The horse carriaged halted, and three white robes came out and gathered the acolytes, then the leader Crow began speaking.
“Now, follow me into the campgrounds, and choose an academy. Remember, you may check on all the various academies, but once you have signed a contract to join one, you must not renege! Anyone who disobeys will be hung to death at the gate of the camp!”
Crow’s frosty words made the acolytes hearts turn cold.
“Haha! Crow! You guys are pretty late today!” A voice sounded, and a fatty walked out from the camp grounds. He too was wearing a white robe, and he greeted: “Don’t scare these adorable newbies!”
“There were some difficulties along the way!” Crow explained.
“Alright! Newbies! Now follow me into the camp!” Fatty spoke with Crow and the others for a while more, then turned his head and shouted to Leylin and the rest.
“You guys can call me Jevon, of the beautiful Ennea Ivory Ring Tower. Trust me, if you are to choose an academy, the Ennea Ivory Ring Tower is definitely your best choice!”
Jevon said, as he brought the acolytes into the camp.
Once they entered, various sounds travelled into their ears, reminding Leylin of the marketplaces in his previous world. As for Crow and the other two white robes, they seemed to have something else to do, and they soon left the group.
The surroundings were bustling with activity, mostly due to acolytes just like them. Some of them had gathered in a circle, while there were others who were entering or exiting the tents.
Jevon brought Leylin and the rest, a total of 40 odd people, into the middle of the camp grounds.
Here, was a large tent of pure white colour, and there were still strange flower patterns on the outside of it They seemed like both ornaments, and yet resembled writing as well.
Leylin could not help but look at it closely, “A.I Chip! Begin Scan!”
[Beep! Forming Image!] The A.I Chip sent the information, but in the constructed image, there was nothing on the white tent, as if the pattern had never existed before.
“How could this be?” Leylin stared at the tent once again with disbelief.
With every passing minute and second, the patterns on the tent seemed lifelike, constantly twisting itself.
“Hehe!” “Haha!” “Ji ji!”
Various noises travelled to Leylin’s ears. The surrounding lights seemed to distort itself, and Leylin looked at his own hands. At this point, his arm seemed to have been pulled into a long shape, which looked extremely slender.
“Leylin! Leylin! What’s wrong with you?” At this point, there was a pat on Leylin’s shoulder.
Leylin’s whole body suddenly quivered, and he came to his senses. Looking at the surroundings, the acolytes were still listening to Fatty Jevon’s speech, and everything seemed to revert back to its normal state.
“Could it be that it wasn’t an illusion earlier?” Leylin got scared, “A.I Chip, reproduce the situation I was in earlier!”
[Beep!] A pale blue light display appeared, and the series of images earlier appeared continuously in front of Leylin’s eyes, [An anomaly in the cerebral vessel, an immediate inspection is proposed!]
[An anomaly is found in the Host’s condition! Staying away is advised!]
[The Host body has returned to normal!] Numerous lines of data kept emerging, which let Leylin know that it was not an illusion earlier.
“Phew……Magi, are they always this mysterious?” Leylin wiped his cold sweat off, still carrying a lingering fear of the events earlier.
“Leylin! Your complexion is really bad! Could it be that you have fallen ill?” George asked from the side.
“No matter who, their expressions won’t be any better if they had experienced that earlier!”
“Not……Nothing……Where did Jevon stop at?” Leylin hurriedly digressed.
“Oh! We need to fill in a form, and take the aptitude test! And then it will be free time, and we can choose our academy autonomously!”
“Because you guys have come a day late, you only have a day’s worth of time left, and in this span of period, you must choose an academy where you will practice magic in, if not you will have to wait until next year!” Jevon was still speaking loudly ahead of them.
Now, all of you line up and take the form from me one by one, and then enter for the test!”
Jevon sat behind a white table, and took out a stack of forms and placed them down.
The line moved forward quickly, and very soon it was Leylin’s turn.
“Fill in your particulars in this form, and then enter the tent and follow the instructions of the person inside!”
Leylin took the form, and realised that it was made of sheepskin paper. The particulars required were minimal, only a name, age and location born, as well as a few others.
