21-31

Chapter 21: Harpsichord

Translator: winniethepooh, Kris_Liu Editor: Vermillion

Victor was glad to see that Lucien did not slow down over the several days' learning. Within fifty minutes he absorbed the rest of the grammar rules. He was smart and gifted in learning language, and had a good memory as well.

Good mood brought him ideas. Victor started humming.

"Ladies and gentlemen, let's have a break. Help yourself to some tea and snack. I gotta jot this down." He was already trotting upstairs when he finished talking.

Picking up the fine white teacup, Lucien took a sip of the weird-tasting tea. Rubbing his eyes, he tried to relax a little bit.

"Felicia, when can we go hunting in your family's manor again? I miss the deers and rabbits there so much, and also the fresh air."

Annie was another noble lady among them. However, except for her beautiful blond hair and gem-like green eyes, her appearance was just around average. Besides, her family was not that distinguished as well. Her father was just one of the many children of a common baron, who failed to inherit anything from the family. No title, no land, no manor. Annie's family had to struggle to live a seemingly decent life with the income from her father work as a court clerk and the annuity from their title.

In comparison, the Hayne family, as one of the biggest families in the Duchy of Orvarit, still enjoyed a high reputation. Although her father did not inherit the title either, he still got a big manor outside of Aalto with its own woods, orchards, and even a granite quarry. They also possessed a property inside of the city.

Among them, Felicia had the most distinguished family background.

On hot summer days, there was nothing better than escaping from the heat enjoying some hunting and some homemade wine in a manor away from the city. Many young nobles who did not have a manor in their families would of course long for it. Lucien could tell Annie was trying to get close to Felicia.

"Is that true, lady Felicia? Are there rabbits and cute deers in your family's manor?" Renee got in the conversation, asking with curiosity.

Since they started studying together, Renee always tried to cotton up to the noble students by talking about music, which worked very well.

She was thus encouraged. Through music, she started joining conversations between noble students more. Somehow she learned a bit on some theories about music. Often she asked Felicia or Annie related questions and became more and more acquainted with the nobles.

Learning from her, Colin and David started doing the same.

Lucien, perhaps because he was too nerdy and reserved, only cared about his own study. And for sure neither the nobles nor the commons would take the initiative to talk to him.

"I miss the place as well." Felicia was still sitting straight, answering with her standard smile, "But there are only around three months left before Mr. Victor's performance. Lott, Herodotus and I have to practice a lot. I really have no time to go there."

For sure, Felicia was happy for being flattered and being the envy of the other students. Who would not?

It would not be true to say that Lucien did not want to have a look at such a fancy manor. But the most urgent thing in his mind was how to borrow the dictionary and finish browsing through it as quickly as possible.

Victor came downstairs with a slight smile hanging on his face. Apparently he was pretty satisfied with his work. The chatting stopped.

Athy, the steward, came in when Victor was about to continue his teaching. He whispered in Victor's ear, "Your guest is here, my Lord."

"Oh! I forgot!" Shaking his right hand, he looked a bit annoyed, "Let him in, please."

Then he turned to his students, apologizing politely.

"I'm so sorry, ladies and gentlemen. I forgot I would have a guest here today. Can we resume the class tomorrow afternoon at two? I'm really sorry."

The students were happy to have an early end today. When they were preparing to leave, Lucien walked closer to Mr. Victor, ready to ask him to borrow the common tongue dictionary for a few days.

Before Lucien began his request, two guests came in following the steward. One was a silver-haired pretty man in a red shirt and black coat, and the other was a white-haired elderly man with a wooden suitcase in his hands.

"Mr. Rhine…" Lucien and Felicia recognized the guest at the same time.

Felicia's face turned pink, while Lucien felt even more surprised. He thought Rhine was just a bard living in the tavern. Rhine being Mr. Victor's important guest was quite unexpected for Lucien.

"Hi, Felicia. And… you're here, Lucien!" Rhine greeted them gracefully.

Felicia smiled shyly, and a second later she was very surprised: how did Mr. Rhine know Lucien?

"Lucien, you know Mr. Rhine?" Victor smiled.

"Yes, we've met before." Lucien nodded, "I Didn't expect I'd meet Mr. Rhine again here at your place."

Rhine's smile was pretty attractive like an elf.

"Yes, we met once before and Lucien impressed me. At that time he was telling us that he wanted to learn how to read. And look! Here he is! I always appreciate young people striving for their dreams."

Commended by Rhine, even Lucien felt a bit shy.

"Mr. Rhine is the concertmaster I'm currently working with, who has very unique and excellent understanding towards music. Without his help, I don't think I could be inspired with my piano concerto."

"What!? Rhine's the master now!?" That almost made Lucien's jaw drop. He had met Rhine in Copper Cornet in the slum several days before.

From his classmates' conversation, Lucien knew that the structure of a symphony orchestra here was similar to the ones on the earth. The first violinist was the concertmaster, who would also be responsible for conducting the orchestra when the conductor was absent. How could Rhine, a stranger who had never cooperated with the team before, get such an important position?

From Lucien's expression Rhine could tell he was very surprised. He explained easily, "The previous master fell in love with a noble lady, who eloped with her to Syracuse several days ago. Mr. Victor had no one else to find but me." He shrugged his shoulders and smiled.

"Mr. Rhine should be the first violinist of the orchestra, even if the previous master was still here." Felicia cut in with her flushed face, "Mr. Rhine just needs more practice with the others."

"I agree." Victor also thought highly of Rhine, "Mr. Rhine's one of the best violinists I've ever met. I was more than lucky to have him here."

Lucien looked at Rhine, who was smiling politely with his right hand laying on his heart, showing his gratitude. Within a few days, a bard was exiled from Syracuse with his harp, and he happened to become the first violinist of a symphony orchestra in Aalto. It was too strange for Lucien. It could not be a coincidence.

"This is Mr. Shavell, the most excellent harpsichord maker in Aalto." Rhine started introducing the elderly man beside him, "Mr. Shavell shall be able to help you with the improvement."

"Nice to meet you, Mr. Shavell. It's an honour for me to have you here." Victor shook hands with him enthusiastically and led him upstairs, before Lucien had any chance to talk to him.

Victor was so excited that he forgot to ask Athy to see his students out. Unsure about the relationship between Lucien and Rhine, Athy did not ask him to leave instantly either. Next, Felicia, Annie, Colin and some other students came upstairs quietly, filled with curiosity.

Lucien was not willing to leave without the dictionary, so he also followed upstairs to end up in Mr. Victor's practice room.

"Mr. Shavell, I was hoping the harpsichord could be more sensitive to the pressure of my fingers, so the the control of its volume can be more accurate." Watching Shavell open his harpsichord, Victor made detailed his request, "My music requires a wider range of tones. More resonant and vigorous, but also delicate and clear."

There were lots of different components in it: springs, pivots, plectrums, strings… Since it was invented, many makers and musicians tried to improve the harpsichord, including adding extra pivots, stops, replacing soundboard, etc.

Slightly frowning his eyebrows, Shevell was carefully checking the parts.

"I'm afraid it's impossible, Mr. Victor. Over more than 300 years of upgrades, this kind of instrument has reached its limitation. Even a slight improvement on it would be quite hard."

Both Victor and Rhine lost their words, especially Victor. If the harpsichord could not be improved, his music would definitely not be perfect. In that case, the performance in the Psalm Hall would be a foreseeable failure for him.

Everyone remained silent for a while, until Lucien started asking all of a sudden.

"Can we… can we turn it into a kind of percussion instrument…? Changing it from plucking to hitting."

Lucien noticed that this world had yet to invent the "king of musical instruments", the piano. Musicians were still working on harpsichords and clavichords. He got his own plan: If he could help Mr. Victor with his improvement, probably there would be no more five Nars every month, and, of course, borrowing a dictionary would be a piece of cake.

As early as they started talking about improving the harpsichord, Lucien opened his Piano: Manufacture and Tones and Mechanism of Modern Piano in his spirit library. He got a rough idea from leafing through the first several pages.

"Then what would be the difference between it and a clavichord?" Shevell threw a stern look at Lucien, "Yes you can control the volume with percussion, but the sound's too delicate and the volume too low. It's only suitable for playing at home, not a hall."

It was in Aalto, the City of Psalm, the City of Music. No one suspected the real reason why Lucien understood the difference between a harpsichord and a clavichord.

Chapter 22: Appreciation

Translator: winniethepooh, Kris_Liu Editor: Vermillion

Victor was quite upset. He knew that without an improved harpsichord, those picky nobles, musicians and critics would by no means be satisfied with his performance. What was worse, he would also receive a bitter comment from Wolf on Music Criticism, and then he'd never have a second chance to play in the Psalm Hall again during his life.

He had seen many excellent musicians fail to perform perfectly in the Hall and suffer lots of setbacks afterwards. Every two or three years there would be a desperate musician among those committing suicide because of his failure. Indeed, most musicians could be quite sensitive and vulnerable.

Although he understood Lucien was just trying to help, Victor still felt a bit annoyed by Lucien's groundless guessing. Controlling himself, he answered with his low voice.

"Thank you, Lucien. But it's more complicated than just combining the two."

"Such an arrogant fool from the slum…" The noble students were angry about Lucien's interruption. While Lott, Herodotus, and Felicia were glaring at Lucien with distaste, Rhine was standing to the site, with an almost undetectable smile on his face, as if he was looking forward to Lucien's answer.

