**Chapter 32: Orthodox and Cannon Fodder**

“Phew… Qi Refinement, Third Layer.”

Jie Ming slowly exhaled a turbid breath, feeling the pure and refined true essence flowing within him like a gentle stream.

With ample credits, Jie Ming no longer scrimped on his appetite, indulging in various high-energy foods.

The nourishment from these essence-fortifying foods, combined with the “Purple Qi from the East” technique and the guidance of an increasingly advanced meditation method, propelled his cultivation progress like a rocket.

In just half a year since enrolling, he had advanced from the First Layer of Qi Refinement to the Third.

The true essence in his dantian had formed a broader, deeper lake, and each circulation brought a noticeable increase in strength.

His body, tempered by the true essence, grew tougher and more translucent, his five senses sharpening.

At the same time, his wizard meditation method was progressing by leaps and bounds.

Thanks to the cultivation system’s nourishment of his mental sea and soul, the aid of a higher-grade meditation chamber, and the fact that his “genius” status allowed him to advance without hiding his speed, Jie Ming had successfully inscribed his fourth Truth Rune as a wizard apprentice. The fifth was on the verge of completion.

Jie Ming focused inward.

In his mental sea, the first three Truth Runes representing the foundations of alchemy—“Transformation,” “Fusion,” and “Refinement”—shone brilliantly. Following closely, the newly inscribed fourth rune radiated powerful mental fluctuations.

Choosing the core for his fourth Truth Rune had been a deliberate decision.

During the wizard apprentice stage, nine core Truth Runes were to be inscribed, laying the foundation for a wizard’s future school and abilities.

Though his primary focus was alchemy, the wizarding school system was vast and complex, with many runes versatile enough to support or complement other disciplines.

Ultimately, Jie Ming anchored his fourth core rune on “Stability,” one of the three core runes of the potioncraft school.

This “Stability” rune could balance energy and material structures, suppressing runaway reactions—an indispensable foundation for potioncraft.

It was also a secondary rune for alchemy, essential for many advanced alchemy experiments to stabilize energy.

Choosing it deepened Jie Ming’s expertise in alchemy while laying groundwork for future potioncraft studies.

Jie Ming had already decided his path: all nine core Truth Runes during his apprentice phase would be from logistical schools—alchemy, potioncraft, and runic studies.

This choice was rare even among logistical wizards.

Many logistical wizards, after inscribing three to six core runes from their school, often chose combat-oriented runes like Amplification, Energy, Shield, Casting, or Elemental to compensate for their lack of direct combat ability.

But Jie Ming was different.

He had another cultivation system!

The Great Dao Book Pavilion recorded countless exquisite combat spells, physical techniques, and methods for crafting talismans and magical treasures, so he had no need to worry about lacking combat means.

Thus, in choosing Truth Runes, he could entirely ignore combat capabilities, focusing solely on accumulating logistical knowledge to build a solid foundation for the eventual fusion of his dual systems.

“Phew…”

Adjusting his breathing, Jie Ming didn’t end his cultivation state. Instead, he capitalized on the mental clarity following his breakthrough, shifting his focus to the center of his mental sea.

Surrounded by the four Truth Runes was his first witchcraft model, nearing completion in the wizarding system.

Learning witchcraft in the wizarding world wasn’t as simple as “incantation plus gesture.” Like meditation methods, it required constructing a witchcraft model in one’s mental sea.

Since building these models consumed mental energy, many wizard apprentices—and even formal wizards—avoided inscribing too many, as it could hinder their cultivation progress.

Moreover, constructing witchcraft models was dauntingly complex.

In the wizarding civilization, every wizard was a researcher, and a witchcraft model was akin to a “research breakthrough” achieved through their knowledge system and direction.

Casting a spell was the practical application of this “research.”

Thus, no two witchcraft models were identical.

Even for the most common basic alchemy witchcraft — different wizards’ models varied due to differences in knowledge accumulation, personal understanding, and subtle research focuses.

The advantage was that these models weren’t static “dead objects” with fixed ranks.

They evolved with the wizard’s growing knowledge, deeper understanding of the world, and technical improvements, allowing continuous optimization and enhancement.

Due to this unique learning method, most wizards mastered only a handful of “original” witchcraft models—much like researchers in his previous life producing only a few truly valuable breakthroughs.

Of course, this referred to “orthodox” witchcraft models.

Beyond the “orthodox,” the wizarding system had an “unorthodox” shortcut: memorizing and forcibly inscribing another wizard’s completed witchcraft model into one’s mental sea.

This allowed casting the corresponding spell without understanding its principles.

However, such “pirated” models lost the potential for advancement or optimization.

In planar conquests, if rules were incompatible or other issues arose, these memorized spells could fail, unlike “orthodox” models built on personal understanding, which could be adjusted on the fly.

Unorthodox models were often favored by combat wizards.

They needed quick, effective attack or defense methods, and principles mattered less than usability.

In the wizarding civilization’s planar invasions, data on the target plane was collected first, and witchcraft models were adjusted accordingly.

Due to the differences between combat and logistical schools, logistical wizards typically handled adjustments and countermeasures, while combat wizards—often called cannon fodder—provided the data.

“Combat and logistical schools? More like orthodox and cannon fodder schools…” After grasping the “research” and “application” essence of the wizarding system, Jie Ming couldn’t help but quip inwardly.

No wonder that wizard Jack had said logistical wizards were the orthodox ones. Now, it was clear: logistical wizards were the ones who truly grasped the essence of wizarding power.