The sun was setting. The gentle, red aura slowly shrank along with the tips of the mountains in the distance.
Angor sat in his garden and stared at the disappearing sun. His mind once again returned to his faraway home back at Old Earth.
What’s Leon doing at this hour? Already had dinner? Did he have a birthday party?
Without Angor, and with Jon ill, everything in Padt Manor had fallen into Leon’s hands. Maybe he already forgot about his own birthday?
Angor raised a glass of… milk, and toasted toward the direction of his home.
Spacial distance could not separate the bond of brothers.
“Happy birthday, Leon.”
…
Angor returned to his laboratory to continue learning illusions.
He never tried to attempt anything deeper. What he had been doing was practicing the basic illusions he already learned again and again.
This did not mean that he had never looked at advanced techniques. He already read through Sunders’ notebook several times and could recite the spells perfectly.
He did not find out which branch was suitable to him like what Sunders asked. He only memorized how to cast the spells and waited for the day when he had completely mastered basic spells so he could comprehend harder illusions with ease.
He was extra interested in one of the advanced cantrips called “Melodious Illusion”, a level-1 cantrip.
The spell was one of the most basic Acoustic Illusionist spells. It was not so different from other basic illusions. The spell constructed a harmless illusion using sound to confuse enemies.
He grew curious about this particular spell because of a new idea he thought about just recently.
Aside from tower challenge, meditation and reading books, he had been working on something else—Toby’s music box.
He already determined the main material for making the music box: Echo Flowers.
As for minor materials… he created a basic list for them. According to his initial plan, he was going to make something that could replay complicated, lossless music like the hologram tablet.
But he hesitated later because something like that was basically another “crystal ball transmitter”. His own transmitter was too low-leveled to record sounds. However, when he visited Sunders last time, he saw his professor watching his matches in a crystal ball which perfectly recreated both image and sound.
So… if he wished to make something to play music, he could simply refer to a blueprint in Encyclopaedia: Basic Alchemy and craft an advanced transmitter.
Since he planned to make an alchemy music box, he was determined to do something interesting about it.
Reading about “Melodious Illusion” got him new inspiration. Could he make something happen by combining Melodious Illusion with music?
Maybe when the music box played a piece of music, it could also create an illusion according to the music. For example, when it played City of Sky, a scene would slowly generate around it where a faint, floating city appeared among clouds in the vast blue sky. The city was decorated by lush vegetation and artistic building blocks as well as chirping birds and lively butterflies… that would look so wonderful.
As he recalled, gentle music did not affect his meditation. Rather, it sometimes helped him enter a meditation state faster.
If so… he could also try applying a mind-soothing rune to it. That sounded interesting.
Yes, he got his ideas only because they felt interesting.
Before he could realize his creation of an “interesting music box” though, he needed to know how to combine Melodious Illusion with alchemy. Angor had everything else prepared and that included runes, materials, and blueprint.
…
While practicing illusions, Angor did not realize that it was already eight in the evening.
More people had gathered under the Sky Tower; most of whom were hired mortals who came to note down the new schedule for tomorrow for their employers. There were also apprentices who came personally. The two different types of people could be distinguished by their positions.
Apprentices mostly stayed right under the announcement board and chatted with the others while mortals kept their distance and looked cautiously at the announcement from afar.
Mortals all remained quiet while the groups of apprentices already began to discuss tomorrow’s matches.
“I heard. The handsome genius, Fox Master, entered the lottery pool when everyone’s looking.”
“So he got a match tomorrow? Of all matches in the last three levels, I want to watch him most.”
Two young witches chatted while holding each other’s arm. When talking about Fox Master, they both blushed a little, probably excited or bashful.
“Even then… Aren’t there too many people here today? For what?”
“I think Parasite Queen came to the tower today, so people thought she’s going to join a fight.”
“Parasite Queen? The number one at Level 13?”
“Yeah, it’s a long time since one of the tops did a match in the tower. I hope the rumor is true!”
“It can’t be. Such matches are always announced a week earlier or two. The tower never told us something like that. Besides, if Parasite Queen entered the lottery pool, no one would go draw a match.”
“I don’t know… Well, it’s just a rumor. We’re all here to check it out, aren’t we?”
“Right. No hope means no disappointment.”
People’s voice slowly quieted down as the bell tower declared eight in the evening.
As the bell strikes ended, the giant screen at the base of Sky Tower quickly replaced its information with the new schedule.
Everyone looked at the header of the list first. The header was always reserved by the Sky Tower to show a recommended fight.
And people remained silent when they saw the two names shown on the screen.
[Parasite Queen VS Baron Milk, Level 13, Match 4]
They rubbed their eyes and checked again. When they still saw the same names on the screen, people finally pointed at the information with trembling fingers.
“WHAT?! Parasite Queen is really here!”
Almost every apprentice yelled out at the same time. They came to check an “unlikely rumor”, but they did not expect it to be real!
The silence was instantly broken by loud cheering.
“Parasite Queen! Parasite Queen!!”
“My heroine has come! I’m getting a ticket! NOW!”
“VIP seat, please!”
“Haha! I was right to come. Maybe I can get a VIP ticket as well!”
“Too bad we can only buy one. Otherwise, we can make a fortune by selling them to others… Hey, hey you! Mortals! Take these magic crystals and go buy tickets, then give them to me! One silver coin for each!”
No one was interested in the other matches now. Everyone swarmed inside the tower hall just to buy a better seat. Some of them even thought about being ticket scalpers.
Even the two witches who came for Fox Master had forgotten about him. They both followed behind everyone.
Only several apprentices who could not afford a ticket remained outside.
Still, they knew well about seeded players in the tower, so they all knew about Parasite Queen’s name.
On the other hand though…
“Who’s Baron Milk? How did he get matched against Parasite Queen?”
“And why didn’t Sky Tower advertise the match earlier?”
“Something’s not right…”
Someone in a white bear costume came out of the sky tower after getting his ticket before everyone else. When he heard the remaining apprentices talking, he silently chuckled in his mind.
“Because they know that this match won’t look so fun in the way you expected.”
Somewhere far from them, a figure hidden in a black robe appeared from the shadow.
The figure stared at the schedule and at the name he had been thinking about all these days. He grinned.
“My precious… I can’t wait to see you again…”
It sounded like someone speaking to his long-lost lover.
Also, there were other people who paid extra attention to Baron Milk, or rather, the mysterious alchemist behind Baron Milk.
Prome also received the information while working in his personal laboratory.
“Parasite Queen? Dave’s little friend met some bad luck today. I still need to know who that alchemist is. I hope he stays alive.”
After thinking about it, Prome decided to go watch the match. Parasite Queen was his acquaintance, so he might as well go and tell her not to slaughter Baron Milk yet.
Dave heard about it too, and he already got himself a ticket. However, his attention was not on Angor for now.
…
About ten at night, Angor acquired his schedule from the mortal he hired.
He had five matches tomorrow. There was one additional match apart from the four ones he already expected.
It had to be a match when someone came and picked his name in the lottery.
“Parasite Queen…” Angor went through the data he saw before. Dave wrote a lot of information about Parasite Queen like how she was extremely beautiful, cool, and awesome. Everything showed Dave’s absolute admiration toward this individual.
There was no useful description. Her skills, no. Her expertise, no. Dave only expressed all kinds of meaningless compliment.
Since he did not have any idea who Parasite Queen was, Angor could only wait till tomorrow and see.
He checked the timeline again. Two matches in the morning, three in the afternoon.
Something caught his attention though — Angor would fight against Fox Master in the first match.