Abe the Wizard

Abel looked sour. He thought the lightning clan was supposed to be reliable, but he couldn’t even use his teleportation circle to get over there. There was probably some sort of accident happening, but he didn’t know what it was.

To get someone to tell him about it, he came to the reception desk inside the Wizard Union hall. It was a young wizard apprentice that was there. He was probably just around rank four, from the looks of it.

The wizard apprentice greeted him politely despite him not showing his face, “Hello there. Is there anything I can help you with?”

Abel threw a beginner stone on the table, “I need information about the lightning clan. Do you know any information provider around here?”

The wizard apprentice’s eyes shone when he saw the beginner gemstone. It was easy to guess that Abel was an official wizard because only wizards had portal bags. Without a portal bag, it’d be impossible for him to take a beginner gemstone out of nowhere.

The rank four wizard apprentice gave out a surprising lot of information, “Sir Wizard, the lightning clan has just brought back all of its wizards outside. From what we’ve been told, one of its elders is just about to have a promotion. They have already locked down the Land of Lightning Fall due to safety reasons.”

“When do you think it’s going to open?” Abel asked.

The wizard apprentice continued to answer, “It is hard to say. One of the wizards that came here told me that the elder’s promotions take between several months to several years. No one can say for sure.”

“Thank you so much,” Abel said, throwing another beginner gemstone onto the table.

At this time, the teleportation circle at one side of the hallroom started constantly flashing in white. Five very powerful wizards appeared right on it. Instead of suppressing their own aura, they all switched them to the maximum so that everyone inside the building had to lower their bodies. Abel was the only one that remained standing, which made him seem extra noticeable.

Abel could see that one of them was Wizard Godwin, who was the rank eighteen wizard that lost his right arm. He had bandages covering the missing bit so that the others would just think that it was a minor injury. There was no way to let the other wizards know that he lost an arm because if the other members of his team knew, these rank seventeen wizards might just not listen to his command. That would be really bad for him. No one would want to face Abel alone, especially when that someone didn’t have four limbs on their body.

There was also another issue. Wizard Godwin didn’t want to risk having his position taken away by other ice wind clan members. He might just be a vice-captain, but he’s pretty much the leader at this point as the captain was already semi-retired. Every time there was a mission, he was the one that’s been responsible for assigning them. The list of examples could go on and on, but the point was clear.

So Wizard Godwin bore great hatred for Abel. He lost his right arm because of him. His good friend Wizard Masin, too. Those were the reasons that he needed to find Abel. He went as far as to get help from his friend in the Land of Ice Frost. If Abel was to remain in the Stan Empire, there was the chance that he was going to reveal his whereabouts at some point. This prediction turned out to be correct since it was only the second day that he received news about where Abel had gone.

While bringing all the rank seventeen wizards that he could, Wizard Godwin got Abel in the Wizard Union building. He noticed him at first sight. His wound felt a strong stang the moment that he got his target.

Wizard Godwin said hatefully, “Don’t escape this time, Wizard Abel!”

He then blinked to the four rank seventeen wizards that were with him. They quickly ran out of the teleportation circle and covered Abel in four directions. They did all sorts of movements, but one thing that they didn’t do was to cast spells.

Abel asked calmly, “So we meet again, Wizard Godwin. Is your right arm alright?”

Wizard Godwin screamed coarsely when his missing arm was mentioned, “You are a dead man, Wizard Abel! A dead man!”

Abel looked around, “This is the Wizard Union, mind if I remind you. You want to start a fight here?”

Spells were not allowed in the Wizard Union. There was no exception to this rule. The four rank seventeen wizards could’ve surrounded him by using “instantaneous movement,” but they chose to run towards him. Speaking of rules, self-defense was legitimate inside Wizard Union buildings. As he didn’t think that Wizard Godwin had the guts to break the rules, he just stood where he was and chose not to move at all.

As the Wizard Union guardian spirit was in charge of taking care of the Wizard Union building, it was programmed to figure who started a fight if one was to take place. If its intelligence decided to make the call, it might even just use the defensive large circle outside the circle to take down the wizard that started it all. This wasn’t a small city like Annual City, by the way. Apart from the contracts that were assigned by the Wizard Union, there was also the defensive large circle that was assigned by Silan City. If Wizard Godwin and the four rank seventeen wizards were to use their spells, they would’ve had to face the city’s large circle’s suppression and Abel’s self-defense in legitimation.

