Sorcerer’s Handbook

No sorcerer would ever doubt the existence of the Reverse Golden Rain, just like Ashe wouldn’t question why there are spirits and Lala Fatty in this world—these are foundational elements of the world, and those living within it can only choose to accept them.

Moreover, there are too many peculiar things in the Virtual Realm: the white mist in the Sea of Knowledge that never disperses, the Whirlpool that covers a thousand miles in an instant, the never-setting great nautical route… Compared to these unique spectacles, rain that flows in reverse seems perfectly ordinary, especially when considering the Golden Flow on the Time Continent, which can influence time.

This month, besides training, Sonya has been in the Forest Library and the Flower Library during the day, reading works about the Time Continent. These include studies on Rainbow Tail, the Golden Flow, Fate Questioning, and knowledge creatures, and there are even some on the heroic soul legion. However, very few people have explored the direction of the rain’s flow.

It’s like no one questions why apples fall.

Maybe some have researched it, but due to the lack of results, no records were made.

When Ashe mentioned this, Sonya’s first reaction was to deny it: “How could that be… What about the white bull then? Has the white bull been turned upside down too?”

“Turned upside down!” Ashe asserted confidently. “We are not at the white bull’s feet; we are on its belly.”

“This is absurd—”

“But has anyone ever seen the white bull’s belly?” Deya suddenly said. “Some Sorcerer’s Handbook masters once tried to fly up in search of the Rainbow Tail. Although they were attacked and killed by knowledge creatures while in the air, when they looked up, they only saw a golden sky, not the white bull’s belly.”

“In fairy tale books, such upside-down schemes are not uncommon either.” The Witch quickly accepted Ashe’s hypothesis. “Think carefully. Is the Golden Flow really a river of time emanating from the white bull’s four legs? If we are on the white bull’s belly, then the Golden Flow has nothing to do with the four legs. It is fixed on the belly, and the belly moves along the Time Continent. Combined with the constant movement of the legs, this creates the illusion that the Golden Flow is connected to the legs.”

“What do you mean?” Sonya’s eyes widened. “Is the white bull’s original form overlapped with the Time Continent? Does it not have a physical body?”

“Sword Princess,” Ashe chuckled, “does the Golden Fish have a physical form? Is it really a fish?”

Sonya was taken aback.

“The white bull is indeed walking on the Time Continent, but it’s walking upside down!” Ashe’s thoughts grew clearer as he continued. “As for what’s below the white bull… damn it, why didn’t I notice this before!?”

Ashe cursed and smacked his forehead. “I’ve seen the Golden Fish with my own eyes; why didn’t I make the connection? Sword Princess, do you remember what the Golden Fish’s original form is?”

“The Golden Fish’s original form is a golden sea. It appears as a fish because it reflects our virtual wings’ feathers, which make it look like scales. The vast golden sea becomes the belly of the Golden Fish—” Sonya paused as she realized, “A golden sea!?”

“If others haven’t seen it, fine, but we’ve seen it with our own eyes!”

Ashe rubbed his forehead. “A golden sea, a golden rain! The Reverse Golden Rain all converges into the golden sea, so right above us is the Golden Fish, the Sea of Knowledge!”

“If someone in the Sea of Knowledge looked up and their vision could pierce through the white mist, the golden sea, and the golden rain, they would see us suspended upside down on the Time Continent. The Time Continent and the Sea of Knowledge aren’t two separate layers; they’re the floor and ceiling of the same space, with the Golden Fish in between. The white bull steps on the Golden Fish and moves upside down on the Time Continent!”

“I remember now,” Sonya murmured. “When we passed through the Golden Fish, it didn’t feel like ’emerging from below upwards’; it felt like ‘falling down from above’… but I was too excited to notice at the time.”

“We overlooked so many things,” Ashe muttered. “There have been many clues right in front of us, like the reverse-flowing rain, the Golden Fish, and… but the Time Continent has so many novel attractions that distract us—the heroic soul legion, the Legend Museum, the Miracle Wonderland, the white bull’s four legs. We’re more inclined to focus on these rare wonders, thus ignoring the Divine Interventions that have always been in our view.”

“Well, if that’s the case,” Deya remarked, “then the so-called Rainbow Tail isn’t above us; it’s below.”

“The Golden Flow.”

Ashe nodded. “The only passageway down from the Time Continent is the Golden Flow.”

Both the Sword Princess and the Witch pondered this and found themselves unable to refute it. The Golden Flow fit Ashe’s previous description perfectly: omnipresent and accessible without any geographical restrictions. Even an ordinary sorcerer could easily find a wild Golden Flow by walking in a straight line for a short while.

But no one had ever attempted to explore the Golden Flow.

It wasn’t just fear of death but also fear of aging.

The inevitability of aging, illness, and death holds great dread, but regular sorcerers have largely transcended ‘aging’ and ‘illness,’ leaving only death as an unavoidable fate. The Golden Flow, however, could make a sorcerer feel the weight of time in mere seconds—sluggish reactions, rusty thoughts, withering souls, and a sedated consciousness. Those who had never experienced it found it hard to grasp the profound fear that sorcerers held toward the Golden Flow. People like Ashe and his companions avoided collecting spirits from the Golden Flow not just because it wasn’t cost-effective but because they were terrified and unwilling to go there.

The helpless feeling of being crushed by time, where your entire body turns brittle like dried leaves, scattering at a touch, was unbearable. Except for those studying the Time Sect, no one bathed in the Golden Flow, let alone submerged in it. Normally, a sorcerer would dissolve into the Golden Flow within seconds, completely disintegrating.

