Heir of Synthesis: The World Mage

As he passed through, Priam found himself immersed in absolute darkness. There was no up or down. He couldn’t feel anything—not even his own body.

The sensation lasted for less than a minute.

Then, a strange light tore through the darkness.

When he came to, Priam was standing alone on top of a mountain.

He took a deep breath and looked up. The sky was dyed a bizarre scarlet. There was no sun, moon, or clouds. The color itself gave off a soft glow that illuminated the entire landscape. It looked like an eternal twilight, but one filled with an oppressive atmosphere.

Priam let out a quiet snort as he sensed the unusual energy in the air. He really was in another world. There was no Ether here, only a purer, more fundamental form of energy.

From his previous research, he knew it was Qi, a basic form of energy found across countless worlds.

Mages didn’t need to panic. Their well-developed meridians allowed them to gradually absorb Qi and convert it into Ether for use.

However, while it took a single day to fully recover Ether in his home world, using Qi required a full ten days. It really was far too primitive compared to Ether.

Priam, on the other hand, had an advantage. Back in his own world, if he focused on drawing the surrounding Ether into his body, he could recover completely in just one hour. For him, the drawback in this world wasn’t nearly as severe as it was for everyone else.

At that moment...

[01 Special Mission Available!]

[Gather the 3 Heroic Relics. When you approach one, the System will detect it and alert you.]

”...?”

Priam’s eyes widened as he read the green window.

’Those relics still exist?’

The Central Elder had implied that using the relics at the end of the war had been a suicidal act to save what little remained of the world. But no one should have known what ultimately became of them.

Which meant... the System telling him this was another enormous advantage that no Mage had ever possessed during this mission.

’Do they have something to do with the central region? Most likely... Good. Now I have a clear objective. I just hope the rewards are worth it.’

Without any exact clues, all he could do was move around at random until the System detected one of them.

Priam carefully surveyed his surroundings.

The mountains were filled with bizarre rock formations, colossal trees, and countless exotic plants he had never even heard of.

Obviously, he was in another world. The laws of nature were different, so life had evolved differently. Even so, the fundamentals should still be similar.

Suddenly, he expanded his senses and picked up a familiar fluctuation. Searching through the ”catalog” of energies stored in his memory, he identified the signature.

’Blood Dictamnus Essence?’

The energy of that plant was identical to the one recorded in the catalog. Its appearance was completely different, but its energetic essence was unmistakable.

Sometimes nature produced identical things through completely different paths.

Blood Dictamnus Essence was an incredibly rare resource in his original world—a true treasure.

The medicinal herb was growing on a cliff not far away. It stood about thirty centimeters tall, covered from top to bottom with tiny blood-red flowers that looked like little crimson stars beneath the dim sky. It gave off a faint, delicate fragrance.

To his surprise, there were dozens of them scattered across the rocky cliff.

Without hesitation, he climbed the cliff with ease.

His hand was only centimeters away from picking one of the herbs...

...when a chill of danger shot down his spine.

He leaped backward at lightning speed.

*Zunnn!*

A beam of light sliced through the exact spot where his hand had been a split second earlier.

It was a small, slender snake, barely over thirty centimeters long, covered in reddish spots.

Hidden among the foliage, it was practically invisible. More than that, it couldn’t be detected by ordinary senses—it could perfectly blend its aura with both the ground and the plant.

Priam took a deep breath.

At first glance, it looked like a harmless little reptile. Even a child could crush it with a stick.

However, he could tell the creature was incredibly venomous. Its poison came from the very Blood Dictamnus Essence it absorbed. Knowing that, he already had a good idea of what it did.

Not even a Mage Master would be able to resist that toxin. It wasn’t immediately lethal, but it caused instant paralysis.

And although the paralysis only lasted around fifteen minutes, the real danger came afterward.

Studying the snake’s mouth and tail, Priam recalled similar species and figured out its hunting method.

Once it paralyzed its prey, the snake would strike at the victim’s eyes and then use its sharp tail to bore a hole through the skull and feed on the brain.

The reptile’s tail ended in a jagged, razor-sharp tip. It wasn’t a perfect blade, but it was more than enough to pierce the eye and skull of an unsuspecting Mage.

Just imagining a death like that would send chills down anyone’s spine. Out of all the ways to die, being completely paralyzed while feeling your own brain get eaten had to be one of the most horrifying.

Priam sighed.

This wasn’t an ordinary snake. It had most likely been placed here as part of the trial. In this Kingdom, which had once served as a training ground for the greatest geniuses of this world, every precious herb and valuable resource came with its own natural traps. The slightest mistake meant death.

Even so, Priam smiled.

As usual, his spatial ring was crammed full of random items that proved useful in the most unexpected ways.

He took out a long pair of tongs and, moving as fast as lightning, clamped the snake’s head before it could even open its mouth. Aside from its deadly venom, it was just an ordinary reptile. Now that Priam had it locked onto his senses, its speed wasn’t even close to his.

He took out a glass bottle and placed the snake inside, sealing the opening with a piece of cloth so it wouldn’t suffocate. That venom would definitely come in handy later.

Then he stored the bottle inside his high-level Life Ring.

Before harvesting the herb, Priam used a stick to poke at it several times while extending his senses to detect any abnormalities. Once he confirmed there were no more surprises, he finally claimed the treasure.

He had no intention of leaving the rest behind.

Over the next hour, he carefully harvested a dozen herbs containing Blood Dictamnus Essence and captured more than twenty identical venomous snakes.

Those snakes didn’t hide only among the leaves. Many were camouflaged in the surrounding grass or inside cracks in the rocks. They were incredibly treacherous creatures.

The experience pushed Priam’s caution to the highest level. But where there was great risk, there was great reward.

Once he confirmed there were no more rare herbs in the area, he pulled an iron spear from his spatial ring and started using it like a walking staff to probe the ground ahead.

*Crack!*

As he walked, a dry snapping sound echoed beneath his boots.

Priam looked down and saw a weathered, blackened bone—a femur. Its dark coloration indicated death by poisoning.

It probably belonged to a Mage from one of the previous expeditions who had died within the first few minutes. A tragic death, without even getting the chance to adapt to the environment.

Priam traveled several more kilometers without encountering a single living soul.

Since the inner region stretched across tens of thousands of kilometers, the odds of running into anyone were extremely low.

’Everything depends on luck...’

He stayed on full alert for the next twelve hours, moving with extreme caution across the scarlet lands.

Until...

He really did spot a familiar figure standing atop a colossal tree.

”Boss?”

The moment Dandara recognized him from above, her eyes lit up like stars.