Although Lucien hadn't got a full understanding of the two books, he still had some overall ideas. By observing the inner structure of the harpsichord in front of him, he was ready to share his thoughts.

"With the help of a certain… unit, the finger movement might be enlarged through the process of conduction, so the striking from the hammers inside could be louder."

Lucien explained it vaguely on purpose, carefully choosing his words to match those of a common lad living in the slum, to avoid suspicion. Terms like 'amplitude' were definitely not supposed to show up in his vocabulary.

"Enlarge? Like what?" Shavell's eyes were still stern and his white eyebrows twisted together. He had heard similar ideas before, but after several attempts failed, they all gave up in the end.

Under their gaze, Lucien took down a flute from the wall. "Once, I saw a farmer who lifted a big rock with a wooden stick and a small rock, like this…" He grabbed a ink bottle and put it under the flute and started doing levering.

"I see…" Instead of refuting, Shavell started thinking. Soon he noticed the disadvantage. "But like this, the striking speed would be slower."

"Impressive, Lucien. You are showing us the Lever Principle." Rhine watched Lucien's model carefully and took a step closer to him.

Pretending confusion, Lucien was actually very surprised. How come Rhine knew the Lever Principle? People here called it the same way? But the rest of them seemed really confused.

"You may all have seen it before in your lives. I heard the principle when I was traveling to Holm. Actually local scholars there already discovered it hundreds of years ago. But here, people worship divine power and the Blessing in the blood, so science doesn't pervade very fast." Rhine explained.

"Have you noticed that the longer the stick is, the easier you can lift something on the other end, Lucien?" Rhine asked.

"Obviously," Lucien thought, but his face put on a confused look as he said, "Really? Then can we put more than one lever together?"

Lucien stopped himself here. He could not go any further talking about stuff like multi-lever transmission.

Rhine's eyes were lightened immediately. "Connection! Multi levers!" He walked close to Shavell and talked to him in a low voice. He was drawing on a paper.

"Rhine… He's more than a bard. I'm almost sure." Lucien thought while Rhine talking. The bard's hands were waving in the air explaining the principle.

Soon Victor joined their heated discussion.

"Lucien, how did you connect them together? I mean, yes, I saw it before several times but I never thought it could be used on this." Surprisingly, Lott started talking to Lucien.

But he was stopped by Felicia, "Be quiet. Go downstairs if you want to chat."

Lott did not want to miss their discussion now. He nodded and remained silent.

The rest of the students were pretty annoyed by the factor that Lucien, the nobody who just recently arrived there, somehow got the spotlight. They were hoping his idea wouldn't work out.

Understanding that there were still many more differences between a harpsichord and a modern piano, Lucien once again started reading his two books, to see if there was more he could help with.

...

An elegant melody came out from the room, resonant and rich at the beginning, gentle and soft in the end.

"Awesome!" Victor's face was glowing with excitement, "Thank you, Rhine. Thank you, Mr. Shavell." Although there was still a way to go, the key problem had been solved.

"It's my pleasure." Rhine smiled elegantly.

After hugging both of them, Victor came to Lucien with his open arms. "Thank you, Lucien. You gave us the direction. Thanks God for bringing you to me."

"It's nothing, Mr. Victor." Being hugged by a man, Lucien felt a bit awkward. "I didn't expect I could actually help."

Victor laughed and thanked Lucien again sincerely. "Anyway, from now on, if you need any help, just ask."

The rest of the students started being envious again. The newcomer earned Mr. Victor's favour so quickly!

Lucien was very glad as well.

"Yes… Yes, Mr. Victor." He asked shyly, "I do need help with something…"

"Yes?" Victor was waiting for his request, smiling. In his eyes, Lucien was genuinely a good-hearted and promising young lad.

"Can I borrow your common tongue dictionary?" Rubbing his hands, Lucien was pretty unsure.

"Ah?" Rhine couldn't stop himself from laughing. Lott, Felicia and the rest people there were amused as well.

"Sure, no problem. My good boy." Mr. Victor nodded instantly, "Anything else?"

"Um…" Lucien was even more nervous now. He felt he was asking for too much.

Noticing Lucien's hesitation, Victor tried to encourage him. "It's okay. Don't be shy. Just ask."

"Um… Mr. Victor, can I… can I study here for free…?"

"Hahahaha!" Rhine could not hold back anymore.

Chapter 23: More About the Notes

Translator: winniethepooh, Kris_Liu Editor: Vermillion

Victor also started laughing. He was almost laughing to tears. Even a serious elderly man like Shavell was smiling and shaking his head, not to mention Lott, Felicia and Herodotus. The rest of the students who hadn't had a chance to be Mr. Victor's music students laughed as well, albeit bitterly to some extent.

Lucien felt a bit awkward. "Mr. Victor?" He asked carefully.

Victor stopped himself after several coughs, looking at Lucien seriously. "I mean, Lucien… would you like to study music under me? I know it's hard to start from scratch at your age, but a smart and hardworking young lad like you could still be a qualified musician in the future. Also, completely for free." Victor added humorously.

Victor had three types of students: the ones learning how to read, which paid five Nars every month; the ones selected among the previous type, who would learn music from him for the price of ten Nars a month; and only a really gifted and outstanding student could perform with him and benefit from his fame and network. Victor, for now, had just one student like that, who was already a well-known musician.

So, what Victor offered meant that Lucien could save ten Nars every month. On the other hand, that much was still not a lot for the musician, even now when he was kind of struggling because of his current income. Victor would only earn about seven gold Thales a year for teaching these students, which of course did not mean much to him. When Victor was performing for the nobles, his income was around 100 gold Thales annually.

Actually, merely seven Thales a year was already pretty good for most of the commoners. Annie's father, a court clerk, earned no more than fifteen Thales a year.

Although the other students envied Lucien, he was a bit hesitant about the offer. He never thought he would learn music. Different thoughts were flashing through his mind: the witch's note, John's family, and his own plan…

"I'm afraid I'll have to live in Aalto for a longer time, until I find a better place to learn magic. After all, Aalto's the biggest and busiest city in the west. Being a respectable musician can be a pretty good cover for me."

Soon Lucien made up his mind, and his face lit up with a smile.

"Of course. That would be great honor.Thank you, Mr. Victor. Really."

Victor was nodding with satisfaction, "You're both smart and diligent, and also have a simple heart. I'm sure you'll achieve something if you keep working like this."

"I'm not that simple…" Lucien thought to himself. At the same time, he felt slightly uncomfortable with the way the other students were looking at him.

Having his dictionary and the returned five Nars with him, Lucien left the house and was ready to go back home.

"Good job, Lucien!" The girl with brown hair and green eyes caught up with Lucien from behind. "I'm Renee, Renee Weisz. I just want to say that your talent really impressed me…"

Being eager to read the rest of the witch's note, Lucien was not in a chatting mood now. "Hi, Renee. I'm running late for an appointment… I'm sorry but… can we talk next time?"

"Oh… all right.." Her expression froze for a second but soon the smile came back.

At this time Annie and another noble student, Maxi, passed by them and Annie's mouth twisted in a contemptuous sneer. Keeping her elegant paces, Annie directly walked away without having a glimpse of Renee.

From a distance, Colin and David sneered at Renee as well. But they also wished they could be as lucky as Lucien.

...

The early summer sunshine still shone over Aderon at around five in the afternoon, when Lucien arrived at his house. He couldn't wait to read the rest of the notes. The good news could wait until tomorrow to be shared with Alisa and her family.

Devouring the brown bread, Lucien locked the wooden door from the inside. After taking out his quill and paper he was ready to start his exploration again. Then he entered into his spirit library to copy the dictionary.

Finishing the work, Lucien opened the witch's book again.

By ten o'clock that night, Lucien had finished all of his reading. With a long sigh, he stretched slowly.

It looked like the witch was not very good at reading ancient Sylvanas texts as well, because she took the notes in great detail. Some of the parts came directly from her ancestors. Lucien was pretty confident that he could just follow her notes to learn magic.

The only problem was that the notes explained no further than how to become a primary-level sorcerer. After that point Lucien would have to find other ways to advance. Or maybe he could learn some ancient Sylvanas characters from the note and learn the contents from the book Astrology and Magic Elements.

Anyway, now Lucien was ready to start learning magic.

According to the notes, people in ancient magic empires believed that magic worked as the result of four basic elements – earth, fire, wind, water – releasing power under the guidance of their spirit. Later, light, darkness and necromancy magic joined in. And sorcerers were also able to summon demons from hell, pits or other dimensions.

At the same time, all the magic could be divided into eight schools: Element, Astrology, Necromancy, Illusion, Summoning, Force, Transformation and Alchemy. The book Astrology and Magic Elements was mainly focused on Element and Astrology magic.

Before becoming a real sorcerer, an apprentice could only learn some simple tricks instead of real first circle magic.

In Lucien's viewpoint, the structure of those apprentice spells was very simple. They were just some geometric patterns combined together, which could be triggered by the spells and corresponding magic reagents.

There were also three levels of the sorcerer apprentices: in training, intermediate, and advanced, graded according to the different levels of spiritual power, which determined how many spells they were able to cast in a row – five, ten and twenty, respectively.

