Chapter 16 Birthday Gift

"Ahem, alright, let's not talk about that for now. Little Ye Lang, can you show us the box you bought?" Marshal Li coughed.

"Hu Niu, give him the box." The little prodigal son was very generous in his agreement. He didn't really care about these things, and although he had bought it, he didn't mind giving it to anyone or whether there was any reward.

In his words, a prodigal son wouldn't care about these things.

When Marshal Li excitedly received the box, and everyone was eagerly anticipating, they suddenly discovered something rather depressing. Inside the box was another box.

This couldn't help but make people think of one thing. Would this box be one of those where there are boxes within boxes, repeating endlessly until the notes appear?

Think about it, the notes wouldn't be that big. This box was clearly too large.

Fortunately, it turned out that the box wasn't like that. But now there was a new problem. This box needed some procedures to open it, and these procedures might be very, very difficult.

"Damn it, this old man is really sick. He puts his notes in a box and locks it up. How are people supposed to see it?" Marshal Li was the first to curse.

That's right, this box wasn't an ordinary box. It was a box with mechanisms that Ban had painstakingly crafted. These mechanisms required very deep knowledge of alchemy to unlock. This was a test he set for those with a connection to him. He didn't want his notes to be seen by ignorant people. If someone wanted to see his notes, they had to possess alchemy skills he approved of.

And this box was the exam paper to test people.

The smart people present could easily guess this, and immediately called upon the most powerful alchemists in the empire to crack it. Fortunately, most of them were nearby.

Because of this box, everyone's attention seemed to be drawn to it, causing them to forget some things, like the two birthday stars of the day. Fortunately, both of them were very generous and didn't mind at all. They just happily played on the side.

Children are best when adults don't pay attention to them. They can play as much as they want.

"You mean you can't unlock it for now?" The Emperor frowned, slightly surprised.

"Yes, Your Majesty. This box requires very complex procedures to open. If there's even a slight mistake, it might activate the mechanism inside and destroy the notes. So we need time to carefully study it." The alchemists said.

"That makes sense. Since it's Ban's box, it wouldn't be so simple. You can take your time. I believe you are more eager to see what's inside than I am." The Emperor said.

He was right. The contents inside were something all alchemists wanted to see. They were more anxious than anyone else to know Ban's alchemy insights.

"Hehe." The alchemists started laughing, a bit foolishly, but it was a kind of silly laughter that many found endearing.

"Your Majesty, may I ask, how did you obtain this box?" The alchemists, after their happy silly laughter, curiously asked.

"We should thank our little birthday star today, our young Master Ye. You should go over and wish him a happy birthday as well." The Emperor pointed to the thirteenth young master who was playing an unknown game with the Seventh Princess in the middle of the square.

"…" The alchemists didn't understand at first what this had to do with the little prodigal son. But they soon remembered, it must be this legendary super prodigal son who had bought this box somewhere. They had heard that his luck was always incredibly miraculous.

Speaking of which, this was indeed a very, very fortunate thing. Every few hundred years, this box would appear in auction houses and general stores, with an unacceptably high price tag.

According to those who did this, and Ban himself, he hoped that someone with exceptionally high alchemy skills would see it, and he also hoped that a person with a connection to him would get it. Before that, no one would reveal any information about it.

However, once someone obtained it, they would immediately announce it to the world, as if to prevent it from being buried by this person with a connection.

It was fortunate that they announced it to the world. Otherwise, this box would have been buried in Hu Niu's spatial pouch, with little chance of seeing the light of day again.

To thank the little prodigal son for his "merit," the alchemists, of course, surrounded him to celebrate his birthday. Soon, they considered a problem. They seemed to need to send him a birthday present.

However, they had all rushed here in a hurry and didn't have anything prepared. But soon someone came up with a good idea.

"Young Master Ye, happy birthday. I don't have anything good to give you, so I'll give you this book." An alchemist took out a book and gave it to the little prodigal son. As a book given by an alchemist, it naturally had to be a book about alchemy.

Books are the source of knowledge. This gift might not be very impressive, but it would never go out of style, no one would say it was inappropriate, and it's suitable for people of all ages.

With someone taking the lead, others started giving books as well. They always carried alchemical materials and books with them, and they avoided giving duplicates.

These people were all top-level alchemists on the continent. Although they were just giving books, they were very precious, some of them were even rare and hard to find.

Although the little prodigal son didn't understand why these people suddenly came over and gave him books, he accepted all the gifts without hesitation.

"Let me see this box." Suddenly, the little prodigal son saw the box in the alchemist's hand. His eyes showed a moment of confusion.

At this time, everyone seemed to understand the little prodigal son's confused expression as him wondering if this was the same box.

If it were someone else asking, the alchemists would have refused. But now they knew that the original owner of the box was the little prodigal son in front of them. They hesitated, but still handed the box to the little prodigal son, reminding him to be careful.

"What is this?" The little prodigal son looked at it for a while, then pointed to an alchemy array on it.

"This is a defensive alchemy array. It's linked to the alchemy array next to it, surrounding the entire box. It can protect the box from damage and also ensure that the box cannot be opened by other means. I've never seen this arrangement of alchemy arrays before. We need to study it further to see what exactly it is." The alchemist started to answer professionally.

"Oh." The little prodigal son looked at the box and responded.