Chapter 908: Derivative

Translator: Atlas Studios  Editor: Atlas Studios

Splash!

A rush of water splashed onto his face, immediately dousing Snow awake.

He continued struggling while crying out loudly. However, he was gagged and could not say a word.

The professor and the students were tied to the thick trunk of a tree.

I’ve been kidnapped by a lizard?

After this thought surfaced in Snow’s head, he was so ashamed that he wanted to hide in a hole.

Suddenly, he spotted the giant lizard in front of him.

It seemed to be staring curiously at him, and its gaze carried a mocking look.

No! This can’t be right! This Derivative’s intelligence is completely beyond my expectations! It might even be a first-class Derivative… Damn it, this was supposed to be just an ordinary assignment…

“All right, Mr. Snow. Let me release your bindings. I hope you don’t misunderstand!” A man’s voice came from the lizard’s mouth.

Turning around, it waved its claw and snapped a few vines. He fell to the ground immediately.

” Cough cough! ” Snow spit out the cloth gagging his mouth. He was about to chant again. “S—”

Smack!

The next instant, he was thrown violently onto the ground. He was in so much pain that his mind turned blank, and he could not speak for a while.

“If you want to teach me spells, I’m more than happy to learn. However, let us communicate in a common language for now… You do realize that your spells use a different language system, right? From now on, every time I hear anything like it, I’ll whip you once. Understood?”

Fang Yuan lowered his claw, pressing down on Snow to threaten him aggressively.

“I… understand…”

Snow had finally confirmed that this giant lizard had intelligence equivalent to a human’s. In fact, it was extremely cunning.

“Where are you from?”

“Newtlud, of the Sorcerer Congress!”

“What’s your name?”

“Snow!”

“How old are you?”

“Twenty-one!”

…

After a few questions, Snow’s gaze began to relax and turned dazed.

“That’s it…” Fang Yuan sighed heavily. “If my magical powers had recovered fully, I wouldn’t have had to go through so much trouble just to hypnotize him…”

He seemed as though he had been drugged with truth serum and was basically ready to answer any questions he was asked.

“Where did you get your abilities from?” Fang Yuan’s voice was dreamy as he asked the most important question.

Snow revealed a struggling expression but still answered the question. “The Philosopher’s Book!”

“What kind of book is that?”

“It’s a first-class Derivative. At first, it was nothing more than a regular notebook. But as long as you write a spell in it, it’ll become real…”

With that description, Fang Yuan understood the special feature of the Philosopher’s Book.

As long as he wrote the power of a spell in the book together with its incantation, it would become real.

After that, if someone in this world recited the incantation, that spell would come to life!

Furthermore, without paying any price, any caster who practiced enough would be able to become a sorcerer!

It was precisely because of this that the Philosopher’s Book was so well-protected. Furthermore, the incantations were written in a near-indecipherable language. All because they were afraid that it would turn into a horrifying disaster.

“The Philosopher’s Book… has it reached this point already?” Fang Yuan really could not believe it. “Is there something wrong with this world? Why does it sound so similar to the Magic Encyclopedia? Hey, is there a fat blue robot that has a four-dimensional pocket here?”

“No… At least, I haven’t heard of a Derivative like that before!” Snow answered honestly.

“What is this ‘Derivative’ you’ve been talking about? Explain it properly!”

“Yes!”

…

After a series of questions, Fang Yuan finally gained a deeper understanding of this world.

This was a world that was very similar to Earth. The advancement of its technology was also similar. Until one day, ‘it’ appeared.

No one knew what ‘it’ was. Perhaps it was a ray of light or a natural phenomenon. Perhaps it was a god that was playing a joke on humanity.

In other words, from a certain timeframe afterward, there were some strange things on this planet. They were so peculiar that it could cause scientists to collectively puke blood.

The existence of these peculiarities violated the fundamental rules of this world.

For instance, no matter how strong a person was, they would never be able to pull their hair and lift themselves off the ground.

However, once this phenomenon influenced them, they would be able to do it!

All these unimaginable characteristics were formed after a certain ‘contact’. Some of these characteristics could even topple the ecology of the planet.

After going through multiple life-changing crises, some people paid the price of a horrifying experience. Finally, they managed to get a grasp of the rules of this first-class Derivative. With that, they set a contract to jointly control the existence of Derivatives. Furthermore, they took action to seal this secret off from regular citizens.

“So-called first-class Derivatives are things that came to life after coming into contact with ‘it’. There are multiple classes of Derivatives as well. Secondary Derivatives were infected by first-class Derivatives. Come to think of it, Snow could be considered an ‘infected’ party of the Philosopher’s Book, so he’s a secondary Derivative. Some secret organizations also borrow the power of Derivatives to fight against new Derivatives. Furthermore, the most dangerous ones are those with strong attributes. They aren’t particularly stable yet either, and they can infect an unlimited number of Derivatives. It seems like each one that appears is considered a world-level threat!”