Thus, it was still quite safe to be in a big city such as this. Abel was calm because he knew about this. Wizard Godwin was kind of surprised when he saw how calm Abel was. He had expected the man to escape with his “instantaneous movement” or attack them with his spells. Actually, given how Abel barely had the time to know about the central continent, he just kind of thought that the large circle would be activated very quickly. Abel was a lot more vigilant than that, so it seemed. He tried to know everything there was about the central continent as soon as he arrived. It took him about just a day to get many questions answered by a lot of people.

Abel revealed his full set of magic robe after putting away his long robe. The unlucky worgen wizard had just been forced to the ground by the presence of the five advanced wizards. He was quite relieved when he saw the crest that Abel was wearing on his chest. If he really tried to do anything back then, Abel could’ve just killed him right there and then in however ways he wanted.

Two red-cloaked wizards appeared out of the teleportation circle, “Hey, you! What are you all doing! This is the Wizard Union!”

The red cloak was the standard costume of the law enforcement wizards. They were very powerful inside the Wizard Union. With a sufficient amount of evidence, they could capture and arrest any wizards at their own discretion. Just then, after receiving news that there was chaos taking place inside the Silan Wizard Union branch building, they came here immediately to check what was happening.

Abel bowed and explained himself, “Greetings, officers. I’m only here to get some things sorted on my personal behalf. Nothing I’ve done is against the rules.”

The two red-cloaked advanced wizards knew. The guardian spirit already reported to them everything, so they were really just here to hear what both sides had to say. Abel’s got his testimonies finished pretty quickly. Wizard Godwin and the four rank seventeen wizards were obviously much more powerful than the two of them, but they still had an obligation to justify their actions.

Wizard Godwin put up a straight face, “All we’ve done was to unleash our presence. Nobody cast any spell. No rules were violated. Yes, officers?”

One of the red-cloaked advanced wizards warned out, “You better not be lying. Remember, if you want to settle anything, do it outside the city. Don’t do anything that’ll harm regulars if you are here.”

Wizard Godwin threw a malicious glare at Abel, “I’ll be keeping a watch on you, Wizard Abel! I’ll find you no matter where you are.”

Having said that, Wizard Godwin knew that he was not quite prepared this time. He didn’t have the time to think it through, though. Actually, there was just no telling when the next time he’d find Abel was. He’s also quite busy regularly. If someone told him where Abel was while he was in the middle of his mission, there was just no way that he could come alone.

When Wizard Godwin and his men were just about to leave, Abel suddenly spoke.

“Stop!” he suddenly spoke out, making everyone stop, “I was tracked the moment I used the teleportation circle. Does the Wizard Union sell out its members?”

His voice echoed through the entire hallroom. The two red-cloaked law enforcer wizards’ expression changed very quickly. If such an accusation was verified, the entire Silan City Wizard Union and the entire Stan Empire Wizard Union would’ve been involved. It’d be a very alerting thing to know if the wizards knew that every one of them would be surveillance the moment they used teleportation circles. And since Abel was a rank sixteen wizard, no one could just ignore his accusations like they were non-existent, to begin with.

Even Wizard Godwin changed his expression when he heard. He didn’t think that Abel would think like this. As a matter of fact, his guess was right. There was an advanced wizard in the Stan Empire Wizard Union that revealed his track when he came here.

A red-cloaked law enforcer wizard inquired, “Are you certain of what you’ve said, Wizard Abel?”

Abel took out his identity card, “I arrived at Silan City yesterday. Today, I went to the teleportation circle to check on my destination. I didn’t actually teleport, but the system recorded every data that was in my wizard crest. Wizard Godwin and the four advanced wizards appeared ten minutes after the procedure. If you ask me, I think I have every reason to believe that my privacy was violated.”

As the red-cloaked wizard took over the identity card and scanned it with his power of the Will, the look on his face changed quite a bit. He gave it back to Abel quite quickly. He was starting to understand why Abel didn’t leave the teleportation circle after he used it. His destination, the Land of Lightning Fall, was locked down. Also, since Abel’s card indicated that he belonged to the lightning clan, the accusation he was making just made things a lot harder to not be taken seriously.

After he spoke, the red-cloaked law enforcer wizard took out an identity card and started scanning it with his power of the Will. He immediately took the result to his partner. As every one of their actions would be recorded by the Wizard Union spirit, they must make sure that they report whatever they were planning to use to receive the needed authorization.