Through meditation an apprentice could improve his or her spiritual power. With the help of certain magic potions, he or she could start mentally building a first circle magic structure. Those who succeeded would become real sorcerers. Having sufficient spiritual power was the key factor during the process, because the casting of magic from the first circle did not require any spelling, magic reagents or gestures.

"Today I met another sorcerer here in Aalto. I'm really excited. But he looked a bit weird… very different from the ones hiding." Lucien got really encouraged when he found out that there were still other sorcerers in the city.

…

"I found some strange red-eyed rats in the sewers. I detected magic on them, but I cannot trace them, yet."

…

"My experiment shows that they're very fast-breeding, and their blood is toxic, which can lead to hallucinatory experience and paralysis. It is a perfect match for my Lapland Bloodvine. I think my magic trap is ready now… But who do those rats belong to?"

…

Lucien was shocked to know that the rats didn't belong to the witch. That was to say, there were probably still other dangerous things down there.

And the notes kept going:

"I met the sorcerer again. His thoughts about magic were so unique, his knowledge broad and profound. He was… very attractive.

"But he said that the ancient magic was outdated, except for those really powerful ones, which could still be valuable. Also, he mentioned those ancient people were ignorant and uncivilized… I don't know… It doesn't make sense to me."

...

"He showed me a magic book called Arcana. It was thin. Actually he called it a… journal. He said that Arcana is the nature, the theory of magic. But I never thought magic could actually be explained. I was shocked…

"The book, or journal, was first released more than three hundred years ago. It started from a script of a great arcanist in a sorcerer conference. Three hundred years ago… I've never heard of any of this before… After reading it, I was shocked. I don't even know how I came back home."

The witch took down some of the script from the journal. Her writing was messy in this part. Lucien could tell her hands were shaking with great excitement.

Here was the script in the note:

"Ladies and gentlemen. Many years ago, in order to fight against the magic creatures, our respectable ancestors learned how to exert our spiritual power directly from dragons, elves, giants, and even from demons. They studied them: their bodies, their blood, their inner magic patterns… and thus our ancestors were able to evolve their own human bodies. They left us the meditation to strengthen our spirit; they left us magic structures to empower their offsprings; and they left us a peaceful continent by pushing those evil creatures back into the pits with their great power.

"Dragons are hiding. Giants migrated. Elves are gone deep inside their forests… Now we are the owners of the land!

"The Great Victory, ladies and gentlemen. The Great Victory had been reminding us for hundreds of years to keep seeking greater power, from the pits to hell, from hell to other dimensions, until the Saint Truth Church gained its power… Within a few hundred years, our empires were conquered, our sorcerers slaughtered and exiled. Our past glory died in the ashes of our castles.

"It's about time we take a step back and ask ourselves: What on earth are we pursuing? What can we do to prevent our magic from dying? Have you ever thought about the following questions:

"What's the nature of magic?

"Why are we endowed with spiritual power?

"How does that power exist?

"Are earth, fire, wind and water, really the most basic elements in the world? If they are, how do they stick together to form everything we know? And if not, which are the real magic elements?

"What's the nature of the soul? Is it different from consciousness?

"Do we need any certain 'tools' to help us with the magic structures?

"Does God exist? If God exists, who is our God? Why can vampires remain undead forever?

"Why is there a sun and a moon in the world? Why do they rise and set every day? What keeps them moving in such a manner?

"If we can explore more about the world itself instead of chasing power around blindly, we can find the truth about magic, know who we are and understand where we should go."

The name of the great arcanist was Douglas.

Chapter 24: Sorcerer Apprentice

Translator: winniethepooh, Kris_Liu Editor: Vermillion

The notes thrilled Lucien as well. When he first came here he also had many questions about the world. However, he soon forgot all his questions while struggling to survive.

These overwhelming questions pointed directly to the origin of the world. Lucien believed that if he could figure them out, he might be able to learn how he came here and how to go back.

"Even if the arcanist named Douglas had not completely understood any of the problems, as long as he was still working on them he should be an extraordinary arcanist nowadays, comparable to the sorcerers and sorceress of legend." Lucien was organizing his thoughts.

"There's a journal called Arcana. The witch did meet other sorcerer in this city. Everything seems to indicate there are still safe places for people to learn magic. But why would it be a journal? It sounds pretty academic…"

"Why call him an arcanist instead of a sorcerer? Does an arcanist rank higher than a sorcerer?"

...

Lucien got more and more excited with his thoughts. He wished he could meet the sorcerer as soon as possible and move somewhere where he could learn magic safely. He would come back to Aalto and do something for little Iven's family when he became stronger.

Among all questions, the two Lucien felt most interested in were:

"Are earth, fire, wind and water, really the most basic elements in the world? If they are, how do they stick together to form everything we know? And if not, which are the real magic elements?"

"Why is there a sun and a moon in the world? Why do they rise and set every day? What keeps them moving in such a manner?"

According to what Lucien had learned before, earth, fire, wind and water were not basic elements. As for the second question, it drew his attention because they seemed to want to combine the rules of the physical universe with magic, in case Lucien's knowledge might really come in handy to learn magic faster.

However, Lucien didn't know how helpful his knowledge would be in this world. It was a world full of incredible creatures, magic, divine power and souls. Nevertheless, Lucien hadn't met anything that varied from the basic laws of physics. And he did find the same materials, like silver, copper and iron.

"I might have been wrong before, regarding why some books in my library were locked." Lucien guessed, agitated with the prospect.

Gradually he calmed down. He was now more mature and understood that no matter how great ambition one had, sitting there and daydreaming would not change anything. After all, every person still had to be practical.

He turned to the last page of the note:

"Sometimes, during the break of my meditation and experiments, I think about him. He's wise, elegant, and attractive."

...

"He said he came here to Aalto for an important secret mission. If everything goes well, in some months he might take me to the heaven of our sorcerers and sorceress — 'The Continental Congress of Magic'.

"We have an appointment in the cemetery. I wonder what he'll tell me."

The witch's notes ended here. "She and her sorcerer friend must have been ambushed by the night watchmen. I wonder if the sorcerer managed to escape…" Lucien thought with some disappointment. The Continental Congress of Magic was his only clue for now. But he had no idea how to find other hiding sorcerers and sorceresses.

Taking a deep breath, Lucien decided to start his first meditation. He eliminated all the distractions in his mind and got ready for it.

Following the note, Lucien kept his breathes long and gentle. Along with the breathing he let his spirit freely spread like water and then drew it back in, similar to waves, again and again until he entered into a blank world. A world where nothing existed.

Talented as the witch was, it took her more than two years to reach this level. Plus another year to augment her spirit until it was strong enough to sense the surrounding magic elements as a junior apprentice".

However, after becoming a junior apprentice, it would still take quite a while before one could move forward and become a real sorcerer or sorceress. An apprentice needed to keep forging his or her spirit by doing meditation, to only then be able to analyze and build different magic structures.

Having started meditating when she was ten, the witch became an apprentice at the age of thirteen. A year later she became an intermediate apprentice and was really satisfied with her progress. But then, since she was not good at analyzing the patterns of magic and building their structures, she could not progress any further. So she tried to use a precious magic potion called "Magic Gate" to break through the bottleneck.

Lucien felt both disappointed and excited. From the witch's note Lucien understood that learning magic did take time, so unfortunately there was no way for him to take revenge on the gangsters within a short period. Actually, as Victor's music student, Lucien was now in no hurry to protect himself with magic, since a mistake could affect his teacher's social status. At the same time, it was exciting because Lucien was unexpectedly great at the meditation. After the bitter fight underground, Lucien's spiritual power was improved by a great extent. It only took him less than thirty seconds to successfully enter into the meditation world! Observant as he was now, Lucien was guessing he could probably shorten the time for becoming a junior apprentice remarkably, doing so probably in months or even weeks!

Actually, it was even faster than he thought.

The meditation world was very different. Lucien could feel all sorts of power here: some of them were steady, some restless, others were dynamic, and there were even gentle ones, among others…

"They are… earth, fire, wind and water… the four elements? My spiritual power has reached the level of a junior apprentice?!" Lucien was so surprised that he almost failed to maintain his meditation. "The badge really helped me a lot!"

He became truly happy. Soon he would start learning his first magic!

"I wonder… why do the four basic elements feel more like… forces…" When Lucien was about to follow the basic Element Meditation mentioned in Astrology and Magic Elements, a question came to him. Then he noticed the similarity with the question raised by Douglas. "Maybe… they are actually the four fundamental forces — gravity, weak nuclear force, electromagnetism and strong nuclear force — in the universe? "

"But then gravity would definitely be related to the earth element, while the other three are in fact different manifestations from the other forces, according to what I learned in my world…"

As soon as the idea came up, Lucien noticed that the world around him changed: A starry sky showed up and the stars were shining brightly against the dark background. Every star had an invisible string of force hanging down to the earth. Attracting those countless strings, the earth, gentle and profound, was like a silent giant grabbing mysterious ropes in its hand.

On the other hand, the remaining three elements — fire, wind and water — showed no such change, since Lucien could not figure out the corresponding connections between them and the other three forces yet. However, the previous clear boundaries between them were seemingly blurred now.

"The world… changes with my cognition?" Lucien was guessing that the sky appeared because he happened to understand the connection between gravity and the Earth Element. He suddenly recalled an excerpt from the witch's notes: "Stars — It was a way of meditation belonging to another school for advanced apprentices."

