Within this team, Deya’s spirit system was the most complete-she was the Empress of the Gospel Kingdom, with the kingdom’s resources at her disposal!

Over the past few days, Deya had meticulously crafted her set of spirits, still relying primarily on the Water-born Thread for attack, but now she had three additional core spirits: “witness,” “soul restrain,” and “void slash.”

The “witness” spirit allowed her to launch any of her miracles along her line of sight, so she no longer needed to cast the Water-born Thread physically; as long as the enemy was within her sight, the Water-born Thread would emerge from their eye sockets, mouth, earlobes, heart, and other places!

The “soul restrain” spirit had a powerful suppression effect on soul entities, manifesting as dizziness, blindness, sluggishness, inability to think, etc. In reality, this spirit might not be very useful, given that sorcerers have the protection of their physical bodies, but in the Virtual Realm, it was an unrivaled killing tool!

The “void slash” spirit gave Deya the means to breach sanctuaries, and combined with “witness” and “soul restrain,” she could instantly subdue a sanctuary sorcerer projection!

Though not spirits from the mystic sect, “witness,” “soul restrain,” and “void slash” were exceedingly rare even in Yisuo’s treasury, leading to a qualitative leap in Deya’s combat capability-her attack range was greater than a gun sorcerer’s, and her destructive power surpassed that of a swordsmanship sorcerer!

With the additional speed from the time spirit, she could instantly tear apart any enemy!

Boom!

Slash!

Ashe just came to his senses, only to see the Lava-Scaled Slashing Dragon already split in two, and the wind spell sanctuary fared worse; even the spicy Lala Fatty dish Ashe had earlier was more intact than it.

A moment later, the Lava-Scaled Slashing Dragon dissipated into light smoke, leaving behind an Experience Orb and a two-wings spirit. Surprisingly, the wind spell sanctuary only dropped a Sorcerer’s Handbook-it seems the drop rate here is quite low.

However, Ashe and the others didn’t immediately collect their spoils but instead focused on the words formed by the dissipating smoke:

“All things are unstoppable.”

“Even a feather can cut through steel.”

“This is a hint left behind by virtual realm creatures,” Sonya explained. “We need to analyze these hints to determine the true affix of this dream phantom. If the hints aren’t enough, we’ll have to find other virtual realm creatures within this dream-“

“It’s spatial,” Vesser suddenly interjected. “Earlier, that vacuum trap should have only restricted our movements, but the airflow could still hurt us. I was wondering if it was some kind of Miracle… Now it seems it’s the influence of an affix.”

“All impacts in this world result in spatial slicing effects.”

Whoosh.

As if time were rewinding, all the damage from the previous battle was restored. The bystanders torn apart by the aftershocks were also resurrected, and everyone resumed their activities as if nothing had happened.

Only a stream of information flowed into the minds of the sorcerers.

“Trajectory of the Void: Glass cannons are a thing of the past; now it’s glass space annihilation cannons, with all attacks capable of piercing space.”

“Affix identification reward: small amount of spatial sect experience, small amount of spellforce.”

“Limited affix privilege: your next attack will definitely trigger the Trajectory of the Void.”

Ashe and the team looked at the small rainbow virtual wings forming on their backs, finally understanding the way to explore the Distant Sky Domain-kill!

Kill through all dream phantoms, kill through all world affixes!

In the first and second layers of the Virtual Realm, spellforce could be accumulated just by traveling, but in the third layer, if you do not identify the world affixes, you can’t even muster spellforce! If previously there was a basic wage and you could “touch fish” as a worker, now you’re a free creator, living and thriving by your own means!

Even if you’re a secluded sanctuary sorcerer, once you’ve fully formed the rainbow wings, you’ll have become a tactical weapon seasoned by countless affixes and battles.

Ashe sighed, “I still prefer the leisurely exploration style of the Time Continent.”

“Yeah, me too!” Deya nodded repeatedly. “Every dream phantom is different, and it feels like exploring the Distant Sky Domain is going to be really exhausting.”

“The path of the sorcerer is getting harder and harder,” Sonya couldn’t help but remark.

Vesser looked at this bunch complaining and thought to herself that if any other sanctuaries had faced the attack they just did, they might have been in for a long battle. The fact that these guys won so easily and are still complaining made her ask, “Was your combat on the Time Continent even easier than what just happened?”

Ashe replied, “On the Time Continent, we had a car; we could run over sorcerer projections.”

Sonya added, “We ran over quite a few virtual realm creatures too.”

Deya said, “There were even times we ran over a heroic soul commander.”

Vesser asked incredulously, “Are you talking about a car or some kind of war machine?”

“It’s pretty much a war machine at this point,” Ashe said. “If I kept upgrading that sports car…”

“Plowing through a heroic soul legion frontally wouldn’t be too difficult.”

Virtual Realm, Time Continent.

With the screech of tires from a sudden brake, the sports car made a donut turn and stopped. The front end of the car was equipped with a bloodied, menacing blade, while the back emitted a thick Toxic Mist. Surrounding the sports car was a battlefield littered with corpses.

With the final charge, a staggering purple figure was sent flying again. The Bewitcher inside the sports car stood up and peeked out to investigate. “Looks like it’s dead.”

“Really dead?” a Blood Saint questioned. “That was a heroic soul commander! The number one calamity on the Time Continent! My teacher repeatedly warned me never to approach such despair!”

“But even its shoes fell off, and the spirit dropped as well,” a Purple Moth said. “We…”

“Really did rely on just this car to crush an entire heroic soul legion.”