The Wizard World - Chapter 151

The fog was still thick. Black stones filled the gaps between the grasses on the ground. A tall withered tree stood in the middle of the large empty ground alone.
Beside the tree was a still, blue lake.
Several piles of bones were left ashore. Furthermore, this mysterious foggy place gave Angele an unpleasant feeling.
Angele glanced around. The only thing he discovered was his own self being surrounded by black cliffs. The empty ground in front of him was about the size of a soccer court, and the lake in the middle had a diameter of 10 meters.
That was all he could see here, only the area within Zero’s scan range was visible, the rest was still covered in fog.
Angele wiped the dust off his black robe and walked to the small lake.
He realized that the tree was in the center of the lake as he moved closer.
Its trunk was black, no leaves could be seen on the branches, and several white pigeons were flying above the tree.
*COO*
The pigeons noticed Angele’s presence, then they chirped.
"Intruder, you are not welcome here. This is the private garden of Six Ring High Tower. Please identify yourself." One of the pigeons suddenly started speaking in the ancient Byrun language.
"Six Ring High Tower?" Angele felt a bit surprised. His sight fell onto the speaking pigeon.
"You’re the guardian?"
"I am. No permit from my organization, please leave the canyon immediately." The pigeon glared at Angele with its blood red eyes and warned in a high-pitched voice.
Angele grunted for a second and responded, "Fine. If the place is claimed, I’ll be leaving.’
He stepped back and turned around, then started heading back along the path he passed through from before.
Angele stopped walking by the entrance of the canyon and waited on the side. Although he knew the garden was owned by another Wizard organization, he wanted to see if other people who entered the canyon would have the same experience as him. Also, he wanted to see what would happen after people consumed the Knight’s Faith.
After waiting for a while, Angele suddenly felt intense heat coming from his left chest. When he lowered his head, he saw a white ghost-shaped pattern glowing. The pattern was blinking in a particular order.
Angele’s expression changed. He immediately took out a tiny black metal bottle from the pouch and opened it.
*CHI*
Green smoke rushed out of the bottle and formed a gaseous sphere right in front Angele’s face.
A green slate slowly appeared in the center of the gaseous sphere, with words written on it in Anmag.
‘The underground races have invaded the school. Don’t come back within five years. Liliana.’
This was a message board. The first message was from Liliana. Several other messages were written right below it.
‘Master Liliana is severely injured. Our situation is grave. Without the leader, we won’t survive in this organization. Moreover, the school has claimed that Liliana had betrayed the school! We failed, so we’re now in deep trouble. Disciples of Liliana, don’t return to the school. Eric.’
‘Last time, it was the Mind Reader. Now, it’s our master. What the hell is going on! Damn it! Again, disciples of Master Liliana. Listen! Stay away from the school. We are now identified as traitors! We need to preserve our strength and retaliate later! Manera.’
‘This message will take a month to get to you. As a disciple of Master Liliana, I hope you will be able to understand the situation. We are being hunted down by the Wizards of Ramsoda. At the same time, the underground races are attacking us. This is a planned invasion, and we’re the victims. If you didn’t sign the contract, stay calm. The school has no right to kill you. It’s highly possible that the school is already under the underground races’ control. Green Slinger.’
As Angele continued to read the messages on the board, his expression turned serious.
He left the school not so long ago, yet it seemed that many things had occurred. Only the first message was from the master. The rest was from her disciples. Liliana was a mentor who genuinely cared for her students and disciples. Her disciples would always unite to solve her problem whenever she was in trouble. This was one of the reasons why other organizations fear her power and authority. More so, there were more than 10 formal Wizards among her disciples, with one of them already in the Liquid stage.
Liliana had built herself a strong force and thus was feared by most of the Dark Wizards and people in the school. For some reason, however, the school had claimed of Liliana now being a traitor.
Angele was not certain if his master actually did betray the organization, but even more than that, he couldn not understand the reason why Ramsoda would give up such a strong force so easily.
The message slate was a one-time item with a self-destruct function after displaying messages.

