End of the Magic Era

But very soon, several mage organizations realized their disadvantage. If they didn't purchase the Blue Demon Potion on a large scale, their opponents would be stronger than them. If their opponents who should've been as strong as them had twice as much mana as they did, how could they possibly win?

When they explored relics, they might have to quit halfway due to the lack of mana, but their competitors could continue after taking the Blue Demon Potion, and find all the treasures.

When they conquered a plane together, and agreed that the territory that each party occupied would belong to that party, their competitors suddenly accelerated the conquest, as if they had taken exhilirants. In only a month, their competitor's territory might be 25% bigger than theirs. For a plane, a 25% difference meant the area of a grand noble's territory, or even part of a kingdom.

Gradually, the Blue Demon Potion's advantages were fully revealed. It became a potion that no mages could possibly give up on. It was no longer a lifesaver to be used at critical moments, but a necessary expendable they had to use every day.

Considering the new needs, the sales of the Blue Demon Potion wouldn't drop. Also, the Blue Demon Potion would remain a necessity for a long time. Even if better mana replenishment potions were invented, the Blue Demon Potion would still be a necessity, although its price wouldn't be so crazy.

The method to make the Blue Demon Potion had been figured out in only one month. A top Artisan who was good with potions was even able to infer the whole procedure to make the Blue Demon Potion. Unfortunately, it was useless.

In only three months, there had been a dozen alchemy stores that were selling potions that had the same effect. There were five families that started to make similar potions too.

But their sales weren't great, and their profits weren't nearly as great as what the Blue Demon Potion brought. The best of the counterfeits could only regenerate 5% of what the Blue Demon Potion could, and it would take eight seconds for the potion to release half of its mana. It could only be used by High Mages at best. Its performance wasn't satisfactory.

Most of the counterfeits were only suitable for Mages or Great Mages. The worst of them could only be used by Magic Apprentices as a replenishment potion.

The producer of the best potion thought, since it was 5% as effective as the Blue Demon Potion, it could be sold for 5% of the Blue Demon Potion's price, which was 9,000 purple gold apiece. But its sales were only great on the first day. On the second day, all sorts of negative responses came up.

The potion's price was lowered to 1,000 purple gold, but very few mages were willing to use it as well. The sales didn't rise until the price was lowered to 600 purple gold apiece, but at such a price, the potion's profit rate wasn't even as good as that from normal potions, and it would be a waste of time to make and sell such potions.

In such a situation, the Gilded Rose quietly released a second new potion, the Luminosity Potion!

The Luminosity Potion could reduce a mage's time cost for mana accumulation. It could significantly expand a mage's storage of mana, and accelerate their meditation for a while.

More importantly, there were no restraints concerning the Luminosity Potion's effects at all. It had no side effects at all, even if it was used for a long time. It wouldn't be less effective, either.

After the drug was taken, it would essentially be an enhancing buff. When the buff was gone, one could always take another bottle of Luminosity Potion.

There were similar potions, but they all had many restraints. Under normal circumstances, those potions could only be taken a few times, and each time they would be less effective than the last time. Their enhancement could only last three days when they were taken for the first time. For the second time, the duration would be reduced by half…

Also, the potions' enhancement was unremarkable. Even the best of them could only accelerate meditation by 30%. As for the Luminosity Potion that the Gilded Rose released, even the normal-quality Luminosity Potion could improve the meditation efficiency by 300% for 10 days in the worst-case scenario. The duration was 15 days on average, and could reach 18 days for special people.

Not only was the Luminosity Potion surprisingly effective, but more importantly, there were no restraints on the potion at all. Even if one took two bottles of the potion every month for 50 years, it would be just as effective…

After the Luminosity Potion was released, it instantly became a hit. The organizations that had been reluctant to work with the Gilded Rose all had second thoughts.

The Andlusa Kingdom was the weakest country, but because of the potion, the greatest powers in the country had all been significantly strengthened in only a couple of months. The experts who were on the same level became 20% stronger. The mages were upgraded by one level in general too.

That was because the Andlusa Kingdom was the first to cooperate with the Gilded Rose. In the Andlusa Kingdom, the Gilded Rose monopolized the entirety of the high-end market and 80% of the middle-end market. It didn't enter the low-end market, because it left the low-level potions for other alchemy stores and alchemists.

