Chapter 4

Auction House, Magnolia

People gather around the stage in excitement as guildmaster Bob announces the next time up for auction.

"As you all know the body parts of monsters are valuable as they can be made into equipment that can vastly increase someone's strength, speed, durability and even intelligence. Normally monster body parts are available for shop anywhere you go in Fiore but this particular monster is very special as it's the dead corpse of an S-Rank monster, Holy Eagle."

The audience quietly whispers to each other in shock and amazement. What is an S-Rank monster? S-Rank jobs usually involve killing or defeating this level of creature but most S-Rank missions target demons from the book of Zeref. Demons are some of the most terrifying and horrific beings that roam this world and are feared by all. Even among the best of humanity there are few that can kill these behemoths called demons. For this bird to be considered the same level of strength as these demons it must be extraordinarily powerful and it's body would have a deep connection with magic. Using such a body for refinement or rituals would have an incredible effect unlike anything else in this world.

Jacob quietly evaluates the enormous worth just this singular monster would have, 'If I had this corpse I would be able to modify my bone structure to allow me to fly or use the eyes of the bird to vastly increase my range of vision. With the talons I could make incredible weapons able to tear apart the hard scales of S-Rank demons. Every single part of high ranking monsters like this one are valuable and usable for many things I can't believe that this is just the second item in this auction.'

An annoyed frown spreads across Jacob's face as he continues to think, 'Even so the soul of this monster is missing. If I had it's soul I could quickly assimilate a deep connection to this world and adjust my spells in accordance to this new world's rules. This past week I've been experimenting which spells work and don't work and what adjustments need to be made for them to function. After many hours of trial and error I've found that only 80% of my spells work and the 20% that don't need to be adjusted in accordance. To do that I need experience using spells of this world and insight of the people of this world. If I had that monster's soul I could weaken it untill it was safe for consumption and then I would gain it's life experience. Unfortunately not only does this corpse not have it's soul I also don't have enough money to purchase it.'

"The S-Rank monster know as Holy Eagle is able to use light magic, healing magic, and lightning magic. It's body is extremely large even more so than this entire building and is currently separated into many different pieces with all of them being heavily preserved and healthy."

Guildmaster Bob presses down on a bottom and the lacrima in his hands brights up before casting the image of the dead giant gold and white bird that lies in multiple pieces.

"The starting bid for this precious resource is 10,000,000 jewels and the minimum increase for every new bid must be at least 100,000 jewels."

Many gasps come from the crowd sitting down before the stage. This price for most people is simply ridiculous, after all that is more than a years worth of a regular person's paycheck and this is simply buying the body. To make actual use of it you'd spend over 5 times as much money in actually using the body for anything. This is why skilled enchantment mages are so wanted, it costs extraordinary amounts of money to enchant spells onto something permanently. Having an enchantment mage is incredibly good for a guild because it means that the guild can invest money into this person for them to give them lower costs for enchantment. It's very hard to become a master of enchantment magic due to how expensive it is to learn through trial and error. Many huge forces would go bankrupt trying to nurture enchantment mages as it's simply too costly to due so. But even so many still try regardless because of how hard it is to enchant anything for any amount of time.

Most enchantments carved into an object can only exist for a period of time, months, years, or decades. But that is because the mage using the enchantment magic simply doesn't have a high enough understanding of the magic of enchantment. Enchantment is engraving ethernano into something, this something can be anything, a vase, a wall, a body, a soul. The essence of enchantment magic is creating a permanent connection between ethernano and that something. The things we call spells are simply controlling the ethernano inside of us using a specific method. This method is a magic language that directly controls ethernano to make an effect on something. Mages attempt to understand this magic language in order to create spells and to create branches of magic that people use today. The more understanding of this magic language the more effect your spells will be. The branches of magic, fire magic, earth magic, wind magic, water magic, and the others, they all come from the same source. This magic language dictates everything that exists and has ever existed and everything that will ever exist.

Mages slowly learn percentages of percentages of percentages of this magic language over their lifespans attempting to comprehend the very thing that allows them to exist. A master of a branch of magic is someone who has comprehended how that magic can be used and effect the world to a certain level. Of course it is very rare for someone to be able to completely comprehend a branch of magic in it's entirety, the number of people who have done this in all of Earthlands existence could be counted with just 10 fingers. Masters of a branch of magic are rare as they have insight of a portion of the magic language, having this incredible level of insight allows someone to create new spells in that branch of magic with ease and attain incredible levels of inspiration and ideas for that branch of magic with no difficulty. The difference in skill and power between someone who is a master in a branch of magic and one who doesn't is like the difference between the sight of a normal person and someone without eyes.