Strongest Mage with the Lust system

Chapter 829: A Grade Nine Artifact?

”What help do you want?” Max asked, feeling increasingly curious, the unusualness of which was starting to make him a bit uncomfortable.

Is it my bloodline that’s telling me to listen to him? Hm, that shouldn’t be the case though.

While Max wondered what was going on with him, Ling Han said, ”Young Master, can you conjure an isolation ward around us?”

Shua!

Max waved his hand without hesitation, forming a crimson barrier of Fire Elemental mana and his Bloodline Energy.

Ling Han looked at the barrier with an uncertain look, but then took a deep breath, shifted his gaze to Max, and extended his hand.

As Max stared, an unassuming, small black pyramid-shaped tower appeared in his palm. It had several small cracks all over its surface and its top was even missing.

Max furrowed his brows, not finding anything special about it. He even enveloped it in his bloodline sense, but still found nothing out of the ordinary.

However, he could tell this tower was most likely the reason why his instincts had ’told’ him to stop and listen to Ling Han’s plea despite the current situation—because the moment he took it out, his agitated instincts went silent.

”What is it?” he asked, shifting his gaze away from the tower to Ling Han.

Ling Han stared into Max’s eyes for a moment, in which Max could see Ling Han was feeling very nervous, and there were signs of hesitation, but they disappeared a moment later.

Then he slowly said while looking at the tower with a complicated look in his eyes, ”This is the ancestral treasure of my family. Before my parents passed away, they handed it over to me for safekeeping. Within my family, it was rumoured to be a... Supreme Grade Treasure Artifact, but as you can see, it is badly damaged and has no trace of spirituality left.”

Thump!

Max’s heart skipped a beat when he heard the words ’Supreme Grade Treasure Artifact’. Though this was an unfamiliar term, since there was Supreme in its name, it meant it was a Grade Nine Artifact.

Despite him trying hard to do otherwise, his expression couldn’t help but change. Now, when he looked at the broken tower, there was a heat in his eyes, but there was also slight suspicion.

Noticing this, Ling Han sighed in his heart.

It’s a good thing I didn’t tell him the exact rumor, he thought, inwardly smiling wryly.

In his family, the exact rumour was that this tower was an artifact surpassing Grade Nine—a Godly Artifact. Of course, none believed it, but they knew it was truly an extraordinary artifact.

”If it’s really a Supreme Rank Artifact, how is it your family’s ancestral treasure? Did your family have a Supreme Mage in the past?” Max asked with an impassive expression on his face.

Before he found out it wasn’t only Supreme Mages who could pass down bloodlines, he might have had an easy time believing it if someone told him that their family had a Supreme Mage in their history—because even though rare, there were many who possessed bloodlines.

However, after finding out about it, he didn’t believe so. In fact, he even believed that there were chances that even Emperors in the past might have been able to pass down their bloodline through some mystical techniques that people didn’t know.

So, guessing whether someone had a Supreme Mage in their family through their bloodline was no longer a reliable method in his mind.

Ling Han smiled wryly upon seeing his expression. ”I want to say this is not the case because I know you would have a hard time believing it, but it’s the truth. My family did indeed have Supreme Mages in the past.”

Max nodded in response and smiled lightly while the look in his eyes deepened. ”If it was anyone else, I might not have believed them, but I believe you.”

Though he had limited interaction with him, he could tell despite his easy-going and somewhat submissive personality, Ling Han was an astute person. If there was no substance behind the rumors in his family, he definitely wouldn’t have believed them. Since he did so, he also chose to do the same.

Moreover, whether he believed it or not wouldn’t make much of a difference when it came to deciding to help him.

Ling Han was visibly surprised, but he quickly smiled gratefully. After pausing for a moment, he began speaking.

”A hundred or so years ago, my Ling Family used to be quite powerful. We had multiple Emperor mages in our ranks. However, like most powers, we also had enemies who suddenly struck us and killed most of my family members. Only my grandfather and my father managed to survive that calamity and escaped from the Inner sector.”

As he said this, there was not much sadness in his eyes. Max understood why this was so. He hadn’t been born then, and those you didn’t know, you wouldn’t feel sad for—no matter what happened to them.

”My family hid here and there. Many years later, my father fell in love with my mother and they got married and had two children—me and my younger sister.

They had thought our family’s enemies would forget us because my grandfather and father, although from the main branch of the family, weren’t too prominent, but they were wrong. Over ten years ago, they found us, and in battle, my grandfather, father, and mother were killed—but before they died, they had safely sent us away.”

Ling Han paused after saying this and closed his eyes for a moment, most likely to hide his pain and rage.

He then continued, ”While trying to find a place to live in, my sister and I ended up here. While life was difficult, because we had enough mana stones, we didn’t suffer much.

But then a few years later, things changed for worse. When I returned one evening, I found my sister unconscious in her room. Her body was freezing, and on her neck were some black lines.”

”I had her checked up. Many doctors didn’t even know what was wrong with her, but then I eventually found out she was cursed. I desperately tried to find a cure for her but there was none—because curses are almost non-existent in the Central Plains.”

Sighing, he continued, ”I could see the black lines spreading day by day—the curse was strengthening. And as it did so, my sister became increasingly weaker. Of course, the fact she had been unconscious and wasn’t able to eat or drink is one of the main reasons.

Because I couldn’t leave my sister alone, nor could I take her with me, I couldn’t go to the Inner sector. But I did visit several border towns and tried asking experts that came from the Inner sector and the desolate region—and it was from them I found out the Cursemancers had been eradicated several thousand years ago.

After finding this out, I had almost lost hope but then... through some lucky coincidence, I managed to activate this Ephemeral Cosmic Tower and it sucked me in.”

’Mm?’

Max’s pupils constricted when he heard this.