Land of Magic

by Kirill Klevanski

  That was how a Lord and Mentor of ‘The Holy Sky’ School viewed their quest. A little adventure. The death of almost fifteen hundred ordinary disciples hadn’t even been considered a loss by the School authorities. Moreover, the fact that disciples from the ‘Meltwater’ and ‘Quick Dream’ Schools had attacked their own disciples hadn’t even fazed them. They almost didn’t care.

  All the cultivators who’d died were seen as weaklings, unworthy of wearing the School token or serving the Empire. Those who’d survived would become stronger and would perhaps be worthy of notice one day. There were countless people in the Darnassus Empire, and thousands of geniuses capable of reaching the Heaven Soldier level by the age of sixteen came to Dahanatan every year. How many true cultivators roamed the vast territory of the Empire? Too many to count.

  In Lidus and the Sea of Sand, Heaven Soldiers were the rulers. Here, they were treated like practitioners at the Bodily Nodes level. Nobody cared about them. One Lord could kill thousands of them with ease.

  “I can see that you were severely wounded,” Markin sounded concerned.

  Hadjar was surprised by the concern in the man’s voice. Why did a Mentor of ‘The Holy Sky’ School care about a mere ordinary disciple?

  “I come from a distant land, honorable Mentor.”

  “I see.” Markin drawled. “That makes sense. Perhaps you were the only one, or one of a very few Heaven Soldiers back in your homeland.”

  Hadjar only nodded. The memory of him standing on a mountain peak and saying goodbye to Elaine flashed through his mind. He wondered how his little sister was doing. She had enough talent to progress to the middle stage of the Heaven Soldier level on her own and extend her life to at least five thousand years. Maybe that would be enough time for them to meet again. By the High Heavens, why was there so much pain in his chest?

  “When you go back, there probably won’t be anyone alive who remembers your name,” Markin said, as if reading his mind. His gaze, like Hadjar’s, was directed at the stars. “If you become even stronger, if your path is long and perilous, when you return, there will most likely be nothing left of your hometown, or even the kingdom itself.”

  Hadjar was struck by how wistful the man sounded.

  “Are you from a distant land, too?”

  “From a kingdom far to the east,” the Mentor replied. “I was the only one in a thousand years who managed to reach the Heaven Soldier level by the age of sixteen. My entire Kingdom, and the King himself, spent half their treasury to buy me a ticket to Dahanatan.”

  “And when you came back…”

  “I never did.” There was a slight bit of hesitation in his words. “I never came back…”

  “You’ll get a chance to go back, one day.”

  The Mentor turned to him and smiled.

  “Thank you, disciple, but that was a long time ago. So long ago that I don’t remember the King’s face... not even my mother’s and father’s faces. They were simple peasants. They wanted a better life for their son, but... I don’t remember their faces. Even with absolute memory, it’s hard to keep someone’s face in your heart for seven thousand years.”

  Hadjar choked on air. Damn it! He was talking to a creature that could destroy him with a simple snap of his fingers, and he had also lived for more than seven thousand years!

  The most frightening fact was that Markin wasn’t even one of the top ten strongest instructors at ‘The Holy Sky’ School, not to mention the rector and vice-rector. They were a kind of monster Hadjar had never seen before.

  “Well then.” Markin cleared his throat and got to his feet. “One day, we all start taking the deaths of the young disciples for granted. You are like sand flowing through the fingers of old people.”

  “Thank you for your company,” Hadjar saluted.

  “You’re welcome, disciple. Good luck with your exam. I hope to see you wearing the gold token of a fully-fledged disciple soon. If you do earn one, I’ll have a special task for you.”

  Markin disappeared into the darkness, leaving Hadjar standing in the middle of the stone-paved street. He hadn’t even lit his pipe. Despite the cloudless sky, he felt like a storm was coming.

  Chapter 483

  “What did he want?” Einen asked, appearing from the shadows.

  “Damn it!” Hadjar flinched, almost dropping his pipe. “Again?”

