Synthetic Wizard

Chapter 178 - 128: Power Built on Money (Part 2)

As his strength improved, Sunan gradually came into contact with more and more secrets, along with encountering increasingly powerful opponents.

Items like Stone Golems and Dual-bladed Spiders are adequate for dealing with ordinary knights, but they do not even qualify as cannon fodder against slightly stronger enemies.

Even Elite Stone Golems and Steel Golems, Tier One Legendary Puppets, are becoming somewhat strained.

So considering the future, Sunan thought it necessary to craft more advanced golem puppets.

He had three options in this area.

The first option was naturally Elite Dual-bladed Spiders.

Elite Dual-bladed Spiders have already proven their combat effectiveness.

These extremely swift puppets are very useful against some agile enemies.

According to the instructions he left before departing, Base No. 1 and Base No. 2’s warehouses had accumulated a large amount of tungsten steel, just right for refining Dual-bladed Spiders.

Sunan estimated he could synthesize three to four Elite Dual-bladed Spiders.

The second option was to synthesize a higher-grade Stone Golem.

Due to the consumption of miniature soul crystals required for crafting Steel Golems, until a stable source is secured, mass production of Steel Golems is impossible, making the synthesis method using Steel Golems unfeasible.

So he could only settle for second-best using Stone Golems.

At least Sunan now had a stable source of gemstones.

Before arriving at Ghost Lake City, he visited Base No. 1 to check on the insect nest.

During his absence, Carolina consistently delivered collected split catalyst nutrients to Base No. 1, where the apprentices fed the gemstone worms.

The number of gemstone worms had now grown to eighteen, increasing the annual gemstone production to over six hundred.

In addition, there were regularly purchased gemstones from the Fire Fox Trade Association.

This aspect did not present a concern regarding material shortages.

Also, the cost of synthesizing a Tier Two Legendary Stone Golem was not high, reaching nearly twenty thousand gold coins.

Even with the addition of demonized weapon technology similar to advanced Dual-bladed Spiders, the cost slightly exceeded twenty thousand gold coins, which was less than advanced Dual-bladed Spiders.

In contrast, its combat effectiveness was slightly inferior to advanced Dual-bladed Spiders, except in situations requiring frontal assaults where it could play a more significant role.

The third option, naturally, was to craft even higher-grade golems.

Avegni’s experimental notes contained a design blueprint for Refined Gold Golems.

Refined Gold Golems are Tier Three Legendary Golems, with combat power surpassing many Level 3 Wizard Apprentices.

Back then, Rose was at a loss against the Refined Gold Golem and had to seek Sunan’s cooperation to successfully resolve it.

Even Sunan, at the time, had to unleash full power from the Demon Pattern Core to barely inflict severe damage to the Refined Gold Golem.

Nowadays, his strength had significantly increased, but it would still require considerable effort to take down a Refined Gold Golem.

Had he possessed fifty or sixty Refined Gold Golems, Sunan believed he could roam the Starlight Continent unchecked.

"But crafting this thing is exceedingly arduous."

Even among the various types of golems, the Refined Gold Golem stands in the mid-tier, with considerable crafting difficulty.

Level 4 [Puppet Refining] was only barely sufficient; Level 5 was considered the normal standard.

Sunan glanced at the panel.

Due to the extensive and frequent crafting of golems, his [Puppet Refining] progress bar was now nearing two-thirds completion, lacking just over three thousand proficiency points to reach Level 5.

The skill requirement was not an issue and could soon meet the standard.

The key was still the materials.

The primary material for the Refined Gold Golem was Magic Refined Gold, the product of enchanting refined gold.

Creating a single Refined Gold Golem approximately required fourteen to fifteen tons of Magic Refined Gold.

Adding other various gemstones, rare materials, silver, and gold, the total cost was estimated at around fifty thousand gold coins.

"Fortunately, I recently received a substantial sum from the Starfire Sect, enough for me to craft a Refined Gold Golem."