The red-cloaked law enforcer wizard spoke, “It’s been verified, Wizard Abel. While you were using the teleportation circle, Wizard Gilini of the Wizard Union did check your messages as you sent them. Rest be assured, though. I’ve already reported this to the Wizard Union. As the appropriate punishment, Wizard Gilini will be exiled for at least a total of three years. He will also have all his authorities within the Wizard Union confiscated away from him.”

Having said that, he turned to give a sympathetic look towards Wizard Godwin. He didn’t think that there’d be many people who would want to be close to someone who would sell out his friends.

“You dirty crooked wretch!” Wizard Godwin tried to suppress the sharp pain in his right, “We’ll leave now!”

“Thank you so much, officers!” Abel quickly turned to give his thanks without caring for Wizard Godwin as he was leaving, “You really did a lot of justice there. Thank you for your service.”

Before the red-cloaked law enforcer wizards were about to say something, a glass-shattering voice came from the side outside.

“No!” the red-cloaked law enforcer wizard cried out, “The city defensive large circle broke!”

To respond, he and his partner immediately teleported out of the hallroom. Yes, the defensive large circle was still on, but as red-cloaked law enforcer wizards. They had the choice to teleport freely within a certain authorized area. Abel heard their screams when they disappeared. At the same time, he decided to teleport out of the building as he could no longer feel the spell circle’s presence. Outside the hallroom, he could see a defensive large circle that shattered like glass in the sky. A small part of it had already vanished into sparks, whereas others were broken and shattering by bits and pieces.

From then on, milk-white streaks of light appeared in the sky. Not very far outside the Wizard Union hallroom, a teleportation door appeared in the middle of the road out of nowhere. The color it was emitting was aquatic blue.

“It’s the evil knights!” the red-cloaked law enforcer screamed in fright, then turned to Abel, “Please, Wizard Abel, help us to protect the Wizard Union! Don’t let the evil knights destroy the teleportation circle!”

“You’re not going to call reinforcements?” Abel couldn’t help but ask.

The red-cloaked law enforcer wizard explained as fast as he could, “There’s no time, Wizard Abel! This is a teleportation portal opened by demons! Under the influence of the power of dimension, there’ll be at least five minutes where we can’t use the teleportation circle or the contact circle! We’re in big trouble! If we can’t hold on for at least five minutes, the evil knights might just destroy the Wizard Union’s teleportation circle! A lot of losses would happen to Silan City if that actually happens!”

“Shame,” the other red-cloaked law enforcer wizard reinforced the point, “If only Wizard Godwin left a little later, we’d probably have five more advanced wizards to join the fight with us.”

That’s not what Abel thought. As far as he was concerned, if the evil knights attacked earlier when Wizard Godwin and the other five advanced wizards decided to stay, he’d be in a lot more dangerous than where he was at now. He had a lot of beef with Wizard Godwin, so it was kind of hard to guess if it was him or the evil knights that Wizard Godwin would go after first.

“My lord, you are the almighty god;

My lord, you are the one that makes it so that my enemies who want seek redemption. You are the one that would make them repent.

My lord, I implore you to soften all resistance that my enemies would have against the truth. May the seeds of your word be planted in their thoughts and wills;

My lord, may you shatter the will of my enemies, drive them into despair and bring them to their own ends;

My lord, may you break the authorities my enemies have as they were alive. May you stop their voice and silence them;

My lord, may you use your power over my enemies, help them escape from the influence of the filthy spirits that are over them. May you motivate them and make them repent. I’ll put ropes over the spirits that created chaos in their eyes and filth in their beliefs.”

A bunch of voices came from within the aquatic blue teleportation circle. The voice went from far to near. After that, an army in full armor came out of the teleportation portal. The voices became so clear when they went out that they spread throughout the city. From what Abel could see, many regular people had this wavering look in their eyes as they trekked towards the teleportation portal. It was a small boy that was walking at the front. As soon as this boy stepped into the teleportation portal, he quickly disappeared. It was the same with the other people who walked in. The singing had some sort of hypnotizing effect that could make regular people lose their self-control.

It’s not like Abel didn’t want to help, but when he saw the red-cloaked law enforcer wizards standing right where they were, he was starting to get a better grasp of the situation. They were standing right outside the Wizard Union hallroom, which was a very important channel that protected the teleportation circle. They had an obligation to guard the teleportation circle because if they were distracted and tried to help these common people, there was the risk that the entire city would have to suffer under the attack of these evil knights. What they wanted to do was to minimize the amount of casualty there was.