  Once upon a time, when they’d first met, Hadjar hadn’t been able to sense the islander when he approached from the shadows. A while later, after growing stronger, he’d learned how to do it. And now Einen had been able to catch him off guard again.

  “You aren’t the only one who’s been cultivating his Techniques, my barbarian friend,” the islander smiled a little smugly.

  “Since you’re so stealthy again, didn’t you already hear what he said?”

  “I can hide from you, not a Lord,” Einen remarked. “I stayed away.”

  Hadjar looked at his friend skeptically. Subterfuge and half-truths were something the islander used frequently. He did so without even noticing. Even if he didn’t intend to deceive them, he still misled people with ease.

  “I couldn’t read his lips,” Einen confessed after a few seconds of silence. “As soon as I looked at him, my thoughts grew hazy and I found myself thinking about something completely different.”

  Hadjar nodded. He’d felt the same thing when, back during his first days of studying at ‘The Holy Sky’ School, he had tried to observe the training grounds. After all, the other people at the School weren’t stupid.

  “So what did Markin want?” Einen asked again.

  Hadjar looked in the direction the Master had gone in when he’d walked away. No one could say for sure whether the Master had actually left or not. Maybe he was still lurking in the shadows and watching the friends.

  On the other hand, why would he bother? They were two ordinary disciples of the outer circle. There were tens of thousands of disciples just like them.

  “He just wanted to talk,” Hadjar shrugged, and then, remembering the man’s words about a task, added hesitantly, “Or maybe not.”

  Einen looked in the same direction his friend had. Both of them peered at the pitch-black gardens of ‘The Holy Sky’ School. When not lit by the magic lanterns and only caressed by the scant, cold light of the stars, the gardens looked like a theater of shadows.

  “I don’t like this.”

  After standing in the alley a bit longer, the friends went back to the Forest of Knowledge. No one was waiting for them on the way to their hill. Moreover, while the friends had constantly felt people’s eyes on them while walking through the forest before, everything had now changed. It seemed like they were being shunned.

  “The news of Ian Gorr’s death must’ve spread so quickly it returned before us,” Einen said.

  Hadjar nodded. The servants of House Tarez must have had some way of communicating at a distance. Otherwise, how else could one explain the fact that they always found out about the death of their warriors before they could’ve feasibly received the news? Of course, if some disciples had found out about the death, the news had definitely reached the others as well.

  “I don’t want to leave it.” Hadjar sighed.

  They were standing in front of their hut. The traps had turned out to be unnecessary. The disciples of ‘The Holy Sky’ School were smart enough not to steal or attack anyone on School grounds. There were no fools suicidal enough to risk feeling the wrath of the Masters who were responsible for enforcing discipline.

  “We’ve only spent a few nights in it,” Einen said philosophically. “Besides, my barbarian friend, material possessions don’t lead cultivators to anything good.”

  “I know that even without you telling me,” Hadjar grunted. “But I can at least grieve a little over the loss.”

  Einen smiled and was the first to enter their temporary, but beloved hut. That night, they decided to take a break from training for a while and allowed themselves the luxury of sleep. Being true cult
ivators, whose physiology was far from that of a mortal, they had little need for sleep. It was normal for a Heaven Soldier to stay awake for several months and then regain their sanity with a simple, hour-long nap. Nevertheless, they needed a psychological rest.

  As experienced warriors, Hadjar and Einen could withstand a lot, but the recent events had injured their minds. So, sleeping was a good idea. In addition to training, resting was also very important. Without it, the body, or, even worse, the mind, could fail at the most inopportune moment.

  After spending the night in the sweet world of dreamless sleep, the friends awoke in the morning and, after using a bucket of rainwater to wash up, hurried over to the Treasure Tower. They hadn’t been there since that first visit immediately after the exam.

  There were far fewer people in the Tower than in the Hall of Fame. No queues or crowds at the entrance. Only the old golem who served as a Keeper, janitor, and was one of the oldest constructs at the School.

