Wizard: Starting from the Skill Tree-Chapter 540: Water Flow Shadow

If one could decipher these imperceptible traces of information carried by the water flow, it would be akin to having countless invisible eyes and ears in the deep sea.

Based on this concept, Duke began working on a brand new magic, temporarily naming it the Water Flow Shadow.

The core principle of this magic is not to spy on real-time events happening afar, but to trace and interpret the faint imprints of various energies, substances, and information recorded by a specific body of water over a certain period.

To achieve this, the caster must have a sufficiently high Water Element Affinity Talent, otherwise it would be difficult to perceive these imperceptible bits of information hidden in the sea.

This requirement presents a high barrier for other wizards; those whose Water Element Affinity is insufficient have virtually no hope of using this magic.

Perhaps some wizards in the past had similar ideas, but the natural barriers directly thwarted the possibility of implementing those ideas.

If Duke could truly realize this idea, even if he successfully constructed the magic model, not everyone would be able to use it.

Even if he shared this magic model with others, other wizards could only learn from it. Even if they successfully constructed the magic model themselves, they still would not be able to use it properly.

Many spells are like this, with various requirements acting as barriers to their use.

Duke then went to the meditation chamber in the courtyard, a room crafted specifically for wizard meditation.

The chamber was extremely tranquil, with walls made of thick, soundproof coral rock, and floors paved with obsidian, which aids in energy convergence.

At the center of the room was a slightly sunken meditation pit, filled with tranquil sea sand collected from the deep sea’s frigid zones.

The most striking feature was the meditation chamber’s ceiling, inlaid with a gigantic, uncarved natural blue crystal, within which a small cluster of eternally flickering cold flames was sealed. It not only provided stable, gentle light but also emitted energy waves that effectively assisted meditation by screening out external distractions.

Duke sat cross-legged on the tranquil sea sand, his Spiritual Power highly focused, meticulously honing his perception of the surrounding seawater.

He did not perceive the resistance, temperature, or pressure of the seawater but focused on capturing the billions-to-one anomalies, distinct from the seawater’s molecular structure.

These so-called anomalies might be a wisp of extremely faint pheromones from the Insect Race, a trace of Free Energy Particles left after an energy burst, or a faint spiritual wave imprint on the verge of dissipating.

Ordinary wizards could not possibly perceive these things—it’s like a faint odor in the air that those with less acute senses cannot detect.

But this does not mean these odors do not exist; it’s just that most people cannot smell them.

The same goes for seawater; it’s not as clear and pure as it seems, but is filled with various impurities.

These impurities are so minute, their traces almost undetectable, that without sufficient Water Element Affinity, one cannot perceive them.

After initially being able to capture the noise within seawater, Duke began to conceive the general structure of the magic model.

This model is extremely complex; it needs to function like an exceedingly precise multilayered filter and decoder.

The first layer needs to eliminate the overwhelmingly prevalent, meaningless background noise in seawater. The second layer, according to the caster’s intent, screens out specific types of imprints.

The third and most crucial layer performs reverse deduction and scenario reconstruction of the filtered chaotic weak imprints, attempting to interpret the vague outlines of the events they represent.

Once his concept was complete, Duke took out a specially crafted magic parchment and used his Spiritual Power as a pen to outline the preliminary framework of the Water Flow Shadow magic model.

He first crafted an extremely intricate three-dimensional structure composed of countless tiny nodes and the energy channels connecting them, resembling an enigmatic crystal formed by condensed water flow, with veins running through it.

This was the core model he envisaged.

However, the risk and difficulty of directly constructing a complete model were too high.

Duke employed his most commonly used and reliable method for developing new magic, starting from the smallest unit to test.

This was the approach he used when preparing for the Crystalization advancement scheme, validating from the simplest functions and then deducing step by step to the final result.

Duke dismantled this enormous three-dimensional structure in his mind, isolating the most foundational and core functional unit, the smallest structure.

This unit is only responsible for the basic capture and recognition of information, equivalent to a mesh in the vast filter.

Duke cautiously sketched this heavily simplified minimal unit model in the parchment’s corner with extremely precise Spiritual Power lines.

It resembled a tiny, continually self-rotating spiral, its nodes gleaming with different perceptual frequency lights.

Duke closed his eyes and, with highly concentrated Spiritual Power, meticulously constructed this minimal unit model in the depths of his Spiritual Sea.

This required an extremely high level of precision in controlling Spiritual Power, as any deviation at a node or instability in the energy channels could cause the model to collapse.

For Duke in his current state, however, this was basic work with no pressure.

After approximately a few minutes, a miniature spiral structure emitting a faint blue glow floated quietly in his Spiritual Sea, operating stably.

The next step was testing.

Duke injected a trace of Spiritual Power into this tiny magic unit and directed its perception towards a specific small cluster of seawater in the meditation chamber.

Several hours earlier, he had deliberately infused a faint, nearly dissipated magic imprint into that cluster of seawater to simulate the historical information needing tracing.

The minimal unit model in his mind trembled slightly, with several nodes lighting up.

In Duke’s consciousness, he immediately received some vague and fragmented fragments.

It felt like listening to an extremely distant echo mixed with a lot of noise. He concentrated intently, finally capturing a trace of familiar magic wave belonging to himself, though faint but clearly discernible.

Duke felt a surge of joy in his heart, but he didn’t relax.

This was just the first step; he recorded all the data during the unit’s operation: the consumption rate of Spiritual Power, the model’s stability, information capture sensitivity and accuracy, anti-interference capability, etc.

Subsequently, he began constructing the second and third minimal units with slightly different functions, respectively testing their perceptual effects on biological pheromones and energy residual fluctuations.

With each construction and test, he meticulously recorded all data, quickly covering the parchment with dense symbols, formulas, and observation records.