The red-cloaked law enforcer wizard explained to Abel, “What the nation of evil is trying to do is to rob our population. It’s getting hard for them to increase their population due to the lockage over the last few thousand years, so the demons occasionally open up portals for them to siege the various cities that were on this central continent.”

Abel was a bit disappointed to hear this. He didn’t think he would be so unlucky as to see a teleportation portal on a day like this.

Meanwhile, a vulpera was attracted by the evil knight’s singing to come to the teleportation circle. An evil knight killed him with his sword as soon as he walked over next to the army.

The red-cloaked law enforcer continued to speak, “The nation of evil does not require other races. All they want are humans. They eliminate the others.”

By this point, Abel’s already had the energy defensive shield and the frozen armor on him. Golden mana spheres were generated out of his energy defensive shield. It made the two red-cloaked wizards’ eyes shine in awe.

One of wizards had his defensive spells switched on as well, “My name is Lamar. It’s an honor to fight with you, Wizard Abel.”

The other red-cloaked law enforcer wizard said as well, “My name is Chapman.”

The army was finally out of the teleportation portal at this point. This was a knight squad that consisted of two hundred men. Abel could not make a precise estimate as to their real strength, but something really captured his attention. The knight that was leading gave off this very strong essence as he was marching forward.

Abel couldn’t help but ask himself, “So that’s a crusader?”

Upon a closer look, he could see that the evil knight had a full set of knight equipment. He had knight armor, a knight helmet, two steel gloves in his hands, iron belts around his waist, iron war boots on his feet, a knight’s shield in his left hand, and a knight’s big sword in his right. Unlike the Holy Continent’s knights, the halo was a light ring that was shaped like a cloud of blue mist.

“It’s the sacred freezing” technique!” Wizard Lamar cried out, “This evil knight that was leading must be an advanced evil knight! He’s trying to slow down everyone in his way to deal freezing damage to them!”

The knight’s squad was already standing still in front of the teleportation portal. The chanting just ended. It looked like they were all praying together. As the singing stopped, a few regular people were approaching the teleportation portal were coming to their senses.

“My child! My child!” one of the women screamed. She searched around herself to find her child, but she couldn’t find them. After trying for a while, she had her eyes locked dead into the teleportation portal.

“Don’t worry, honey,” she eventually stood still and said resolutely, “I’ll be with you in hell.”

Her husband grabbed the air as he was too late to grab onto her, “Larrie, no! My child!”

Having lost his only chance to get the woman back, the man stared at the praying soldiers hatefully. He had forgotten about fear and the difference between their strength. Without caring, he screamed frantically and rushed towards the evil knights. His mindset was very simple. He wanted to deal as much damage as he could to avenge his wife and child. However, as soon as he had the intent to make the attack, his entire body was wrapped up by a blue ice frost qi. His body stopped as he tried to make a charging motion. The evil knights turned him into a frozen statue as he raised his leg to run.

Abel could not hold onto his wrath any further. He revealed the “leaf” magic staff in his hand, and with his power of the Will, he marked the evil knights as his enemies and flashed out a complicated spell rune in his right. He was activating his “lightning blizzard” spell. A flash of lightning went across his body and ignited the frozen armor that was over him. After that, the spell rune flashed across his hand. He threw a giant firewall towards his front. His power of the Will was so impactful that the firewall was thrown right in front of the evil knight squad, which interrupted them as they were in the middle of their prayer.

While these knights were called the evil knights, Abel still preferred calling them the crusaders. He respected their notions of shielding themselves with their faith and the readiness to fight at any time.

Wizard Lamar reminded again, “Be careful of their charging ability, Wizard Abel!”

As someone who could use the “charging” ability himself, Abel knew very well how broken the ability was. Actually, while what he learned was the improved version designed for the regular head knight commanders, these crusaders were known to use the original version of the technique.

Even though they were interrupted from their prayer, the evil knight squad continued to maintain their battle formation. They ignored the firewall in front of them and rushed straight towards Abel. To their miscalculation, the firewall did a lot more damage than they expected as Abel had the bonus effect of the “leaf” magic staff. The wall was dealing about 1800 points of fire damage at every second. That was quite unbelievable because even wizards who maxed out their fire level spells would do about only 1300 points of fire damage in total.

The advanced crusader leading the way didn’t think that there would be a wizard like this in a city they picked randomly. Their decision turned out to be a blunder, and the price for their miscalculation was that all fifty of the crusaders on their side were hurt by the fire element as they passed through the firewall. This was the case even when the crusaders knew the “fire resistance” technique that would reduce the firewall’s damage.

