章 18: Shadow Tower

編集者: Dragon Boat Translation

The Underdark Treesea was a small Wizard resource area on the west coast of the Old Land. It had a total area of over 100,000 square miles, which was about half the size of Blue Star.

There were countless Wizard organizations of all sizes in the Underdark Treesea, and among them, the largest one was undoubtedly the Shadow Tower. It was located in the area where the elements in the Underdark Treesea were the densest, and the entire Underdark Treesea was under their control.

At this moment, at the entrance of the Shadow Tower.

Walking on the sheep farm path filled with thick withered leaves, Heath turned his head to look at the surrounding scenery.

The crisscrossed trees blotted out the sky and covered the sun. The grass that grew crazily above his knees was stacked on top of each other. The light was very dim. Only a few rays of sunlight could penetrate the thick leaves and shine down, interweaving into a few beams of light in the air.

It was oppressive, depressing, and gave people a feeling of suffocation.

After walking like this for more than half an hour, the road ahead suddenly opened up, and the group came to an empty valley.

It was still a very dark and depressing valley.

A thick layer of dark clouds floated above the valley, covering up the sky that had finally appeared.

In the center of the valley stood a tower that was dozens of meters tall, built with large black bricks.

Looking at the dark clouds above his head, Heath suddenly felt that it looked familiar. It was very similar to the dark clouds above the Demonized Forest.

Ender, who was beside him, probably saw his confusion, and said, "It looks familiar, right?"

Heath nodded and said, "There is a dark cloud in my hometown that looks similar to this."

Ender said, "The Demonized Forest in the Rodin Kingdom, right? You guessed it right. This is the Enchanted Dark Cloud. In fact, it is a kind of enchanted life. It is gentle and obedient. It can stay in a place without moving for a very long time. It is very easy to manage, and it also has good combat ability. That's why Wizards like to raise one in their Wizard tower."

"It's said that a Wizard once lived in your Demonized Forest. That Enchanted Dark Cloud was raised by that Wizard."

Ender had been raised as a Wizard since he was young. For this reason, his foster father had collected countless information about the Wizard World. Therefore, his understanding of the Wizard World was far greater than that of ordinary people.

Heath suddenly understood. "Oh."

A young man in his twenties was sitting on the grass at the entrance of the valley. His eyes were closed as if he was taking a nap.

When the group approached, he immediately opened his eyes like a vigilant beast. When he saw Salado again, his tense expression eased.

He got up and walked over to Salado. He bowed to Salado. "Wizard Salado."

Salado took a puff of his cigarette, pointed at Heath and the other two, and said, "These three are the talents I found in the Forgotten Land. Take them in and make some arrangements. I still have some matters to attend to, so I won't go in."

"Yes."

Salado paused, then turned to the three and said, "The three of you, each give him a Magic Stone. If you don't have it, write an IOU. If you have any questions, just ask him directly."

"Oh, okay." The three of them did as Salado said.

Salado left.

The young man lowered his head and waited for Salado to leave, then, he turned to the three of them and said, "I am Pierre, a middle-level Apprentice of the Shadow Tower. Welcome to the Shadow Tower. I will take you to go through the procedures to enter the tower. If you have any questions, you can ask me directly."

Probably because he had received the Magic Stones, Pierre looked very enthusiastic.

"Okay."

"Thank you."

After a brief exchange of pleasantries, Ender began to ask questions first. He looked at the tower in front of him and said, "Wizard Pierre, are there many people in the Shadow Tower?"

"Just call me Apprentice. The title cannot be messed up," Pierre corrected him.

After a pause... Pierre answered with a proud tone, "Of course. Our Shadow Tower is the largest Wizard organization in the entire Underdark Treesea. There are at least thousands of Wizards, formal Apprentices, and informal Apprentices."

Ender widened his eyes and said, "Thousands of people? Are there really so many talented people?"

Pierre said, "There's nothing strange about it. The Old Land is not an elemental dry land like the Forgotten Land. The probability of nurturing elemental constitutions is much higher than your side."

A place like the Aike Continent, which did not have any Wizards, was also known as the Forgotten Land.

"It's also much easier for us to test our innate constitutions than your Forgotten Land. More than a dozen human kingdoms in the surrounding area send an endless stream of apprentices every year."

