The Art of Unraveling
The Archmage Tvalier had no distinct master.
Back when he first learned magic, the art was shrouded in secrecy and strictly gatekept.
Mages monopolized knowledge within their own private sanctuaries, taking extreme care to ensure their secrets never leaked.
They believed that magical knowledge was sacred, a privilege meant only for a chosen few.
Consequently, most mages possessed an innate sense of superiority and elitism.
Tvalier was the man who shattered that arrogance to its very foundations.
In truth, he had never needed anyone to teach him.
Whether it was elemental magic, rune magic, divine magic, spirit magic, or dark magic—he could grasp the underlying principles of entirely different schools of magic simply by taking the time to "observe" them.
He would pierce through their core principles in an instant.
He was an anomaly of the world.
To the established mages, he was an outlaw and a thief who stripped away their sense of exclusivity.
Naturally, Tvalier faced severe opposition and hostility from the magic establishment.
Yet, the primary reason they despised him was not actually his extraordinary talent.
The greatest source of conflict was that Tvalier shared his abilities with others without hesitation.
As long as someone possessed talent, Tvalier would teach them magic regardless of their social status or personal connections.
He even went so far as to compile the entire discipline of magic into books and distribute them to the public, establishing humanity's very first Magic Tower on the estate granted to him after he defeated the Demon King.
His reason for refusing to monopolize magical knowledge, unlike his peers, was simple.
"Knowledge must be shared with the masses for new knowledge to be born from it."
He believed that making magic universally accessible to the absolute majority would spark far greater advancements in the field.
And that belief quickly bore fruit.
As the collective intellect of countless people gathered, it provided him with numerous breakthroughs. Thanks to this, Tvalier, who had been stagnant at the 7th Circle for ages, attained profound enlightenment and rapidly broke through his limits.
Ultimately, Tvalier became the first 8th Circle Master in the history of the continent.
Even after retiring from the Magic Tower, he continued his obsessive pursuit of magic, eventually achieving the legendary 9th Circle.
He never married, having spent his entire life consumed by his obsession with magic.
When it came to the study of magic, he was a madman through and through.
To him, vast fortunes, noble status, and even the warmth of romantic love held absolutely no value.
A single line of a newly discovered, peculiar spell, or a unique arrangement of mana in a magic circle was worth more to him than any priceless gem.
In fact, when he publicly released the spells he had mastered, understood, and recreated, the elders of the traditional magic community could no longer afford to remain isolated.
They were forced to swallow their pride, get off their high horses, and submit to Tvalier.
To mages, new knowledge was synonymous with absolute power.
Thus, Tvalier completely revolutionized the world's concept of magic, revered as a transcendent being who had shattered the limits of all previous mages.
Yet, even before he became a fully realized mage, what the great Tvalier excelled at most was observing and understanding the magic of others.
He would dissect it down to the smallest character, every single stroke of a formula, and every individual thread of mana, completely neutralizing it.
This eventually became an entirely new genre of magic that Tvalier pioneered:
Magic Deciphering.
An original school of magic formally known as Dispel.
In this domain of Anti-Magic, Tvalier was a transcendent being who had already reached unfathomable heights.
Gong Jeol-gang, the Great Sorcerer of Cheonsa Prison.
He was a 7th-grade Suseonza of the Qi Condensation stage, a pride of Cheonsa Prison, and one of the next-generation successors destined to lead them.
A 7th-grade cultivator was an absolute realm. In terms of martial arts, it surpassed the Peak Realm and was comparable to the Transcendent Realm.
Gong Jeol-gang's reputation was well-known even among other public enemies of the Murim, such as the Blood Sect, the Mansi Sect, and the Demonic Cult. He was a renowned master in the fields of sorcery and formations.
Cheonsa Prison, the sect to which Gong Jeol-gang belonged, was a group of sorcerers specializing in alchemy and formations for generations.
And the pride they boasted to the world was the Great Array of the Myriad Hells.
Among all the formations existing in the Lower Realm, this was easily counted among the top five.
It was a formation that manifested a portion of actual "Hell" into reality.
Once trapped inside, one could not escape even in death.
The victim would suffer endlessly in the infinite hell unfolded within the array before their soul was ultimately dragged down into the abyss.
'But even this formation has one fatal weakness.'
It required an immense amount of resources to activate.
In fact, Gong Jeol-gang had just sacrificed roughly half of the cultivation he had accumulated over his entire lifetime as the price to trigger the array.
It meant a permanent loss.
Though the cost of this endeavor had already far exceeded any potential rewards, he had no choice.
'Damn it, I had no other option.'
That unpredictable monster of a brat had been about to steal a treasure belonging to Cheonsa Prison.
