The light of dawn was still hidden behind the misty curtain of night.
At such a time when light and shadow swapped places, a pair of ladies wearing silk clothes were kicking the water of a river situated along the edge of the apprentice town.
Dim light traveled through the woods nearby and brightened their sweet smiles.
The lady in white silk seemed about 17 or 18. With her fluffy blond hair that moved along with the morning breeze, she appeared like a fairy that came straight out of a fairytale book.
The one in transparent, golden silk was about the age of 30, and she had distinctive yet charming body features. Her long, dark-brown hair went all the way inside the river water, sometimes wetting her alluring body with every movement.
The other male creatures, who had been keeping their eyes on Angor’s villa, now had their attention fixed on these women while drooling. They only wished they could lunge at the beautiful souls.
Despite their elegant looks, the ladies were talking about absolutely inelegant matters.
“Gods. It’s been two days. My feet gonna swell.”
“Heh, you’re better than me. I’ve been flipping my hair in water for two days. I’m definitely getting sick after this.”
“Just… hold on for a bit more, for our future.”
“Future, huh? If we somehow anger the great wizard, we will have no future.”
“Don’t think like that. Wizards are humans too, and all humans have desires. If we can get a start, we will keep going.”
“For other wizards, maybe. I doubt it will work on this one.”
“What do you mean?”
“I have a sister named Melaner, who tried to seduce this wizard while she worked at the Tree Spirit Palace. Guess what, he yelled at her! I tell you, this man doesn’t know how women work.”
As they talked, the villa door which was kept shut for several days suddenly opened up.
Angor slowly paced toward the yard entrance while wearing a hooded wizard robe.
When he walked out, the onlookers all approached the door.
People immediately caught up to Angor the moment the entrance was unlocked.
“Mister Padt, this is a letter from my master, please take a look.”
“Mister Padt! My master has gifted you a one-use space capsule! Do check out this letter please!”
“Mister Padt…”
“Mister Padt!”
Before Angor could say anything to them, a surge of magic suddenly came and squeezed everyone away. Then, a plump man with several gold teeth walked in front of Angor.
“Nice to meet you, Mister Padt. My name is Jurrington.”
Angor sensed the man’s magic aura. Another level-3 apprentice.
“Good to see you too. I have a business to attend to, Mister Jurrington. Please come next time.”
Angor tried to walk around the man.
Jurrington grimaced and put a fat hand to block Angor. “Mister Padt, do allow me some time and listen to my words, alright?”
Jurrington clapped, and the women who had been putting on their show beside the river joined them, wiggling their buttocks intentionally as they did so.
“I shall present them to you as your gift, Mister Padt. A virgin, and an… extremely experienced hustler. I guarantee that you will be satisfied,” Jurrington said as he gave Angor a wicked wink. Meanwhile, Angor expressed nothing. Only the other visitors showed their own jealousy.
Jurrington asked the women to go and join Angor’s side.
When the women prepared their sweet expressions and poses, Angor lifted an arm to stop them from reaching out to him.
“You keep them. I’m not interested.”
Jurrington rolled his eyes and pushed the women away. After that, he dragged a decent-looking man from the crowd.
“How about this one?”
The fellow quickly got over his initial surprise and fingered his hair bang to show his self-proclaimed handsomeness.
Angor tried not to vomit. “I don’t have that… fetish! My professor is expecting me. If you really have something important, Mister Jurrington, I guess I can delay my meeting just a little.”
Upon hearing the word “professor”, Jurrington quickly stepped aside with mild fear on his face. “Of course I can’t delay your appointment with Mister Sunders, Mister Padt. I’ll see you next time.”
With the help of Sunders’ name, Angor walked away while everyone was looking at him.
After he left, Jurrington huffed and scoffed. “Mister Sunders huh? Like I’d buy it! Fine, I’ll let you go this time,” He turned to address the silk-covered ladies. “I’ll keep ’em if you can’t help yourself!”
…
There were always people pointing and glancing at him discreetly. Angor finally found peace inside a sky bus.
After making sure he was the only one in the cabin, Angor let Toby out from his robe, who fluttered around a little before he landed on his shoulder.
Toby had completely healed aside from some lost feathers on his breast area. However, it wasn’t a problem with the bird’s white lace princess dress on.
Angor finished preparing a basic alchemy plan last night. Considering the complicated magic array that he was going to use, he would probably create another alchemy omen. Therefore, he left his house in the morning and headed to the ethereal laboratory located in The Tributary.
