Chapter 16 – Birthday Present
Translated by imakeussmile
Grand Marshal Li coughed dryly and said: “let’s not talk about this, Little Ye Lang can you show us the box you bought?”
“Tigress, give the box to him.” The little prodigal son answered generously. Since, he originally wanted to be a prodigal son, it did not matter to him whether he uses it or gives it to someone else as a gift without expecting anything in return.
According to him, why should a prodigal son care about such a thing?
When Grand Marshal Li excitedly took the box, everyone raised their heads and looked towards the box with anticipation. But then a somewhat a depressing matter occurred. What was placed inside the box was another box.
This made everyone think of one thing, which was “Could this box be the kind of box where a box would be placed within a box and the cycle would keep repeating itself until a notebook appeared?”
Thinking about that, if it was just a notebook, how big would it even be? This box to begin with was not that large.
In the end, it was still alright as it seemed that this box was not like that. It was just then that another problem appeared. This box needed certain procedures to be opened, and those procedures were very very difficult.
“What the fuck. This Ban is seriously fucking sick in the mind, making a box to lock his notebook for no good reason. This fellow seriously did not want others to look at his notebook?” Grand Marshal Li immediately opened his mouth and cursed heavily.
That’s right, this box was not an ordinary box, and it was instead a box with a mechanism which Ban spent great efforts to create. These mechanisms needed one to have deep knowledge about alchemy. This was a test for the person who was fated with him. He did not want his own notebook to be seen by ignorant people, and thus to see his notebook, one must have profound understanding of alchemy techniques.
As such, this box was a test used to test others.
Regarding this matter, everyone present easily figured it out and immediately called for the empire’s best alchemists to come and decipher the box. Fortunately, all those individuals were basically in the vicinity.
Due to the presence of this box, which captivated and held everyone’s attention, they had all forgotten about some matters, such as today’s birthday boy and girl. Fortunately, these two children were very magnanimous and did not go to argue about it. Instead, they were just happily playing at the side.
Since they were children after all. It would be best that adults didn’t notice them, so that they could play as much as they liked.
“……You are saying that, you need a period of time to decipher it?” The emperor frowned and asked while feeling somewhat uncertain.
“That’s right your majesty, this box requires very complicated procedures to open it. I’m afraid that, if there’s a mistake in between the procedures, the mechanism inside the box would start and destroy the notebook. Therefore, we need time to slowly study the box.” The alchemists said.
“Hmmm, you’re right. Since it is Ban’s box, it would naturally not be that simple. You guys can slowly study the box. I believe you guys would want to see the item inside much more than me.” The emperor said.
That’s right, the thing within this box was something which all the alchemists wanted to look at. They were much more anxious than everyone else, and wanted to know Alchemist Ban’s knowledge.
“Haha……” All the alchemists started to laugh somewhat foolishly. However, this foolishness instead let other feel that it was a very cute.
“Your majesty, I would like to boldly ask something. Where did this box come from?” After the alchemists finished laughing foolishly, they started to ask about this curiously.
“About this, we would have to thank our little birthday boy, our Ye Family’s little prince. You guys should also go over there and congratulate him on his birthday.” The emperor pointed to the little thirteenth prince who was playing a game, a game which was not known to all in the banquet.
“??” At the beginning, the alchemists did not understood why the little prodigal son would have any relationship with this matter. However, they quickly recalled that it must be that this rumored ultra-prodigal son had bought the box from who knows where. At an earlier time, they had already heard that this little prodigal son’s luck was always very mystical.
Bringing up this subject, this matter was indeed a very very lucky one. In fact, in the past few hundred years, this box would appear in some auction house or grocery store from time to time, and the price would always be high to bid.
According to Ban, he was hoping that the person who would inherit his alchemy techniques will be someone with high alchemic techniques, and the people employed by Ban would not reveal any information about the box.
However, once someone gets the box, they would immediately announce it to the whole world, to prevent the fated person from inheriting Ban’s alchemist techniques.
Luckily these individuals announced it to the whole world. Otherwise, this box would definitely lie dormant within Tigress’s space pouch, with no chance ever to see light again.
For the purpose of expressing their thanks to the little prodigal son’s ‘meritorious service’, the alchemists came up to congratulate him for his birthday, but they suddenly remembered that they did not have any gift to present him.
As they came here hurriedly, how could they have had any time to prepare a gift? However, someone immediately thought of a good method.
“Little Ye prince, I wish you a happy birthday. I don’t have anything good to give you, so I will give you this book instead.” An alchemist took out a book and gave it to the little prodigal son. Of course, a book taken out by an alchemist would of course be a book about alchemy.
A book is the source of knowledge. Although giving out a book as a birthday present was not very fancy, however it would not be old-fashioned and no one would also say that it was not suitable either. Moreover, it is ok to give a book to someone, no matter if they were old or young.
When someone began to give a book, the other alchemists started to give out books as well. They would always bring along books and materials about alchemy with them wherever they were, and that also prevented each other from giving the same book to the little thirteenth prince.
These people were the continent’s top-notch alchemists. Although they were only giving away books, these books however were very precious, which could only be discovered but could not be purchased.
Although the little prodigal son did not understood why all those people suddenly came over and gave him books, he still accepted them unrestrainedly.
“This box……let me take a look……” Suddenly, the little prodigal son looked at the box on the alchemist’s hand and made a confused expression.
At this time, towards the little prodigal son’s confused expression, everyone seemed to understand that the little prodigal son was thinking if this box was the previous box.
If it was the request from someone else they would have refused it immediately. However, right now, they knew that the original owner of the box was the little prodigal son. As a result, they passed the box to the little prodigal son hesitatingly, while at the same time telling him to be careful with it.
“What is this thing?” The little prodigal son looked at the box for a while and then asked while pointing to one of the alchemy formations on the box.
“This is a type of defensive alchemy formation which interlocks with the others alchemy formations on the side and covers the whole box. This alchemy formation can help protect the box to stay intact and also at the same time guarantees that others cannot use other types of methods to open this box. This is the first time that I have seen this type of alchemy formation arrangement. As for what it does, we will have to study it slowly.” One of the alchemist replied very professionally.
“Oh……” The little prodigal son looked at the box and replied.