Chapter 636: Civilization’s Evolution

Translator: imperfectluck Editor: Kurisu

When the dimensions became unstable, when countless nightmarish creatures arrived in the mortal plane, countless powerful individuals who had been in long hibernation or hermitage raised their heads to look at the skies in the southwest of Eich.

The stars themselves were also pointing at the dimensional invaders there. This place was the source of the change. Powerful individuals could discern the direction to the battlefield even with their eyes closed.

The fluctuation of the elements was now no mere small tides. The changes were like tremendous tidal waves, each higher than the previous. These dimensional invaders had broken the dimensional walls of Order around Eich. Immeasurable amounts of elemental power poured into the mortal plane. The period of high magic had truly arrived again.

Ancient dragons awoke from their long slumber and stepped out of their nests. Ancient species hidden deep in forests and mountains walked out again. These powerful creatures only capable of surviving in high magic environments had finally entered their generation again.

Meanwhile, in the chaotic sky, our airship squadron which consisted of seven motherships met with some trouble.

This wasn’t because of any malfunctions. Instead, since the Elemental Tide had suddenly increased by such a great amount, all of the magical engines suddenly started working with several times the previous power. The airships all suddenly rose up much higher, and zoomed above the clouds.

Thankfully, we had already planned for the sudden rise in the Elemental Tide. All the airship pilots were veterans. They acted according to plan and turned off the sub-engines in time, adjusting the airships’ balance and steadying the center of gravity. The mage towers also activated anti-gravity magic spells in time. Thus, the laughable situation of all of us crashing and dying before we even met the enemy was averted.

However, while we were prepared beforehand for this, it wasn’t the same for others. All other magical airships would be in great danger, and flying magical beasts which relied on magic to fly, even including dragons, were commonly losing their sense of balance in midair and spinning down, crashing into the ground.

To use an analogy from Earth, this was as if the value of gravity and an airplane’s engine output suddenly all changed simultaneously. Unless you were prepared beforehand, it would only be natural for there to suddenly be many airplane accidents.

If Eich had the concept of insurance companies, just the payouts from today would likely make any insurance company bankrupt many times over.

“Heeheehee, such a majestic scene…”

Our airships were fine, but, as expected, the black and red dragons crashed down into the ground. Still, judging from their energetic roars, my guess was that none of the dragons died from the impact.

“You must have done this on purpose. Why didn’t you warn our dragons about this?”

“No, I did warn them about this.”

Still, of course I had done this on purpose. Our hired black and red dragons were all incredibly arrogant. When I requested that they temporarily stay inside the airships for the sake of their own safety, they all laughed at me, telling me that I didn’t understand aerial battles, because I didn’t have wings. “We won’t feel safe inside an iron lump”, “We’ll all be finished if we’re suddenly ambushed”, and so on were their comments. Now, I was having fun watching how they would fly even though they had wings.

Any older dragon with plenty of combat experience would naturally know how to readjust their balance in midair. Also, any older dragon who knew of my reputation and temper would never ignore my words. But, these younger dragons were all only one or two hundred years old at the most… Heehee, I bet they enjoyed the sensation of a bungee jump with no rope.

Even if other flying magical beasts weren’t flying that high, it was likely that they would die if they crashed into the ground from their height. However, all dragons knew how to buff their physical bodies with magic spells. They would also be able to cast some magic spells before the impact to mitigate it. That was why no dragon was likely to die from the impact. However, it was natural that they would still be in great pain.

Now that our dragons had all fallen to the ground, our airship squadron naturally needed to stop and reorganize. It wasn’t only the dragons that needed to rest and recover.

The difference between a high magic and low magic environment would be the difference between ancient Earth and modern-day Earth. The difference in “oxygen”, to use an analogy, in the environment would mean a tremendous difference in the physical traits of the main ruling species. The most direct comparison I could make would be to say that it would be the difference in physical body between a dinosaur’s body and a modern-day human’s body. Since the ancient beasts of Eich no longer had sufficient “oxygen” to support them, their overly powerful physical bodies were unable to get accustomed to the ever-worsening environment. Finally, these ancient species all disappeared from history.

But now, the oxygen level… or magic level had returned to the high magic level of ancient times. The ancient species had returned from their hibernation or hermitage. A fierce battle between dinosaurs and humans was about to begin.

When considering the most dangerous levels of the Chaos Abyss that were coming here, those residents that even I considered highly dangerous, the difference between those demons and the main residents of the mortal plane was probably even larger than the difference between that of dinosaurs and humans back on Earth.

This would be no exaggeration. For quite a long period of time now, only the top-level Legend-ranked individuals would dare to venture into the Chaos Abyss, and only in teams with other similarly strong individuals. Even the ordinary residents of the Chaos Abyss would be truly troublesome for such teams to deal with. Meanwhile, there was still the issue of the Chaos Abyss’s top-level strength. Not to mention, the Chaos Main Gods along with all the Demon Lords would all be incredibly difficult to deal with.

