Chapter 100
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Chapter 100: False Wisdom and True Wisdom
The next morning, after getting 6 bottles of Mana Potion from The Slaughtered Lamb, he planned to practice new spells he learned – Arcane Intellect and a weak magic he secretly learned from Naga – with imp Saenor.
At Mirror Lake outside Stormwind, in a small deserted grove, Jesse found a clearing and had imp stand opposite him.
"What do you plan to do with me, master?" Saenor asked, standing tall.
Looking at the fiery imp, Jesse reached out his hand and said, "Come, be my test subject."
The imp’s smiley face quickly changed, "No no no… master, wait, I mean, I can do it, but won’t you feel sorry for me if I feel pain? Can you tell me what magic you want to test on me?"
"Are you still afraid of pain?" Jesse said, "I just want to try out a weak magic I learned from that Naga. After being hit by that magic, I couldn’t even lift my hands and feet, couldn’t walk at all. But I managed to memorize its spell."
"Anuniki, Duzhazara, Kana."
Jesse made the gesture to release the fear magic towards the imp. The imp exclaimed, "Wow," in shock, but nothing happened.
"Kana is not Demonic, master, this doesn’t sound like Demonic at all!" the imp said. "If I’m not mistaken, the Shadow Magic used by the Nagas comes from the Shath’Yar of the void realm. This is a curse of the Shath’Yar! It sounds right!"
"Shath’Yar?" Jesse hesitated a bit. He heard of this language, but it was in a past life.
Shath’Yar is the language used to communicate between the ancient parasitic evil god and its dark minions in Azeroth. Not many NPCs in the game know it.
In this world, Jesse had never heard anyone speak this language, let alone finding any related textbooks in the library (which of course do not exist). How could he learn its pronunciation?
"Since you seem familiar, do you know Shath’Yar?" Jesse asked.
"If I did, it would be all over for me!" Saenor jumped up and replied, "Those who know Shath’Yar are either pure shadow creatures, dark flesh born from parasitic beings, or powerful shadow devotees! And me, I’m just a weak sorry creature! No one will teach me Shath’Yar, and I have no control over its power!"
Since there were no teachers around, how could one correct their pronunciation?
Jesse gazed at the lake, recalling Naga’s pronunciation while skipping rocks into the water.
After practicing various pronunciations, pauses, and emphasis adjustments for "Anuniki, Duzhazara, Kana" countless times, he felt something was off after finishing a particular phrase.
Even the imp looked over. Was it the gathering of Shadow Power?
Jesse confirmed the pronunciation just now and said, "Saenor, stand over there for me!"
The imp bounced back to its original position, stood still, and excitedly exclaimed, "I’m ready!"
It then dawned on him that he was standing there as a target for some sort of painful magic, his expression changing from excitement to discomfort.
"Try not to pronounce it so perfectly, master."
"How could I possibly pronounce Shath’Yar perfectly?"
Jesse made a joke, then thought about the interaction with the shadow just now, combined with the gestures of the Naga witch in his memory… Of course, it was one of her hands pointing at the imp.
"Anuniki, Duzhazara, Kana."
A wave of shadow flowed inside him, making his arms somewhat itchy. He watched as the imp’s expression started to look strange, no longer jumping around but trembling in its legs.
"This is… this is…" Even the imp’s mumbling voice became much weaker.
But Jesse felt refreshed. The sudden weakness of the imp gave him a sense of superiority, a feeling of tormenting the weak.
After all, he already dominated in this relationship. He was the master, while the imp… was the servant, the minion, the obedient tool. Soon, reason rushed back, pulling him out of that "enjoyment," and the Shadow Power that made his arms itchy quickly dissipated.
Jesse was no longer surprised by the side effects of Shadow Magic.
However, this was much better than when he first encountered Shadow Magic, now he could recognize which part of his emotions came from the power of darkness and which part came from himself.
"Taking effect… cough!" The imp now couldn’t even stand easily. "This is the shadow’s curse, master, this is the Curse of Weakness."
"I know," Jesse said as he took out his prepared paper and pen, writing down the pronunciation of the spell he was about to try in Universal Language letters.
He was getting ready to teach the Curse of Weakness to the warlocks at The Slaughtered Lamb… Gakin and Zardeth must have other spells that they haven’t shown yet.
Since the warlocks have had contact with the Dark Iron Dwarves, they must have learned more than just the Fear magic from there.
When Jesse first went to that basement, he met Erlan and Surena, who cast the Curse of Agony on him. Until now, Jesse still hasn’t learned the Curse of Agony spell.