Every time the Gilded Rose released a new potion, all the forces of Andlusa would promptly come for negotiation, willing to offer any material that the Gilded Rose needed as long as they had it.

After all, if they got the new potion, they would be strengthened overall, and they would gain much greater returns in a shorter amount of time. They wouldn't suffer any loss.

With the example of the Andlusa Kingdom, more and more organizations in the Odin Kingdom signed exchange contracts with the Gilded Rose, including one of the top forces.

However, not everybody was willing to cooperate.

"Sir Faleau, we cannot continue preparing for the branch in the south of the Odin Kingdom anymore. The Holy Light Alliance, which is based in the south of the Odin Kingdom, wants our Blue Demon Potion, and claims…

"They claim that the Gilded Rose must pay a price if we want to march to the south of the Odin Kingdom. They ask us to give away half of the territory that yields the Blue Demon Potion's materials, and inform them of the plane's coordinates…"

The person who was reported blushed, unable to continue.

Faleau put on an awful expression.

To enter the market in the south of the Odin Kingdom, he certainly had to know the forces there well.

The Holy Light Alliance was definitely one of the top 10 forces in the south of the Odin Kingdom, which was the most powerful part. If it were in the north of the Odin Kingdom, it would rank in the top six.

The Holy Light Alliance was headquartered in the southeast corner of the Odin Kingdom. Its Holy Tower was the first to embrace sunlight in the morning every day.

Apparently, the Holy Light Alliance was made of holy light mages who were best at light healing. Unfortunately, those people were very annoying, and were the rabid dogs of the Odin Kingdom.

When they encountered dark mages, they would kill them.

When they encountered undead mages, they would kill them.

When they encountered unorthodox mages, they would kill them.

Whoever had been defined as heretics by the Holy Light Alliance had to be prepared to fight when encountering them. It would be impossible to escape until they died. They were considered rabid dogs because of their persistence.

They would chase those they deemed heretics relentlessly no matter the cost.

In the past thousands of years, the Holy Light Alliance had eight massive wars against the undead mages and 13 wars against the dark mages.

The Thorny Crown was headquartered very far away from the Holy Light Alliance, exactly because the Holy Light Alliance had declared war on the Thorny Crown twice.

The Holy Light Alliance was also the main reason why few mages in Noscent were good at water class spells. For a long time, only the water class spells and the holy light spells included popular healing spells. Unfortunately, there were few water class spells that were suitable for individual battles; they were more apt for legion campaigns…

The City of Mist, where a lot of skilled water mages gathered, was destroyed in a war against the Holy Light Alliance…

Hearing that the rabid dogs of the Holy Light Alliance were trying to take advantage of the Gilded Rose, Faleau became grim.

They didn't offer anything in exchange for the coordinates of the plane and half of its territory. However, everybody with the slightest brains knew that as soon as the coordinates were offered, those domineering and pigheaded dogs would surely swallow the entire plane without leaving anything behind.

Would the Gilded Rose pay such a high price just for the right to start a branch in the south of the Odin Kingdom?

Damn it, those bastards were truly outrageous. If their request was not declined, would other people make outrageous requests to the Gilded Rose too?

"Ignore the rabid dogs of the Holy Light Alliance. Let's open our branch in the southwest of the Odin Kingdom first. Someone will help us. The dark mages and undead mages in the south of the Odin Kingdom are all gathered in the western part. The Holy Light Alliance won't be able to intervene if we start a branch there.

"Wait, ask the dark mage to start a branch in the southwest of the Odin Kingdom too. Those dark mages and undead mages are united against the Holy Light Alliance. Our men are dark mages too. They won't just stand aside if the Holy Light Alliance comes for trouble.

"We'll give a 20% discount on all of our products in the branch, and a 40% to the Heaven Rank experts!"

After giving the instructions, Faleau didn't look any better. It was easy to deal with other forces, but the Holy Light Alliance was a major problem. They only ranked around 10th in the south of the Odin Kingdom, but they even dared to challenge the royal family in terms of certain issues. They were crazy.

There was no telling whether the Holy Light Alliance was trying to coerce the Gilded Rose or it was the intention of someone in the Holy Light Alliance. But the difference was trivial for the lunatics.