Ender suddenly understood. "I see."

Heath asked, "I just heard you say formal Apprentices and informal Apprentices? What do you mean?"

Pierre explained, "There is a big difference between the two. Formal Apprentices are carefully taught by instructors. The knowledge does not cost money, and there is a Magic Stone allowance every month. They just need to focus on their training."

"As for informal Apprentices, they have to rely on themselves for everything. They have to pay for the spell models, training resources, experimental materials, witch tools, and even food and lodging. In addition, there is no specific instructor to teach them. They can only learn in the public classes that are occasionally held in the tower, and most of them can only be taught at a cost of Magic Stones."

The three of them looked at each other.

Ender asked, "Then are we considered official Apprentices or unofficial Apprentices?"

Pierre smiled and said, "What do you think?"

The three of them did not look too good.

Pierre comforted them, "It's nothing. I'm also an unofficial Apprentice. The Apprentices who join the tower are all unofficial Apprentices. But as long as they perform well and get noticed by a certain teacher, they can be accepted as official Apprentices."

"Also, you don't have to worry too much about training resources. There are a lot of tasks in the tower every day. As long as you are willing to work hard, it's easy to earn Magic Stones."

Everyone's expressions eased a little.

Heath asked, "Then how many official Apprentices are there in the Shadow Tower?"

Pierre thought for a moment and said, "Well... I haven't counted them in detail. There are about sixty of them. Last year, it seems that Wizard Karan only accepted three Apprentices."

Heath frowned. There were more than a thousand apprentices, but only sixty of them were official Apprentices... This ratio was too small...

Ender then asked, "What about Wizards? How many Wizards are there in the Shadow Tower?"

Pierre said, "There are more than thirty official-level Wizards who belong to us, but most of them have followed the Wizard master to explore a secret realm. Now there are only six Wizards in the tower."

After a pause, he smiled and said, "Don't think that it's too little. We have the most Wizards in the entire Underdark Treesea. It's not that easy to become a Wizard. You'll find out in the future."

"In addition, our Wizard Master is a Rank 2 Wizard, the most powerful Wizard in the Underdark Treesea."

Ender asked, "Is Wizard Salado who brought us here one of them?"

Pierre shook his head, "Wizard Salado is a free wizard in the Underdark Treesea. He is not a member of our Shadow Tower."

Ender was surprised, "Is there a difference between formal and informal Wizards?"

Pierre nodded. "More or less. You will know when you become an official Wizard. To put it simply, it is not necessary to form an organization to become an official Wizard. Therefore, some official Wizards do not join organizations. Instead, they act as free Wizards. At most, they just put their name on an organization. This is what happened to Wizard Salado."

As they spoke, they quickly entered the tower.

From the outside, the tower looked a little dilapidated. It was the same for the internal facilities after they entered, and it seemed that very few people cleaned it. There were spider webs and weeds growing on the corners of the walls, and many of the stone steps were covered in moss.

Looking at a strange weed in the corner, Heath became curious. 'Speaking of which, these plants look strange. They should also belong to supernatural substances, right? Can they be extracted?'

With this thought in mind, he pulled the weed down and silently chanted in his heart, 'Extract.'

[Beep, extraction successful. Spirit +0.01]

Heath thought in surprise, 'It's really possible!'

Feeling the pure energy surging into his mind, Heath immediately became happy. If the plants here could be extracted, then could the plants outside also be extracted?

Along the way, he saw many strange species that he had never seen before.

At this moment, Pierre stopped in front of a stone room.

Pierre said to Karina, "Take off your mask, Miss. We need to register here. It's not possible to wear a mask."

Karina hesitated for a moment and then took off her mask.

All of a sudden, Heath and Ender could not help but become curious, and they looked at Karina.

From the first time they met at the White Water Harbor to the three months of drifting on the sea, Karina had always been wearing a mask and looking mysterious. Even after spending so much time together, the two of them had never seen the true face of this girl.

Everyone was very curious about what this beautiful Princess Crimson, who was known as the one-in-a-thousand-years beauty of the Aike Continent, looked like.

Karina did not wait long. She quickly took off her mask. Her true face, which had been hidden for a long time, was finally revealed to everyone.

At this moment, whether it was Ender, Pierre, or even Heath from the Blue Star...

Everyone's eyes lit up...

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