Wizard Bloodline

Soraya shook her head slightly.

"Bloodline transplantation isn't something easily achieved."

"The Kachin family spent hundreds of years and several generations, only to scratch the surface."

"Only after I took over the Kachin family did we make some progress, but it still falls far short of true bloodline transplantation."

Soraya thought for a moment, retrieving a small box about a foot square from her spatial ring and handing it to Ronan.

"If you're interested, take a look yourself. I was planning to ask for your input. If we manage to obtain the essence blood of the third-level Frost-scaled Python with a trace of the ancient Ice Crystal Serpent bloodline, it would be a shame to use it solely for 'talent transplantation.'"

Ronan accepted the box, thanking Soraya.

Just then, a figure approached from the other end of the corridor.

It was Lady Reeve.

Upon closer inspection, Ronan noticed that Lady Reeve bore a striking resemblance to Soraya in her youth—the girl in the painting—with the main differences being in hair and eye color.

Of course, their personalities and temperaments were also quite different.

"Grandmother."

Lady Reeve approached and bowed her head in greeting to Soraya.

She seemed to fear Soraya greatly, standing before her with none of the poise or charm of the manor's mistress, appearing rather stiff and even anxious.

"Hmm."

Soraya's attitude towards Lady Reeve was icy, despite the latter being her true blood relative. Ronan saw no affection from Soraya towards Lady Reeve, unlike the warmth she showed him.

"From now on, Linus is half the master of Cold Stone Manor."

Soraya's words made Lady Reeve jerk her head up in shock.

Soraya seemed oblivious to her reaction, offering no explanation, merely stating calmly, "In my absence, you all must follow his will."

With that, Soraya looked at Ronan, her gaze turning gentle, a stark contrast to her demeanor towards Lady Reeve.

"I'm going to visit some friends; it will take a few days. If you need anything, tell Reeve, and she'll accommodate you."

"Yes, Aunt Soraya."

Ronan nodded. He couldn't see Lady Reeve's expression but sensed her body trembling slightly, clearly struggling to process the sudden, dramatic change.

Ronan mused silently.

He called Soraya "Aunt," and Soraya was Lady Reeve's grandmother, making him Lady Reeve's uncle by extension?!

Life is full of surprises.

Night fell.

The warm light from the thermostat array softly illuminated a corner of the large room.

Ronan sat at a heavy desk. The walls were adorned with beautiful tapestries and paintings, while the wind and snow beat against the large bay window.

By the light of a crystal lamp, Ronan slowly examined the contents of the box Soraya had given him.

It contained comprehensive information on "talent transplantation" and "bloodline transplantation."

"So that's what 'talent transplantation' and 'bloodline transplantation' are all about."

Ronan pushed aside a pile of rune stones, gazing at the snowstorm outside, rubbing his temples lightly.

Everyone had imagined "talent transplantation" to be mysterious and profound.

In essence, the method was rooted in runeology.

White Stone Castle's "talent transplantation" originated from an ancient wizard's private secret realm, where the first explorers discovered a rune called [Cold Soul].

This rune could extract an ice magical beast's innate traits, applying them like a soul rune to oneself.

However, it couldn't be condensed as a normal soul rune because [Cold Soul] required the beast's soul and blood for condensation and was consumable.

According to the ancient wizard's notes, [Cold Soul] was immensely powerful, allowing its wielder to harness various ice magical beasts' abilities and spells, effectively granting countless skills.

The downside was that once [Cold Soul] was depleted, new magical beast blood and soul were needed for re-condensation.

Despite this, [Cold Soul] remained an unparalleled top-tier rune, especially for wizards specializing in ice spells.

The first explorers who obtained this legacy were ecstatic. After internal strife and battles, the survivors decided to share the rune.

They formed a soul contract, ensuring none would divulge the legacy.

These explorers were the ancestors of several major wizard families in White Stone Castle.

Under normal circumstances, this land would quickly see the rise of several ice wizards from the same spell lineage, with "Cold" becoming renowned.

However, fate played a cruel joke on these fortunate souls—they obtained the core [Cold Soul] rune but couldn't find a way in the legacy to perfectly embed the condensed [Cold Soul] into their mental and soul crystals!

A crucial missing step forced them to regroup.

They settled in one place, collaboratively researching and interpreting the legacy, striving to find the correct method for rune embedding.

Thus, a wizard enclave governed by several families gradually formed.

Over generations, these family wizards discovered a way to barely utilize [Cold Soul]—embedding its rune during the crystallization of mental power and solidification of soul runes.

This is why White Stone Castle's "talent transplantation" is only feasible at certain stages, such as first-level wizards advancing to second-level, as these are moments when new mental power crystals are formed.

While this method addressed the critical rune embedding issue, it revealed new problems.

For instance, since [Cold Soul] wasn't a true soul rune but an alien rune formed from beast blood and soul, embedding it into one's mental power crystal inevitably caused mental and soul power pollution.