  He was calmly observing the disciples who were wandering the Tower, sweeping the courtyard, and softly whistling to himself.

  “Venerable Keeper!” The friends greeted him and saluted.

  The old man looked up. At first, his eyes seemed dull and lifeless to Hadjar, but after a few seconds, they became more human.

  “Einen from the Islands and Hadjar Darkhan,” the old man smiled and returned their salute. “I thought you’d come earlier.”

  “Thought?” Einen asked.

  “Earlier?” Hadjar added a bit resentfully.

  The golem, without pausing his cleaning of the already perfectly clean stone platform, pointed to the tower behind him.

  “I’ve been a Keeper for so long that the fact that people love composing stars into constellations seems like a terrible folly to me — stars go out too often and others light up to replace them.”

  After they heard this, the friends looked at each other and swallowed. In spite of their adventures, every time they came across an ancient creature, they felt a certain thrill.

  “I’ve seen a countless number of disciples. Gifted and incompetent. Worthy and dishonest. Great and inconspicuous. So, it isn’t difficult for me to distinguish a few lights that can fan the flame from within the darkness of boredom. You are two such lights. This is not praise, but only a statement of fact.”

  “Thank you, honorable Keeper,” the friends nodded. Hadjar decided to get to the point: “We’ve come to buy access to the fully-fledged disciples’ exam.”

  “That’s right.” The Keeper said

  The friends were about to go inside when a simple broom blocked their way, made of very unassuming wood and straw. However, Hadjar doubted that even the Primeval Giant or Mentor Markin could survive an attack from that broom.

  “You should not enter the Tower today,” the old man said calmly. “Many temptations create false indecision and set deceptive goals.”

  The phrase struck Hadjar like a thunderbolt. He felt that it contained deep wisdom, preserved by the golem through a number of distant eras.

  “Take these.” The old man held out two scrolls. Each of them had a magic seal in the form of a glowing hieroglyph emblazoned on it.

  The friends saluted him again and accepted the scrolls. As they did so, the corresponding amount of 7500 Glory points disappeared from their tokens.

  “Mentor Jean will arrive at the Hall of Fame in a few hours,” the old man said in a strange voice... judging by his stony stare, he was becoming a golem again. “He’ll instruct you on how to pass the exam. May Elora’s Light be with you.”

  The golem turned, indicating that the conversation was over, and walked over to the far side of the courtyard.

  “Elora’s Light?” Hadjar asked.

  Einen didn’t answer at first. Finally, he muttered:

  “I’ve heard that name before, but I can’t remember where.”

  Hadjar looked at the old man’s back as he swept the yard. For some reason, he felt like the golem had said that ancient phrase for a reason…

  Chapter 484

  The few hours of waiting that the Keeper had mentioned turned into over half a day. The Mentors surely had their own affairs to take care of, far more important than an event that concerned mere disciples of the outer circle. The friends didn’t waste any time, however.

  “Two disciples of the outer circle are taking their exam!” Hadjar shouted like a real barker. “They didn’t stop at defeating the two most powerful disciples of the outer circle! They survived the Primeval Giant quest and the battle against the disciples of the ‘Meltwater’ and ‘Quick Dream’ Schools!”

  The crowd of people moving away from the Hall of Fame inevitably fell for the trap of the cunning friends. Since a majority of them were disciples of the outer circle, who simply hadn’t been able to avoid hearing about the two ‘monsters’, they immediately became interested and came closer.

  “And now they’re taking the exam to become fully-fledged disciples!”

  A wave of whispers immediately spread through the ranks of the curious cultivators.

  “The fully-fledged disciple exam…”

  “Damn it! I’ve been an ordinary disciple for twenty-three years, and I haven’t saved up even half that amount!”

  “Demons and gods! How long have they been disciples here?”

  “About two months!”

  “Monsters…”

  Their words flattered Hadjar at first, but then became boring and he tuned them out. Like a true huckster, Hadjar was engaged in reeling them all in. He saw these people as little more than numbers.

  “How much does a ticket to the exam cost?”

