The morning sunlight streamed through the window onto Ye Chui. The incessant chirping of birds filled the air. Rubbing his sleepy eyes, Ye Chui climbed out of the wooden bed, feeling aches all over his body. At that moment, he particularly missed the comfortable life of his original world.
Yawning, Ye Chui washed his face in a wooden basin in the corner of the room to wake himself up. As he wiped his face with a dry towel, he glanced at his reflection in the water. A handsome sixteen-year-old boy with a sharp nose, deep eyes, and features that hinted at a Eurasian mix, with long jet-black hair. In his original world, he would have been a proper heartthrob.
“I’m really handsome!” Ye Chui nodded with satisfaction, his sleepy mind fully awakening.
Yes, he was always woken up by his own handsomeness.
He took some hard bread and dried meat from a nearby wooden cabinet, paired it with boiled water from the previous night, and settled for a simple breakfast.
Three days had passed since he arrived in this world, and Ye Chui was gradually getting accustomed to its ways.
The place he now lived in was his home.
The original owner of this body, a boy named Wade, wasn’t a native of Stan Town. Ten years ago, six-year-old Wade was found in the Wilderness Forest outside the town, near a trade route leading to the West Mountains. Those who found him speculated he was the son of a merchant. The Wilderness Forest was home to many ferocious beasts, and it was likely a merchant caravan had been attacked, leaving Wade as the sole survivor.
For a long time afterward, Wade grew up in the church. Later, when his strong magical aura was discovered, a lonely old man adopted him. Compared to the other destitute orphans, Wade was incredibly fortunate. When the old man died, he left this small wooden house to Wade.
A mage’s talent couldn’t be fully confirmed before awakening; it could only be estimated. Those without a magical aura definitely couldn’t awaken, while those with one might, and the stronger the aura, the higher the chance of awakening. Wade’s magical aura was exceptionally strong, so by all logic, he was almost certain to awaken. Unfortunately, he was the exception.
As for the iPad becoming a grimoire, that likely had nothing to do with Wade.
After finishing breakfast and tidying up, Ye Chui sat at the wooden table and extended his hand. With a thought, his grimoire appeared above his palm.
Once a grimoire was obtained, it fused with the mage’s body. As long as they had magic power, they could summon it, as he was doing now. The summoned grimoire could also be controlled at will, floating freely within a certain range. For now, Ye Chui held the iPad in his hands, tapping and swiping on the screen as if using a computer in his original world, beginning his exploration of the grimoire.
Over the past three days, Ye Chui had roughly figured out some of the iPad grimoire’s basic abilities.
The iPad in his hands retained the appearance of a typical iPad. Its display was still in Chinese, not the language of this world. Its structure and functions were similar to an iPad but with slight differences. Its tools and apps had transformed into spell-like abilities. For instance, the Security Guard app originally installed on the iPad had become a defensive spell, a passive one that consumed magic power to block attacks.
Ye Chui could also access the app store on the iPad, but the software available for purchase had all turned into spells. These were low-level spells, such as basic elemental spells like [Water], [Flame], and [Lightning]. The beginner attack spell [Flame Serpent] that Riken had used was among them. The level of spells seemed tied to Ye Chui’s own abilities, meaning these were spells he could currently cast through his iPad grimoire.
However, like phone apps, these spells required downloading and installing, which in turn required “points.”
Ye Chui still hadn’t figured out what these points were. When he tried downloading a spell, he saw his point balance was 5, but even the cheapest spell required 10 points to download and install. So, his plan to learn new spells was put on hold.
Additionally, Ye Chui could open apps like music and video, but there were no resources to play. The iPad’s camera could be used, but it couldn’t take photos or record videos. Other iPad tools, such as the calendar, clock, newsstand, and browser, had been magically altered but were also inaccessible. These functions required points to unlock.
To Ye Chui’s delight, the iPad’s map app could be opened.
However, the map only showed Stan Town. To view other areas, he needed “map packs,” which, of course, required points to unlock. The map could even mark Ye Chui’s location and show other people within a certain range, much like a game’s minimap.
“Right now, the only spells I can use are [Security Guard] and [Map Navigation], both auxiliary defensive spells. To gain powerful attack spells, I need to find a way to increase my points. But what the heck are points?”
With only a week left until his duel with Riken, Ye Chui’s grimoire was limited to two seemingly useless spells, which made him feel a bit anxious.
His life in the other world had taught him that the best way to deal with anxiety was to relax. Constant stress was pointless.
So, Ye Chui decided to go out and explore the town’s scenery.
“Sitting at home won’t do any good. Maybe I’ll stumble upon something outside, like a way to earn points!”
From Wade’s memories, Ye Chui had gained a general understanding of Stan Town.
To the north of the town lay the Wilderness Forest, a dangerous place where only powerful swordsmen, mages, and experienced hunters ventured. The other three sides of the town were surrounded by the endless Elf Prairie, a name derived from the legend that an ancient Elf King was buried there.
Elves, however, were now just an ancient legend to the people of this world.
In the age of legends, this continent was home to humans, elves, dwarves, beastmen, giants, and even powerful gods. But five thousand years ago, an event called the “Fall of the Gods” caused the gods and other races to vanish, leaving humans as the sole rulers of the continent. The stories of these other races now existed only in the florid songs of bards.
“Though it’s a medieval-style town, it’s much cleaner than those medieval towns in movies and TV shows. Back then, towns were supposedly littered with garbage, with chamber pots emptied right onto the streets.”
Ye Chui mused as he walked along the clean streets, lined with plane trees casting dappled shadows. The air carried the faint scent of irises. He opened the [Map Navigation] spell on his iPad grimoire, and the map displayed a small cursor representing his position, along with small moving dots, each representing a person near him.
The street bustled with townsfolk, visiting merchants, swordsmen in armour with longswords on their backs, and mages in robes of various colours. Ye Chui had noticed that these dots only appeared when people entered a certain range around him, disappearing when they moved out of it. This range, unaffected by buildings, was roughly a ten-metre radius.
In game terms, this was his “field of vision.”
As he wandered around Stan Town, nearing noon, Ye Chui suddenly noticed an odd dot on the iPad grimoire’s map. This dot was far beyond the ten-metre range, at least half a kilometre away.
“What the heck is that?”