As the note mentioned before, there were eight schools in the world of magic, and each of them had its own way of meditation. The witch just had a brief description in the note about the Astrology School because it was the Element School she majored in. However, as the fundamental way of meditation for the Astrology School, the first time an apprentice entered into his or her meditation world it would allow them to see one's own night sky, from which he or she could choose a "Host Star of Destiny" by themselves. The star could be connected with the person, which would provide great help in the person's future learning. More importantly, without a Host Star, magic belonging to Astrology, like Horoscope, could not be obtained.

That school believed that every soul matched a star in the boundless sky. One's destiny kept changing along with his or her Host Star. The sorcerer would not be able to see the strings of destiny without a connection, and thus could not cast a Horoscope.

Therefore, even the basic meditation of Astrology School required an advanced apprentice's spirit level. Before achieving that requirement an apprentice was supposed to refer to other ways of meditation to improve their power until they became qualified.

"In this world, gravity has something to do with destiny? Interesting…" Lucien thought to himself. "It seems like many things happening here do not comply with my previous knowledge… Or maybe I just cannot understand it fully."

Chapter 25: First Magic

Translator: winniethepooh, Kris_Liu Editor: Vermillion

Staring at the night sky, Lucien sought his own Host Star using the astrology meditation.

Searching in the vast and spectacular sky, soon Lucien located a star in a distance which somehow he felt familiar with. The star was not very bright, seeming like a newborn one.

Extending his spirit, Lucien approached the star. Under the guidance of meditation, little by little, Lucien started connecting his spirit with the star.

Suddenly, like a string being plucked, Lucien's soul shook and started vibrating fiercely. Knowing it was the hardest but also the most important part in the process, Lucien quickly reached out his spirit again to grab the almost broken string between the star and himself.

Gradually, the thin string started shining bright as the stars, and gradually grew stronger. The vibrating slowly disappeared. With a last sudden vibration in the end, an image of the star showed up in his soul.

Drawing the power from the star greedily, Lucien continued tempering his soul and spirit until his soul felt "swollen". Then he switched to element meditation to improve the interaction and strengthen the bond between his spirit and the elements. The stronger the bond was, the faster one could cast the element-specific spells and shorten the cooldown (CD) in general.

Lucien finally opened his eyes when he started feeling extremely tired deep in his soul. They were full of excitement and ecstasy.

"Even when I'm not practicing meditation, I can still feel my Host Star in my soul. And if I focus more, I can even feel that there's a star shining afar in the sky that is connected with me. I can feel the power of the star…"

But soon he felt confused, "Wait… I came here by mistake. I don't belong to this world, so why would I find my Host Star of Destiny here? Theoretically speaking, if someone dies, that person's star would gradually dim until it finally disappeared. But the star I felt just now… It belongs to me, the real me…Xiafeng."

Lucien could not figure it out at the moment.

Also, from the notes, Lucien learned that a sorcerer or sorceress needed to use specific magic to measure other people's spiritual power. Only those who just broke through to a new level could be detected in a direct way, without using any magic, due to the instability of their power.

Of course, magic that could hide one's power existed.

After taking a very short break, Lucien opened the notes with great excitement. He couldn't wait any longer to see what magic spells were waiting for him.

Since he now had the Host Star of Destiny, Lucien could master all three apprentice spells in the School of Astrology, which were relatively powerful among those of similar level from other schools. But for now, Lucien's power was only enough to cast the spells two to three times before his spirit was exhausted.

Different levels of apprentice were accessed depending on how many spells an apprentice could cast before exhausting his spirit. An apprentice in training could cast up to five spells, while and intermediate doubled that number, and an advanced doubled it again to cast no less than twenty spells before running out of power. That was to say that, for now, Lucien could only use up to five spells of apprentice level consecutively. As for the Astrology magic, probably only three. When feeling exhausted, one needed to rest or take magic potions to help his or her power to fill up again.

The three spells of apprentice level were: Horoscope (basic-level), Eyes of Stars, and Disarming Loop.

Among them, Horoscope was the best-known one. Even the basic level required lots of knowledge to understand the movement of stars and tell the precise moment to tell the fortune. It took the witch several years to barely understand some of them, but her predictions were often inaccurate.

While for Lucien, the most challenging part was to find a crystal ball made of pure and precious Morning-light Crystal. He had no idea where to find one. The witch's crystal ball came from her family, but it was taken away by the church.

As for the astrology-related basic knowledge, which the witch found very complex, Lucien realized it was basically just celestial mechanics of high-school level, but it was described in a messy way.

However, Lucien could not explain with his current knowledge why a star would have something to do with a person's fate.

Picturing himself in the future sitting in front of a crystal ball and casting spells, Lucien felt thrilled. If he wore a black sorcerer's robe, Lucien had the impression he would look more like an evil wizard.

"Eyes of Stars": An hypnotism magic. The caster needed to have the person staring at his eyes.

"Disarming Loop": Lucien's understanding was that the magic could use the gravity from the stars and build an about twenty-centimetre thick loop, in which the gravity could be controlled. It was a magic mainly used for defence.

Lucien decided to start by protecting himself ㅡ he would learn Disarming Loop.

Besides, the other spells all required other materials. For example, Eyes of Stars needed Night Star (a type of herb) as its reagent. And almost all the Element-specific spells had similar requirements.

Although Lucien could also learn magic from other schools, his meditation technique would make it easier for him to start with Astrology and Element.

Keeping himself focused, Lucien cast the strange spell in a low voice, trying to search for the power in the hanging string connecting the star with his own Host Star. He felt his spirit started vibrating with the casting. It was possible to feel the gravity from the star!

Hurriedly, Lucien tried to shape his spirit according to the simple magic pattern in the notes. However, before the pattern was created the combination of his spirit and the gravity ceased. Lucien had failed.

After five failures, finally his efforts were successful. An almost invisible loop of soft light fell down on the table, surrounding a previously lit candle. Controlled by Lucien, the candle flame was suddenly constrained, and in the next second soared up in the air. After two minutes of practice Lucien stopped.

Crossing his fingers, Lucien bit his lip thoughtfully. "I'm not able to create a big difference in gravity. The loop might be barely enough for people to lose control of their weapons to some extent, but not strong enough to disarm them completely. After all, it's just an apprentice spell.

"And it takes me too long to cast it. If I practice more, I should be able to create the loop within three seconds.

"Anyway, it is my first magic." Lucien was glad that he could master Disarming Loop in such a short time, while it took the witch more than a month.

"The witch explained in the note that the difficulty came from the the fact that she couldn't understand why would the stars lead to the chaos of the Earth Element, so she had no choice but to practice over and over again without knowing the reason. But I know the reason behind ㅡ gravity. It seems the saying also works here in this world: Knowledge is power."

Recalling the whole process, Lucien tried to reduce the casting time. "I felt the spell just created a certain frequency and then made my spirit start vibrating with it. What if… I just remember and follow the specific frequency and skip the spell?"

The answer was yes, but it definitely required a spiritual power control of a higher level. After a long time of practice Lucien was exhausted and he had to call it a day, but by then he had reduced the activating time (no casting since there was no spell needed now) to a bit more than three seconds.

"I need more practice tomorrow. And… I'll try to find some common materials for magic potions…" Lucien's brain was not working properly due to his sleepiness.

Even if a sorcerer or sorceress didn't aim at being an alchemist, the process of learning from creating magic potions was still very significant.

Chapter 26: The Beginning of a New Life

Translator: winniethepooh, Kris_Liu Editor: Vermillion

There were over ten different magic potions in the notes. Every one of them was amazing. For example, "Brown Owl" was helpful for restoring energy. The most precious among them were three: "Magic Gate" provided a great boost for those apprentices who found themselves stuck because of certain magic structures; "Silver Moon" was a potion that could help the apprentice during the process of break through; and "Crying Soul" could reveal the power hidden in a developed body, or so to speak, an adult.

For now, Crying Soul was the one Lucien was longing for the most.

The materials required for Magic Gate and Silver Moon were precious and hard to find. They also demanded a higher level of spiritual power, close to the one a real sorcerer had. Only Crying Soul could be used on any healthy person, becoming a very famous potion back in the days when the ancient sorcerers were trying to have more low-level squires to face moments of crisis. But there was also a side effect: the potion would overdraw one's strength, causing problems in the future development. If a person became a knight by using Crying Soul, he wouldn't be as strong as the normally-trained ones in the future, and his final development would be overall inferior.

But for Lucien, he never really expected being a knight. It was just a good way for him to become stronger quickly.

The problem was that even the materials for Crying Soul were still not that very easy to collect. They were either expensive or very strange. And Lucien was not yet an adult, so the potion might be dangerous for him. The stronger the person was, the greater chance of success for the procedure.

Crying Soul belonged to the Necromancy School. Its simplified magic formula was:

"Corpse mushroom + Aquatic Zombie brain tissue + Revenant dust + Moonlight Rose dust = Crying Soul Potion"

Corpse Mushrooms grew on dead bodies. Before they were ripe, they were white like milk, but then turned black within a day. They could last for one month when they were ripe. Smelling them could lead the person to suffer from light delusion. If someone ate the mushroom they would be infected with diseases from the corpse. The darker the color was, the better the quality the potion would have.