He brought Toby with him because he needed to bring lots of stuff.
Hidden under the feathers on Toby’s neck, there was an extra snow-white feather, which was the space storage Angor crafted for Toby. This one had a space of nine cubic meters, which was almost the biggest possible volume for low-tier space storage items. It contained Toby’s clothes, food, and a tiny bed. Angor named it the “Snowy Feather”.
He needed to take tons of materials to The Tributary, but all of his existing space storages were for sale. That was why he had to make another one to hold everything, while also considering Toby as another item listed on his manifest.
Toby kept chirping and tweeting on his shoulder. The bird had been in a super good mood ever since Angor gave him Snowy Feather, and he expressed his happiness by singing and rubbing against Angor’s face.
The bird had a terrible singing voice. However, Angor didn’t mind it, as long as he could witness Toby stepping out of the grimness they went through. Besides, there was no one else on the sky bus.
Angor watched as Toby dance on his shoulder for a while. “Hey, you’re a ‘boy bird’, right? How can you not feel embarrassed in that princess skirt?”
Toby stopped his song and moved his wings around.
“Caw caw caw!”— I look beautiful in it!
“I see. I can’t judge the look of a bird using human senses,” Angor said as he nodded. “But why do you want to look pretty anyway? To attract a wife bird? So you can mate?”
Angor asked that one because he just watched an animal documentary the other day.
Mate my arse!
Toby rolled his tiny eyes. Since he just received a brilliant gift, he held back the urge to kick Angor. He then explained to Angor, about his special habits.
It took a lot of time for Toby to do his explanation using body language this time, and it was pretty complex. Angor kept asking questions until their bus arrived at Tree Spirit Garden, where Angor finally gained a basic idea.
Angor stuffed Toby back into his wizard robe before heading toward The Tributary, all the while thinking about what Toby just told him.
Greya’s Artificial Life was one of the most powerful kinds among all original spells. This particular spell had breached the restriction of Occult Gourmet and created a brand new, unknown field of subject.
By using Artificial Life, Greya had created Section Ephemera, Steam Vortexes, Twisting Protozoa, and similar life forms who possessed amazing powers.
However, none of these creatures was intelligent.
Except for Toby.
As an exception, Toby was the best creation ever made by Greya. Greya broke the rules of the world’s consciousness by bringing something sapient with magic powers into this world.
Toby’s birth was an accident, but it did not fluster Greya in the least.
Any chef would add seasonings to his or her dishes, and a Gourmet Wizard was also considered a chef.
Greya was pretty surprised when she “cooked” Toby out. But as soon as she learned the properties of her new creation, she immediately began giving Toby add-ons as a seasoned chef.
It could already be seen from Barbie’s Restaurant, that Greya had completely different taste compared to ordinary people. Actually, one wouldn’t find many “ordinary people” in the entire Fairytown and Candy House.
The very first “seasoning” Greya gave Toby was “uncanniness”.
Precisely speaking, the uncanniness referred to the bird’s strange aesthetic and maniacal love for all kinds of colorful fabrics.
Angor held his chin while walking.
So, Toby gained his strange “taste” because of Greya’s “spice”? Not because of Greya’s own influence?
“Did Greya give you anything else when cooking you?” Angor asked out of curiosity.
Using his spirit feeler, he saw Toby shaking head behind his robe.
“There were, but you don’t know what exactly? Woah, Artificial Life sounds wonderful. I wonder if everyone who created their own spells without following existing examples would also create such wonders.”
A self-created spell combined personal experience and conviction of knowledge as well as innovation. Rearranging existing spell models wouldn’t produce original spells. There were also Occult spells that couldn’t be rearranged at all.
Angor suddenly got a bold idea. Since he could learn from another completely foreign civilization, could he also use some of their techniques to create his own spells?
…
The Tributary.
Angor stopped in front of a lake with wavering blue water.
He would travel past this lake every time he came to Tree Spirit Garden, and he never paid much attention to it.
He didn’t expect that “The Tributary” referred to this blue lake, which he found out from Vice.
As Vice explained, to enter the other dimension, he simply needed to leap into the lake water while having the name card in his possession.
The Tributary was located at a remote spot from other gathering spots. Angor looked around and didn’t see anyone around. After some consideration, he held the crystal-clear name card in his hand and slowly walked into the water.