Luckily, Angele took Liliana’s advice and refused to sign the school’s contract. Otherwise, he himself would similarly be hunted down.
Angele’s original plan was to search for the treasures and resources he needed on this land, but it seemed that valuable resources like Knight’s Faith had already been claimed by other Wizard organizations.
"The situation will continue to worsen since the treaty has been breached," Angele muttered as he looked toward the fog right in front of him.
"Well, I need to check if this Knight’s Faith is truly helpful. I need to strengthen my mentality."
The message slate quickly dissipated in the green smoke before the latter was blown away by the wind.
Angele turned around and walked into the fog once again. Once again, he reached the lake and saw the guardian standing on a branch.
"Hey, can we do a trade? I really need some Knight’s Faith," Angele asked politely. He didn’t want to offend the guardian of the garden.
"Trade?" The pigeon hesitated. It was, after all, its first time to hear someone asking to do a trade.
Angele did not give the pigeon time to think, only smiling as he continued.
"Yea, trade. I can see that you’ll break through again soon, right? You must need a good amount of magic stones. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have shape shifted into a pigeon to preserve your power, right?"
The pigeon remained silent.
Angele wanted to see what the Knight’s Faith has in store for him, so he continued to persuade, "See, there are too many fruits in this canyon. Most of the invaders got stalled by you, yet some of them still acquired the Knight’s Faith, right? Sell me some and just consider those to have been stolen by invaders, what do you think? It’s a win-win situation. Your master surely won’t notice what you did."
The pigeon was hesitating, "But… it’s against the rules…"
"Hey, listen. After you break through, you’ll become stronger and be able to finish off invaders easily. A small cost for a brighter future, is there a better deal than this? Come on, trust me," Angele smiled confidently. He could see that the pigeon was already considering his offer. It seemed that Wizards barely visited the garden. Mortals robbed the garden, yet the Six Ring High Tower didn’t send any Wizard to pursue them so the garden might be an abandoned resource point.
"But then again… there are rules here…" The pigeon was still having second thoughts. It lowered its head as it began considering the pros and cons.
Angele quickly took out an extremely rare high-quality magic stone from his pouch, which could be traded for many low-quality magic stones and it contained a great amount of elemental power. It was an item the guardian desired the most before breaking through.
After seeing what Angele was holding, the pigeon finally compromised.
"Two! I want two of them." It raised its head.
"One." Angele’s eyebrows creased, uncertain if the Knight’s Faith was worth two high-quality magic stones.
"I need two. One is not enough," the pigeon added.
"Well, show me a sample of the Knight’s Faith, even just a small amount." Angele stared at the pigeon.
The pigeon did not hesitate this time. It hit the branch with its wings, and a white egg-shaped fruit appeared by the tip of the branch. The white fruit was glowing slightly. The pigeon grabbed it by the stalk with its beak before it threw it to Angele.
Angele stepped forward and caught the fruit. The Knight’s Faith looked like a glowing pear.
He was a bit disappointed. He imagined that the fruit would have some fancy appearance, but it looked and smelled just like a pear, with the only difference being its glowing appearance.
‘Zero, analyze its contents.’
‘Task created… Analyzing…’
*CHI*
Blue light dots flashed in Angele’s eyes.
Rows of data were shown beside the white pear in his hand and new data was added every second.
‘Analysis, done. The fruit contains special elements that will make its consumers addicted. People will feel great pleasure while experiencing hallucinations. You will be able to concentrate your mentality slowly if you can resist the pleasure and the hallucination effect.’
Angele was a bit speechless.
‘So, this is similar to opium?’ Angele wondered. This special element affected a person’s nervous system and made them experience hallucinations while gaining pleasure. If he could stay calm after eating the fruit, his mentality would be strengthened.
The chip could actually simulate the effect of the fruit for him after extracting this special element. There was no point in him acquiring a large amount of this fruit. Knight’s Faith was rare, but it had extreme effects and using it was risky. Angele had finally understood why this place had been abandoned.