MMORPG: Rise of the Primordial Godsmith-Chapter 1759: What is a Mystic Rune? (3)

As the question left his mouth, Ataraxia stared at the construct in front of him once more.

Keeping an eye on its changes after shifting its form, the young man eventually dispelled it, letting out a faint sigh the moment he did so.

"What am I missing, exactly?" he asked himself in a whisper, closing his eyes for a bit as he thought back to all of the knowledge he had accumulated on the matter thus far.

"From what Marcus had shown me, a Mystic Rune is the ideal form Mystic Energy takes on once it is infused with a certain purpose."

Opening his eyes after some time, the young man began to think out loud, hoping to better sort out his understanding in the process.

"Depending on the purpose that it is infused with, the shape of the Mystic Rune can vary."

However, that does not mean that the shape is fixed. One could still modify its shape after the Mystic Energy takes on its form. The only caveat is that certain aspects of the infused purpose would be lost, reducing the rune's efficacy."

As these words left his mouth, Ataraxia went ahead and summoned the Mystic Rune that was associated with the Mystic Rune Alchemist subclass, willing it into existence within a matter of seconds.

Whoosh!

Staring at the same exact rune he had summoned over a couple thousand times at this point, it went without saying that the young man had gained a deeper understanding of how it operated.

"Although modifying its shape does reduce the efficacy in some way, once integrated into something like the Mystic Alchemical Rune, the loss in efficacy becomes negligible thanks to the communication between the various runes."

Sending out a number of wisps of Mystic Energy towards the rune, he then proceeded to break the rune down into its more basic parts. "In the case of the Mystic Alchemical Rune, the rune that takes on that loss would be the one bridging the three parts making up the entire rune."

"Though, thanks to the three parts forming a synergistic connection, that loss was instead transformed into a gain, increasing the overall efficacy of the rune in fulfilling its intended purpose."

Swoosh! 𝒇𝒓𝒆𝒆𝙬𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝓸𝒎

Continuing to manipulate more and more wisps to dissect the rune, Ataraxia eventually broke the Mystic Alchemical Rune down to their more basic counterparts, its current state nowhere near what it was before.

Seeing that most of the basic runes were just duplicates of other basic runes, the young man proceeded to remove all of the redundant runes after that, showing great expertise as he used bits of Mystic Energy to remove the runes in small batches.

By the time a few minutes had passed, he was only left with nine runes.

"Man…" Staring at the nine runes in front of him, the young man let out a soft sigh. "After spending a month studying it inside and out, I've discovered the basic runes that make up the foundation of the Mystic Alchemical Rune."

"Yet, even after spending another month on it, I've never made any progress past that," he muttered, a slightly forlorn expression appearing on his face. "All I know is that these runes are the building blocks."

"I don't even have a clue as to what each of the basic runes do."

Letting out yet another sigh as the hopelessness of his endeavor began to kick in, Ataraxia dispelled the basic runes that lingered in the air before proceeding to conjure yet another copy of the Mystic Alchemical Rune.

Dissecting and conjuring the rune a couple more times, the young man intently stared at the rune during every attempt, hoping that he might figure out something different after spending enough tries on it.

Yet, even after spending another couple days on it, he still remained unsuccessful.

"It's useless."

Laying on the iridescent plains of the Mystic Plane after his continuous failures, Ataraxia stared off into the distance, a number of thoughts circling in his mind.

"Should've realized it was a fruitless endeavor from the start," he muttered to himself, a bitter chuckle escaping his lips. "After all, there's no way someone like me could comprehend something that touches upon the secrets of the universe."

"…Or so you'd think."

Not expecting someone to respond to his monologue, Ataraxia paused for a bit before sitting upright to look at the one that responded to his words.

Seeing that it was Marcus, a wry smile soon appeared on his face. "Were you here this whole time?"

The man shook his head. "Just before you began to say dissecting the Mystic Rune was hopeless."

"Is it not, though?" asked the young man in return.

"I… can't say that it is since I haven't delved into it that deeply before," said Marcus as he gave the question some thought. "But think about it for a bit."

"If it really was hopeless, would you have been able to break down the Mystic Rune to that degree?" the man reminded him. "Would you have been able to figure out the runes that form the foundation of the rune I made?"

"I understand, but…" At that moment, Ataraxia felt like he was at a crossroads. "I've been studying the Mystic Rune for the past couple of months nonstop. What can I even do at this point?"

"Probably nothing," replied Marcus after a bit of silence, causing the hopelessness the young man felt towards the matter to intensify.

"However…"

Whoosh!

"That doesn't mean I can't help."

Just as the latter expected the former to continue talking about how worthless his efforts were, the former instead summoned the nine basic runes Ataraxia had obtained after dissecting the Mystic Alchemical Runes thousands of times.

Swoosh! Swoosh!

Arranging the nine basic runes in a line, Marcus stared at them one by one for a bit before proceeding to separate them in a seemingly random order.

"Out of the nine runes you ended up obtaining, there's a group of four that give me the same feeling, then there's a trio that give me a different feeling."

As those words left his mouth, Marcus moved the runes he mentioned closer towards Ataraxia, only to then amplify the feeling the runes gave off.

"Other than that, the two remaining runes give off an entirely unique feeling on their own," he said, letting the latter familiarize himself with the two groups before swapping them with the two individual runes.

"In a way, the two runes feel like they're the actual base that make the rune possible… yet for some reason, the other runes also give off the feeling that their inclusion makes the rune possible."

As Marcus' explanation lingered in his ears, Ataraxia continued to stare at the two individual runes the former brought up for him to look, getting the feeling that he was coming close to understanding something crucial.

Thankfully, as the man continued to describe the feeling each rune gave him, everything eventually clicked into place in the young man's head, prompting a look of realization to appear on his face as he stared at a certain rune.

"Purify…"

…

…

Ding!