Picking up the goose feather pen on the table, Leylin filled in the form very quickly.
The faint, red coloured, inked flower patterns on the sheepskin seemed to be very beautiful.
“I never thought that this brat’s handwriting from the mainland is still pretty good!” After Leylin finished writing, he picked up the sheepskin paper and entered the white tent.
“Come over!” An ancient voice sounded.
It was very spacious inside the tent, and there was only a white haired old lady sitting on a black chair and a crystal ball which rested on a table.
“Okay! Why would I suddenly think of those divination witches!”
“Hello!” Leylin greeted the witch.
“Bring the form here!” Clearly, this witch was not having any of it, and her voice was still frosty cold.
“Leylin huh? Place your hands on the crystal ball!”
WMW Chapter 14 – Aptitude Test
Leylin followed the witch’s instructions and placed both of his hands on the crystal ball.
Icy cold! Vibrations!
A strange tactile feeling was transmitted from the tip of his fingers.
Leylin’s head hurt, as if there was a glass rod stirring inside.
Along with the start of his headache, the crystal ball in front of Leylin also emitted a faint glow.
“Very good! Don’t let go! The witch stared attentively at the crystal ball.
As the pain increased, the crystal ball in Leylin’s hands also grew brighter, “No! No more!”
Leylin clenched his teeth, and the pain that practically split his brain into two caused him to loosen his grip uncontrollably.
“Okay! So you are at this level?” The witch nodded her head. She took out a goose feather pen and scribbled on Leylin’s form.
“We have categorised the aptitude of the acolytes into five grades, with the first grade as the worst and the fifth grade as the best. You are at the third grade, a middle ranked grade!!!”
The witch said as she turned a ring on her hand and made a strange mark on the sheepskin, which had been shining brightly with light.
“My examination here is over, you go on behind me! Next!!!”
Seeing a young girl with freckles entering the tent, Leylin took the sheepskin paper, stood up and gave his thanks, and then lifted the hanging curtain of the tent, heading to the next procedure in line.
The area was still as spacious as the one earlier, and in the middle, there was a white bearded old geezer.
“From the layout of this tent, there should only be two tests. It is really simple!” Leylin thought, as he sat in front of the old geezer and handed the form over to him.
“Third Grade? Not too bad!” The white bearded old geezer stroked his chin, “Alright! Now to test for elemental affinity!”
The old geezer knocked on the tabletop and it split open, and a black basin rose from the centre.
This water basin was not smooth. It seemed to be made of stone, and there was a kind of liquid metal flowing inside that resembled mercury.
“Carefully look into the water!” The old geezer’s voice sounded, seemingly carrying an authoritative tone.
&nb
sp; Leylin could not help but to divert all his attention towards the centre of the water basin. With his constant focus, the mercury in the middle swirled continuously and turned into a whirlpool, as if a mouth had opened at the bottom.
“Now, tell me, what do you see?”
Leylin’s eyes were a little glazed over, “Shadows, and a black coloured whirlpool! And there are red spots near the outer circumference!”
“Anything else?”
“There are also green specks of light in the surrounding area!”
“Is there a lot of green?”
“Not at all! Very little!”
“Okay!” The old geezer snapped his fingers, and Leylin suddenly came back to his senses, “What happened to me!”
“Your test is already over! In the aspect of elemental affinities, you have the highest affinity with the Shadow and Dark elements, after that is the Fire element, and you also have a smidgen of affinity with the Plant element!”
As the old geezer spoke, he rapidly filled in the form and added his handprint.
“Let me give you some advice! Magi are able to use every kind of energy! But only by following the path you have the highest affinity with, can you progress the furthest!”
The old geezer handed the form back to Leylin, “Alright! Your test is over. Walk out from the back entrance and start choosing your academy!”
Leylin bowed, and then left the tent.
As he lifted the canopy at the back, a ray of sunlight came shining down.
“A.I Chip, reproduce the state I was in earlier!”
[……An unknown interference has caused the host to enter a state of hypnosis!]
“As expected!” Leylin’s face darkened, and then he exhaled helplessly, “Thankfully, the other party does not have any bad intentions, if not……”
Deep in his heart, his thirst for power only grew more intense.
