Chapter 769: Reunion with an Old Friend and the Return of the Blood Curse Court

In the southeastern quadrant, a wizard floating vessel descended vertically from midair, sending great surges of air rolling outward in all directions, the atmosphere letting out a mournful cry as though every parcel of it were being crushed under tremendous pressure.

Very quickly the vessel lowered its series of floating staircases.

Locke followed the wizards as they descended the floating staircases.

At this moment, the majority of the wizards making their way from the Cloud Marsh Wetlands to the southeastern quadrant appeared, for the most part, to be secondary traders dealing in war supplies.

There were magical plant merchants, magical artifact merchants, and potion merchants, the variety so broad and numerous as to be beyond counting.

There were also a number of wizards, like Locke himself, who were natives of the southeastern quadrant returning home.

At the same time, the Cloud Marsh Wetlands and the southeastern quadrant had always maintained certain fixed trade channels. The southeastern quadrant appeared to possess a magical gemstone vein that the Cloud Marsh Wetlands had need of.

The southeastern quadrant also had a small number of speciality products in the areas of potions and magical plants that the Cloud Marsh Wetlands did not possess, items that could only be obtained as local specialities from the southeastern quadrant.

Or at the very least, it could supply the most basic raw materials.

The Forbidden Forest of the southeastern quadrant was an inexhaustible treasury from which one could harvest raw materials needed across alchemy, breeding studies, and even textile studies, magical painting, and fuel studies, among other disciplines.

The wizards from the Cloud Marsh Wetlands, beyond transporting certain war supplies over, also shipped a great many specialized magical resources in return.

And so both sides maintained a trade relationship of considerable scale. Were it not for that trade with the Cloud Marsh Wetlands, the southeastern quadrant on its own would likely be unable to sustain the number of wizards it currently harbored.

Locke observed those wizards one by one, each wearing astral rings on both hands, and those astral rings were of no small caliber, their internal spatial capacity quite large.

There were even wizards carrying magical suitcases.

Magical suitcases were items used within wizard civilization for transporting magical goods of large quantities but lower grades, capable of holding numerous magical boxes within them, each magical box in turn holding a great many magical items.

Although their purpose seemed to overlap with that of astral rings on the surface, this was not quite the case. The magical suitcase and magical box transport system was considerably safer, easier to count, and the entire process remained in a semi-transparent state, fully visible to both parties, which greatly reduced many of the unnecessary complications that arose during transactions.

At this moment, Locke reined in his magic pressure, forcing it down to just over 3,000. He quickly descended from the floating vessel and blended into the crowd.

The moment he stepped into the southeastern quadrant, Locke felt intensely uncomfortable, as though he were a fish that had left the open ocean and found itself in shallow water.

The magical tides here were extraordinarily thin. Not only was there no lifting from the Root Fields, even the magical force contained within the air itself was pitifully weak.

This meant that Locke, as a being with a highly concentrated magic pressure, would shine like a lighthouse in the dark the moment he fully released his magic pressure here, drawing the gaze of the majority of formal wizards across the southeastern quadrant.

Moreover, Locke's avatar was deeply ill at ease here. He even felt that if he were to remain for an extended period, his magical power would not advance but retreat.

'This is entirely different from being in a medium-scale plane,' he noted to himself.

Locke successfully blended into the crowd, passing himself off as no more than an ordinary formal wizard, walking through the docking area of the southeastern quadrant's wizard floating vessels. He took in the bustling crowd of formal wizards around him, the greeters holding signs outside the docking area welcoming high-circle wizard experts who had traveled from afar, and the wizards waiting for the various resource traders to arrive.

There were also large numbers of first-class wizard apprentices in the southeastern quadrant who had come to attend to matters on behalf of their wizard mentors.

In the Cloud Marsh Wetlands, first-class wizard apprentices were rarely given such responsibilities or afforded any significant standing, but within the southeastern quadrant their standing was an important one.

For the various academies here, a first-class wizard apprentice was already considered a valuable asset.

Locke took in the sensation of returning to the southeastern quadrant once more.

'In the Silent Plane, I can draw upon the plane's force and redirect it for my own use, so even if that plane possesses little magical tide, I am never short of magical power. But in the wizard world, my standing is nowhere near sufficient for me to touch that level.'

'And this place is too close to a low-magic environment. So I am like a large fish entering shallow water, deeply ill at ease here. Were I to live here for thirty years, my magic pressure would likely not rise but fall.'

'Although, given the existence of the Grand Magic, it would be unlikely to drop below the Second Circle threshold. No, actually, if someone had become a Second Circle life-form through means other than a Grand Magic, they could fall out of the Second Circle in a place like this.'

