"Half ancient-elves! What is this race..." Punk wondered
Punk couldn't even fully say the strange name of his bloodline weird name, but "ancient elves" did sound pretty amazing to him. In fact, this was a unique world where ancient races were more powerful than modern races. Even though, according to Darwin's theory of evolution, the latest species should be the best adapted to changes in nature.
But in a situation where ancient gods were still present and modern mortals were living in the dark ages, this meant that either this was the first civilization of this world, or all advanced civilizations were somehow destroyed.
This world was obviously the latter; although this was a new era, the gap between ancient and modern species was not too significant in terms of bloodlines.
Like, Punk's half-ancient elves' bloodline. This bloodline's only advantages were- better preservation of vitality, better looks, and high agility, that's all. This so-called "ancient" title proved that this race was destroyed a long time ago.
Thus, in modern times, it might only serve a purpose for exploring ancient runes that necessitate a racial identity check.
Punk was really speechless about his half-ancient elven bloodline, which had a grand name but no actual ancient supernatural power.
In addition to this bloodline, which temporarily had no value, there was one more thing left to him by the parents of this body's original owner, -"inheritance memory," Which seemed broad and profound but actually was very fragmented and messy.
Punk relied on the system to organize these scattered pieces of information, which took more than a month. While sorting through this information, Punk also gained a preliminary understanding of this new world.
First, he learned about the history of this world. Here, "The ancient Netheril civilization" had a profound and long-lasting influence. Their most renowned achievement was the simplification and enhancement of the meditation technique, which allowed mages to advance relatively quickly to the highest possible rank, "Legend." And they also made this meditation technique available to the general population.
Even to this day, when a mage witnesses soldiers engaging in a life-and-death battle over a secret battle qi cultivation book, the authenticity of it they themselves are uncertain about, if it was genuine or fake.
They would just genuinely express their gratitude to the great Arcanists of Netheril to share with them Mystic Attainment.
And because of this, knowledge monopolization ended once and for all. The Netheril civilization thought that it was a massive waste of a civilization's potential to let ordinary people stupidly worship practically high-level professionals as gods.
At the moment, Punk found himself in the Pheren plane. It was the birthplace of the Netheril civilization, and they engaged in a great battle here with the Gods. Because of this, this plane had been heavily fortified. Consequently, most of the gods from the multi-dimensional universe also moved near the Pheren Plane to confront the Netheril, following the order of the Heaven's will.
Therefore, their ultimate fortress, or as some might refer to it, their ultimate prison, "The Divine Kingdoms," was also situated in near to the plane of Pheren.
Therefore, the plane of Pheren figuratively became the center of the universe.
As for the survivors of Netheril, they had a clear statement: "If you follow the principles of the Netheril Civilization and contribute to its revival, you are considered part of the Netheril Civilization."
Although it might have sounded informal, Punk sensed an indescribable and profound unity within this statement. It was precisely due to this that the name of a civilization, like Netheril, was still an eternal and glorious banner in countless mages' hearts.
"Interesting…! If there is a chance in the future, I will check this Netheril civilization out," Punk thought.
There was also a piece of important information in the "Memory Inheritance" about the power levels of this world:
The lowest level of combatants was 1 to 4, which was the apprentice level.
5-9 was the trainee level, which was a slight improvement compared to the apprentice level; still, the trainee level was several times stronger than the apprentice level.
Levels 10 to 14 were considered the official level, marking a significant advancement. It was a major improvement over the trainee level. Any attack below the official level couldn't break through the defense of an official level and above. on the other hand, an attack from anyone at the official level or higher could easily bypass the defense of someone below the official level.
This meant that in this world, while someone could challenge across a small realm and still be survive, but if someone attempting to challenge across a big realm then no matter how many people there were or how many protagonists abilities they had, there was only one outcome, "death!"
Levels 15 to 19 were considered the Master Level, which marked a progression of one small realm.
Levels 20 to 39 were a significant advancement, leading to the Legend realm, equivalent to the Demi-god level!