“Hey! Leylin!” George’s voice rang beside his ears, “You finished your aptitude test too?”
George’s voice travelled over.
“Yeah!” Leylin nodded his head and waved the sheepskin paper form in his hands.
“I have completed it too, hehe! I, this young master, am a genius with a fourth grade aptitude!” George laughed loudly, wearing an excessively smug expression!
“I am not too familiar with the grading of acolytes, could you explain it in detail for me?” Leylin asked.
George’s family was much greater than Viscount Farlier’s family, and he was able to know more secrets regarding the Magi.
“Of course! This is all common knowledge. No matter which academy you enter, there will be people who will tell you.” George said.
“The aptitudes of the acolytes are ranked according to the chance of being promoted to a proper Magus, and they are categorised into 5 grades! And the fifth grade is the highest, with a 90 percent chance of becoming a Magus!”
“The fourth grade is slightly inferior, but there is still a 50 percent chance! I, this young master, am a genius at this level! Haha……My father will definitely be elated!” George digressed, he was clearly too excited.
“And the rest? Hurry and say it!” Leylin punched George’s shoulder and finally brought George back on track.
“Oh? Earlier I mentioned up to the fourth grade. What’s below it is the third grade, where there is a ten percent chance of becoming a Magus. As for the second grade, there is only a 2 to 3 percent chance, and the first grade is the worst, with only a 1 percent or even 0.1 percent chance.”
“Anyway, there is only a chance for third grade and above. As for the first and second grade, basically, they can only be an acolyte their whole life!”
“So that is the case. It seems like my grade is middle ranked. There should be no academy that will reject me, nor would they regard me as important!” Leylin analysed his current situation.
“How about elemental affinity?” Leylin continued asking.
“Elemental affinity is the future path of a Magus, you know, some Magi can manipulate lightning, some Magi can manipulate fire, and some others can even manipulate frost! These are all paths of choice.”
“Although a Magus is able to use any type of elemental spell in theory, the ones with the highest affinity will not only let the casting speed be faster, but also contain more power. If a Fire element Magus wanted to cast a water-based spell, not only would he consume more spiritual energy, but the might of the spell would also weaken greatly. There could be a water-based pool summoning that ends up as only a water ball!”
“All in all, the elemental affinity will determine the path of a Magus, and the aptitude will determine how far a Magus can walk on that path!”
George concluded.
“The last sentence makes perfect sense, but it doesn’t seem to be yours!” Leylin repeated the words of the last sentence.
“He he! You found out. These are the words of a travelling Magus! I saw them in my father’s study room.” George said embarrassedly, as he scratched his head.
“Oh right! I finally managed to inquire as to why the black robed Knights were so cold and distant!”
George seemed to have remembered something, and was itching to share the news.
“The strength of a Magus, even if he is only an acolyte, is not something a Knight can withstand, so don’t you think that the black robes’ performance when we journeyed was a little strange?”
“There is indeed something strange about it!” Leylin nodded his head and asked with a conjecture, “Could it be that they have some background?”
“No! No! No!” George shook his head, “My dear brother, you are guessing in the completely wrong direction; these black robed Knights are actually one of the experiments of a Magus!!”
“An experiment!!!” Leylin’s eyes widened. In his world, conducting a live experiment had always been a taboo for science, and even if there were any, they were done in secrecy. But here, they had actually done it so openly and aboveboard.
“In the process of the experiment, this batch of experiment samples had already sustained an overdose of radiation and would not live more than several years. That was why they were used as disposables, to escort acolytes like us!”
“This was the reason?” Leylin thought of Angelo’s pale face, and silently nodded his head.
Earlier, the A.I Chip had scanned and detected traces of radiation, but the radiation discovered on the white robe Magi were a hundred times more concentrated, so Leylin naturally thought that there was no effect.
“For us Magi, we will be acolytes at least; which knight would not want to prostrate themselves and hope that we pick them to serve us in the future. The only ones who will not take us seriously are those who will not live for longer than a few days!”
George said with some regrets. His face was indignant, it seems like, as a heir to a large noble family, he was displeased with the rude manners of the black robes from before.
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