Polluted mental and soul power resulted in increased mental and soul impurities, leading to difficulty advancing and, in severe cases, soul decay and power regression.

Although generations of optimization by the major wizard families significantly mitigated this issue, each embedding still left some residual impurities, making it challenging to remain unaffected after two or three embeddings.

The collective stance of White Stone Castle's wizard families was that it could only be embedded once.

The strict limit on embedding frequency and the cumbersome process reduced a powerful rune's potential to mere adequacy.

Who knows what the explorers who died in the initial secret realm exploration and internal conflicts would think of the current state?

The box Soraya gave contained a blank rune stone with the [Cold Soul] rune's pattern.

Ronan picked up the rune stone, examining the rune's entirety.

[Cold Soul]'s complexity and mystery were second only to the core runes he'd seen within the Myriad Orb.

It resembled a twisted, vibrating droplet, with each rune line inside exuding mystery and coldness.

"Can't be condensed as a soul rune; I wonder if it can be enchanted onto magical tools?"

Ronan mused, memorizing the rune, then picked up the information on "bloodline transplantation."

As one of the original [Cold Soul] rune contract holders, the Kachin family abandoned this path early on, unable to find a perfect embedding method, and ventured into another field.

They drew inspiration from [Cold Soul]'s rune traits, attempting to apply extracted magical beast blood directly to the body for bloodline transplantation.

Transplanting magical beast blood into humans has always been a hot topic in wizard body modification.

With [Cold Soul] rune support, the Kachin family's initial research progressed smoothly.

They envisaged preserving magical beast bloodlines in rune form within the body, activating this "bloodline rune" like a soul rune when needed. The resulting power far exceeded simple "talent transplantation."

However, post-activation, controlling the rampant magical beast bloodline became a significant issue.

Residual magical beast blood uncontrollably drove the recipient's body towards "monster" transformation.

The beast's wild and violent traits in the bloodline even affected consciousness, risking turning official wizards into instinct-driven "beasts."

The Kachin family conducted numerous human experiments, starting with civilians, then wizard apprentices, and finally official wizards.

The family maintained some ethics, selecting test subjects from within their ranks or enemy captives for official wizard experiments.

The Kachin family's decline was partly due to diverting massive resources into bloodline transplantation research and using family members as test subjects.

This research only made breakthrough progress under Soraya's leadership.

"According to Soraya's understanding...

True bloodline transplantation involves fully analyzing a bloodline, then modifying one's own to replicate its powerful traits."

Ronan agreed with Soraya's perspective.

To him, the Kachin family's previous actions were akin to randomly injecting blood into someone, hoping for the desired mutation.

A matter of pure luck!

No scientific basis!

Even modern medicine knows about blood transfusion reactions and tests blood types beforehand.

However, while Soraya's view was correct, she couldn't achieve what she suggested.

Merely analyzing a bloodline's essence exceeded a third-level wizard's capabilities. She could only continue "gambling" on the Kachin family's experiments.

But Soraya was wise, refining the "bloodline transplantation" process.

She broke down the "bloodline rune" activation into a gradual release, from small to large, weak to strong.

The first step released a minimal amount of magical beast bloodline into the subject. Once fully integrated, more was released, continuing the process.

If any uncontrollable situation arose, the "transplantation experiment" could be halted at the current stage.

"This approach sounds much more reliable."

Soraya cleverly stopped seeking test subjects within the Kachin family or capturing civilians and wandering wizards.

She used "bloodline transplantation's" allure to attract power-hungry official wizards as willing test subjects, reducing trouble and expanding the test pool to second-level wizards.

The second-level wizard Yukik, whom Ronan met, was a typical willing participant in the "bloodline transplantation" experiment.

Soraya concluded her documentation with her insights and plans.

For the Kachin family's "bloodline transplantation" to succeed, several conditions must be met:

First, the transplanted bloodline must be pure.

Low-level magical beast bloodlines are too mixed, complicating the fusion process and making outcomes unpredictable. Therefore, bloodline purity is crucial.

Second, the recipient's body must be strong.

A strong body indicates a powerful inherent bloodline, better suited to endure and integrate foreign bloodlines.

A frail body will be overrun by powerful beast blood, spiraling into deformity and monstrosity.

Third, the recipient's will must be strong.

Only a strong will can withstand the beast's wild and violent traits, preventing "bestial" takeover and managing bodily changes during fusion.

Meeting these three criteria offers a slim chance of true bloodline transplantation success.

Ronan gently set down the documents, his eyes flickering.

With his [Immaculate Body], he met Soraya's latter two criteria.

If the third-level Frost-scaled Python with a trace of the ancient Ice Crystal Serpent bloodline Soraya mentioned was pure enough...

"Then I'm the most perfect bloodline transplantation test subject to date..."

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