What Is a Wizard

After extracting the Novice Meditation Method, Richard nearly fainted on the spot. But relying on sheer willpower, he forced himself to use the Basic Meditation Method to meditate.

Once his mental power had recovered, Richard began practicing the Novice Meditation Method.

Compared with the Basic Meditation Method, the Novice Meditation Method had seven additional Spirit Runes. While this allowed Richard to remain in the Sea of Souls longer, it also made meditation more than twice as difficult.

Richard failed many times. In the end, with a stroke of luck, he finally completed the construction of all ten Spirit Runes.

The Novice Meditation Method allowed Richard to remain in the Sea of Souls for four hours, twice as long as the Basic Meditation Method.

But that extra time was not to be underestimated. The longer a soul remained in the Sea of Souls, the greater the benefits it gained. Though it was only two additional hours, the increase in mental power surpassed what six hours of meditation with the Basic Meditation Method could achieve.

Meditation could not be performed repeatedly within a short period, or the soul would lose its way in the Sea of Souls and be unable to return.

So after meditating, Richard chose to head to the Library again.

The Academy's Library was open day and night. Even at night, many apprentices could still be seen heading there.

Richard had much to learn, and time was what he did not lack now.

The entrance examinations soon came to an end. In only ten days, more than half of the nearly ten thousand apprentices who had come to take the test had died, while all the rest entered the Academy.

During this time, Richard relied on the Library's Free Books to gain a general understanding of the Wizard World's structure and its various customs and etiquette. Under the effects of the Novice Meditation Method, his mental power had also successfully risen from 15 to 15.1.

With the end of the entrance examinations, the Academy's free courses also opened.

Every student had four free classes per month. After attending those four free classes, the remaining courses required Magic Stones to attend.

For the first three years after enrollment, the Academy distributed one Magic Stone each month. But if apprentices wanted more Magic Stones, they needed to complete Academy tasks or trade with other apprentices.

Newly enrolled apprentices had a three-year probationary period. During this stage, the Academy would not forcibly assign them tasks. Once the three-year probationary period ended, the Academy would assess them. If they wanted to remain at the Academy, apprentices had to inscribe at least one spell mark and reach 20 points of mental power—in other words, become a Low-level apprentice.

Dong—dong—dong!

The heavy tolling of a bell echoed through the Academy, signaling that it was eight in the morning.

Even after coming to another world, Richard had failed to escape the fate of eight a.m. classes.

This class was Introduction to Alchemy, Richard's first class.

He was currently seated in a tiered classroom on the third floor of the Central Black Tower. Ellie sat beside him, and the entire classroom was packed to the brim.

"Richard, why hasn't the teacher come yet?"

Ellie looked at Richard's profile, countless thoughts swirling through her heart.

It had already been six days since they entered the Academy, yet Richard remained neither warm nor cold toward her. Every day, aside from reading in the Library, he meditated. The only time he had gone to the Restaurant was when she had taken the initiative to invite him.

Was she really that unattractive?

"Maybe something held her up."

Richard flipped through Introduction to Spellcasting, which he had borrowed from the Library, and answered absentmindedly.

He did not care about Ellie's thoughts. At the moment, he was immersed in an ocean of knowledge.

This Introduction to Spellcasting filled him with yearning through its descriptions of wizard spells. Elemental Magic, Soul Magic, Necromancy Magic, and even Curse Magic—each had its own characteristics and uses. The book also mentioned a concept called a Combat System.

A powerful wizard was bound to possess their own Combat System. Using their most essential spells as the core, supplemented by minor spells for handling all manner of situations, they constructed their own battle strategies. Thus, whether in planar wars or conflicts between wizards, they could face any enemy with calm composure.

If he were to build a Combat System, he definitely had to...

Tap, tap, tap, tap...

A set of footsteps approached from outside the classroom. The somewhat noisy room instantly fell silent.

Bang.

The classroom doors were pushed open, and a long-haired woman in a wizard's robe and black leather boots strode inside. She was tall and curvaceous, with a breathtakingly cold and beautiful face. Her narrow eyes lent her an even more mysterious air.

A mysterious black cat.

That was Richard's first impression of her.

She walked up to the podium and swiftly wrote a line of large words on the blackboard.

What is a wizard?

"Greetings, everyone. I am Anna Dorsey, a student of Wizard Gerald from the Alchemy School. This class was originally supposed to be taught by my mentor, but an extremely important alchemy experiment of his is at a critical stage, so I will be teaching it instead."

Anna's voice was calm, yet it carried an authority that brooked no disobedience.

"So, can any of you tell me what a wizard is?"

Holding a teaching pointer, Anna swept her gaze across the classroom. Though she stood lower than the students, everyone who saw her felt as if she were looking down on them.

"You, tell me." Anna pointed her teaching pointer at an apprentice.

"Um... I think wizards are people who can use magic." The apprentice who had been called on was clearly unprepared, and his answer was rather perfunctory.

"Very good. That is indeed one trait of wizards. Does anyone else have a different view?"

Anna waved the pointer, signaling for him to sit down, then pointed to another student.

"I think wizards are people who use magical power to change the world."

Anna nodded. "That is also good, but it is still only the surface."

Anna called on several more apprentices, but none of their answers seemed to satisfy her.

At last, Anna's teaching pointer pointed at Richard.

"Apprentice, what do you think a wizard is?"

Richard looked into Anna's eyes. This woman, whose presence had filled the room from the moment class began, was staring at him now. Her gaze was sharp enough to bore a hole through him. Before this, every apprentice had avoided her eyes, but Richard intended to face them head-on.

Richard took a deep breath and slowly spoke as he looked at Anna.

"I think wizards are a group of madmen who pursue knowledge. Spells and magical power are, in essence, merely byproducts of pursuing knowledge."

After Richard finished speaking, the classroom fell deathly silent. Every apprentice in the room was looking at him.

His answer was far too outrageous. Magical power and spells were the hallmarks of wizards, the abilities they relied on to survive. How could they possibly be byproducts?

"Very good."

Anna gestured for Richard to sit down, then wrote Richard's words on the blackboard.

"Wizards are a group of madmen who pursue knowledge. Whether or not you can become wizards hinges on this sentence. My mentor told me this back then, and now I am telling you the same."

Anna's words shook every apprentice in the classroom to the core. Had they not entered the Wizard Academy to become wizards?

But how were they supposed to understand these words?

Every apprentice had their own interpretation.

Richard looked at Anna on the podium. Those words were not his own creation; they had come from the chairman of the Truth Council, the ruler of the Wizard World.

When Richard had first seen them, he had only felt that the chairman was showing off.

I merely wanted to pursue knowledge. Magical power, spells, and all that were just things I happened to develop along the way. Not worth mentioning, not worth mentioning.

But after hearing Anna say this today, Richard gained a new understanding of those words.

"Madmen who pursue knowledge... pursuing knowledge is enough to make one a scholar, so why become a madman?"

Richard looked at the blackboard and raised his hand to write a sentence in his notes.

"Perhaps it is not that madmen pursue knowledge, but that pursuing knowledge requires one to become a madman."