It was the same for the other materials: stronger aquatic zombies and revenant with stronger hatred would improve the potion's effect as well.

Moonlight Rose was precious and expensive, costing about a gold Thale per gram (a hundred silver Nars). It shone like the silver moon at night. Also, high-level knight squires would use the Rose to help them awaken the "Blessing" in their blood. One dose would need at least ten grams, if everything went well.

The witch once tried to make a Crying Soul potion to become stronger, in order to help on the search for Snow Gorse later. After all, the potion could help a person fight in the same conditions with a level one knight. And there were just about four hundred knights in the whole Duchy.

She could not afford the Rose. But the witch mentioned in her notes that there were aquatic zombies along the Belem River at night. She also recorded that the Revenant Dust could be obtained by summoning a low-level Revenant using the blood of evil creatures, which was also an apprentice-level necromancy spell.

Lucien had no better options available. The only thing he could do now was keep practicing and strengthening his spiritual power, while at the same time trying to find these materials secretly.

...

Approaching the Month of Fire, the sun rose much earlier than before. The orange-colored clouds were slowly changing as they crossed the sky like blooming flowers.

Lucien succeeded in activating Disarming Loop again. He already knew that the spelling was not necessary if he first made his spirit resonate in the same frequency of the spell. However, that method was more energy-consuming. He was disappointed to see that without the spelling, activating the magic even once could drain his spiritual power completely.

After doing meditation, Lucien felt invigorated. He tidied his messy place a little bit, leaving no proof of the magic practice, and headed to Auntie Alisa's house.

"Morning, Lucien! Come and join us for breakfast!" Iven opened the door. Recently he was helping his mom in the Textile Association and thus looked more mature now.

"Sure! I planned my arrival time just to be able to have breakfast." Lucien smiled.

"You're playing the funny now, little Evans!" Joel was having the veggie soup with dark bread. He was happy to see Lucien's growth, "You seem more confident now."

Every Sunday morning, those faithful ones among the citizens would go to the Saint Truth Church. Lucien did not want to go with them because was too afraid of being found out, so he always sought different excuses not to join them.

"Have some hot soup, little Evans." Auntie Alisa scooped a bowl of hot soup and handed it over to Lucien.

Lucien was starving from his previous meditation and casting. Sipping the hot soup with dark bread, Lucien felt much better.

The dark bread here was still not tasty. Lucien could taste some wheat bran mixed in the bread, and it was much better than what he had at home. His bread tasted like pure wood.

"Uncle Joel, I got something else to do tomorrow. Sorry, but I can't go with you to the church." Despite the risk, Lucien also had no time to waste with that.

"Don't you have to work in the market tomorrow?" Auntie Alisa asked.

Lucien pulled out the old purse and gave it back to Joel. He smiled and answered, "I'm Mr.Victor's admitted student now. I'm going to study music under Mr. Victor.

"And…" Lucien paused a bit, "he will teach me for free."

"What!?" Joel almost choked on the bread. His face turned red from coughing. "He allowed you to learn music there? You just wanted to learn how to read, like… like a week ago!"

Clearly Alisa had a different focus.

"For free? Really for free?"

Iven gasped in great admiration. "Lucien, what did you do?"

Lucien told them the full story. "I'm pretty lucky to have this opportunity. I'm gonna visit Mr. Victor tomorrow morning and borrow some related books."

In fact Lucien was going to study at Victor's place this afternoon to make up for lesson they had missed. But it was also a very good excuse for him to be absent from the church again. And he was going to visit Mr. Victor tomorrow morning again to collect more books in his spirit library.

Being a musician was a perfect cover for Lucien. He had to take it seriously.

"Oh, Mr. Victor! What a generous, nice and talented gentleman!" Alisa was touched, again. "Thanks God! God bless you, little Evans! After so many difficulties, your beautiful new life has finally come!"

Joel stared at Lucien for a while with complicated emotions. Finally he started patting on Lucien's shoulder with great joy. His voice was trembling, "You're lucky, yes. But you're also smart, diligent and gifted. Mr. Victor is an awesome teacher and I'm sure you can accomplish big achievements in the future. Do your best, little Evans. If you manage to have a chance to play in the Psalm Hall, let me be there to watch you, then I will have no regrets in music in my life."

On the opposite side of the table, Iven was nodding as well. "Then I can tell my friends that I have two elder brothers, one is a knight and the other is a great musician! Cool!"

"Of course, uncle Joel, I'll work hard." Lucien nodded seriously but sighed in his heart.

He felt sorry that he wouldn't be able to put lots of energy and time in music. Last night Lucien had been drawn into the amazing magic world. For him, being a musician was just a camouflage and a way of making money for learning magic. Joel loved music deep within his heart, but Lucien did not.

He did not know much about music here, but from his experience many songs he heard before were very beautiful, and some of them shared the same features with the classical masterpieces on Earth.

Putting the purse back, Joel reminded Lucien. "When you decide what instrument you'd like to start with, don't be shy and come here to ask for help."

"Sure. Thank you so much, uncle Joel, auntie Alisa. I'm planning to find a new job as well, but not in the market. I'm Mr. Victor's student now, so I hope it'll be a bit easier." Finished the breakfast, it was time for Lucien to leave.

After reading the magic notes, Lucien knew that learning magic was very expensive. He had to hurry up and make money!

Chapter 27: New Work

Translator: winniethepooh, Kris_Liu Editor: Vermillion

Lucien didn't go directly to the market after leaving. Instead, he went back home for his wood stick and started practicing basic fighting skills as usual. Since Lucien's spirit was not strong enough, being physically strong was also very important.

Besides, the stronger the person was, the more likely they would successfully get improved by the Crying Soul Potion.

An hour later, in the market.

It had been five days since Lucien came here last time. The market area was busy as usual. Human and other kinds of humanoid creatures were walking around and bargaining. The assorted shops and stores were like colourful mushrooms in the woods.

Lucien was very careful when he was walking on the streets. The gangsters would probably take revenge on him. But Lucien was pretty sure that with his good perception he would notice if anyone tried to attack him.

However, until he finished buying the materials and was ready to leave, not even a single gangster came to bother him. In fact, the gangsters on the street were in much smaller numbers than usual. They were often in groups of two or three, but today most of them were hanging around alone. Lucien was pretty confused.

No matter what happened, Lucien still had to be careful and try to master all the apprentice spells as soon as possible. Although these spells were not very powerful, Lucien believed that they were already enough for dealing with a bunch of gangsters holding daggers.

It took Lucien more than three hours just to buy three of these materials. Worrying that his shopping might bring any suspiciousness, he was very cautious and decided not to buy anything that was not used for common tasks.

He bought some sulphur, which was very useful for disinfestation in the Month of Fire; nightstar, a type of plant that could promote sleep quality; and icestone, that could be used for keeping stuff fresh.

For the materials that could be found outside of the city, Lucien definitely wouldn't buy them.

The shopping cost Lucien a Nar and twenty Fells, which represented half of his savings, but what he bought was only enough for about a hundred experiments. Among them, the most expensive one was nightstar, followed by icestone, but sulphur was the cheapest, as expected.

Lucien sighed, "I'd better be careful with these experiments… I really can't afford to waste any material."

...

Spells like Acid Splash and Freezing Rays would definitely mess Lucien's place. And he was afraid that someone would notice it during daytime. So he decided to find a new place for practicing, the sewers.

At two o'clock in the afternoon, Lucien started his study on time at Victor's house.

An hour later, the class was over. After Renee, Colin and Annie left, Victor asked in a gentle voice.

"Lucien, do you have a job now?"

There were only four students left in the living room – Lott, Felicia, Herodotus and Lucien.

Shaking his head, Lucien answered with slight depression.

"No, sir… I lost my job for some reason. I'm… I'm still looking for a new one."

It was kind of embarrassing for Lucien to admit, but he was also a bit excited. Did Mr. Victor have a job offer?

"Studying here from two to six in the afternoon everyday can be quite demanding for you. I know you gotta support yourself. Even if you can study here for free, I guess you're still facing a pretty big challenge with your living expenses." Victor tried to be careful with his words to avoid undermining Lucien's self-esteem. He asked Colin and Renee before, so he knew that a poor guy like Lucien had to work at least ten hours a day to barely support himself.

"I know a relatively easy job. You work four hours every morning and you get ten Nars every month. What do you think?"

Lucien felt so touched facing this kind offer. Although he had been through many difficulties and bad things before, Lucien felt he was so lucky to have many kind people helping him like uncle Joel, untie Alisa and Mr. Victor.

"Yes… Sure. That's awesome. It's very kind of you."

"You don't even know what kind of work it is." Victor smiled, "It's a job in the association library. They are short of hands now. Another good thing is that when you work there, you can have access to many music or theory-related books. I think it'll be pretty helpful."

Not being sure of Lucien's music talent, Victor wanted him to be a basic-level musician first to support himself. Then Lucien could advance forward to the next step if he was really born for this.

That was another surprise for Lucien. He never thought he could have a chance working in a library. He was so excited and happy that the only thing he could do was say "thank you" to Victor many times.

Victor was the only reason why Lucien could get this job. People in the association knew that this job was mainly for Mr. Victor's student. Lucien was working like a dog all day long for just three Nars a month. Now Lucien could work for a salary similar to what a common citizen could earn every month. That was another reason why so many people wanted to be Mr. Victor's music students.

