Academy Square

Dago could only let it go and wait for another chance to see Wizard Rosalyn before telling her about the technique.

Since it was still early, Dago continued wandering around Ainak Wizard Academy.

Apart from the main road leading to Ainak Castle, there were still two roads he had yet to visit.

From what he had learned over the past two days, one led to the apprentices' residential area;

the other led to Academy Square, a place dedicated to selling extraordinary wizarding items.

Following the road forward, Dago began to see wizard stalls set up along the way.

Then the stalls became more numerous, as did the apprentices.

By the end, nearly everything in sight was a square filled with all kinds of stalls.

Some belonged to wandering wizards who had received the academy's permission to enter and sell magical materials and wizarding tools.

Others sold rune tools or potions made by the academy's instructors and apprentices themselves.

The square was packed with people, with cries of sales and haggling ringing endlessly through the air. Some passing apprentices were dressed splendidly, while others wore tattered robes, some even patched.

"No wonder that apprentice at the gate told me to keep my magic stone pouch covered."

Dago muttered to himself as he looked at the bustling square before him.

He touched the cloth pouch holding his magic stones, feeling a little more confident.

Though it was empty except for one low-grade magic stone, it should be enough for him to browse around.

He did not recognize most of the things displayed at the stalls, but that did not stop him from gradually blending in.

Dago had his own method for browsing.

Whenever he saw apprentices bargaining at a stall, he would quietly walk over and stand nearby to eavesdrop...

Once he had roughly figured out what the item being priced was and how much it was worth, he would silently leave.

After doing this for a while, his knowledge had risen by several levels.

As he wandered, Dago suddenly stopped at a stall.

It was a small stall displaying complete sets of potion-brewing equipment: silver and brass crucibles, glass and crystal potion bottles, silver daggers, mortars and pestles, scales, and more.

The stall owner was a middle-aged man in his forties, sitting behind the stall with a despondent expression.

Dago's eyes flickered as he asked the stall owner, "How much for all this?"

"Two low-grade magic stones for the lot."

The stall owner glanced at Dago and quoted the price without much interest.

"Were these all tools you used yourself?"

"Yes, all personal-use tools. Unfortunately, I had no talent for potion-making, so I can only sell them cheaply."

Dago immediately understood why the stall owner looked so dejected.

He silently calculated the contents of his money pouch, thought for a moment, then said, "One low-grade magic stone. These are all ordinary tools. I'll take everything."

The stall owner rolled his eyes and waved a hand. "That's a ruthless bargain. But since you're an academy apprentice, fine. Pack them up and take them."

Hearing that, Dago nearly emptied his wallet and handed the low-grade magic stone to the stall owner.

As he accepted Dago's magic stone, the man spoke with a slightly amused expression. "Are you planning to teach yourself to become a potion-maker?"

Dago gave a grunt of assent. It was obvious.

"I used to be as naive as you. Only after reality hit me hard did I learn how cruel the world was. I hope you can keep that innocence until the end. May you succeed."

The stall owner's expression sank into memories as he spoke wistfully.

Dago paused, then replied, "I will. Thank you for your blessing."

He carefully placed the equipment from the stall into his large cloth sack.

At the academy entrance, Dago emerged carrying several large and small bags. It was already around two or three in the afternoon.

He casually ate something at a small restaurant in town, paid the bill, then turned and left.

Dago looked at his empty coin pouch. All he had left on him were two magic stone fragments.

"If the plan goes smoothly, I'll have money from now on."

Dago sighed as he covered his coin pouch tightly.

As the sun slanted westward, Dago returned to his little shelter.

After inspecting it and finding no signs of theft...

Dago sorted, cleaned, and stored his potion-brewing equipment. This was the capital for his future venture.

There was not much: a silver crucible, a stone mortar, a glass pestle, a brass scale, and several thumb-sized glass potion bottles.

He planned to study the profession of potion-maker.

Though he currently had no potion ingredients, according to Wizard Rosalyn, the raw materials for spiritual potions could all be found in the Emerald Forest.

However, due to the large-scale development by the academy and the town, the magical plants and magical beasts in the nearby forest had been harvested and slaughtered clean.

He could only venture deeper into the forest, into places untouched by people.

Of course, Dago would not foolishly run straight into the depths of the forest to explore and hunt.

He would not joke around with his own life. Everything had to be built on the premise of absolute safety.

First, he could not neglect his continued progress in spell training. Second, he needed to find Mariko, who knew quite a few people in the nearby forest regions.

Dago shook his head, throwing aside the stray thoughts in his mind, and focused on what was before him: training his spells and making progress.

Thus, the shelter's exterior was once again filled with the continuous rumble of explosions and the sound of trees falling.

