Dago stood silently where he was, coldly observing this carnival called "selection."
He waited for a long time.
Not until the reception wizards from the three great schools had led away their favored geniuses one after another, turning into streams of light and vanishing beyond the horizon, was he left as the only solitary figure on the vast surface of Spirit Mirror Lake.
At last, a gaunt old man flew out from the Deep Sea School's camp.
The old man had a sharp, hooked nose like an eagle's beak, and his eyes were as cold as though he were looking at a stone.
He could not even be bothered to speak. He merely gave Dago a perfunctory wave, signaling for him to follow.
Dago did not hesitate in the slightest and followed with steady steps.
The old man led Dago down slowly onto the mirror-smooth surface of Spirit Mirror Lake.
He raised a hand with unnaturally long, sickly gray-white nails and casually slashed at the lake surface.
"Hiss—"
A sound like a sharp blade cutting through leather rang out.
The bottomless lake water was brutally forced apart by an invisible mighty power, revealing an oval opening in the curtain of water, a little over a person's height.
The old man flashed forward and slipped directly inside like a slick loach.
Dago stopped before the opening.
Before stepping into the unknown, he seemed to sense something and turned to look up at the sky behind him.
He saw that all the noisy lights above Spirit Mirror Lake had withdrawn.
Meanwhile, the three gray-robed figures, whose status was so exalted they seemed like gods, had lowered themselves and taken the initiative to walk toward Juventus, who sat upon the throne.
That side of the world shone brilliantly, while he was merely an