"Great!" Victor clapped his hands with joy, "This afternoon, I'm gonna take Lott, Felicia and Herodotus to the association for rehearsal. You can come with us together and sign the contract, then you can start working tomorrow."

When Victor went back upstairs to find some of his music work, Lott came and smiled to Lucien.

"Hi, Lucien. I'm Lott, Lott Griffith. We haven't really talked to each other before. I'm here to say that Mr. Victor is a very, very nice teacher and a very kind man as well. I hope you won't let him down as his music student."

Lott was pretty unhappy with this newcomer suddenly becoming one of Mr. Victor's music students. In his eyes, there was definitely no position in the world of musician for a poor, uneducated and ignorant boy like Lucien. As a noble from the Griffith family, he felt ashamed of studying with the poor.

But from Mr. Victor's words, Lott found out that Victor was expecting Lucien to be a common musician first, not really a music master. Therefore his anger and dissatisfaction turned into noble's arrogance and pride, looking down upon the poor and miserable guy standing in front of him.

"Mr. Victor must be happy so I'm willing to accept him." Lott thought to himself. He always tried to give a good impression to Victor, in order to become his most outstanding student.

Lucien was not very interested in Lott's intention, because he knew that he had a different path to go – magic. He just replied politely, "I won't. Thank you, Lott. I'm Lucien Evans."

"I'm Felicia Hayne." Politely but also coldly, the red-haired girl nodded to Lucien. She didn't believe Lucien would achieve something in music. Besides, she couldn't allow herself to get too close to a poor guy. It was bad for her reputation.

And Herodotus, who always disliked Lucien, also did just a simple self-introduction like Felicia.

...

The hall of the Musicians' Association.

Stepping on the thick and soft carpet, Lucien was following Mr. Victor to the reception counter, while the other students were practicing upstairs.

"Good afternoon, Mr. Victor." The cute girl, Elena, slightly bowed and greeted him.

"Good afternoon, Elena." Victor was always kind to everyone, "This is Lucien, my new music student. From tomorrow on he will be working in the library. Can you kindly help him sign the contract and hand it to Mr. Hank later?"

She nodded and took out the already prepared contract and a quill. When she was passing Lucien the contract, her green eyes were opened with surprise.

"Lucien! It's you! No wonder I just thought it was a familiar name!"

She couldn't believe her own eyes. About more than a week ago, Lucien, the guy from the slum, was rummaging through trash from the association. Today he was standing here as Mr. Victor's music student! What a crazy world!

"Hi, Elena. Nice to see you again." Lucien took the contract and started reading it. Still not very good at reading, it took him quite a while to understand the few lines on the paper, during which Elena finally calmed down and was staring at Lucien with great curiosity.

"You can do fingerprint or sign here, either way is fine." She smiled, "You changed so much since last time I saw you."

"You know Lucien?" Victor asked.

"You were there at that time as well, Mr. Victor…" Elena started explaining to him. Lucien finished reading and wrote down his name slowly.

"I see…No wonder I feel I've seen you before somewhere. You're always diligent, Lucien. You'll be successful if you keep working hard in music."

"Succeed in music? Victor, are you prepared for the concert?" A sharp voice came from behind them.

It was Wolf, the brown-haired musician with a protruding jaw. Lucien still remembered him.

Chapter 28: In the Sewers

Translator: winniethepooh, Kris_Liu Editor: Vermillion

With his latest progress, Victor was more confident when facing Wolf's bitter challenge now. After a fierce competition, Victor and Wolf were the last two competitors remaining. In Victor's opinion, Wolf lost the chance in the end because he spent too much time on criticizing other musician's work instead of investing more energy in studying music itself.

"I do think so, Wolf. Actually I'm pretty happy with my new work. Do you want to give me some suggestion on it?" Victor had registered his new piano concerto at the association. There was no chance for Wolf to try to plagiarize it.

Wolf thought Victor was still very frustrated with his work. Now Victor's confidence was something beyond his expectation. Wolf's face turned ashen and he murmured,

"Not really, Victor. I'd rather keep my curiosity. We'll see it in three months."

Shrugging his shoulders, Victor smiled, "All right. I was quite looking forward to your opinion."

Wolf just wanted to get rid of this topic, and he saw Lucien was standing aside in his cheap and old linen clothes. Raising his chin, he asked in contempt, "When did you become friends with people from the slum?"

That behavior came from a long time ago when Wolf's family still ranked among nobles. From his great-grandfather on, Wolf's family lost the title, but it did not prevent him from regarding himself as a noble. He looked down upon the musicians like Victor who came from common families, not to mention poor people like Lucien. His arrogance was mixed with the hatred towards Victor, so in his eyes Lucien was comparable to a disgusting mouse jumping onto his dinner table.

Lucien was a bit angry, but he was already used to this kind of contempt. As long as there was social status and wealth in a world, people would be divided into different levels – the superior and the inferior, the decent and the filthy…The only way for a person to change the situation was striving for power and wealth. But once someone succeeded, they would often join the group and become one among the ones who looked down upon the common folk.

"Mind your words, Wolf." Frowning his eyebrows, Victor warned him seriously, "Lucien's my new music student. He's a… a very talented young lad." Honestly speaking, Victor boasted about Lucien's ability. He was not sure about Lucien's music gift yet.

"Are you serious, Victor? Really?" Wolf started laughing so hard that he almost lost his footing, "You got that nervous with your performance and lost your mind?"

Lacking a bit of confidence, Victor tried to fight back.

"Aalto is the City of Psalm, the City of Music, everyone here can have a chance at learning music. Many outstanding bards are of poor background. The talent of music is a gift from God, and God doesn't only bless the wealthy and the noble."

Wolf shook his head while he was still laughing, "Come on, Victor! Both you and I know that a talent can easily awaken the Blessing in their blood. We call people like Princess Natasha and Lord Verdi talents, but your student… Get real!

"If he manage to become an outstanding musician in the future, I will do an open apology to you and your student on Music Criticism, and never hold my own concert again."

Wolf made the bet on impulse, but he was pretty cautious as well. He added the word "outstanding" on purpose since it was really hard to reach a consensus on what really made an outstanding artist.

Lucien heard that Princess Natasha, also known as the Violet Countess, was the only child of the Grand Duke of Orvarit. And her current title was also one of the prerequisites to become the Grand Duke of the Duchy. She was very gifted in music and had excellent skills in playing violin, flute and harpsichord. Besides, the twenty-five-year-old princess was also an outstanding level five Grand Knight, who was expected to become a Radiant Knight soon.

Lord Verdi, the nephew of the Grand Duke and also a member of the Violet family, just became a level five Grand Knight, and was currently serving as the chief commander of the City Guards in Aalto.

After making the comment, Wolf directly turned and left the hall.

Victor shook his head in repulsion. "Lucien, just ignore him. Everyone knows Wolf is a total bastard. Your work starts from tomorrow. One day off a week. You can arrange your day off with the library administrators. I have to go to the odeon now."

Lucien nodded and watched Mr. Victor leave the hall. Then he turned to Elena and gave the contract back to her. "Thank you, Elena," he said.

There was a sweet little dimple in Elena's left check. "No worries, it's my job. Like Mr. Victor said, never let Mr. Wolf bother you. He's always like that… looking down upon most people in the association, except several directors with titles."

"I'm looking forward to seeing Mr. Wolf's high-lifted jaw digging a hole into the carpet along with the noble directors." Lucien shrugged a bit and smiled.

Elena started giggling with his words.

When Lucien was about to leave, Elena stopped him. Her right hand clenched into a small fist, and her face looked serious.

"I believe in you, Lucien! You can be an outstanding musician! Mr. Wolf would deeply regret his bet!"

Honestly speaking, Lucien did not take the bet seriously. But he also raised his fist like Elena and replied, "I certainly will."

...

There was no nightlife in Aderon. At nine o'clock at night most residents in this area were already in bed, except for several drunkards who were still hanging around. Everybody else had to prepare for the hard work in the following morning.

Lucien told Joel and Alisa he got a new job over dinner, and then went back to his shack to meditate and prepare for his magic experiments.

Gently closing the door, Lucien sneaked out of his shack and walked towards one of the entrances to the sewers. It would still take Lucien quite some time to learn how to build a secret passage like the witch did.

After making sure that no one was watching, Lucien stepped into the underground world.

The stinking smell and the slimy wall were still the same, disgusting and gloomy, but none of that would prevent him from exploring magic. Walking in the pipes, Lucien was mapping in his spirit library and trying to find a proper corner to start his experiments.

He also scraped off some of the moss on the wall and put them into his pocket. It was called Light Moss, which was the reagent for the apprentice magic Extinguishment.

The deeper Lucien went, the more gruesome the place became. Down there Lucien never met any homeless guy, like Corella mentioned. The sound of his footsteps was intensified within the sewers. Lucien could even hear his own breath.

Finally Lucien found his ideal place: a fork path. The front way was blocked by a huge rock, while the one turning left went further into the darkness. Lucien could easily notice if anyone was approaching him from this position.

Lucien pinched some sulphur from his pocket while recalling the structure of the magic. Then he started casting a strange spell and the powder slipped through his fingers. His face looked serious and mysterious in the cold light.