Sunan estimated that crafting fourteen to fifteen tons of Magic Refined Gold would not be completed in a year or two if left to himself.

However, if it was made into a task assigned to the apprentices at Base No. 1, it should be finished in two to three months.

The crafting difficulty of Magic Refined Gold was not high, comparable to demonized weaponry, and there were already many apprentices at the base capable of independently completing such tasks.

Noting this down silently, with plans to implement it as soon as he returned to Base No. 1, Sunan then began crafting Dual-bladed Spiders.

After spending more than half a month, he refined all the tungsten steel in the two bases into Dual-bladed Spiders, ultimately synthesizing four Elite Dual-bladed Spiders.

In addition to the one previous, Sunan now had five Tier Two Legendary Puppets in hand.

However, he did not stop there and began further experimentation.

"Although Dual-bladed Spiders are agile, they also have a notable weakness, such as the inability to fly."

"They’re fine against Legendary Knights, but when facing Wizard Apprentices who master the Floating Skill or possess flying magic items, they turn into passive targets."

To eliminate this weakness, Sunan eventually devised a solution: permanently affixing [Floating Skill] to the Dual-bladed Spider.

This idea was inspired by the Secret Puppet’s design blueprint.

Following this concept, any puppet could permanently fix a magic, thus acquiring the ability to cast it.

However, the Secret Puppet managed this because its main materials contained abundant gemstones and mithril.

Understandably, Sunan was unwilling to expend mithril at this point.

So he settled for an alternative solution, adding spell-casting capabilities to the Dual-bladed Spider through the creation of a magically imbued item.

Essentially equivalent to embedding a spell-storing magic item within the Dual-bladed Spider.

However, since the Dual-bladed Spiders lacked Spiritual Power, another form of energy was needed to activate the magic item to achieve the spell-casting effect.

Sunan ultimately chose magic stones.

The resulting Elite Dual-bladed Spider gained flying capabilities after casting the Floating Skill, at the cost of consuming approximately one low-grade magic stone per hour.

For other Wizard Apprentices, this was undoubtedly a shocking expenditure.

Just to grant a puppet flight capabilities, consuming a massive volume of precious magic stones was clearly an extravagant and irrational approach.

Yet, Sunan had an abundance of magic stones, allowing him to manufacture such items at low cost and high volume.

For him, magic stones, invaluable to others, existed merely as a cheap energy resource.

Conversely, the cost of affixing a Tier Two Magic was somewhat higher.

Affixing just the [Floating Skill] added around three hundred gold coins to the cost.

Considering the likelihood of facing Kasham’s swarm, Sunan also equipped the Elite Dual-bladed Spiders with a wide-area damage-type [Shattering Sound Wave], a mobility enhancing [Light Spirit Skill], a body-strengthening [Toughness Skill], and a power-enhancing [Barbaric Strength Skill].

Overall, the cost for each Elite Dual-bladed Spider exceeded twenty-three thousand gold coins.

The total cost for five reached over a hundred and ten thousand gold coins.

This was excluding the cost of magic stones during combat.

"The strength range of Level 3 Wizard Apprentices spans from Tier One to Tier Four."

"The combat power of an Elite Dual-bladed Spider is roughly equivalent to a mid-range Level 3 Wizard Apprentice."

"Spending one hundred and ten thousand gold coins for five Level 3 Wizard Apprentice-level combatants is also quite worthwhile."

Sunan nodded silently.

He planned to synthesize several more Tier Two Legendary-level advanced Stone Golems for good measure.

Additionally, a batch of Rings of Great Protection and Rings of Calamity were to be crafted for personal protection.

After all, crafting golem puppets with a cost of over twenty thousand gold coins was done, and a batch of Micro-Light Level magic items wasn’t going to break the bank.

However, considering this, the mining revenue from Ghost Lake City for the next few months would need to be funneled into this bottomless pit.

It’s fortunate that three new mineral veins were recently developed; otherwise, he wouldn’t be able to sustain such extravagant spending.

"Power is built with money,"

Sunan couldn’t help but sigh.