Kiel City, the Wizard Association branch.
White light suddenly flared on the ancient teleportation array, and Su Xiao appeared out of thin air. Bubu Wang, Eminem, Baja, and Guy stood behind him.
Diagonally opposite the teleportation array, behind a wooden-barred display window embedded in the stone wall, a mass of tree roots lay tangled together.
Crack, crack~
As if the tree were moving, a pair of dim, lifeless eyes opened within the roots.
"You're here."
The old wizard's voice was hoarse. Sitting in a wooden wheelchair, he pushed himself forward as the roots around him surged, breaking free from them. His upper body was no different from an ordinary person's, though his gray-white hair was somewhat sparse. His legs, however, had been severed below the thighs.
From the uneven scraps of cloth around the wounds, it was clear that the old wizard's legs had not been cut off by a sharp weapon. Instead, some long, blunt object had smashed them apart blow after blow.
The wooden wheelchair beneath the old wizard rolled over a mechanism on the ground. The wooden bars in front of him rapidly rotted and shattered, along with the stone wall more than a meter high beneath them.
"How did it go, Hunter? Did the mission go smoothly?"
The old wizard pushed his wheelchair toward the inner section of the Wizard Association branch.
"If I'm not mistaken, you're the previous generation's 'vessel.'"
Su Xiao gestured for Eminem to go and "help." Eminem understood at once, came to the old wizard's back, and helped push his wheelchair.
The old wizard fell silent for a moment, then a smile appeared on his face.
"'Vessel' is a very fitting name. That's right, I was the previous generation's vessel. If nothing had gone wrong, Nia would have been the new vessel.