A few days later, another piece of news spread out. The master of the city where the Gilded Rose was going to open a branch was killed by the Holy Light Alliance for conspiring with heretics, including the Thorny Crown and the Gilded Rose…

He was just the master of an insignificant border city. Nobody was willing to piss off the rabid dogs of the Holy Light Alliance for him. Those people would bite anyone they met as long as heretics were involved.

The Gilded Rose didn't stop the plan of opening branches. Instead, it moved to the southwest of the Odin Kingdom, which, according to the Holy Light Alliance, was an unlit place of filth and corruption. Everything in that place, including the living creatures and the land itself, had to be purged…

The Gilded Rose did not concede at all, which infuriated the Holy Light Alliance. It had been trying to suppress the Thorny Crown while the latter had internal conflicts, but the Gilded Rose then stepped up. Everybody of the Thorny Crown was too busy accomplishing Lin Yun's mission to bother the rabid dogs of the Holy Light Alliance.

Unable to find anyone from the Thorny Crown, the Holy Light Alliance vented its fury on the Gilded Rose. The Gilded Rose's staff were attacked when they were on their way to the southwest of the Odin Kingdom, but two dark mages happened to pass by.

Seeing the people of the Holy Light Alliance in the southwest hunting others, the dark mages, who hated the Holy Light Alliance's guts, didn't stop to think at all. They never asked what the Gilded Rose's staff were doing there until the mages of the Holy Light Alliance were killed…

Learning that the Holy Light Alliance was trying to stop the Gilded Rose from opening a branch in the southwest, the bad-tempered dark mages and undead mages burst into fury. In only three days, all of the Holy Light Alliance's mages that snuck to the southwest, including three Heaven Rank experts, were killed. Even their bodies were divided by three undead mages…

Faleau was rather flabbergasted when he learned the news…

"Damn it. Those idiots are truly not afraid of causing trouble. They don't care, because there's already a grudge between them and the Holy Light Alliance, but right now, the Holy Light Alliance will surely consider the Gilded Rose an ally to those dark mages and undead mages. Those rabid dogs never bother to think…

"They were only trying to coerce the Gilded Rose into giving them money. After all, the Gilded Rose appears to be just an alchemy shop. If the Holy Light Alliance had demanded protection fees, we might've bargained with them, but we'd have had to pay in the end.

"But as it turns out, the Gilded Rose had become one of the heretics. It's not only closely associated with the Thorny Crown, but also an ally with the dark mages and undead mages. Great. They will surely declare war on the Gilded Rose…"

The Gilded Rose had somehow ended up as the Holy Light Alliance's enemy. It would surely be blamed for the deaths of the three Heaven Rank experts. Faleau didn't think he could take care of the matter anymore, and he went to talk to Lin Yun…

Inside the Natural Demiplane, Lin Yun was learning truth runes. He had already mastered more than 90 truth runes, which were fully melted into the Demiplane, and accelerated its evolution. Its size had only been expanded by two kilometers, but it looked more and more like a real world.

Mountains, rivers, clouds, and the blue sky had all appeared. The lives that had been born included low-level insects and some simple reptiles. In the ocean, which was only the size of a lake in Noscent, even more lives had been born, but most of them were very little.

It seemed that all the lives went through millions of years in only a decade. Their evolution was terrifyingly fast.

Supposedly, the evolution of a Natural Demiplane's essence was the hardest part, but it was very easy at this moment. The constant evolution of essence required a huge amount of mana, but the expansion of the Natural Demiplane's size would consume more in the long run.

There was little mana left in the Natural Demiplane. The magic vines had formed a green forest, and continued expanding. At this moment, they had already covered an area of 20 square kilometers. The thick vines rose from the ground into the sky. Observed from the distance, they looked like green pillars that stabbed into the invisible sky from the ground.

The mana that the vines grabbed from the void fell from the sky like a river, and gathered in the Mana Lake. When such a huge amount of mana poured in, the Mana Lake didn't expand at all, as the new mana was almost entirely consumed by the Natural Demiplane to expand its size.

In only a couple of months, the continent of the Natural Demiplane had been expanded to more than 30,000 square kilometers, which was already the size of regular planes, though it had more complete laws. The Raging Flame Plane was no bigger than the Natural Demiplane at this moment.

Watching one of the truth runes that was engraved on the pillar melt and disappear into the pillar, Lin Yun took a long breath of relief. The circulating torrents of runes in his eyes were gone.