Chapter 29: The Dead Body

Translator: winniethepooh, Kris_Liu Editor: Vermillion

After practicing many times, when dawn was drawing near, Lucien finally mastered the five apprentice spells: Eyes of Stars, Freezing Rays, Darkness, Mage's Hand and Acid Splashing. Furthermore, now Lucien could activate Disarming Loop without a verbal component in about three seconds.

It took the witch much longer to understand all these spells. It was amazing how Lucien could grasp them in such a short period of time. In his eyes these magic structures were related to different mathematical models and the knowledge of planar geometry. After reviewing what he had learned before in high school, Lucien found they were actually pretty easy to be understood.

Here magic could be explained by science. In Acid Splashing, for example, sulphur was transformed into sulfuric acid. However, Lucien had a hard time understanding how Darkness worked. His farfetched guess was that the magic reconstructed the Light Moss and made it absorb the light. As expected, Lucien had to spend more time to master the Darkness spell.

Lucien reflected on his magic experiment: His knowledge from the past, like physics and chemistry, was useful, but it could not be used to explain everything in this magic world. There were some similarities shared between this place and the earth, but there were also many things he couldn't understand, like those precious metals and magic materials. He knew he should explore the world more by himself.

After a ten-minute break, Lucien started doing some simple cleaning.

"These apprentice spells are not powerful enough." Rubbing the floor, Lucien thought to himself, "They can only kill someone when they hit the vital parts, or the most they could do is make the person move slower or suffer a bit." But Lucien was not disappointed. He knew that, if need arose, they could still be more than helpful.

Finishing the cleaning, Lucien carefully hid the materials nearby. He didn't go back to the surface directly but continued his exploration towards the end of the outlets. He was looking for Corpse Mushroom, which meant he had to find some carcasses first. Searching in a graveyard under the nose of the church was too risky. Lucien heard that many poor people, who had no families or friends, died lonely and miserably down there. Besides, dead animals and rotten flesh were even easier to be found.

The witch did not mention any possible danger in the pipes, but Lucien was still very cautious, staying alert to any sign of trouble.

...

Within twenty minutes, Lucien had found two dead rats and a jelly-like creature body, but no Corpse Mushroom was there.

Turning around a corner, an open area appeared in front of Lucien. That was where the homeless people lived.

The sewer here was very broad. An underground river was flowing slowly with waste floating in the middle, which went all the way to the Belem River. On both sides of the river old dirty rugs and pots were scattered everywhere. The clothes the beggars were wearing could barely cover their bodies.

"Why did you come here, young lad? You don't belong here." An old man probably in his sixties asked Lucien. His ribs stood out like arching blades. However, when Lucien heard his voice, the old man sounded like he was only forty or something.

Lucien's old but clean linen clothes were far from decent, but compared to what they were wearing, the youngster looked like a noble.

"I have a friend who also lives here." Lucien tried to sound confident and strong. He must hide his feeling of insecurity in front of these guys, or they would think it was easy to prey on the teen standing there.

Several beggars behind the old man stood up. Their eyes were full of greed and ferocity. Lucien was not scared. Instead, he pulled out his dagger and took a step forward.

The beggars did not dare take any further action. On the contrary, they were now standing in a defensive position.

At this time, the old man started grinning. "You don't look like a guy with a decent job, young lad."

"None of your business." Lucien answered coldly.

"Anyway, I can tell you're not doing very well. Even a hard-working young lad like you couldn't afford proper bread and beef. It's not your fault."

Lucien was not sure about the old man's intention.

"The Saint Truth Church tells people that all of us are God's servants. But why can the noble live an extravagant life while the poor have to suffer every day and night. There's no difference between us, and all human beings are born with sin!"

"I'm not interested in your nonsense." Although his words were pretty obscure, Lucien knew the old man was trying to preach, but obviously not the Saint Truth. No matter what the old man believed in, other Gods or demons, Lucien had no interest in it. The price for having something to do with a heresy in this world could be his own life.

He did not want to end up being tied to a stake and burned to ashes alive.

Facing such direct rejection, the old man and the other beggars were very angry. Their belief was blasphemed.

Lucien knew it was time to get away from those guys. He started walking towards the outlets slowly and calmly, grabbing his shiny dagger in his hand.

"Anyone wanna try me?" Lucien stared at them fearlessly.

When he walked by, Lucien noticed that there was a clean black cloth lying on the ground, on which there was a shiny silver-colored horn. He remembered these beggars were sitting around the cloth when he arrived here.

The beggars were hesitant. No one wanted to fall on Lucien. Finally they gave up and sat back on the ground.

...

After walking for another ten minutes, the sound of the river flow gradually became louder.

"Here should be the end of the sewers. The underground river joins the Belem River here," Lucien thought to himself. There was a iron net covering the water outlet at the confluence and tons of floating trash accumulated in front of the net.

Lucien slowed down his pace. He was hoping that he could find more dead bodies here.

Lucien did not find anything until he walked towards the end of the sewer. When he started feeling disappointed and was about to go back to the surface, Lucien suddenly noticed that the net was missing a part, under the water.

Out of curiosity, Lucien grabbed the net and tried to shake it. As expected, there was a big hole under there on the iron net. What was really unexpected was that, at this time, a black bulk of something gradually surfaced from the water.

Lucien moved closer. It was a dead body, swollen and rotten. Many parts of its skin had fallen off. The clothes on the body were tangled with lots of trash, which increased the buoyancy a lot.

Lucien felt very disgusted and also a bit scared. However, he was still trying to see if there was any Corpse Mushroom on it.

There was a long wound on its chest. Someone cut the poor man open vertically and took away his heart. Checking with the dagger, Lucien's eyebrows frowned.

"Wait…This is…my purse?!" Lucien was shocked. He picked the purse up using the dagger and was certain that it was the purse which was taken away by the gangsters some days ago.

"Why is it here…" Lucien was confused.

Then he looked at the face of the dead body. The corpse was so badly decomposed that it took Lucien quite a while to finally recognize the guy.

"An…Andre?!"

Chapter 30: Ghost in the Shadow

Translator: winniethepooh, Kris_Liu Editor: Vermillion

A strong stench of death came out from Andre's rotten face. A face on which Lucien could still tell his great fear and pain before he died.

"The gangsters under Aaron are acting weird recently…Does it have anything to do with Andre's death?" Lucien had absolutely no clue.

Wrapping his hand with a piece of cloth, Lucien pressed Andre's body hard back into the water. This time the body did not hook on the iron net. It was washed away directly into the Belem River and disappeared.

Lucien stood up and set off for the surface, but to avoid the beggars, he did not take the same route. According to the map he drew in his spirit library, he took another direction about twenty meters away from the place where the beggars gathered. If the map was correct, Lucien would pass by the ruins of the witch's chamber and come back to the ground from the same entrance through which he came down earlier.

Several meters away from the corner, Lucien heard the sound of some heavy footsteps and suddenly stopped. The footsteps echoed in the sewers, loud and clear. It sounded like there were a bunch of people approaching, and some of them must be pretty big.

Lucien looked around calmly. Soon he found there was a hole in the wall, big enough for someone to hide. Lucien hid himself in the hole, with his back against the wall.

A while later, those guys walked directly past him, turning around a corner a few steps ahead. In such a dark place, they would not notice Lucien hiding a in the hole without a careful check.

"Throw these bodies into the river. Hurry up." It was a low voice from a man. However, he was speaking indistinctly, as if he missed some front teeth.

Lucien felt he had heard this voice somewhere before, but could not remember where.

"Why did it take you guys so long. Remember, don't screw up the whole plan." It was the old man's voice.

After a few seconds of silence, the first man answered with slight fear.

"Sorry… But within ten days, we promise it will be enough… at any cost, like Aaron said."

Aaron… Rosan Aaron?

Now Lucien finally recognized the first voice. It was Jackson, the guy who smashed Lucien's shack, and also because of Lucien, Jackson could not even speak clearly now.

From their conversations, Lucien's guess was that the Aaron gang was by no means a victim of the heresy, but an accomplice, and probably Andre was killed because of his disobedience.

The old man's voice was very unpleasant. "Please tell Mr. Aaron… and the other guy, that as long as you continuously spare no efforts in helping us grow, you will all receive huge rewards. I know that, in your eyes, I'm only a dying, useless old man, which is true, but we are just tiny worms on the ground. Our priests are already powerful enough to beat their bishop. We wouldn't need any of your help were it not for maintaining that… thing."

"I will." Jackson answered in a low mood.

"But… Jackson, I don't think we can meet their requirement…" Another voice came, trembling, "We gotta make sure that those are people that no one would care about. Homeless guys are ideal, but we cannot find any of them down here, other than his people…"

"That's true, Jackson. It's too difficult to find fifty of them within ten days." Someone else agreed.

The old man laughed, "The rest of them are at the bottom of the Belem River. Eels in the river will clean them up for us."

"Skar, Aaron told us to make it at any cost. We don't necessarily have to focus on homeless guys. If they are just the poor… Aaron will be able to handle this." A cold smile appeared on Jackson's face.

"You have any target already, Jackson?" Skar was a bit surprised.

"Yes, I do." Jackson's face turned hideous, "They gotta pay the price… the two little bastards, and their families."

