Wizard Apprentice

High above the clear, cloudless sky, an airship emblazoned with the emblem of a white tower soared through the air. On the deck, children under the age of eight chattered and played together.

Taylor sat cross-legged at the edge of the deck, staring blankly at the clouds streaking past. Every time he tried to reach out, an invisible barrier blocked his hand.

He watched the horizon quietly, then reached out again to touch the invisible barrier, sighing to himself. Although he had tried dozens of times, he still couldn't quite get used to it.

He had truly transmigrated, and into a world with wizards at that.

Taylor had been a junior in college on a water-blue planet. With one blink, he had transmigrated into the body of a boy who looked much like he had in his youth, sharing even a similar name.

Before he could even react, he heard the children around him chattering about how they had been chosen by powerful wizards to learn knowledge and truth.

Emmmmm.

Taylor spent several days suppressing his distracting thoughts and complex emotions, eventually figuring out what he was supposed to do. He decided that since he was here, he might as well make the best of it; rather than lamenting his fate, he should focus on becoming a wizard and mastering extraordinary power.

The brats around him now kept their distance; those seven or eight-year-olds found Taylor incredibly boring. They had grand ambitions and ideals—they wanted long lives, powerful strength, endless beauties, and vast territories. These were the common desires of children at that age.

That gloomy kid looks like a total loser.

In a place hidden from the children's sight, Mendes, a Level 1 Wizard operating the ship from its center, was projecting his mental energy to carefully observe these new wizard seedlings.

Mendes was a White Wizard belonging to the White Tower Alliance. Unlike Black Wizards, while White Wizards might not necessarily possess higher combat prowess, they lacked the bizarre pursuits and desires of their counterparts. They preferred to pursue knowledge and truth, passionate about analysis, dissection, and experimentation, roaming the ocean of knowledge and truth.

Compared to the viciousness, greed, and cruelty of Black Wizards, the methods of White Wizards were more upright. They rarely employed curses, ambushes, or extortion. White Wizards were gentler than Black Wizards, advocating for equivalent exchange. They disliked forceful plunder and preferred rules and order, as they viewed rules and order themselves as a form of cultivation and a manifestation of truth and knowledge.

Just as Mendes was feeling disappointed while observing these children who only cared about chatting and goofing off instead of pursuing knowledge and truth, Taylor, sitting by the side of the ship, suddenly caught his attention.

Taylor was silently planning his future and potential emergencies. Although he hadn't truly arrived at the White Tower Alliance yet, he felt it was highly likely he would encounter some tricky situations, such as conflicts.

However, he had already set the core goal for his life's path: to collect more knowledge and analyze more truth. After all, in this world and for the profession he was about to enter, knowledge was the most fundamental power.

Thinking about how the knowledge and truth he was about to learn would transform into his own foundation and strength, gradually leading him toward greater power and a longer life, Taylor couldn't help but feel a sense of yearning. This birthed his own ambition: to collect all knowledge and truth, gradually ascending to the very top.

When will I finally be able to learn the knowledge and truth of wizards~~~~~

Taylor's heart was filled with ambition and longing. His appearance, brimming with desire, and the subtle fluctuations of mental energy he emitted involuntarily were captured and observed by Mendes's mental energy.

This kind of desire is good. It is an ambition for truth and knowledge, a manifestation of the thirst for learning.

Mendes understood the importance of such a mindset for a wizard apprentice.

Someone with this disposition might not necessarily become a knowledgeable wizard, but it was a trait possessed by every wizard who pursued truth and possessed profound knowledge.

It seemed this ship wasn't entirely filled with naive children; there were still natural wizard seedlings.

Mendes smiled with satisfaction. He didn't know the boy's name, but he felt that with his own efforts, this child would surely become a powerful wizard.

It was a premonition.

The massive airship flew for about two more days before finally arriving at a vast island. In the center of the island stood a continuous stretch of white towers. Each wizard tower, whether tall or short, was carved with bizarre patterns and wizard runes that symbolized mysterious power.

When Taylor was the first to poke his head out to look at this endless cluster of white towers, he felt a sense of mystery and shock, of the unknown and trepidation.

Watching the mysterious light flowing across the white towers from time to time and the peculiar magic arrays that operated without pause, Taylor felt that he would likely spend the rest of his life here, pursuing that mysterious knowledge and truth.

The airship descended slowly from the horizon, passed through the clouds, and arrived at a port established beside a white wizard tower.

"Disembark."

Wizard Mendes's voice rang out in the ears of all the children simultaneously. It was a clever application of mental energy. As he spoke, a wooden walkway extended from the left side of the ship, connecting directly to the port.

After Taylor and the children on the ship crossed the wooden walkway to the port, they were greeted by wizard apprentices wearing white robes with the white tower emblem embroidered on their chests.

These wizard apprentices were lower-level Level 1 Wizard Apprentices and some menial apprentices within the White Tower Alliance. Their duty was to guide this fresh blood joining the White Tower Alliance, helping them understand necessary rules and regulations, how to become stronger, how to exchange for knowledge, how to obtain spell models, and so on.

Once the guidance was complete, they would submit their completed tasks to the menial department of the White Tower Alliance. Once a task was finished, they would earn points, which they could then use to exchange for the things they wanted.

Taylor and the children from the ship followed the guidance of the Level 1 Wizard Apprentices and menial apprentices, dividing into different squads to learn about the White Tower Alliance from the apprentices leading them.

In truth, these wizard apprentices didn't know all that much; they mostly explained the rules and regulations of the White Tower Alliance, as well as certain taboos. Through their explanations, Taylor learned that the White Tower Alliance was primarily composed of White Wizards, who advocated for order, rules, and equivalent exchange. Their style of conduct was relatively peaceful, and they strictly forbade wanton plunder, mutual scheming, and fratricide.

White Wizards believed that the wizard apprentice stage was a time to lay foundations, cultivate a spirit of exploration and research, and accumulate knowledge. If one spent every day thinking about how to plunder, scheme, or even kill companions, how could they ever become a wizard who pursued knowledge and truth?

Generally, when conflicts arose, there were law-enforcement wizard apprentices and even specialized law-enforcement wizards to handle them. Once a serious offense was committed—such as harming an apprentice or stealing knowledge—the offender would have a portion of their soul's core extracted, leaving the soul incomplete. They would be unable to make any further progress for the rest of their lives, relegated to becoming consumables and menials.

White Wizards advocated for rules and systems, and their style was relatively peaceful, but that did not mean their methods were gentle. They certainly would not wantonly exploit, dissect, or torture wizard apprentices like Black Wizards did, but for those wizard apprentices who committed grave errors and had their soul cores extracted...

As White Wizards who sought to explore the mysteries of the human body and delve into true knowledge and truth, they naturally had a need for some consumables.