Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations
“I placed an illusion around the house,” Angor said to Baal as he sat down on a sofa. “I call it the ‘trap of mental demons’. It arouses anything you fear most from the depth of your mind.”
Baal shivered. As he expected, it was really something created by this wizard. And… it was only an illusion? He still couldn’t forget how those ghosts choked him like it was a real deal.
“So, you stepped into the illusion, but how did you get out?” Angor asked curiously. He added something else in that simple illusion to trick people’s sense of direction.
Angor discovered how to maximize the effect of illusions by blocking the human’s five senses some time ago, and he was getting better and better when he learned how to use nightmare illusions.
Both Lady Mirror and Sunders highly praised his theory. So how did Baal—a mortal—escape from the illusion so easily?
“Mister Dodoro brought me back, sir,” Baal said.
Dodoro?
Angor wasn’t expecting that answer.
He could understand how Dodoro could avoid getting affected by the nightmares as he had an empty mind, but how did Dodoro escape the tricks that blocked human senses?
Angor believed that any mortals would easily lose their orientations in the illusion and so would supernatural beings who possessed weaker knowledge systems or powers.
Angor decided to keep that question for later.
“Give me one of your accessories,” he said as he reached a hand out toward Baal.
Baal was a little surprised, and he quickly began to search his pockets.
He first went for the gold ring on his finger, but on second thought, he feared that the wizard might despise ordinary trinkets, so he took out an exquisite-looking casket instead.
When Angor opened the container, he saw a pink earring decorated with a rose.
It was a gift Baal took with him today, which he planned to give his girlfriend. But since the great wizard asked for it…
“Are you sure you will give me this?” Angor checked the girlish accessory and gave Baal a weird look.
Baal nodded quickly. “This is an exclusive collection made by the best goldsmith in the city. It’s all yours, sir!”
“Well, I won’t take it. It’s meant for you.”
Angor injected some mana into the earring and deployed a micro illusion on it.
“For… for me?” Baal was confused.
Angor handed it back to Baal with a smile. “Put it on and you can avoid that mental illusion. Come on, try it out. You’re going to guard Trusan and Dodoro tomorrow.”
Why didn’t you say that earlier?! Baal bellowed in his mind.
“But, but I thought—”
“No buts. I must say that I wasn’t expecting you to have such a… peculiar taste.”
“Can I keep it in my pocket? Sir, I… don’t have a piercing on my ears, as you see,” Baal said, and he almost cried. His finger ring would be a way better choice!
“You must put it outside so that the nodes aren’t blocked.”
Without giving Baal any time to react, Angor held the earring using Hand of Spell and forced it into Baal’s left ear.
A drop of blood gave the rose emblem on the accessory an even brighter look.
“Oh, it suits you well. Now go,” Angor said with a grin, “and don’t remove it until I leave Water Grasse. Oh, and before you leave, don’t forget to ask Trusan about her schedule.”
Baal nodded sadly and left the manor while he covered his ear with one hand.
Trusan came to Angor next. “What happened to his ear?”
“Who knows, perhaps he’s happy about something,” Angor said and chuckled.
“Happy?” Trusan didn’t quite understand why the thug would be happy after receiving her lectures.
“Isn’t it a happy thing for one to find his old self?”
When Angor returned to his own room, Trusan stayed in place and pondered over what she just heard.
Old self?
…
The city had fallen asleep at night.
Angor came to Dodoro’s room and saw the young man huddled up under the blanket like a kitten.
Without waking Dodoro, Angor used the room to deploy a small illusion.
The illusion was only a simple lump of mist, but Angor also tried to block Dodoro’s sense of direction.
He then retreated outside and used Hand of Spell to shake Dodoro awake.
Dodoro sat up and looked around the misty room in confusion. He then fell down and began to snore again.
Angor facepalmed.
Again, he shook Dodoro. This time, before Dodoro could lie down, he said “Come out” in a small voice.
Dodoro’s ears twitched upon hearing Angor’s voice. He headed straight to the door of his room and looked at Angor with a bright smile.
Angor facepalmed again.
The trick that’s supposed to affect Dodoro’s mind didn’t work at all?
Angor considered and smiled back at Dodoro. In the next second, Dodoro felt his vision getting blurry. He saw Angor becoming a Cloud Leopard which lunged at him at great speed.
Dodoro ducked toward one side in fear.
The beast suddenly disappeared, and Angor was standing at the door again.
“Goodnight, you can sleep now,” Angor said with a smile.
Dodoro was still confused, but he complied without saying anything else.
Angor returned to his room again and thought about his test.
“Just like at the hunter’s house… illusions can trick his eyes, but not his senses? Maybe Akeso’s blood had granted Dodoro a higher level of mana energy? No. That would prevent all illusions from working.”
Angor tried, but he failed to think about any viable answer, so he simply gave up. Dodoro held too many secrets, and he needed to be patient.
For now, he would continue working on his next cantrip—Heal.
This one required knowledge about basic human body structure, which Angor already learned from all the western and eastern medical theories he obtained from Jon’s classes.
…
Time always went by extremely fast whenever he immersed himself in his studies. Soon, it was time for the meeting with the other supernaturals.
Leonrick never came again. It was probably because the count was terrified when he heard that he had to face “the rage of a wizard who could destroy Water Grasse”. Angering a great wizard MIGHT save his daughter, but it would definitely bring doom to Water Grasse. It was a hard choice.
And Angor only went to visit Leonrick because of Shadow and Krakok. He didn’t intend to help the shadowless patients for real.
He had no time to care about someone else’s trouble when his own future was still unclear.
Compared to Krakoks, Angor was more curious about Pocratee. How did a plane passageway appear over there? Why did the rainbow dragonflies settle down, and why did they guard the place for a thousand years? And what about that wizard-level monster, Akeso?
Still, he thought about these questions purely out of curiosity. To him, these matters didn’t have imminent profit, so they weren’t important. He wasn’t one of those apprentices who had been stuck at their bottleneck for decades and desperately needed to find a destiny out of random stuff.
The real concern for him now was to find a way back to either Brute Cavern or straight to Floating Mech City.
And he would rely on today’s meeting.
If he still couldn’t find an answer from the participants, he had to prepare to travel around again.
The meeting was due at midnight. He needed to prepare something first—a material list.
He planned to purchase or exchange for some materials from people so that he could craft a vehicle item.
No matter what the outcome of the meeting was, he would need to leave the city, and he preferred not to continue his journey on foot.
While learning new cantrips, he spent some time looking into how to make alchemy vehicles. There were instructions on how to create low-level ones in Encyclopaedia: Basic Alchemy.
The core of a vehicle was its “engine”. He wasn’t going to design one by himself because he had already found something which he could work on, which came at an acceptable cost.
Still, the other parts of the vehicle were problems that had to be solved.
He needed to build a “shell” around the engine. In most cases, shells were crafted from nontiered materials. Angor had a lot of valuable materials saved up but not cheap ones that he could use in bulks.
This was why he thought about buying some materials from the apprentices during the meeting. Even “amateurs” should at least have some cheap stuff at hand.