The reason Jesse hasn’t been interested in the Curse of Agony is because he initially thought Surena didn’t know where the spell came from.
Without a standard source for spells that can be corrected during the learning process, they will end up twisted. Just like this Curse of Weakness… Jesse didn’t have the original Shath’yar spell text, nor did he know how to pronounce it, so he could only poorly imitate it. He remembered when the Naga used the Weakness Spell on him, he couldn’t even stand properly and struggled to take out a potion from his bag.
The imp was the smallest and weakest creature he had ever seen, and even such a small creature couldn’t fall from the spell. It showed how much the spell had weakened from the Naga to Jesse.
It could be the problem with the spell or the casting motion, or there could be other conditions involved.
Jesse suspected that as servants of the Old Gods, the Naga might have some special advantages in shadow magic that he was not aware of yet.
In any case, this secondhand Curse of Weakness can be the first step for improving one’s status in the basement.
Especially when Gakin asked to join the group, one of his requests was to be able to compete with the strong Erlan. Gakin must really like Curse of Weakness as a spell that weakens physical abilities.
"Next, the second spell, Saenor," Jesse said as he put away the note and took out the book "Feilis – Beginner’s Guide to Arcane Magic" that Malin gave him, flipping to the chapter on "Arcane Intellect".
He flipped through a few more pages and discovered that there were many variations of Arcane Intellect, with descriptions filling almost dozens of pages detailing various forms, durations, effects, and even offensive variations, similar to a kind of mental disruption that overwhelms the consciousness with too much information.
What Malin taught him was the most standard one – a spell derived from elves that was improved by Dalaran into a beginner’s version.
"Is there another spell?" The imp, still trembling, shouted, "Please spare me, master!"
Jesse turned to Saenor and shouted, "Miss Tist, Yopely, Shinig!"
A mass of Arcane energy instantly surrounded the imp, causing it to jump in fear. Before it could escape or react in a more complex way, the energy dissipated.
It was still the same issue, Jesse found it difficult to locate that feeling of converting free-floating magical energy into infused power.
"What magic is this, master?" imp asked.
"It’s called Arcane Intellect," Jesse replied.
"Ah… Arcane Intellect, I know this spell!" imp exclaimed. "But your technique is all wrong."
"Right, you need to learn Blood Pact," Jesse said. "Can you teach me how to convert magical energy into a spell that enhances its effects?"
"I was born with this knowledge, how can I teach it to you?" imp sighed. "But you’re right, Arcane Intellect shouldn’t be that difficult." imp was right, Arcane Intellect was considered a beginner’s spell, which is why it was included in "Feilis."
After mastering the Light Spell, Jesse was eager to learn Mage Armor immediately. He was too impatient, always looking for shortcuts, thinking that he could learn faster by following his own understanding.
Unlike Shadow magic, Jesse didn’t have a natural talent for Arcane magic, so following the traditional path was actually a better choice.
Jesse opened "Feilis" again and carefully compared his pronunciation and movements to the instructions for the basic version of Arcane Intellect, repeating them over and over until he felt the magic.
After a while, he started to feel tired.
Maybe practicing the Curse of Weakness earlier used up some energy, and mistakenly summoning a wrong Arcane Intellect wasted some more.
Do you want to drink a bottle of Mana Potion?
These potions are hard to come by, so it’s best not to use them unless you’re really tired.
Jesse stood up, tried to forget as much of the experiences from practicing the Light Spell as possible, cleared his mind, and cast "Arcane Intellect" carefully.
When the casting was done, he suddenly heard a crisp sound of Arcane energy ringing in his ears, and a strange feeling started. His field of vision seemed wider, as if he could see more than before.
But he knew it was just an illusion. His ability to recognize images in his field of vision improved, his focus expanded from just a circle in the center to a larger area. This was an enhancement of his observational skills.
The sound of wind through the leaves, ripples in the lake, birds chirping… No, not quite right.
It was the call of a black finch.
Jesse remembered clearly. When he was casually flipping through the Kingdom Geography Chronicles in Malin’s study, he had noticed the distinctive call of this common Elwynn bird.
The original sentence is: The high to low three-sound melodious continuous chirping is a typical characteristic of the Blackcap bird.
How could he remember these details?
Is this the power of Arcane Intellect? Can this magic even extract hidden information overlooked in the mind?
Only when feeling this memory and observational power far exceeding his usual state, did Jesse truly understand what Malin meant by that statement — abusing Arcane Intellect would soon lead to personality split, gradually beginning to dislike the foolish, true self.