Lucien was shocked. His anger was burning his guts. He knew Jackson hated them, but he never expected that the thug could be so cruel and inhuman to the point of planning to kill the whole family!

But thank God Lucien was here and found out about Jackson's plan.

"I gotta solve the problem here and now." The plan of killing them all in the sewers arose in Lucien's mind. He couldn't let them go back onto the ground, or he would not be able to protect John's family anymore.

Lucien must kill them all. Then Lucien could tell John about the heresy and no one would know what happened down here.

Many thoughts quickly passed through his mind. Lucien's reached out to his pocket and made sure that all the magic materials were in position. Carefully, he creeped out of the hole and approached the corner.

They had nine people there. But Lucien had no choice. Staying calm was his most important and powerful weapon.

...

Throwing the last sack into the water, Skar poked the body bag with a long pole in fear. Although they were gangsters, gouging out people's hearts alive was still too much for them, and they also believed in the God of Truth. So they prayed in their mind, begging for forgiveness.

"Jackson, all of the bags are gone." Glancing at the weird old man, Skar carefully asked, "We'd better go now… I heard there are lot of aquatic zombies in the Belem River."

Jackson turned to the old man, "Does it have anything to do with the bodies we threw away? I've never heard of zombies in the river before."

The old man shook his head, "We don't want any trouble while we're not strong enough. Aalto was the core city of the previous magic empire. Maybe some kind of death power was sealed deep within the river, and now the seal is no longer effective."

"All right." When Jackson was about to leave with his men, he saw Scar's terrified face. At the same time, Jackson heard a weird, low voice murmuring in the back, like a spell…

Twenty meters away from them, there was a dark humanoid shadow standing there. Half of his body and face were hidden in the darkness. In the shimmer of the moss, the mysterious shadow was even more strange and terrifying.

"Gh… Ghost!" Skar screamed at the top of his lungs. Since he was involved in this, his conscience was tortured by the fear that the people they killed would come back and seek revenge. When he closed his eyes, the warm and bloody hearts that they took from those people's chests when they were still alive were still beating in his mind.

Great fear seized him. Skar now could not even move at all.

The ghost raised his right hand, and some shimmering powder fell through its fingers. Jackson and the old man started running as soon as they saw the ghost, but all of a sudden they were devoured by complete darkness.

The glimmer from the moss disappeared. The darkness spread quickly like a bottle of spilled ink and no light could penetrate it.

They couldn't see anything. Except for the old man, the rest of them were crazily wielding their daggers, trying to keep the bloody ghost away.

The pipe was narrow. They hurt each other by accident and some of them started screaming in pain. But fear and panic did not help them at all.

Darkness, an apprentice spell. It could block all kinds of natural light in an area no larger than 6 by 6 meters, enveloping everything in complete darkness.. For now, as an apprentice, Lucien could maintain the spell for one minute.

"You idiots! Calm down! Stop!" Although he could not cast a single spell, the old man heard the priests mentioning about different kinds of magic before.

"…Ouch!" However, before the old man made that command, Jackson's dagger scratched him.

Within little more than ten seconds, two guys got stabbed by the chaotic attacks of daggers and fell on the ground. The others were also injured to some extent. Driven by the horrible fear, Skar and other three guys started running backwards. In the darkness, two of them fell into the river like the body bags, while the old man, Jackson, another thug started rushing towards the shadow.

At this time, the weird spellcasting voice arose again.

Chapter 31: Zombie in the Sewage

Translator: winniethepooh, Kris_Liu Editor: Vermillion

After a few more steps the old man finally broke the siege of darkness. However, his eyes were no longer accustomed to the weak light from the moss.

It was just a blink. When he opened his eyes again, some kind of pungent, dark green liquid hit his face directly.

"Ow!!" The shrill cry from the old man scared the rest of them. Jackson looked back subconsciously, even though he could not see anything.

With both hands covering his eyes, the old man was rolling on the ground in horrible pain. The skin of his face burned and turned black instantly. His scream was so bitter that Jackson and the rest of them shuddered with fear. Several second later, the old man fell into the river and the scream disappeared.

Jackson knew there was no way to escape. They would either kill the shadow, or be killed by it.

Their only hope was to fight it!

"Run! Run close to that fucking thing!" Jackson yelled and dashed to the shadow.

Then he saw it was Lucien!

Jackson was furious. Hatred replaced his fear and the only thing in his mind was to tear the fucking bastard up into thousands of pieces.

When he was about to throw his dagger towards Lucien, he saw a blue beam of light in Lucien's hand. Jackson hurriedly dodged to the left and barely avoided it.

Unfortunately for them, the other thug following behind him was not that lucky. The light beam hit directly in his face and a thin layer of ice quickly filmed his eyes, nose and mouth. Freezing cold invaded the guy's brain and made him lose most of his power before he could smash the ice.

The guy was choked. Then he banged his head fiercely on the ground.

At this time Jackson finally realized that the person standing in front of him was no more that weak poor guy. However, he became a wizard, an evil wizard with terrible power!

Jackson was not an idiot. He understood that by no means Lucien would let him go. Grabbing his dagger, he leaped at Lucien's throat with all his strength.

Suddenly, Jackson felt a heavy pressure fell on him and then his legs caved. Then his body fell down directly onto the ground.

"Fuck!" Jackson swore desperately. He did not know what was going on there, but he knew that losing his footing at this point would be fatal.

Longer before Lucien cast Acid Splash, he had already activated his defensive magic — Disarming Loop, without saying a word.

Lucien walked towards Jackson, looking at him wielding his dagger in vain. Without saying anything, Lucien grabbed Jackson's hand and slowly pushed the dagger into his neck.

The gravity affected the blood and it didn't squirt out from his neck too much. It was ideal because Lucien did not want any of Jackson's dirty blood on his clothes.

Jackson's great anger and pain were choked in his throat. His eyes were wide open and his eyeballs almost burst out, while his arms and legs were twitching against the wall. Jackson's nails were scratching on the ground, but soon his resistance was no more.

The other guy did not take Lucien much time as well.

Standing beside the underground sewage river, Lucien saw the old man's body floating quietly downstream with his face soaking in the water. Lucien felt relieved, because he thought the old man would be the biggest threat among them. Who knew if the old man had some kind of evil power from his heretic belief.

All this happened within just twenty seconds. The darkness was still covering the area some distance away. The two injured beggars were still writhing in agony on the ground. Some beggars and gangsters were still floating on the water. But they were too scared to find the broken steel net to escape.

Lucien did not want to kill them all by himself, and he was also not able to. His power had a limit. So the easiest way was driving the rest of them into the Belem River and leaving them to the ghosts there.

But there was one problem. Lucien also could not see anything in the dark area, so he had to stand there for now, waiting for the magic to expire. At the same time, he was adjusting his respiratory rhythm in order to recover his power.

Casting the four spells was very tiring. Lucien's remaining power was only enough to use either Darkness or Freezing Rays once.

Suddenly the light returned within the spell area. The light startled Skar and he couldn't help but close his eyes. The fear of death scared him to his knees. He trembled and prayed, "May God forgive me… May God forgive me…"

Slowly opening his eyes, Skar was shocked to find how young the wizard was. In the dim light, the wizard had fine features.

Skar had lost his mind and surrendered. He could not tell whether the man standing in front of him was an evil wizard or a hateful ghost.

It was a good chance to cast Eyes of Stars on Skar, when he was suffering a mental breakdown. The apprentice magic could mesmerize the enemy or make the person fall into a trance state.

The two effects were different: The former, mesmerization, required the caster to look into the other person's eyes for almost ten minutes, while the latter, trancing, only needed some eye contact, which was more helpful in a fight.

If Lucien could take control of Skar, he could use him to kill the rest of them.

When Lucien was about to cast the spell, a sudden short scream pierced the silence and echoed in the whole space. Even Lucien felt very strange.

As suddenly as the scream of agony started, it stopped.

Lucien stopped his spelling and took a step behind his Disarming Loop. His Freezing Rays were ready to go.

At this time, both Lucien and Skar saw the horrific scene: In the river, a strong and pale hand was holding tight at a gangster's neck, whose skull was half opened. A black tongue was licking the white brain inside with some effort.

The owner of the tongue was a humanoid monster, whose body was so swollen that its skin appeared almost transparent. Parts of its skin were hanging, showing its rotten flesh beneath. Under the cover of the monster's seaweed-like long hair, there were facial muscles that could fall off at any time. The place where the eyeballs should be was completely hollow, and there were two tiny white flames burning inside the two eye sockets.

Another beggar's body, whose brain was completely gone already, was floating towards the river through the big hole on the steel net.

"The Great Master of Argent, the forever lasting silence, may you bless your servants…" A beggar sitting next to the wall started praying desperately.

The monster had a frightening power that reeked of doom. Even Lucien was extremely nervous and terrified, although he was quite a distance away from the monster.

Aquatic Zombies! These were the monsters in the Belem River! They were zombies!

Lucien suddenly recalled the witch's note, which described the features of the undead creature:

"Aquatic Zombie: immune to Mind magic; No Morale; Immune to poison, sleep, paralysis, stun, disease effects; No fatigue, exhaustion, breath; Do not feel cold; Strong resistance towards ice and acid; Extremely afraid of Fire and Light magic."

But what frightened Lucien was that the note did not mention anything about the flames in the Zombie's eyes. Something was definitely not right.