Warlock Apprentice

The train dived deeper into the land, while its wheels clanked against the metal railway with unchanging frequency. Apart from the occasional candles along the tunnel which illuminated a small part of the walls, the tunnel was completely dark.

Half an hour later, the train entered a spacious area inside the land.

Angor was very shocked at the amazing place hidden under the surface. There were extending woodlands, glittering river streams as well as wildlife running around. He could not see the edge of the place at all. Actually, he would not believe that he was below the ground had he not gone through the tunnel.

He poked his head out of a window and looked up. There was no ceiling in sight. The whole area was bright as day.

“There are plants up there that reached all the way to the surface, which transmit light to here. In the night, they can even bring stars and moonlight,” Prome exclaimed. “The residents in Darkivil Empire are rough thanks to their nature, and you’ll find many criminals gathering here who came from different nations. However, we must admit that the gods bestowed such a paradise to these underground folks.”

The underground race a.k.a the Subterrians was another variation race of mankind. They were still considered humans but were not exactly the same beings.

On the outside, Subterrians was a bit shorter than average humans. There were occasional exceptions when a Subterrian would grow taller than two meters, but in general, they were smaller than homo sapiens and the Karabits.

“Um, what about those people?” Dave pointed to the confused apprentices.

Angor shrugged. “My illusion only covered so much area. They can always walk out of it, or they can wait for someone to discover the illusion nodes and break them.”

“But what about mortals?”

“I only used enough mana to sustain the illusion for five minutes. They can wait it out.”

“Good job you did there,” Prome commented. “If you go for the tower now, I believe you can reach the top without relying on your alchemy weapons or Toby.”

Angor shook his head. “People will get wary if I use illusions too much. I still need weapons to compensate for my lack of strength.”

As they talked, Angor sensed that his illusion was breaking apart.

“Someone found the nodes,” Angor wondered who managed to break his illusion so fast. But on second thought, he should leave as fast as possible so no one learned that he was the “culprit” behind this. “Anyway, we should go.”

Soon, a group of apprentices covered in dust rushed out of the train station furiously.

“Come on out, bitch! Whoever you are!”

“I’m so killing this bastard today!”

Despite their yells, the “criminal” was gone.

Among the angry crowd, a woman wearing tree leaves as decorations spoke to her companion. “I think that was a Melodious Illusion… Didn’t you learn something like that before?”

“It was. But whoever deployed the illusion was a lot better than me. He blocked our senses with some unknown effort. But he didn’t keep doing it, or we’d have a hard time escaping from the illusion.”

The speaker was a woman who only wore a transparent silk veil and violet cloth which covered her breast and back door. “It must be someone really talented in illusions. Not every illusionist can block our judgmental senses with such ease.”

“An Illusionist… You can find many illusionists among Occultists. I wonder which master did that,” said the leaf woman with a tilt of her head.

“I smell no blood. He only used an illusion to get rid of the annoying mortals. Good job, I must say. He got rid of the flies, and gave a lesson to these arrogant apprentices.” The silk woman leaned on the shoulder of her beautiful companion. “Lady Daichese… you mentioned something about a strange treasure, right? May I check it out?”

“Daichese” shook her head. “No way, Anna. I’m going to use this thing to buy a glass of White Orchid Potion. The moment you see it, you’ll try to steal it.”

The woman in silk, Anna, curled her lips. “Come on… What’s so precious that I can’t even take a look?”