The most basic foundational difference would be the difference in strength of foot soldiers. 80% of mortal plane residents went about their ordinary daily lives every day. Rather than worrying whether they would be suddenly devoured by some hungry demon, they were more worried about the price of food on the market, price inflation of luxury goods, and so on. War was only the responsibility of warriors.

However, this type of daily life would be seen as far too naïve in the lower planes. There was no such thing as someone who wasn’t a warrior in the Chaos Abyss. Every single existence down there would need to fight for its own survival. Every single scrap of food or gulp of water would need to be fought for with your life. Not to mention, you would need to slaughter and devour in order to evolve and obtain the strength to survive.

Placing mortal plane and Chaos Abyss residents in the same world would be the equivalent of placing a rampaging hungry dragon in the same cage as an ordinary person who was unarmed. The end result would be quite obvious.

And now, since the restriction of “not enough magic level in the atmosphere” had been completely eliminated, ancient beasts who hid in the Chaos Abyss had returned to the mortal plane. Not only that, Cynthia, the Goddess of Chaos who had always restrained the scale of the Holy War, had disappeared. It was likely that there would be absolutely zero balance in this war between “dinosaurs” and “humans”. This war would continue in the cruelest fashion until one side was completely annihilated.

However, all hope wasn’t lost…

“Hurry, drag out those big pieces in the airship warehouses.”

The airships stopped on a patch of grassy plains. Dwarf and goblin engineers were working swiftly as they dragged out various strangely shaped equipment and weaponry.

The next generation magic crystal cannons, the 2nd edition magic energy condensing heavy cannons. Not only could these cannons consume mana or magic metals to fire powerful shots, they were even capable of absorbing elemental power from the air to power up their cannon shots. The longer the cannon charged for, the more powerful the attack would be. However, in the low magic environment, the 2nd edition magic cannon was actually even weaker than the 1st edition.

But now that we were in a high magic environment, the maximum power of this cannon’s attack would be more than triple its previous one. It would be no joke to say that a single cannon shot would be capable of destroying an entire castle wall.

Crystallized armor. These were defensive armors constructed out of countless smaller magical shields. This armor was stronger defensively by more than several times when compared to the current strongest known alloys. Yet, this armor had only half their weight. Still, without a doubt, this armor would use up a tremendous amount of energy to power it. However, in front of the next new pieces of equipment, its energy consumption would seem like nothing.

Mana crystal core engine 3rd edition (high magic environment usage only). Anti-gravity engine 3rd edition (high magic environment usage only). These engines were no different from their previous editions. But, you probably understand just from the name that these engines had been prepared for the high magic environment of the Holy War. These engines were far more powerful, and also used far more energy.

K3 rocket shooting system, goblin sniper helicopters, and so on… Various new theoretical weapons prepared for the new generation were taken out of the warehouses. They had been waiting for this day for far too long.

In the game’s history, when the hopeless Holy War finally began, magical engineering reached an era of great development. When the Chaos Faction sent countless nightmarish creatures, the high magic environment ushered in a battle involving the newest high magic technologies.

The foundational source of making all this high magic technology possible was still the Olivia’s Magic Box from ten years ago. It was the Olivia’s Magic Box’s invention that caused the extravagant but impractical goblin engineering and alchemy to combine together, creating the brand-new field of magical engineering. This also caused magic swordsmen equipped with magically engineered weapons and equipment to gradually replace the pure warriors and knights of old.

This was no coincidence. This was the decision made by the generation itself. In a high magic environment, the power of magic would be greatly amplified, meaning that pure melee job classes or ranger types would be greatly weakened. Changing oneself and controlling some power over the elements through magical engineering equipment was a definite choice that warriors who still wanted to do battle would make.

Thanks to my involvement, Olivia’s Magic Box invention was brought forward by a decade. Magical engineering should have only started its development after the Holy War began, but it was now everywhere already. In that case, that also meant that the invention of all these weapons and equipment, along with the rise of new magic swordsmen job classes like Four Elemental Swordcaster, had also occurred ten or more years before it should. In fact, all of this occurred even before the high magic environment arrived!

The seeds I planted back then had finally sprouted.

And so, the moment that the Elemental Tide started rising with the Holy War’s arrival, our Mist Alliance airship squadron had long been prepared, and started changing out all equipment. Although these new theoretical weapons would be far more powerful, it was only natural that they would also have many undiscovered problems. However, we had no free time to be testing everything right now. We would have to check the new equipment’s functions and gradually improve them in actual combat.

“Even if this entire airship squadron is lost in battle, it will all be worth it as long as we can gain the actual combat data.”

From a certain standpoint, the Holy War was indeed a battle between the Goddess of Order and the Goddess of Chaos.

