Waste of Stones

Zhao Si munched happily on shrimp. He had stashed plenty of bags in his Inventory, enough to keep him supplied with snacks for a while.

With the academy nearby, plenty of shops sold magic-related goods: robes, hats, staffs, glintstone, all kinds of materials, and more. It felt like stepping into Diagon Alley. Except this Academy of Magic was nowhere near as enchanting as Hogwarts. If anything, it felt rather cruel.

Whether it was expelling the two founders who studied primeval sorcery or trying to sever ties with Caria's "moon," the academy had shown considerable ambition. They really were betraying their founders' teachings.

A group of outsiders had descended from the stars into the Lands Between. They revered the starry sky and the night, and established the Eternal City. They threw themselves wholeheartedly into developing magic, and when they created night sorceries, the stars and the moon were still inseparable.

As a rule, all outsiders were called Numen.

These Numen probably weren't the same sort as Marika's group. They seemed more like the later Nightfolk, with skin the color of the night sky. You could nickname them the "little black folk."

Even during the hard times that followed, when meteors brought by the race of Astel, the "Dark Star," destroyed the Eternal City and forced them underground, where they could see only a false night sky overhead, these little black folk who worshipped the stars and the night never lost heart. They kept putting their minds to work and developed something new-the Moon of Nokstella.

It was then that they established a new Eternal City-Nokstella.

There, they sought to use the Dark Moon to guide the stars. From that, it was clear that the Carian Royal Family, representing the moon, ruled over the academy, which represented the stars.

The little black folk's neighbors at the time were the Ancestral Followers, who likewise lived underground.

These simple, primitive people revered nature and worshipped the Ancestral Spirit. With the little black folk's help, they established the Uhl Dynasty. They disliked civilization and metal, preferring everything in its natural state. You could see it in how they wore animal hides and horns, made weapons from animal bones, and fired Spirit Arrows.

Aboveground, however, civilization and metal had long since taken over.

The beasts gained intelligence through their five fingers. With five fingers and the ability to make tools, they fashioned weapons from stone, entering the Stone Age ahead of everyone else.

The giants drove the Ice Dragon from the Mountaintops of the Giants. On the peaks closest to the sky and the sun, they built the Giant's Forge and kindled the everlasting Giant's Flame. They forged metal implements, ushering in the Iron Age.

The beasts possessed intelligence, valued civilization and order, and restrained their own bestial nature. They might well have been more rational than primitive humans. After all, the beast sage Serosh had guided the Golden Lineage-the same Serosh who later served beside Godfrey as his beast regent.

Back when old Godfrey was still Hoarah Loux, he had been a born battle maniac and one hell of a fighter. Otherwise, Marika wouldn't have chosen him as her husband to conquer new lands. After becoming Elden Lord, he took the beast regent Serosh onto his back to suppress his raging lust for battle.

Counterintuitive, wasn't it? Humans weren't the supreme beings of the Lands Between. They might not even have been the first creatures to develop civilization. Before old Godfrey took the throne, Dragonlord Placidusax had ruled the world.

Back then, the old Dragonlord's God hadn't run off yet. Crumbling Farum Azula was grand and magnificent, with a funerary practice unique to its beasts and dragons-their remains became part of the architecture.

The Bestial Sanctum shared the same architectural style as Crumbling Farum Azula.

At some unknown point, the Dragonlord's God had run off. The Dragonlord shut himself away in a rift in time and space at the center of the storm, and power passed into other hands.

Some humans rose to prominence with the help of the Erdtree and the beasts. Those were Godfrey's people, the Golden Lineage.

Godfrey had already been friends with Serosh when he was still Hoarah Loux, and the two had gone into battle together.

Clearly, some beasts had found new paths for themselves. Gurranq had bowed down alongside Marika, sworn himself her brother, and acknowledged her as his elder sister, becoming Maliketh the Black Blade. Serosh, meanwhile, entered the court as regent and continued assisting his like-minded friend Godfrey.

Ah, so that was where the later tradition of giving an Empyrean a beast companion came from.

Yet calamities sent by heaven could be forgiven; those people brought upon themselves left no hope of survival. The Erdtree's faction had reached the brink of wrecking itself.

"Gods just have bigger fists. What's so special about that?" Zhao Si grumbled to Helena as he ate lobster tails.

In a magical world with gods and the Greater Will, Zhao Si was becoming more and more of an atheist. Better to have no gods than to trust them blindly. Just look at Goldmask: he never blindly believed in the Golden Order, but always studied it with a scientific eye, seeking the truth.

Studying Golden Order fundamentalism could even lead to mechanics and Mathematics, producing repeating crossbows like the pulley crossbow. Wasn't that more useful than a god? Gods didn't have any brains.

Helena didn't care what Zhao Si said. She merely smiled in response. Whether he was railing against the Greater Will, the Two Fingers, or the gods, it made no difference. She was Zhao Si's Witch, serving only him and helping him fulfill his mission of "destined death." That was all.

