Isata

As the sea ship gradually reached port, this was not even a seaport, but an inland river port.

Yet this inland river was incomparably broad, at least three hundred meters wide, perhaps even wider.

Who knew how deep it was, for it could actually accommodate sea ships.

But none of that mattered anymore. For Charles, this long voyage of roughly a year and a half had finally reached its end.

Many people aboard the ship were shouting in jubilant excitement, waiting to welcome the wonderful future that awaited them after arriving on the Wizard Continent.

Even Charles's face was full of smiles.

As the sea ship docked, Charles looked down from the deck.

Clatter, clatter!

The sounds of footsteps and metal plates grinding against one another rang out. At least a thousand neatly arrayed soldiers had appeared at the port, while a great number of carriages arrived one after another.

A bell rang aboard the sea ship.

Then a voice sounded in everyone's ears.

"We have successfully arrived at the Wizard Continent. Everyone, gather your luggage and line up to disembark!"

"The soldiers in the port will direct you to the carriages you are meant to board!"

"Third-Rank Wizard Apprentices, wait on the upper deck."

Besides that voice, the knights aboard the ship also emerged from the upper cabins and gradually made their way down, urging everyone to leave the sea ship quickly.

Charles, Molly, and the others who had become Third-Rank Wizard Apprentices aboard the ship gathered on the upper deck.

At that moment, a wizard dressed in a black robe stood there. Only after everyone had assembled did he speak. "Congratulations on arriving at the Wizard Continent."

"You all became Third-Rank Wizard Apprentices while still aboard the sea ship. Not bad."

"Unlike those idiots below, you are of greater value!"

"Next, follow closely behind them. They will take you to the academy for aptitude testing!"

The wizard pointed at several wizard apprentices in gray robes ahead of them.

Afterward, Charles and the others followed the old wizard apprentice off the ship and transferred to carriages.

Charles sat in the carriage, lifting the curtain at the rear to look outside.

A single sea ship could cram in at least a thousand people. With more than a dozen sea ships, there had to be over ten thousand people.

The port was packed with carriages, some arriving and others departing.

By comparison, the carriage Charles and the others rode in was somewhat more luxurious.

They had thought that once they boarded the carriages, their destination would not be far away. But they had celebrated too soon.

They spent another half a month riding like this, with only one or two fixed hours each day to get down, rest, wash up, and relieve themselves.

The rest of the time, they traveled in the carriages.

Every one of the soldiers they had seen at the port was also a knight, forming the escort for the carriages.

Charles and the others truly suffered along the way.

The carriages' comfort was utterly incomparable to that of the sea ship.

At least the sea ship had rooms and beds.

These carriages only had hard, cold benches. Third-Rank Wizard Apprentices received a little preferential treatment, with three or four people to a carriage.

Those who did not even count as Third-Rank Wizard Apprentices were packed in like canned goods.

Charles and Molly were in the same carriage, so they were fairly lucky.

When it was time to sleep, Charles simply slept on Molly's lap, which at least allowed him to rest properly.

He and Molly took turns sleeping and keeping watch.

The other two apprentices in the carriage had it somewhat harder. They could not sleep well, and their waists and backs ached from sitting all day.

Only after they became a little more familiar later on could they, like Charles and Molly, take turns sleeping and resting.

Compared with Charles and the others, the knights outside were the truly fierce ones.

They seemed not to need rest at all. Only the horses rested; whenever the convoy set off, they changed horses and followed along.

Along the way, the carriages were constantly split into different routes.

Seeing that the emblems painted on the carriages were all different, Charles formed a guess.

The emblem likely represented a wizard academy.

He was a student of Isata, while those on the other sea ships might belong to other academies.

With that thought, Charles began silently mourning the wizards aboard the sea ship that had been dragged into the deep sea by the Giant Sea Squid.

Every other academy had brought at least a thousand fresh recruits, perhaps even some with decent talent.

Yet their ship had sunk before they even arrived. That was simply absurd.

After racing onward in the carriages for nearly another month, Charles stepped down from the carriage with one hand supporting his waist, utterly exhausted. When he saw the buildings in the distance, his mind shook.

He was doing relatively well. Beside him, Molly stared at the sight ahead, her mouth hanging open.

It was not just them. Everyone else was the same.

An uproar rose all around them, with exclamations of amazement everywhere.

Before Charles's eyes stood an enormous complex of buildings.

Charles looked around. From the terrain they had passed through some time ago, he could tell that this academy was not situated atop some ordinary mountain peak or in a secluded valley.

The area around it seemed to be a vast swamp.

From afar, mist was the eternal veil draped over this region, but it was not the usual ethereal white.

Instead, it bore a sickly hue, mixed with dark green and grayish purple.

Looking forward from where they had disembarked, the mist shrouded the lower half of the building complex ahead, wrapping those structures in haziness and ill omen.

Rising from the dense fog was a colossal structure formed from the mad accumulation of countless towers, spires, arch bridges, and all manner of indescribable constructions.

From a distance, it looked like a giant tower stabbing straight into the heavens.

This giant tower even gave Charles the feeling that it was alive.

Streams of energy in countless colors crisscrossed between the towers, weaving a complicated aerial spiderweb dazzling enough to make one dizzy.

The towers composing the immense structure did not share the same shape. Some nearly defied the laws of geometry.

They pierced the dense fog at unimaginable angles. Some towers stood straight as spears, their tips vanishing into the thicker fog above.

Others twisted in spirals as though wrenched by some colossal force, their bodies covered in irregular bulges and depressions.

Some towers had simply broken in the middle, their fractures far from smooth, as though they had endured some fierce battle or explosion.

Around the towers and spires, at the tips of the towers, upon window frames, and inside hanging lanterns, ghostly green flames burned.

In some places, there were instead icy blue or purple spheres of light, as though they were the sources of illumination for this colossal tower complex.

Yet these dim lights could illuminate only limited areas, instead deepening the darkness around them.

Simply looking at this gigantic structure made Charles feel as though a hand had clenched his heart and lifted it high.

Ahead, a wizard flew into the air. Standing atop the branches of a twisted, winding tree, he spread his arms wide. His black robe fluttered in the wind, and his hoarse, icy voice rang in everyone's ears like an aria:

"Welcome, everyone... to!"

"ISATA!!!"