As dawn broke, a thin veil of mist wrapped around the forest.

"Gurgle, gurgle—"

The shelter door stood open. Dago stood in the clearing, where his breakfast was cooking in a small iron pot set over a fire.

He had crudely shaved noodles from dough, tossed in some seasoning, and stewed everything into one pot.

After eating and drinking his fill, today's task was to first head to his usual hunting grounds in the forest and hunt a Swift Deer.

Until he found a new source of income, he could not abandon this daily task.

After that, he would find Mariko and ask whether he knew of any Moonlight Flowers near the forest.

Once he made up his mind, Dago returned to the shelter, put on his hunting clothes, gathered his equipment, and set off to hunt.

He moved skillfully through the forest and arrived at hunting grounds farther away than before.

It could not be helped. The Swift Deer herd had moved away from its original water source to avoid his hunting.

But with his sharp senses, he still discovered signs of the herd's migration. He found that as his Meditation Method improved, his perception of the surroundings was also slowly improving.

Following the trail, he found the Swift Deer that loved playing hide-and-seek. He greeted them with an Air Bullet.

A slower young deer was blasted away by the Air Bullet, flying more than ten meters before landing without moving.

"Swift Deer these days are really young. They just collapse and fall asleep at the slightest thing," Dago joked.

He always stopped after hunting one Swift Deer. Even if he killed more, he could not carry them away.

After quickly skinning it and cutting off the meat, Dago used the Ice Crystal Technique to freeze the chunks.

But he did not return to the shelter. He planned to first visit Mariko's treehouse and give him some venison, while also asking where Moonlight Flowers grew in the forest.

Before long, he arrived at Mariko's treehouse and saw him already sitting in the clearing below, gnawing black bread and drinking morning liquor.

After exchanging a few pleasantries, Dago explained why he had come.

"You're really motivated, kid. Hunting and looking for Moonlight Flowers—being young is great.

I heard a second-level wizard apprentice living in the forest once say while drunk that if you keep going southwest through the forest for two hours, there's a lake. He saw a huge patch of glowing flowers there."

Mariko accepted a frozen deer leg and spoke.

"But Dago, let me warn you. He lost an arm there and was crippled because of it, which is why he moved into the forest to barely cling to life. That is Shadow Leopard territory—a pack of cruel and cunning magical beasts. Even I don't dare go there."

Mariko gave Dago a well-intentioned warning.

Dago thanked Mariko for the warning. After thinking for a while, he left and returned to his shelter.

Though he now knew where the Moonlight Flowers were, it was a place even Mariko did not dare visit.

With his current strength, going there would be nothing more than delivering himself to death. As for asking people from the academy to help develop the area, given the academy's bunch of bloodsuckers, he probably would not even get a hair.

After considering it carefully, he decided to improve his strength first, then develop the place himself.

However, he still had too few spells under his command. He had to learn more.

He still had a black leather wizard book he had not studied. There were some specialized spell terms in it that he did not yet understand.

So he planned to hunt in the morning, sell his catch in town, and visit the academy to learn specialized spell terminology. In the afternoon and evening, he would train spells at home and improve his strength.

With that happily decided, Dago changed into his apprentice robe and ran toward the academy.

As he jogged along, the wind blew into his loose robe, feeling pleasantly cool.

It was already ten o'clock when he arrived at the academy. He first went to the research office to look for Instructor Rosalyn...

Unfortunately, her seat was empty, and he had no idea when she would finish her task.

After asking around for a long while, he finally found the academy library. The vast library was extremely quiet at the moment.

Only the sounds of apprentices turning pages came from the seats in the center...

He found the indispensable old gatekeeper of the library and asked where the spell dictionary was. The old man pointed to a bookshelf in one corner of the library.

Dago went over and searched for quite some time before finding the book he wanted. It was clearly rarely read.

He picked it up, found an empty seat among the central library chairs, and sat down. Then he took out the wordless black leather wizard book and placed it beside the wizard dictionary on the table.

He opened the black leather wizard book and began reading. Whenever he encountered a wizarding term he did not recognize, he used the wizard dictionary to understand it.

Immersed in the sea of knowledge, Dago did not realize how much time had passed until four in the afternoon.

Only a few thin pages in the entire black leather wizard book remained without annotations. He intended to finish reading it all in one go.

He did not even plan to eat lunch, intending to combine it with dinner.

The clock on the library wall ticked through another hour before Dago finally put away his books, returned the wizard dictionary, and left the library.

After leaving the academy, he had to return to the shelter before sunset and nightfall to cook dinner. With his current finances, he could not afford to eat in town.

Dragging his starving body toward the shelter, he was fortunate that the sky had not yet fully darkened. He quickly made a pot of boiled dough dumplings and immediately dug in.