Zhao Si gazed up at the academy's towering gates. "I wonder if they let people tour the academy."

No sooner had he said that than a commotion reached him from nearby:

"Hey, isn't that Waste of Stones? Here to buy materials again?"

"We've told you your research will never succeed. After all this time, you haven't even earned a crown, and your Glintstone Sorcery is a complete mess. Yet you're still researching magic that has nothing to do with the stars. What a waste of effort."

"Exactly. You can't even learn plenty of existing Glintstone Sorceries, and you want to invent your own? Hahahaha! Who do you think you are, a genius sorcerer like Sellen?"

There really was bullying everywhere. Workplace bullying at Roundtable Hold, academic bullying at the academy.

Some sorcerers ranked magic into rigid tiers. Anyone who studied different magic was an outsider. Now, students of the Raya Lucaria Conspectus were considered heretics simply because they regarded the moon and stars as equals.

"I-I just wanted to try. In a place full of knowledge like the academy, it would be such a shame not to explore new possibilities for magic."

A man's timid voice drifted over as he argued with the others. Zhao Si could hear his lack of confidence and conviction. He sounded just like Zhao Si had when he first arrived in this world.

Zhao Si pushed through the onlookers and saw several sorcerers in dark blue apprentice robes and glintstone crowns mocking a young man.

The man was meek and barely dared argue back. He simply hunched over and clutched the shopping bag in his arms, protecting his newly purchased materials. Those precious materials had cost him a month's worth of scrimping on food, and they were indispensable to his research.

One male sorcerer reached for the shopping bag. "Such precious materials would only go to waste in your hands. Why not let us use them for you? That would put them to better use."

"Exactly, Thops. If you piled up all the materials you've wasted, they'd stand taller than the Erdtree," another sorcerer chimed in.

Everyone burst into cheerful laughter at that, while Thops only huddled more tightly into himself.

Young Thops hadn't lost all his hair yet

and hadn't grown a beard. He looked rather youthful.

Smack!

Zhao Si caught the male sorcerer's wrist. He couldn't tell these crown-wearing fellows apart. All he knew was that the one before him wore a Karolos Glintstone Crown and was a student of the Karolos Conspectus, which revered Sorcerer Azur as its founder and specialized in Comet Sorceries.

To describe the glintstone crown, it looked like the head of a human man with a full beard. The problem was that the academy had several varieties of bearded male crowns, making them look like Renaissance plaster busts. To Zhao Si, there was nothing particularly distinctive about them.

"You Tarnished! Why are you wandering around here instead of being a good dog for the Two Fingers?" the male sorcerer demanded self-righteously, calling out Zhao Si's identity.

Zhao Si rubbed his cheek, remembering that the visible effect of Grace in his eyes had been concealed. He had begged the Gloam-Eyed Queen to do that, to spare him unnecessary trouble from having a different kind of Grace. Still, being identified as a Tarnished was trouble in itself.

Any Tarnished who appeared in the Lands Between could only be affiliated with the Two Fingers.

"What's it to you?" Zhao Si frowned. "I just can't stand seeing you bully someone like this."

"Bully?" The male sorcerer laughed loudly. "This is a friendly exchange between fellow students, helping each other out. What right does an outsider like you have to interfere?"

The others laughed even harder, seemingly mocking Zhao Si for not knowing his place.

Behind him, Thops also spoke softly. "Th-thank you. I'm all right. Please don't get yourself into trouble over me."

Zhao Si looked back at Thops. "Are you trying to research a spell that can defend against both sorceries and Incantations?"

Thops froze for a moment, then slowly nodded. "Yes. I think... most magic is used to attack, which leaves sorcerers without much protection. So I wanted to see if I could create a spell to protect the caster."

"Then I'm definitely getting involved." Zhao Si smiled. "You're worth more than over half the sorcerers in this academy. It doesn't matter if you don't have a crown."

"What did you say? You dare use a waste of stones to belittle us? What outrageous arrogance." Anger crept into the male sorcerer's voice.

"A waste of stones? If he's a waste of stones, does that make you lot glintstone?" Zhao Si unleashed his mockery without mercy. "A bunch of idiots who can only bow their heads and pick up rocks. What have you got to be proud of?"

Then, before the sorcerers could react, Zhao Si punched the male sorcerer's crown.

Tempered by the battlefield, Zhao Si was no longer the man he had been. His strength and speed had both improved considerably. Most importantly, he had grown far bolder, as though he'd eaten a bear's heart and a leopard's gall.

That single punch shattered the male sorcerer's crown. His knuckles met the man's cheek, and the tremendous impact traveled to his brain, sending it crashing against the inside of his skull until he lost consciousness.

Zhao Si kept hold of the male sorcerer's hand with his left, ignoring the man's body as it slumped to the ground. He merely surveyed the other sorcerers, making it clear that anyone who dared make a move would get punched too.