The giant black ape puppet Gong Jeol-gang had thrown onto the deck was a secret puppet, the only one of its kind in Cheonsa Prison.
To obtain it, Gong Jeol-gang had to spend all the contribution points he had amassed in his sect over his entire life.
And even then, it was only a temporary "loan."
'I cannot lose the Great Black Ape.'
If things had gone according to his original plan, he would have already claimed the Three-Tailed Fox's inner core and used the Great Black Ape to wipe out the insolent Murim martial artists challenging him.
'It was supposed to be my ultimate secret weapon...'
Absurdly, a completely unexpected brat was playing with the Great Black Ape as if it were a mere doll.
He was lifting its limbs one by one, his eyes sparkling with curiosity as he tried to understand its mechanics.
From Gong Jeol-gang's perspective, it was an infuriating sight.
The Great Black Ape was a special puppet that Cheonsa Prison had spent fifty years and vast resources to construct.
The Great Black Ape possessed a faint, yet distinct, ego.
A puppet capable of independent thought.
However, even the high-ranking elders of Cheonsa Prison who created it had yet to figure out the exact principle behind how it developed a consciousness.
Because they didn't understand how it happened, they could never recreate it.
Naturally, it became one of the top three priceless treasures of Cheonsa Prison.
'I can never let him have it!'
This was the very reason Gong Jeol-gang had willingly sacrificed half his life's cultivation to activate the formation.
If he lost the Great Black Ape, he would be dragged back to Cheonsa Prison, where his very soul would be extracted to serve as ingredients for elixir refinement.
"Damned brat!"
Come to think of it, he didn't even know the kid's name.
Well, not that it mattered anymore.
Once the black-robed brat was trapped inside the Great Array of the Myriad Hells along with the Great Black Ape, Gong Jeol-gang wiped away his cold sweat, tracing the wrinkles that had rapidly multiplied on his face in a short span of time.
"Ah... It seems I didn't just sacrifice half my cultivation. Half my lifespan was ripped away with it..."
Looking back, he was filled with immense regret.
He wondered if he had let greed blind him in trying to claim the precious treasure all for himself.
If only he had shared the information with the leadership of Cheonsa Prison and come out together from the start...
'I wouldn't have suffered such a devastating loss...'
Damn it, damn it.
Sighing deeply over his past regrets, Gong Jeol-gang finally managed to tear his eyes away from the deck and turned his head.
'What is happening with the Three-Tailed Fox?'
With exhaustion written all over his face, Gong Jeol-gang turned his gaze toward the flagship of the Jinseong Express Agency.
Blood and screams filled the air, and it looked as though the vessel would be seized at any moment.
"That place will be finished soon."
In Gong Jeol-gang's estimation, the only silver lining right now was the fact that the experts of the Jinseong Express Agency were being utterly overwhelmed.
"I suppose it's a relief that I can at least secure the Three-Tailed Fox..."
Gong Jeol-gang planned to wait until the brat died inside the formation, safely retrieve the puppet, and then sweep away the ignorant Murim fools currently wreaking havoc on the ship.
'Yes, it hasn't deviated too much from the original plan. Hmm? A few of those fellows over there would make excellent ingredients for elixirs.'
A Peak Realm expert running wild over there would make a superb ingredient.
The physical bodies of Murim martial artists, tempered to their absolute limits, could be refined into Regeneration Pills—essential elixirs for growing a cultivator's physical vessel.
And the souls of Peak Realm experts, forged through overcoming the barriers of enlightenment, could be carefully extracted to create Longevity Pills, which boosted one's cultivation.
"Ah... a Peak Realm expert is truly a living treasure. Not a single part of them goes to waste."
Gong Jeol-gang smacked his lips, a look of regret crossing his face.
Because those fools had mastered the crude art of martial arts, their resistance was fierce, making it impossible to capture them fully intact.
Still...
"I spent all my contribution points to borrow the Great Black Ape. I'd like to make up for some of that loss here."
Was there a way?
He needed to at least recoup his labor costs.
As Gong Jeol-gang scanned the Jinseong Express Agency's flagship with sinister eyes, something happened.
Suddenly, across the translucent barrier of the Great Array of the Myriad Hells that shimmered like a haze over the deck, fine cracks began to spread rapidly like a spiderweb.
It had barely been half an hour.
"Huh? Wh-what?"
What kind of sorcery was this?
It was an utterly incomprehensible phenomenon.
Gong Jeol-gang's mind ground to a halt.
Incoherent sounds spilled from his lips.
And then...
Crack!
A massive fissure tore through a corner of the cracking barrier.
Finally, like a mirror shattering into a thousand pieces, the hazy barrier burst apart.
Clang—!
Revealed within the broken barrier was the brat, standing with both hands raised toward the sky with a solemn expression, looking as though he had just received a holy baptism.