When the leading advanced crusader realized something was wrong, he immediately stopped marching forward to prevent rushing into the firewall. If he was too late, his soldiers behind him would’ve lost their lives quite quickly. The fifty injured crusaders had light blue qi rings flashing beneath their feet. The essence poured into their body, clearing up the burns at a speed that was visible to the eyes.

“Very troublesome, I see,” Abel looked towards these crusaders. While he didn’t have time to recover in the short run, his combat capability was pretty much back to normal.

Wizard Lamar screamed, “Don’t get too close to them! We’ll attack as we move. If we can hold up a bit longer, more reinforcements from the inner city will come to aid us!”

As he said this, spell runes began to appear in his hands. Dark clouds appeared in the sky in front of them. Snowflakes started falling from the top. While the “blizzard” spell only lasted for four seconds, if the crusaders were within range, they would have to take a slowing and freezing effect continuously. This blizzard spell was enough to block the road that was leading to the Wizard Union hall. Wizard Lamar noticed, too. The two hundred crusaders marching into Silan City were actually much stronger than he had expected.

Speaking of which, Wizard Lamar did mention attacking as they were moving, but what he was really implying was that they couldn’t hold onto the crusader squad any longer. He did identify a rank eighteen advanced crusader, while the others were intermediate crusaders about intermediate level. This was quite a powerful team. He could make a good estimate quite quickly as he had quite a lot of experience fighting crusaders.

As the teleportation portals had limited capacity, the two hundred crusaders could only be packed with the best of the best. Still, having one advanced crusader and many intermediate crusaders were still quite rare to see,

“March forward! May honor be with my lord!”

The leading crusader chanted as he swung the knight’s big sword in his hand. The crusaders behind him all became phantoms that were rushing forward. As a hundred of them used the charging ability simultaneously, Abel started to notice that something was really going wrong. As it turned out, the crusaders were targeting the teleportation circle inside the Wizard Union hall. To stop them from getting to it, he threw a firewall towards them with his right hand. The other red-cloaked wizards also tried to help by throwing spells that they could generate.

All of an instance, spell lighting shone everywhere outside the Wizard Union. Since Abel and the red-cloaked law enforcer wizards’ objectives were to prevent the evil knights from getting into the Wizard Union, the strategy they went with was to prevent them from getting closer without actually attacking them.

The crusaders stopped when they were faced with the firewall. Not all of them, however. It was just the ones at the back that really stopped. The advanced crusader and the twenty crusaders beside him didn’t really stop moving forward. They charged straight towards Abel and the two red-cloaked law enforcer wizards as they stepped on a puzzle of spells. They got their confidence from their charging speed and the spell resistance they gained from their spirit halo. As spells only did limited damage to them, they believed that they could do quite well against any attacks that wizards might throw at them.

Abel and the two red-cloaked law enforcer wizards teleported away at the same to get away from the crusaders’ charge. It was what the crusaders would’ve wanted. Their objective was not the wizards but to rush into the Wizard Union building. If they could make their way in, then the victory would be theirs.

So, when the advanced crusader ended his charge, lightning from the sky struck right towards him. It was the automatic attack of Abel’s “lightning blizzard.” The advanced crusader was the first to enter its range, so he became the one that was locked onto by this advanced spell. Honestly speaking, the “lightning blizzard” was not the strongest spell there was. Lightning spells weren’t scary for the amount of damage that they could do, but the effect they had to zap their opponents.

Speaking of damage, a total of 320 lightning elemental damage was nowhere to be compared to the 1800 elemental damage of the firewall. This was the case when lightning wizards were commonly perceived as the deadliest type of wizards. The main reason for this was the special effect of their lightning spells. When the lightning sphere dropped from the sky and hit the advanced crusader, it struck him and made him enter into a state of immobility. This zapping didn’t last for very long, but it was long enough to interrupt him from performing his charge. It also made the twenty crusaders behind him panic as they were suddenly without someone to lead them.

At the same time, Abel unleashed the “lightning chain” spell to make an instant strike at the advanced crusader. He didn’t think that he was going to deal a lot of damage to the advanced crusader, but the lightning chain managed to immobilize the eight crusaders and the advanced crusader together. When the zapping effect ended, the sky’s lightning sphere dropped and hit the advanced crusader once more. The continuous interruption angered the advanced crusader, making it turn its gaze right towards Abel.

The advanced crusader screamed and activated his charge, “My honor be with my lord! You, destroy the teleportation circle while I end this little worm myself!”