Chapter 525 – Tabletop Magic Duel

Chapter 525 – Tabletop Magic Duel

Zelina looked as though she’d just been thoroughly sold on it, and immediately used Dawn Society Magic right then and there, searching through the shop.

“Instant text message delivery? And this cheap?”

Zelina was extremely surprised. She pretended to top up some Gem Coins in the Dawn Society, then “purchased” the Communication Card. She then pulled out her own Witch-version Communication Card—one she had long since figured out how to use—and put on an expression of dawning realization:

“So unlocking the more advanced functions all requires permanent psychic power! No wonder it’s so cheap! How do you add friends on this thing?”

Under Mo Lan’s guidance, the two of them successfully added each other as Communication Card friends.

For the small talk that followed, Zelina was much more composed. She had secured the Sorceress’s friend contact now—later they could chat privately through the cards without worrying about exposing their identities.

She also had the mental bandwidth to think about how to make this meeting of theirs seem more natural.

After some thought—when two advanced mages met, they should probably discuss something related to mage magic, right?

Mo Lan and her companions had only graduated recently. Although they were disguised as mages and looked the part on the surface, they certainly wouldn’t understand certain deeper topics. She couldn’t bring up anything too arcane. Zelina thought it over and came up with a good idea:

“You probably don’t care much for any of these auction items either, right? How about a round of Tabletop Magic Duel?”

Tabletop Magic Duel was a dueling game played between mages. Both duelists drew cards from a deck and battled by playing cards.

Come to think of it, it was somewhat similar to Lady Moira’s cards.

The game tested magical knowledge, spell application, and dueling strategy. The names and effects of spells were all written on the cards, so even an Apprentice could play the role of an advanced mage in a Tabletop Magic Duel, and an advanced mage could very well lose to an Apprentice at the card table.

Moreover, many mage magic effects shared certain similarities with Witch Magic.

Supposedly, Lady Moira had excelled at Witch Magic while still in school, and she had also conceived something as brilliant as the “Dawn Society Plan”—she would surely pick it up easily.

Even if she lost, it wouldn’t be a problem.

“Sure!” Mo Lan actually knew about this tabletop game popular among mages, though she had never played it herself.

That’s right—in her eyes, this was just a tabletop game.

Except that compared to Earth’s tabletop games, Tabletop Magic Duel was more realistic. The rules were all based on real magical principles, and the knowledge involved was real magical knowledge.

Zelina produced a common Elemental Magic card deck. Mage Elemental Magic and Witch Elemental Magic had relatively high similarity, making it the least likely to cause mistakes.

Mo Lan looked through the entire deck from start to finish. “Ready. Let’s begin!”

Zelina specifically called over an attendant to deal the cards.

The auction was still underway, but over here, they had started playing cards.

Three minutes later, Zelina lost.

No matter! It seemed Mo Lan had adapted to this game well—she had made the right choice.

Though it did make herself look less like a proper advanced mage. She was conspicuously bad.

Ten minutes later, Zelina lost again.

She was starting to lose her composure. Who was the one who had been blending in among mages for over a decade here?!

Half an hour later, Zelina had already forgotten that she was supposed to go easy on Mo Lan, who had only recently emerged from the Wilds and shouldn’t be challenged with advanced magical knowledge. She was pouring her heart and soul into the cards in her hand. She couldn’t lose every single round! That would be too humiliating!

An hour later, Zelina was losing so badly she was questioning her existence.

Every single play Mo Lan made was supremely decisive, as if she hadn’t even thought before playing her card—yet somehow she finished the battle swiftly every time.

No matter what magic combination Zelina chose, Mo Lan could precisely identify the counter-strategy and utterly annihilate her.

“I’m done!” Zelina felt that if she lost any more, she wouldn’t be able to show her face in public.

Mo Lan silently apologized to her. There was a reason she hadn’t gone easy even once. With such a perfect opportunity today, so many mages gathered in one place—how could a stingy wild mage like her let it go to waste?

She said, “Zelina, your specialty is fire-element magic? I noticed you always tend to pick fire-element magic cards.”

“That’s right.” As a Witch, Zelina was also more proficient in fire-element magic, so her disguise was that of a mage specializing in fire-element magic.

“Pure fire-element magic has plenty of destructive power, but lacks mobility, and the consumption is too high—the cost-efficiency is just too low. That’s why your psychic power cards always run out so quickly. You really need to combine it with other types of magic for better versatility. It doesn’t have to be mid-to-high-level magic—sometimes even an Apprentice-level spell can produce remarkably effective results at a much better cost-efficiency ratio,” Mo Lan said. “Have you read Alan Graham’s Mo Lan spoke. “Have you read Alan Graham’s 《Cost-Efficient Spell Combinations Centered on Fire-Element Magic》?”

Zelina paused, then shook her head. She really hadn’t read it.

“Then let me give you a rough overview…” Mo Lan began her explanation.

Zelina listened with a feeling of sudden enlightenment.

She was also a wild mage.

A genuine wild mage—the kind who had figured everything out entirely on her own from start to finish.

She hadn’t originally planned to disguise herself as a mage. It was just that she had happened to take a magical aptitude test in a small town, and unexpectedly, the testers hadn’t detected that she was a Witch at all.

So she had naturally continued traveling through human nations under a human identity.

Her fire-element affinity was extremely high, and her initial psychic power was decent as well. It was only because she was too old to enroll in a magic academy that she had been learning bit by bit using human mage methods.

But self-study always lacked proper direction, and the resources available to a wild mage were limited. Besides, her real energy wasn’t focused on this anyway. Compared to being a mage, she was more interested in making money—it was just that in human nations, having a mage’s identity made things more convenient.

So while she appeared to be an advanced mage on the surface, her actual mage ability was only at the Beginner level. The rest was all Witch Magic disguised as mage magic.

But unexpectedly, listening to Mo Lan’s explanation, she genuinely felt like she was learning something.

Whenever she didn’t understand something, she would follow up with a question, and Mo Lan could actually give her a detailed, well-sourced explanation.

It was like listening to an Instructor lecture?

This must be what it was like when a mage Instructor taught Apprentices!

Supposedly, powerful mages all possessed incredibly strong psychic power and vast knowledge, and even casually explaining something could greatly inspire their Apprentices.

Zelina was experiencing exactly that kind of profound inspiration right now.

She even noticed that many of the mages who had come to attend the auction were no longer paying attention to the auction at all, and were instead eavesdropping on their conversation.

Though she didn’t know how Mo Lan managed it, she finally realized that Mo Lan’s understanding of the mage magic system far surpassed her own.

She also tentatively asked some additional questions—puzzles she had long been unable to find answers to.

Mo Lan answered every one of them.

Having served as her Instructor for a round of questions, by the time all doubts were resolved, the auction was drawing to a close. Only then did Mo Lan reveal her true intentions.