After he found out about all this, Fang Yuan’s interest in Derivatives magnified infinitely.

“What is ‘it’? How can the rules be distorted so arbitrarily? Is ‘it’ stronger than the entire world?”

Fang Yuan’s eyes lit up.

That phenomenon, as well as the ‘it’ that all organizations were chasing after, was probably a Great Dao!

Only the power of this type of Dao path could distort the rules of a world. Furthermore, since it was created in this world, its power would not be restricted at all.

“In churches, it is the ‘reason’ for everything, the agent for change! Within the scientific world, ‘it’ is nothing more than a phenomenon that can be researched and restricted. However, it’s a great pity that despite all these organizations’ efforts, they had only seen ‘it’ once. The ‘it’ of that time was a brilliant streak of light! Furthermore, the witness went crazy soon after he saw ‘it’…”

…

“All right, one last question!” Fang Yuan stared at Snow, who was in a dream-like state. “Write down all the incantations that you know!”

“No! I can’t!”

Snow’s eyes turned red. He was about to shed tears of blood.

“Hmm? Protection spell!”

In an instant, Fang Yuan’s spiritual will dived into this unfortunate man’s sea of consciousness.

Clearly, there was a spiritual will there. It rampaged about as it destroyed all his memories on incantations.

“Damn it… I didn’t want to do this initially!”

Fang Yuan’s spiritual will turned into a giant python and absorbed everything quickly.

While Snow was destroying the knowledge within his sea of consciousness, Fang Yuan continued to rapidly absorb broken fragments of his memories.

“Memory Erasure, Body Enhancement, Confusion, Meteor, and Fireball spells. Sadly, this one is destroyed. There’s also… the Devotion spell?”

He retracted his spiritual will. As he regained his senses, he saw Snow stare blankly ahead like a lifeless puppet.

With his current abilities, there was no way he could alter another person’s memories without side-effects. That was why he took control of his mind by hypnotizing him first.

However, the Devotion spell had obviously been cast on Snow. It took effect whenever he was chanting an incantation.

In order to protect his precious gains, Fang Yuan could only do this the hard way.

Both sides fought hard. Finally, Fang Yuan obtained a portion of the spell’s power, whereas Snow turned into a complete idiot.

“However, the power of spells has its limits as well. Or rather, the rules are limited… Otherwise, it would be completely possible to write a spell that could kill someone immediately…

“Hold on, even though the power of Derivatives is amazing, energy endurance and management must be something that I’ve neglected. Therefore, I paid the price for it. It’s this precise reason that certain spiritual techniques can’t be created.”

Fang Yuan pushed these thoughts aside. Since he did not have a lot of information, he could only continue guessing.

“Thankfully, I managed to salvage some important spiritual techniques. The Memory Erasure spell, huh?”

He stared at Professor Xifan and his students, and then at Snow, who was drooling on the ground. His eyes flashed mysteriously.

…

After a month, a boat traveled on the sea, heading back in the direction it had come from.

“Thank you, Mr. Snow. I will definitely increase your pay!” Professor Xifan grabbed on to Snow’s hands tightly. “If it weren’t for you, we would have died on that island…”

“No problem. It’s my job!”

Snow gave a gentlemanly smile. Several female students blushed while looking at him dreamily, feeling that his charisma seemed a little different from before.

In reality, he had changed.

“We’ll get to Newtlud in a few days!”

After he responded courteously with a few words, Fang Yuan returned to his room. He opened his stats window.

“Name: Snow (Fang Yuan)

Power: 1.2

Speed: 1.5

Physique: 0.8

Psyche: 2.0

State: Healthy

Specialization: Grappling, Driving, Weapon Proficiency”

…

“As a Magical Clone, stats like these are far too weak!”

He moved his body in dissatisfaction. “Fortunately, the stats window has been unlocked. After removing the restrictions of this world, I can increase my level quickly! As long as I give some time to my main body on the island, I’ll definitely be able to recover a large portion of my power as a Demon God!”

The original Snow had already turned into an idiot. Obviously, Fang Yuan had made sure to recycle trash properly and made a Magical Clone to replicate him. Then he went on the return journey together with Professor Xifan and the heavily injured Xinge.

As for his excuse?

A Memory Erasure spell was enough to resolve most of his problems.

For the explanations that came after, Fang Yuan had used Snow’s original idea. He told them that they had inhaled a large amount of poisonous hallucinatory pollen.

As for himself, he managed to find and save them after a long search.

With the influence from the spell, all of them had lost all memories of what had happened, so they easily accepted Fang Yuan’s explanation and felt extremely grateful toward him.

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