What magma domain? Wasn't his own water domain far better?
Water nurtures all things, yet it can also wipe out everything. It was the most powerful force in the world.
Unfortunately, his disciple had gone a bit astray. Still, this wrong path wasn't exactly a bad one.
"Which type of domain does she have?" Helga's curiosity was instantly piqued. She instinctively felt that the Old Serpent's disciple should have inherited her teacher's domain, or at the very least a sub-domain derived from it.
Rhys: "..."
He began carefully fiddling with the components in his hands, acting as if he hadn't heard his old friend's question at all.
Helga: ???
o(=ω=)oAhh!
Seeing her old friend play dead, realization suddenly struck her. Her expression immediately changed.
"Old Serpent, what are you trying to avoid?"
Rhys: (=ω=)
Seeing Salazar react like that, Helga instantly understood. The smile at the corner of her mouth could no longer be held back.
She took two deep breaths before asking, her voice trembling slightly from holding back laughter, "Hey, that child didn't awaken a fire-attribute domain, did she?"
Rhys: "Wow, you're seriously annoying. Can you just focus on your work? The clients trusted you enough to hand over a deposit, and this is the attitude you have when making their puppets?"
Pfft.
Helga couldn't hold it in anymore and burst out laughing.
Daphne and Astoria raised their heads in confusion, looking at Professor White without understanding what was going on.
"You two keep working. I just thought of something funny," Helga said to the two girls, her face beaming.
The next few seconds were sheer torment for Rhys.
Every look from Helga seemed to take on a different meaning in his eyes. Even an absent-minded yawn or a casual stretch from her was enough to trigger a stress response in him.
Rhys, who felt like a slab of meat being slow-roasted in an oven for two hours, finally had a breakthrough: wasn't it perfectly reasonable that Daphne had comprehended a magma domain?
Her teacher was aligned with water. She had spent the entire day working in a "earth" office. Then, while staring blankly at the flames in a fireplace, she reached enlightenment. A domain that fused water, fire, and earth—wasn't that the most natural outcome imaginable?
The instant the tension in his mind snapped with a sharp crack, Rhys's thoughts suddenly became crystal clear.
The domain of [Water] should not be limited to "water" alone. Anything in a liquid state fell within its scope. Yes, that was it!
Rhys's eyes lit up abruptly, shining like two small suns—magma was liquid too, after all. So magma came into the "water domain"!
No matter how one looked at it, Daphne had still comprehended a water-type domain!
Rhys's unusual state drew Helga's attention. She looked at him in surprise, at the same time sensing that strange fluctuation of magic radiating from his body.
Had the old snake just gained another insight?
Rhys slowly rose from his seat, his feet hovering three inches above the ground. In an ethereal voice filled with quiet magnetism, he said to Helga:
"I've understood it."
Helga: ???
"Understood what?"
Daphne and Astoria also set aside their work and looked at Rhys curiously, not knowing what he was about to say.
[All that flows belongs to water; all things are so]
Helga: ?
Salazar, do you want to listen to what you're saying right now? Are you out of your mind? I admit I laughed a bit too loudly just now, but could you please be normal?!
Helga was genuinely panicking. Among the four of them, Salazar was the best at brewing potions. If Rowena went mad, Salazar could fix it with potions. But if Salazar went mad, they would truly be at a loss.
Even worse, she would have to expend considerable effort to seal away the mad old snake. In his current state, he was far too dangerous. Someone like him losing control would be a world-ending crisis.
Helga silently assessed their respective combat power. She thought she could win, but might not be able to restrain the old snake. She would probably need Dumbledore's help.
At the same time, she couldn't help grumbling inwardly at Rhys: it was just a bit of teasing about his student's domain. How did that drive you to this point?
Rhys spread his hands, and two masses of silvery liquid gradually condensed in his palms.
Helga: !!!
She froze on the spot, because what Rhys was using was not some other spell, but a pure, unmistakable domain expansion.
A mercury domain, or rather, a quicksilver domain.
Helga's expression became grave. As an old friend of many years, she knew all too well what Salazar's domain was like. It had nothing whatsoever to do with a metal like mercury. Yet now, he was using the power of his domain to conjure a large mass of quicksilver.
There were only two possibilities.
One was that Salazar had stumbled into awakening a mercury domain by sheer coincidence.
The other was...
If what he had just said was taken at face value, then the scope encompassed by Salazar's domain had clearly become far broader, and his authority had increased yet again.
Could a wizard or a god possess two domains? Of course. Loki and Odin, for example, both possessed multiple domains. But what Salazar was exhibiting now was far rarer than simply awakening an additional domain.
A secondary domain awakening. It was actually a secondary domain awakening!
When the mercury in Rhys's hands vanished and was replaced by a mass of molten magma, Helga immediately became certain of what had happened to Salazar.
His domain had undergone a second awakening, switching the core concept within the domain from "water" to the broader concept of "liquid."
Helga showed an extremely complicated expression.
A secondary awakening was a realm the four of them had pursued tirelessly.
It was truly "going one step further after reaching the hundred-foot pole," the "ultimate peak of magical extremity." And yet, it was the old snake who had taken that first step, and in such an absurd way at that.
All she could say was that magic really was this wondrous.
Those who knew what to look for understood the doorway it represented, while those who didn't merely saw the spectacle. Daphne and Astoria had no idea what had just happened. They only knew that Rhys seemed to have pulled off some flashy new trick again.
"It's shiny. Is that mercury?"
"Yes."
"Wow, it's like my magma domai—"
"Quiet!"
After being scolded by her sister, Daphne reverted to her well-behaved self, though her wide eyes were still darting around restlessly.
The light in Rhys's eyes gradually dimmed. With a faint smile at the corner of his mouth, he drifted back down to the ground.
_____
12 Chaps ahead at Patreon.com/HornyFBI