Chapter 41

  As the lumen from his palms hammered into forging the card’s frame, Shouren watched with fascination. He was seeing in real time how the weak points were being created.

  It’s the four main gates in the card’s frame.

  Shouren kept his palms steady as the forging process continued. He observed the lumen tendrils twist into the shape of a card. The four weak points were actually the zones where the lumen had twisted the most, making that line more brittle than other sections of the frame.

  They are like the glue that holds the other lumen tendrils together.

  Shouren’s face brightened at the new revelation. Instead of seeing how to break the weak points, he was now witnessing how they were born in the first place. It gave him an entirely new perspective on the star nodes.

  He felt more lumen from his chest rush into his palms as the two waves of energy collided with each other. Shouren was now forging the card veins. The reflection of the glowing incomplete card flickered across his hazel eyes.

  The larger star nodes are the spots where the lumen tendrils are only connected to two other connections, and they get smaller and smaller the more connections they have.

  Shouren believed he solved the correlation between the size of the star nodes and the ease with which he could destroy them. The large weak points, such as the four main gates within the card frame, connected mainly only to their two neighboring points. Hence, making it easier to break off that connection.

  However, Shouren inspected and found that the smaller star nodes connected not only to their neighboring weak points but also to other sections on the complete other end of the card. It was almost like a secondary network of lumen connections flowing underneath the main channels.

  He had to carefully navigate the structure to break one of those smaller star nodes, avoiding any connections that would affect the main signature of the card. If he carelessly destroyed the star node, then the whole card would detonate in an explosion.

  This was the reason Shouren had to previously make his lumen thread thinner to shatter a smaller star node. If it was too wide, the other connections would block it. The lumen had to be thin enough to only target the specific weak point.

  This feels like another world exists inside the card.

  Shouren breathed in awe as his Veinreader trait unveiled an alternate reality before him. The forging was almost complete. There was a lot more going on within the veins but Shouren’s mind couldn’t keep up with every instance. When he focused on one spot, a hundred other things were happening on the other side of the card.

  A faint vibration passed through his palms. The forging was complete and a fresh Spectral Threads spell card lay floating in front of him. Shouren wiped away the traces of sweat on his face and grabbed the newborn card.

  His fingers softly grazed over the card’s surface.

  Could I manually forge the card, fixing those weak points?

  Shouren contemplated, deep in thought. He couldn’t entirely eliminate the weak points as they were gateways for the lumen and had to be tied to other sections. However, Shouren could theoretically modify the points, reducing the current brittleness and easing the tension around the nodes. This would make it harder to break them in the future.

  That could actually work, but I can’t attempt it right now. Forging the card requires two threads of lumen, and if I want to change anything, I need more threads to keep the incomplete card stable.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

  Shouren put the card inside his vault and stared up at the night. The constellations were reminiscent of the scene he just saw in the cards. He couldn’t yet take the risk of manually forging the card. He’d learned from his last failure with Sharding. Incomplete cards had to be stabilized externally before he started messing around with its internal structure.

  I get why splitting my lumen into two threads was so easy. I already gained that knowledge instinctively from the card recipe. It needs two lines of lumen to create the anvil.

  Shouren realized why his grandmother couldn’t comprehend the concept of lumen threads. Unlike Rhea, he already had a foundational knowledge about how to do it. Back during the sharding, he only needed to keep the card frame stable while he experimented with the card veins. He was operating on an already finished card, and two lumen threads were sufficient for that.

  However, during forging, it was an incomplete card. Shouren had to stabilize both the frame and the unfinished veins. Then he needed another two lumen threads to maintain the anvil, and then the final two additional lumen threads to hammer out the weak points. Considering all of that, Shouren needed to control at least 6 lumen threads to start manually forging the card.

  Attempting to do so before achieving that would be tantamount to suicide. And Shouren still had a waiting order for a lemon pie in a week. He couldn’t die now.

  Shouren smiled sardonically and glanced at his status. He needed a few more hours before he could forge another Spectral Threads card. He still had to gather 9 more of the spell cards for Isola, so he would simply observe more during the forging and take mental notes for the future.

  Still don’t want to come out?

  Shouren tried once again to goad the demonic chains to come out. He knew the crimson chains could hear him, but the demon only came out when there were traits or class cards to be devoured.

  Alright, you greedy pig. I’ll ignore you the next time you ask me for cards as well.

  Shouren muttered with annoyance as he raised his hands over his head and whistled softly. The night was too beautiful to think about the irritating chains.

  “Stew is ready, potato!”

  Rhea’s call reverberated outside through the broken wooden door.

  “Finally! I’m coming, grandma.”

  Shouren jumped towards the door and bolted inside.

  Stew was more important than the demonic chains.

  [=3aqt/>gw]

  Someone strongly disagreed.

  — The next morning —

  “I’m back again.”

  Shouren could see the now familiar dungeon portal as he walked towards the town’s center. This was going to be his third dungeon run, but only his second solo run. From his experience with Rubin, Shouren knew solo runs provided better loot and higher end rewards from the dungeon.

  Besides his first [Rare] card from the bear, Shouren had yet to see another blue card dropped from the dungeon. Just his lone Dimensional Vault [Rare] card had been enough to overcome countless hurdles. What if he had another [Rare] card in his arsenal?

  However, today’s plan was not to beat his original record, but to kill three monsters as quickly as possible and use the rest of the day to forge cards. Shouren was on a race to accumulate another 60 [Common] class cards to upgrade his class card.

  He quickly peeked inside his vault. He only had 9 [Common] spell cards in total, with two of them being Spectral Threads. Shouren had managed to forge another card before sleeping.

  None of his other [Common] spell cards were useful in a fight, leaving only the two Spectral Threads spell cards Shouren could use today. He had [Uncommon] spell cards that would be useful in a fight, but that was only for a last resort.

  Should I steal a weapon?

  Shouren thought not for the first time. He tilted his head to watch the rows of shops to the side of the market. One small tap, and the weapon would be quietly transported to his vault.

  That’s a dumb idea. Merchants are the most cunning of the lot, and all of them would have safety measure to prevent storage cards from being used. Worst case, they have an alarm that would identify its use and then I’ll be rotting away in prison.

  Shouren shook his head briskly as a shiver shot up his spine. No stealing… for now.

  Alright, sticking to the original plan then. Find a large enough boulder the moment I enter the dungeon. If I can’t find one before I come across a monster, corrupt the [Uncommon] Sonar Pulse spell card to kill it, and then use the remaining spell time to cut through a tree’s trunk as boulder’s temporary replacement.

  Shouren could see multiple parties entering and exiting the dungeon’s entrance. The ones returning either looked ecstatic with their run, or came out despondent with losses, or sometimes, even dead party members. It was a small town, and the people here took little risk. Dungeon deaths were pretty abnormal in the village, since most didn’t go past the first floor.

  Oh, there’s the nun who scammed me! Better not get in her sight.

  Shouren soon spotted a figure of the young woman in white cleric robes. She was the same person who healed his burns from the lightning beast. She hadn’t really scammed Shouren, but the boy felt that anyone who took his money was secretly a scammer in disguise.

  “Hey, kid!”

  A girl’s voice cried out from the side.

  Shouren ignored the voice and touched the dungeon’s portal.

  Shouren swiftly tapped ‘yes’ and his body vanished into the dungeon. In the background, a disgruntled voice cursed at the boy.

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