Lord of Arcane

Chapter 396 Trend Detection
"There is no direct contact!"

"No direct connection?" De Parker frowned. He didn't think Xia Duo would waste his time to amuse him, but he couldn't figure out what the price of magic items had to do with the 'study group'.

The purpose of Xia Duo coming here is to find out the bottom line, to ventilate, not to guess riddles. The logical chain of thinking flashed through his mind, and then he said:

"Times have changed, Master Depak! I don't know if you have ever thought that one day, the price of magic items may be cheaper than raw materials?"

"That's impossible!" De Parker retorted immediately.

Xia Duo shook his head. In fact, it is much more understandable to replace it with "market price" and "cost". The situation of "market price < cost" has happened countless times on Earth.

"Market price" is relatively stable, but for production entities with different technologies, "cost" is a variable.

Selling more and losing money is not a joke, but a possible reality.

In the wizarding world, the current manufacturing of magic items is inseparable from the caster, so the actual pricing is largely determined by the mage, and the proportion of materials is relatively small.

Cost = mage labor + materials.

And the labor cost of a mage is largely proportional to the time the mage spends on production, so in terms of qualitative analysis——

Cost = mage time + materials
Improving production relations is actually reducing the working time of mages, and handing over some work that does not need to be done by high-level mages to low-level mages, or even ordinary people.

And once the productivity changes suddenly, and the mage may even be separated from the specific production link, then the cost is limited to materials.

Of course, Xia Duo did not express the conjecture that future magic items may not need to be made by mages himself, but only mentioned the benefits of improving production relations, as well as the speculation that other mage towers may have been transformed.

And the "study group" is a pilot for the transformation of the tower of time.

Xia Duo will not only try more advanced production methods, but also try more advanced organizational methods to lay the foundation for the next comprehensive transformation.

After speaking, he looked at De Parker, waiting for the other party's reaction.

"Master Xia Duo, I think what you said makes sense, but there is a problem. Doing so will inevitably lead to a large amount of relevant knowledge spreading, which—"

Looking at De Parker's still suspicious expression, Xia Duo sighed deeply in his heart. The prosperity of science and technology and manufacturing on the earth actually allows a considerable degree of public knowledge to exist.

Secret methods and recipes have been replaced by patents.

However, in the magical world, the boundary between theory and technology is not clear. Theory can be directly transformed into technology (spells), and technology is still technology (spells).

To a certain extent, knowledge is equivalent to strength, and it is also the strength of individuals, so most Nether mages are relatively conservative.

Especially the lower you go, the more conservative you are, and you wish you didn't let anyone know about it. It's best to only be a mage, and everyone else is an ordinary person.

This is like on the earth, it is against human nature to get rich first and then get rich. Only people with firm beliefs can really do it. Most rich people, their purpose of existence is to make more money and prevent other People become rich.

And in the wizarding world, visionary people are not absent.

The birth of the Arcane Union is actually the consensus and compromise reached by the powerful spellcasters.From it, Xia Duo faintly saw the prototype of a magical community similar to a scientific community.

It is only short of replacing the Severton Council as the official legal order of Netheril.

The will of the country and the organization does not depend on the will of the individual, even if it is as strong as a great arcanist, as long as the number exceeds one person, they must seek common ground while reserving differences.

Regardless of the external environment, "Netheril" itself has a strong desire for development, but is limited by the current backward production relations, unable to fully liberate productivity and vigorously develop magic civilization.

What Xia Duo is doing now is also in line with the development trend of the current era to a certain extent. The real era is calling!
For De Parker's worries, Xia Duo didn't explain too much, and he felt the bottom and breathed out, so let him think for himself next.

If you go against the trend, you will inevitably be swallowed by the trend.

Of course, even if you follow the trend, you may encounter an undercurrent, the so-called darkness before dawn, which is generally the case.

After leaving from De Parker, it was not too early. After finishing a set of focused training, Xia Duo rested early, but before going to bed, he asked Ta Ling to make an appointment with the other directors of the Tower of Time and the middle-level mages. Meeting the next day.

Mages are busy people, especially mid-level mages. Of course, Xia Duo can go there directly, but if the other party has something important to do, then he might just make the trip in vain.

An appointment is actually a reminder to remind them to spare time in advance.

……

the next day.

There is still no news from Niya's side. On Savile's side, Derrick has already received Xia Duo's instruction to start negotiations with those raw material supplier associations in Savile, trying to re-sign a fixed share supply contract. .

In the Tower of Time, Xia Duo interviewed all the mid-level mages. Of course, unlike the "informed person" like De Parker, Xia Duo did not directly talk about the "study group" for these mid-level mages.

Instead, it is like a daily communication, asking them whether they are satisfied with the current environment, what improvements the Tower of Time needs, etc., just like a boss chatting with an employee.

Intermediate mages are not a closed circle. There will be communication and cooperation between them. The transformation of the Tower of Time is not a secret.

But Xia Duo hopes to cause extensive discussion, rather than him notifying all of them, without any feedback, and running away a group of people when the real transformation comes.

In the next few days, Xia Duo did not return to Linshui Village, but stayed in the Tower of Time, waiting for Niya's news, while using the magic laboratory to increase the intensity of spell practice.

At the same time, he was still paying attention to Tilak's permanent magic project and the negotiation process of Derrick outside, of course, there was no progress in both of them for the time being.

……

The fifth day after Shaduo returned to the Tower of Time was also the eighth day after Shaduo expelled Priest Kole.

On this day, Xia Duo was doing his first [Detection] practice in the magic laboratory. He was very interested in this kind of prophecy-like spell, so he only ranked it after [Short-distance Teleportation].

Of course, the first practice is not a complete spellcasting and a success, but as usual, the method is the same as when practicing spells before, splitting the elemental units, and then performing a complete spellcasting after all the elemental units are practiced proficiently.

Splitting element units requires the caster to have a good understanding of the principles of spells and be able to identify the internal logic. Otherwise, just splitting them doesn't make much sense.

In the final analysis, the elements are essentially just operations on the strings of the magic net, and the types are limited, but the element combination units of different levels of the magic net are almost infinite.

According to the principles of spells, the split element units are actually the decomposition of specific spell-casting steps.There is no need to practice individual elements at all, Xia Duo has already mastered them by heart.

While Xia Duo was practicing, the tower spirit suddenly sent a reminder, "Xia Duo, the agent, the master has returned to the Tower of Time, please meet in the study."

(End of this chapter)