Warlock Apprentice

Rein gave Angor a cold glimpse when he recalled the recent rumors he heard.

“You are Angor?”

Just like the man’s power, Rein’s voice was something that could force people to quiet down.

Not knowing Rein’s purpose did not prevent Angor from showing his manners. “I am, sir.”

Rein briefly inspected Angor up and down and said something to Sunders using eye language.

You found a very nice student.

Sunders returned a mild smile.

I was lucky.

Rein chuckled slightly, nodded to Angor, and moved to Sunders’ side so that both of them were looking at the sky.

“That appears so familiar…” Rein didn’t look very surprised at the looming disaster.

Sunders narrowed his eyes and scanned around him. “Indeed, but this is such a coincidence too.”

“Care to explain?” Rein fixed his attention on Sunders again. “It has been many years since Greya created a new spell. Weren’t you expecting her to do it again?”

As a level-3 “truth-finder” wizard, Rein fully knew what was going on—someone was inventing a brand new spell, which attracted an omen. From what he knew, he easily reached the conclusion that Greya, who was currently residing at Phantom Island, was behind this.

It had been a long time since Greya made herself known as a truth-finder by creating her first original spell, which meant she was very likely to do it a second time sooner or later. Compared to this, Rein was a little annoyed about the fact that a wizard who didn’t belong to Brute Cavern was causing this mess on his turf.

It was several centuries ago when a wizard of Brute Cavern created a new spell. After all these years, combined with the fact that Greya was not a member of the organization, most people in Brute Cavern failed to realize what the omen meant.

“Of course it’s a coincidence. Greya had been traveling around different worlds for decades without succeeding. As soon as she came to Phantom Island, she made her new spell,” said Sunders.

Rein chuckled. “Heh, not good enough. Everything in this world can be explained as coincidences in this way.”

He meant to say that Sunders’ theory was not sound.

Sunders didn’t protest. He simply gazed at Greya’s temporary hut, which was unleashing a huge amount of energy into the environment, and then glanced at Angor.

Angor was going over what he just heard with a dumbfounded look—Sunders and Rein did not make their conversation private, so he heard everything.

This is caused by Lady Greya making a new spell? But… the professor got a point. Why now?

“I’m curious though. What has she been doing at Phantom Island these days?” Rein asked Sunders a question.

Angor felt his heart skipping a beat.

As far as he knew, Greya spent several days inside the illusion of Twinning Wings. Before leaving for Valley of Souls, he moved past the hut and felt familiar nightmare energy from there, which meant she was still going over the illusion.

And there were Sunders, who just learned a new cantrip called “Wither” from his illusions.

Don-don’t tell me Lady Greya did this because of my illusion? Or rather, the “manifestation of Mystery” inside the illusion?

The first thing that came to Angor’s mind was how to avoid potential danger brought by this incident.

If anyone learned that there was something that helped wizards comprehend new spells which could cause such a large-scale omen… then the whole wizarding world would probably fall into total chaos.

One of the many challenges one needed to complete before being recognized as a truth-finder was “creating a unique spell which was acknowledged by the world’s consciousness”. In other words, by using manifestations of Mystery, tons of truth-finder wizards would pop up like it was nothing!

What he didn’t know was that while Greya did use the help of the manifestation to break through major obstacles for finishing the spell of “Birth”, she did not fully rely on the manifestation. The enormous wisdom revealed by the manifestation was only a boost that helped her reach her goal, while most of the work and resources were prepared by Greya herself before coming to Phantom Island.

But still, tools that possessed great value would always convince people to go after them at all costs, while rules, morals, and whatsoever did not matter. When there was enough profit, people would gladly risk their lives.

Supposed that Angor’s manifestations of Mystery only had a negligible chance of allowing wizards to create new spells, in the views of wizards who happened to need a little extra help to achieve their goals, such a slim chance was something they would like to grasp no matter what.

Thinking about this, Angor almost shivered in fear.

Sunders suddenly pointed to his own face and spoke to Rein, “You just heard how I lost my eye, no? I’ve been busy finding a replacement, so I do not know much about other matters. And no, I have no idea what Greya’s been up to. Besides… I’m not someone to peek into a lady’s locked room without getting her consent.”

Rein’s eyes twinkled. “I see. Mister Phantom Master has given up all mortal passion and love… You’re not interested in women.”

Rein looked away from the lightning strikes and began to tease Sunders instead. “Seriously now, you deserve an inheritor. I peeked into Samantha’s diary once. It was her dream to become a dedicated wife. Your wife.”

Samantha? Angor tilted his head a little. Did my professor have a lover before?

“I’m NOT interested in broken glass, and I believe I said that before.” Sunders’ expression turned into that of disgust. “I don’t need inheritors and force my will upon them, for I am going to attain immortality by myself.”

Rein’s neutral look slightly wavered a bit—by those words, Sunders was indirectly accusing Rein’s negligence.

Rein shook his head. “Right… I wasn’t faithful enough as a father.”

It seemed they would not talk about Sunders’ lover at this rate. Both of them remained quiet for a moment.

While Rein recalled the old days when he was together with his daughter, Sunders leaned on the wall and removed his gloves.

The gentleman pretended that he was taking it easy, but Angor noticed that his professor was telling him something by using his good eye.

Don’t say anything to anyone.

Angor nodded slowly.

Of course Sunders also knew about the connection between Angor’s illusions and Greya’s success. He meant to warn Angor to stay safe for now.

A mighty wizard like Rein Mute could easily detect common communication spells, so delivering the message in this old-fashioned way was the better choice.

The lightning bolts in the sky weren’t slowing down one bit. Under their continuous assault, the forest on Phantom Island was burning violently, while the phantom beasts tried their best to run for their lives.

The fire was getting closer and closer to Sunders’ mansion when he finally moved.

Sunders closed his eyes and chanted something under his breath. At the same time, groups of green, strange-looking creatures emerged from the ground around the mansion.

These creatures looked like glowing green balls of different sizes. Some were as little as human fists, while others were like small hills. Their “skin” appeared glossy and smooth, while each one had a pair of black, beady eyes.

They reminded Angor of a monster called “slime”, but compared to the puddles of filth described in stories, these ones looked rather cute.

The green balls bounced into formation and made a circle around the mansion area. Any fire that reached them simply fizzed into white mist and vanished into the air. Also, the lightning strikes coming down couldn’t hurt these things either, which shocked Angor greatly.

Are they monsters or a spell?

Sunders chuckled at Angor’s obvious curiosity. “I asked you to manage Phantom Island for some time, but you never bothered to learn what was around the island? What you are seeing now is an amalgamated phantom beast called ‘Pokoly’. They are immune to energy-based attacks that are below the wizard level. There’s a section beneath the ground specially designed to house these creatures.”

Angor grew a little embarrassed—he could have asked Goode about the basic layout of Phantom Island, but he never did.

Rein heard their conversation and stopped recalling old memories. His expression turned plain and unemotional again.

“Sunders, when you created your spell, ‘Nightmare Substitute’, the omen you caused was not so serious, am I right?”

Sunders nodded. “Yes. The area covered by the omen was smaller, and I never attracted the world’s consciousness to me.”

Rein grinned. “That’s Greya for you… Her last spell was quite a sight to behold, and here she is again. But if my memory serves me right, this omen is slightly weaker compared to her last one.”

“Greya earned an extremely high starting point as a truth-finder wizard by creating ‘Artificial Life’, which defied many rules of nature. It’s almost impossible to surpass that feat.”

“You’re right. A higher start, a harder path forward,” Rein said as he gazed at Sunders. “So, do you think Greya continued her way of creation or did she go after a new path?”