Because the external energy was simply too sparse.

Shallow water cannot raise a large fish.

Locke had thus discovered yet another advantage of the Grand Magic. Compared to kingdom-class domains and phantom magic, a Grand Magic was essentially a matter of prove it once and it is proven forever.

'First, I should return to Lilith’s Cottage, visit Teacher Halen Vera, along with the senior fellows and friends I made at Lilith’s Cottage. After that, I will arrange passage by ship back to... Corfu Island.'

Locke thought of his very earliest beginnings, there on Corfu Island.

So many years had passed. He wondered what changes had come over Corfu Island, whether the Frankish Kingdom had managed to unify the other six nations.

He also wondered how the original owner's father was getting along.

Locke let out a quiet sigh. He had long intended to investigate the identity of the original owner's mother, yet even having traveled all the way to the Cloud Marsh Wetlands, he had been unable to obtain any information whatsoever. The only thing he had ever gained was his brief contact with the Black Sun Tower.

The original owner's mother had claimed to have been hunted by the Black Sun Tower, which had driven her to Corfu Island in the southeastern quadrant. In the eyes of ordinary people, wizard apprentices, or even First Circle wizards, that story might have seemed plausible. But now that he had come to understand, at least in some measure, the true face of the wizard world, that account was riddled with inconsistencies.

It had to be a lie.

The original owner's mother, that witch, now that he thought about it, could only have come to Corfu Island for one reason: she had gone there deliberately.

But what was her actual relationship with the Black Sun Tower?

Locke exited the docking area and found a second-class wizard apprentice, hired a magical carriage, and climbed aboard, preparing to make his way toward Lilith’s Cottage.

The magical carriage was drawn by two special magical creatures of mixed unicorn and common horse bloodlines, two grey-backed horses, nothing more. Locke furrowed his brow.

Because the ride was extraordinarily uncomfortable.

The road was rough and uneven, and the horses pulling the carriage were creatures barely a step above ordinary animals.

The second-class wizard apprentice driving the carriage glanced back at Locke inside with an expression of deep respect.

"My lord, you are heading to Lilith’s Cottage? My driving is quite excellent, I assure you. I guarantee we will reach our destination in the shortest possible time."

"Wizard lord, are you a wizard mentor at Lilith’s Cottage? I hear that Lilith’s Cottage..."

Locke said briefly, "No."

The second-class wizard apprentice dared not press further and could only crack the whip to urge the two horses into a faster gait.

At this moment, Locke looked out beyond the carriage and took in the familiar Forbidden Forest, its lin bathing feather-leaves rustling softly in the breeze as though greeting him.

The Forbidden Forest stretched across the entirety of the southeastern quadrant.

Now that he had become a Second Circle wizard, he could see for the first time just how deep an influence the Forbidden Forest held over the southeastern quadrant.

Wood element particles continuously welled up from the depths of the Forbidden Forest, drawing the entire southeastern quadrant's planar force attributes toward the wood element.

Yet this wood element force was intermingled with the Forbidden Forest's quality of confinement and suppression, and so the southeastern quadrant as a whole did not possess the brightness of the Cloud Marsh Wetlands.

And moreover, Locke looked into the depths of the Forbidden Forest.

The magical tides in the southeastern quadrant's air were continuously flowing into the depths of the Forbidden Forest, and then, under some mechanism resembling the rhythm of breath, a portion of that magical tide was exhaled back out.

'The southeastern quadrant's natural magical tide level should be somewhere in the middle-to-upper range of moderate-magic territory,' Locke thought. 'Considerably higher than the Land of Six Towers or the Jade Splendor Enclave, only somewhat lower than the Cloud Marsh Wetlands. Yet nearly all of the southeastern quadrant's magical tides are absorbed once over by the Forbidden Forest, and of what the Forbidden Forest breathes back out, less than one part in ten remains.'

'In other words, the southeastern quadrant's greatest magical resource has been entirely consumed by the Forbidden Forest. The Forbidden Forest is naturally abundant and beautiful. Outside the Forbidden Forest, everything is barren beyond measure.'

'No wonder the southeastern quadrant is so impoverished. The majority of this region's resources are in the Forbidden Forest's hands.'

Through the carriage window, Locke seemed to make out, not far away, in the forest running parallel to his carriage, the silhouette of a figure with extraordinarily large feet passing through the trees.

Locke was just about to focus his tiger's eye to take a closer look when the magical carriage abruptly lurched violently through a large pothole, jolting him so sharply that he lost sight of that large-footed figure in the Forbidden Forest.