“But we have the Six-tone Anchor,” Ashe pointed out. “The 100% anchoring effect can make us immune to any harm, including the temporal corrosion of the Golden Flow.”

“But wouldn’t that make it extremely difficult?” Deya expressed her concern. “Finding the Golden Fish might be tough, but that’s a mental challenge. As long as you see through the Golden Fish’s scheme, you could easily convince another sorcerer to help you cross it.”

“Moreover, Observer,” the Witch continued, “you had to loot spirits from six different factions to obtain the Six-tone Anchor. Typically, this is an achievement that requires defeating a heroic soul commander. Can other sorcerers truly meet this prerequisite? If no one before has met this condition, how did the legend of the Rainbow Tail spread?”

“There are two possibilities,” Sonya replied. “First, there might have been a time when heroic soul commanders were considerably weaker. During that period, even ordinary sorcerers would have had a chance to defeat them. This isn’t far-fetched—after their wars concluded, their forces would have been severely depleted, making them much easier to defeat than they are now.”

“And the second possibility,” she hesitated, “is that the legend of the Rainbow Tail might have existed long before the appearance of the heroic soul commanders.”

Both Ashe and Deya looked puzzled. Deya asked, “But without heroic soul commanders, how would one obtain the spirits used for soul summoning? And without those spirits, how could anyone acquire the Six-tone Anchor?”

“Do you remember the Chaotic Shopping Book?” Sonya said. “I did some research on the Dramatic Poet and found that many sorcerers have encountered the poet’s legacies. After thorough investigation, it’s been suggested that the Dramatic Poet didn’t create new Virtual Realm Buildings out of thin air but rather modified existing ones to suit his needs.”

“Modified?”

“The poet’s buildings may have originally been resource points, Miracle Wonderland, windmills, the Arena, or the Amnesia Cabin,” Sonya explained. “Because the poet’s buildings were repurposed from existing structures within the Virtual Realm, they have been maintained by the realm itself. Even after the Dramatic Poet disappeared, his buildings have remained intact and rejuvenated over time.”

Ashe started to understand. “Are you saying the six colors of the Six-tone Anchor…”

“Each of the six Divine Sovereigns claimed a color,” Sonya elaborated, holding onto Ashe’s sleeve and speaking calmly. “They developed their main cities and heroic soul legions using those colors as a foundation. Thus, to obtain these colors, we must defeat heroic soul commanders. However, in the distant past, before the emergence of the heroic soul factions, these six colors might have been a ubiquitous special mechanism on the Time Continent.”

The Era Calendar only dates back to the year 1668, so Sonya didn’t believe that the Divine Sovereigns have been around since the beginning of time. However, imagining a time before their existence was still challenging for her, inducing a strange sense of existential dread.

“Ah,” the Witch said, “I once read a children’s picture book that described a very unique concept. It mentioned a Zero-Purple Monument, which would display a person’s past in purple text the moment they stood before it. Everyone but the individual would forget those memories, but they could imprint the purple text onto their body. Each letter would transform into golden sand…”

“In the world of sorcerers, gold often signifies Golden Feathers,” Sonya remarked. “If it’s really a mechanism from the virtual realm, then this implies that one could trade their past to rapidly gain golden spellforce… similar to the effect of a Whirlpool!”

“Come to think of it, I’ve always found it odd that there’s no mechanism similar to the Whirlpool on the Time Continent,” Ashe said. “If the Divine Sovereigns did steal these mechanisms, it all makes sense. Compared to them, the Dramatic Poet’s actions pale in comparison. The poet left legacies for future generations, while the Divine Sovereigns established eternal wars that have persisted for thousands of years and may continue indefinitely in the virtual realm!”

“The Golden Flow, the Zero-Purple Monument…” Ashe couldn’t help but laugh, his eyes sparkling with curiosity. “What we see now on the Time Continent is merely a fragmented version of its past. Indeed, the virtual realm is like a lavish buffet; how could it remain untouched?”

“In other words, long ago, the Time Continent had six mechanisms similar to the Golden Flow.” Deya summarized, “Back then, sorcerers only needed to gather the six colors and then dive into the Golden Flow to find the Rainbow Tail. Then the Divine Sovereigns arrived, and the Time Continent became what it is today.”

“This is the most reasonable explanation,” Sonya agreed. “It’s also the best one we have at the moment.”

“So then…”n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

Ashe stepped off the carriage, waved at them, and said, “Let’s go.”

The delicate, translucent Six-tone Armor draped lightly over them, making them appear even more stunning and radiant. On the other hand, Ashe looked quite odd wearing the same Six-tone Armor, resembling a Cult Leader with a penchant for flashy, colorful cloaks.

The three of them passed through the Rain Curtain and approached the Golden Flow. The time spirits swimming in the river curiously eyed them, but as if repelled by the brilliance of their armor, they quietly drifted away along the river.

Ashe had initially considered snagging a few time spirits, but seeing their uncharacteristic retreat, he lost the inclination to chase them. Without looking back at his companions, he walked straight to the edge of the Golden Flow. Observing that his Six-tone Armor was still flowing normally and feeling no unusual sensations, he let out a small sigh of relief. He then lightly touched the lake’s surface with his toe, causing ripples before stepping into the Golden Flow.

As he fully submerged into the Golden Flow, the river also became ‘contaminated’ by the six colors emanating from his armor. Like a painter’s brushstroke, the entire Golden Flow gradually transformed into a vibrant, multi-colored spectacle. Upon closer inspection…

It resembled a Rainbow Tail.