While the Chaos Faction was using the law of the jungle where the strong preyed on the weak to achieve the ultimate individual evolution, the Order Faction was also evolving. What the Order Faction evolved was the entire society as well as civilization. Perhaps the Order Faction individuals’ strength would be far weaker overall than the powerful individuals from ancient times, but every technological advancement and revolution would mean progress for the entire civilization. Also, the evolution of the civilization would also mean concrete power.

This wasn’t limited to only humans. The Great Demon Empire’s advancements in voodoo magic and witchcraft, the Haletdam scholars generation’s advancements in alchemy and soul research, the dwarves’ smithing of stones and metal, the Undead Tark Republic’s research of undead magic and the nature of death, and so on were all such examples. However, in this generation, the combination of magic and engineering made magical engineering into the new spoiled child of the current generation.

I could only exclaim at the busy scene before me. I was both happy and pained.

I was happy that we had managed to keep up progress on par with the new generation and even becoming the leading innovators. I was pained because what I really believed in had taken such a major hit again, a really severe one this time… What I meant was that swordsmanship would probably become outdated. When a Sword Saint who worked hard at swordsmanship for decades could no longer compare to a newbie magical swordsman equipped with a magic sword, who would still be willing to spend so much effort on learning swordsmanship?

“In the future, it’s likely that basic swordsmanship classes will involve teaching meditation and magic sword control.”

As an aside, mages, the main users of magic, would also naturally become the spoiled children of this new generation. Their magical power and mana regeneration would be greatly improved, while mana consumption would be greatly decreased. Reaching the next power level or developing new spells would also become incredibly easy for them.

Not to mention, there were summoners, soul mages, demon warlocks, and other such mages who were connected to other dimensions. It would become far easier than before to borrow power from powerful existences in other dimensions. Additionally, since magic had greatly improved in power, with basically 2×2 = quadruple power, mages would become incredibly strong.

Casually being able to summon an entire horde of cannon fodder, or casually casting meteor showers, blizzards, thunderstorms, and so on? Bullying melee job classes would become far too easy. Pure warriors could finally compete with summoned creatures for the job of cannon fodder.

“Alright, as expected, Riot really hates fighters and loves their mages. The mages are overpowered, so let’s nerf Irelia…”

Cough, I was getting off topic. Just like in any game, there would always be some job class at the top. Since the current game patch favored mages, those who went against the flow… Well, I probably wouldn’t need to explain the ending of idiots who tried to play other job classes that weren’t the most powerful in this generation.

Since it was now a high magic generation, we would need to get accustomed to this.

Still, thanks to my knowledge of what would happen beforehand from the so-called “game walkthrough” that Astrya had provided me with, along with our war practice in the high magic environment of Dragon World before I transformed it into Hell, the Mist Alliance was far more accustomed to the high magic environment than anyone else in the mortal plane. That was the advantage of being a beta tester.

When I came back to my senses, the engineers were still busy working, while Little Red was scolding the young dragons who had arrogantly refused to listen to my advice and ended up falling down so painfully. The mages and warriors were also doing their best to get used to the new environment. Meanwhile, Harloys was also incredibly delighted.

As she was a pure mage, nothing could make her happier than a high magic generation. Not only that, this high magic generation was different from all others before it. The power of the elements no longer had any limitations whatsoever. This was the strongest high magic generation in all of history.

“I declare that the elves’ magic generation has arrived!”

Although her face was filled with worry as if she was anxious for the Moonwheel Capital elves, I could tell through our soul connection that she was absolutely delighted.

Indeed, what she said made sense. Humans had learned their magic from the elves. There were also plenty of top-level elven mages. Not only that, the elves also had many mystical secrets passed down from long inheritances. This indeed seemed like the most appropriate generation for an elven magical civilization.

After so many high magic and medium magic level Holy Wars, it was likely that the elves had plenty of ancient magic spells in their warehouses. As long as they used them properly, it seemed that their entire species could soon flourish again.

However, I knew that this would be impossible.

“Harloys, you’re wrong. In the game’s history, the elves were finished before they could do much. That’s because they’ve hardly ever had any contact with magically engineered products.”

“What? Why?”

“Magical engineering is the product of magic and engineering. What do you think those traditionalist elves think of engineered machinery? How many goblin engineers can tolerate the elves’ attitude? Also, magical engineering has greatly decreased the difference in combat strength between individuals. Do you really think that it is a good thing for the elves who have low population but more elite fighters?”

Harloys contemplated over this deeply. The current her truly did seem like the Elven Empress. After a while, she lifted her head again. Her pretty face was filled with resolution as if she had come to a decision.

“This time, that won’t happen. At least, the elves under me won’t be rejecting change that this generation will bring.”

“Yep, of course. We’ve long since changed the game’s history. The future is in our hands.”

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