235 Mirror Image (1/2)

It truly was the power of an Archmage.

Lys stood there in a daze, panicking.

Lys was a Master Alchemist, so how could he not know the importance of having high levels of magic power when cracking arrays? It could be said that when two alchemists of similar rank faced the same array, the intensity of one's mana would decide the final outcome of the contest.

Especially in this situation where one was a 9th Rank Great Mage and the other was an Archmage.

They simply didn't have the same starting line.

The advantages of an Archmage were too great. Insight, knowledge, experience… They far surpassed a 9th Rank Great Mage… Not to mention, an Archmage's understanding of laws wasn't something a Great Mage could imagine. Any of these advantages would be enough to change the outcome.

Moreover, this was assuming that they were competing with an ordinary array.

If it was a maze-type or illusion-type array, the gap between them would be unimaginably wide. A gap of two ranks was like a death sentence to a Great Mage. The Archmage could effortlessly deal with them.

At first, Lys hadn't quite understood why Fran had offered to compete with Merlin. After all, even Suyass, whose alchemy skill far surpassed Fran's, had no choice but to humbly concede. Why did Fran became so bold?

But Lys now understood.

It turned out that Fran had already reached the Archmage realm...

”Fran, you hid yourself quite well…” Lys squeezed those words out.

There was no suspense in this alchemy competition. Fran would have to be an idiot if he couldn't win.

The fact that he had proposed such an unfair competition made Lys feel utterly disgusted with Fran.

No, it wasn't just Lys.

At this time, everyone in the exploration team was looking at Fran.

There normally would have been nothing wrong with hiding his true power. After all, no one wanted to show all their cards.

But Fran was too excessive this time.

The joint exploration team had gone through a lot. From the flock of Thunderbirds till now, they had pushed through so many challenging fights, yet Fran had kept hiding among them without revealing his true strength despite Merlin and Suyass charging ahead to do their best.

And now, Fran finally revealed his strength, but for no other reason than to fight over the spoils with Merlin.

”Regardless of who cracks the array first, we, the Silver Moon Mercenaries, will only recognize the previous agreement.” Sasu was the first to speak out.

It was also a bit strange.

At first, when the Gilded Rose was only a third-rate alchemy shop, the leader of that top mercenary group decided to ally with the Gilded Rose over a Ghost Potion. At the time, many people had said that a pie fell out of the sky for the Gilded Rose.

But the events that followed showed that the truly lucky ones were the Silver Moon Mercenary Group.

It was the same now. Facing Fran, who had just revealed his strength as an Archmage, Sasu didn't even have to think about it as he stood with Lin Yun. Others tended to be unable to comprehend why every time Lin Yun was in trouble, he would stand with him.

”Our Flash Arrow Mercenary Group is the same.”

”Same for our Viper Nest.”

”You can add our Black Horn Auction House too.”

”You can count on the Sage Tower.”

...

In an instant, of the eight major forces of Thousand Sails City gathered, seven of them already declared their intention to stand with Lin Yun. The only remaining one was the Elder High Mage of the Monchi Family. After a bit of hesitation, he finally clenched his teeth and weakly raised his hand to indicate that he stood together with the other seven forces.