Locke furrowed his brow. He cleared his throat, then passed a magic stone forward to the second-class wizard apprentice.

"Wait. I think I will change to a different mode of transport after all."

Having grown accustomed to magical carriages pulled by First Circle magical creatures in the Cloud Marsh Wetlands, sitting in this grade of carriage was simply something he could no longer tolerate.

Locke stepped down from the carriage, and the second-class wizard apprentice grew somewhat flustered.

"My lord, have I given you poor service? Are you..."

In the next instant the apprentice blinked, and found that Locke before his eyes had simply vanished.

The second-class wizard apprentice gave a start, rubbed his eyes, and looked all around him, suddenly feeling as though something about the situation was not quite real.

"Where did that lord go? How did he disappear in just an instant?"

Were it not for the magic stone sitting on the seat inside the carriage, the apprentice would have convinced himself he had been dreaming.

For in all the wizards he had ever carried in this carriage, even the formal wizard passengers, none had ever managed this.

He had only blinked, and that formal wizard lord had simply vanished before his very eyes.

At this moment, Locke was using Lone Tree Cannot Form a Forest to ride the Magical Dragon Rose in low-altitude flight, moving so swiftly that a gust of rushing wind was left in his wake wherever he passed.

The dark red fantastical flower appeared behind Locke, extending three pairs of rose petal-wings that resembled dragon wings, while three dark red roses shaped like dragon heads appeared upon Locke's shoulders, like three heads held level with his own.

"Flying myself is still faster," Locke said, and then came to a sudden stop, because halfway along his route he had caught sight of a familiar face.

"Patty? Patty Aissa..."

In those earlier years, Patty, Kode, and Locke had all been students together at the intermediate academy that Virdantia University had established on Corfu Island, studying magic together for two years.

They were, one could say, the companions of the very moment when his dream had begun.

Later, Kode had gone to the Crow’s Nest Brigade. When Locke had rescued the only formal witch in the Company from the Blood Curse Court's cursed array facility, Kode had already disappeared without a trace.

Patty, meanwhile, had gone to Virdantia University.

He had never previously had the opportunity to meet with her, nor the time to seek her out.

It was only now, with the ability of his avatar magic, that he had the leisure to return to his homeland and take stock of where he had come from.

Locke recognized Patty's magical force fluctuation signature in a single glance. A flash of memory passed through his mind, of an entirely unremarkable afternoon many years ago when he had sought out Patty and asked her to give him supplementary lessons.

That had been the crucial turning point that allowed him to pass Dean Tongus's assessment.

That afternoon at the time had seemed utterly ordinary. Looking back on it now, he found it was tinged with something impossible to put into words.

Locke was just about to approach when he suddenly sensed that something was wrong. The wizard party that had appeared near the white wizard territory was, quite plainly, a black wizard merchant convoy.

And moreover, it belonged to an old acquaintance of his, the Blood Curse Court.

'Hmm? The Blood Curse Court's people have become this bold? After so many years apart, they are directly appearing in the heart of the white wizard territory, swaggering around so brazenly.'

Locke furrowed his brow.

He looked toward the three banners mounted on the central carriage of the magical convoy. Two of them were perfectly ordinary, simply the flags of the Blood Curse Court and the black wizard alliance.

But the banner in the middle was different. It bore the emblem of a skeletal hand.

Locke glanced at that banner, and at the same time took note of the seven formal wizards within the convoy. None of them were ordinary formal wizards. All seven were gasification wizards.

For the southeastern quadrant, this represented a formidable force.

Put another way: seven powerful fighters.

Locke raised a hand and used his magic pressure to construct a magic pressure wall, then fell in behind the carriage convoy.

When the difference in magic pressure between one wizard and another was sufficiently vast, it became extremely difficult for the weaker wizard to perceive the stronger one's presence.

This was the brute dominance that came with an overwhelming difference in magic pressure.

For who Locke was now, a gasification wizard was no more than a newborn infant, still lacking the perceptive ability to detect someone who was deliberately concealing themselves.

It was not invisibility in any conventional sense, but rather a cognitive blindness born of the sheer disparity in magic pressure. Just as a person standing too close to a great mountain cannot perceive its full form.

And so Locke followed directly behind them, and they would instinctively take him for a fellow traveler.

Of course, should Locke make a move, or conduct himself in some manner that stood out, or radiate strong hostility, those gasification wizards would still detect him.

But at this moment Locke wished only to observe, and so his approach did not provoke any reaction from anyone within the magical convoy.