However, within the Legend realm, there were distinctions in power, dividing it into three smaller realms:
Levels 40 to 49 — Morning Star (Low God)
Levels 50 to 59 — Radiant Moon (Base God)
Levels 60 to 69 — Brilliant Sun (High God)
The next substantial advancement occurred between levels 70 and 79, known as the Divine Throne realm!
However, for some unknown reasons, since the destruction of Netheril civilization, the High Gods didn't allow anyone to interfere with anything on the universal scale.
The strictness of this rule was even more significant than the command of Heavens will towards the Gods. As a result, most powerful individuals didn't dare to challenge the Divine Throne's realm. However, a few relentless seekers of knowledge, who sought knowledge beyond anything, continued their pursuit. Yet, once they reached the Divine Throne status, every single one of them mysteriously vanished, without exception.
After this realm people could only made assumption. Like,
80-89 level was Transcending-Universe. This was another big realm.
90-99 level was the void realm*.
As for realm beyond 99,
This was an unknown and incomprehensible level for mere mortals.
There was a metaphor that suggested, "If everything in the boundless void is like a story within a book, then after reaching level 99, you can transcend that book and enter reality." But of course, this was just merely a legend.
Only when someone reached the Legend level, they had an endless lifespan and also had the qualification to compete with the Heavens will.
Legendary mages were also eligible to learn the immensely destructive legendary magic, commonly referred to as the forbidden spell. According to the description, Punk discovered that even the lowest level of the forbidden spell possessed power dozens of times greater than a hydrogen bombs on Earth.
"It's look like I had to work hard to become a legend," Punk declared. With this newfound determination, he set small goal to becoming a legend. In a world as tumultuous as this, he couldn't afford to remain weak.
Once he had gathered knowledge about the power system, Punk turned his attention to understanding the various factions in the world.
This world was mainly divided into six factions, they were:
Lawful good faction (the legendary holy maiden or virgins),
Chaotic good faction (Heroic outlaw),
Lawful neutral faction (Most regular people),
Chaotic neutral faction (not good people but have a bottom line),
Lawful evil faction (Organized evil forces),
Chaotic evil faction (Psychopathic murderers).
While there were various methods to differentiate between factions, the primary criterion for evaluating them was the underlying the inner values of the individuals. In other words, if some madman's sincerely believed from the depths of their soul that their actions were for the greater good, even if they were responsible for destroying a world, they would be regarded as "good."
Hence, categorizing these factions was merely a point of reference. Those who held it as an absolute truth would inevitably meet a miserable end.
In addition to this information, there was also some common knowledge--
For example,
While the elite professionals in this realm almost seemed detached from the universe, the ordinary people at the bottom were still living in the Middle Ages.
Additionally, the world's population was so vast, that it was practically uncountable.
One of the reasons for this was the surface area of the Pheren plane, which was more than forty times the surface area of the sun from Punk's previous life.
There were also some common racial customs and some other scattered memories. For instance, the biological parents of the original body were part of a secluded family. They both were master-level mages and aiming for the Legend level. Due to the exceedingly slim likelihood of achieving this advancement, they left this knowledge inheritance and created this green egg-like formation to breed their child.
Based on the deteriorated external conditions, it was apparent that the original body's parents had not succeeded in their breakthrough. And, failure in the breakthrough to such a large realm had always been a do-or-die situation. There was no third result.
.
Fortunately, the Ancient Elves were also a member of the elves, and they would be already 15-year-old when they are conceived. Otherwise, a little baby's body might be very uncomfortable for Punk.
"I don't know the origins of my body's "parents" and if I have seven aunts or eight aunts! "
While thinking about these, Punk finally found the most critical knowledge in the final part of the memory inheritance:-
The knowledge about the cultivation method of a Mage.
..........
*Note: True Void class existence has the power to destroy small universes with a wave of their hand, unlike Punk, who got stuck in the void for some unknown reason and couldn't even move around.
*Note: Divine Throne is the name of the realm, not the God. Unless a God is free from the Shackles of divinity, he cannot exceed the legend realm.
*Note: Mostly about mage class, because the source of information was a wizard.
*Note: After Legend and above rank, an individual needed comprehension of laws for improvement.