  “I’m ready to pay fifteen Glory points!”

  “Twenty!”

  “Nobody will give you more than twenty! Take the points and give us our tickets! After all, the battle between the Tarez and Dinos is the day after tomorrow, so you won’t get more than that!”

  About two hundred people were willing to pay. That would make for a very decent sum. However, neither Einen nor Hadjar were merchants. They were warriors who were simply bored while waiting for Mentor Jean to come.

  “It’s free!” Hadjar startled everyone. “You can find the venue in the Hall of Fame.”

  “Then why are we here?”

  “Let’s go train. We’ll come back when the exam starts…”

  Most of the disciples were more interested in how the exam looked than in whether the friends could manage to increase their rank. None of the people who wore silver tokens had given up their dream of one day earning a gold token.

  “Instead of spending your points, I suggest you earn them!” Hadjar’s words made the people come back, jostling each other. “Participate in our sweepstakes!”

  “Are they offering us a chance to bet on the outcome?”

  “Have you ever heard of a sweepstakes at ‘The Holy Sky’ School?”

  “No, I haven’t.”

  “Me neither.”

  “Aren’t they forbidden?”

  “I don’t know. Since they haven’t been driven from the square yet, I presume they aren’t banned.”

  After a moment of confusion, the people offered up their points. Hadjar sent all of them to Einen. The latter, sitting at a hastily made table near a hastily constructed board, accepted bids and issued betting slips. No one cared that these slips were made from tree bark. To make them, the friends had had to strip a dozen trees in the Forest of Knowledge of their bark. Einen, who had probably participated in something like this before, did well. Two hundred people who wanted to earn easy money left ten minutes later with their slips.

  “How are you?”

  Hadjar turned toward the voice. Beside him, holding her hands behind her back, stood Dora Marnil. She was wearing a long dress. Its wide, oddly shaped sleeves almost touched the ground.

  “Well, now I’m quite amused.” Hadjar couldn’t help but smile.

  At the moment, Dora looked like she’d never held a weapon in her life, like she was the youngest
daughter of an aristocrat. After all, with the help of alchemy, rare resources, and other advantages that came with wealth, a lot of the youngest sons and daughters of nobles would almost forcibly be pushed to the level of a Heaven Soldier. Why the youngest? Because the oldest children of aristocracy usually engaged in cultivation and became very formidable warriors. For example, Enora Marnil. She looked like a dangerous fighter.

  Only one thing prevented her from pulling the look off — the very heavy hammer hanging from the elf girl’s back.

  “I see.” The girl smiled, and, looking at Hadjar, added apologetically: “I haven’t prepared your spatial artifact yet.”

  Hadjar just waved it off.

  “I believe you will keep your word, heiress of House Marnil. You’ll give me one as soon as you can.”

  The elf girl nodded and, biting her lower lip slightly, slipped behind Hadjar. Once she was in front of Einen, she stood over him in silence for a moment. She stared at his face.

  “I’m not sleeping, eldest heiress of House Marnil,” Einen said quietly. “You look great today. Rumors about the skill of the alchemists and healers employed by the Marnil clan clearly weren’t exaggerated.”

  The elf started, and, after recoiling at first, laughed aloud.

  “That’s amazing.” She almost clapped her hands. “I’ve always been fascinated by people with Inheritances. You’re so similar to us elves and yet so different, too.”

  “Thank you,” Einen said. “Such a comparison flatters me.”

  Hadjar, lighting his pipe as he waited for the next group of disciples returning from the Hall of Fame, looked at his friend and the elf girl. During this moment of brief respite, he thought back to the day of their battle with the disciples of the enemy Schools and about Anise. She had littered the clearing with mountains of corpses and had looked like hell after the battle. Someone else might’ve been scared off by such a sight, but not Hadjar. He was a warrior. He’d never been attracted to a woman’s complaisance or meek attitude. None of his lovers had been weak: Stepha, Nehen, and now, Anise. He dearly hoped he wasn’t wrong to include her on that list.