"What? Working as what?" Theron looked bewildered. "Like a courier? I said, aren't your family farmers? How can you work as an escort?"
"This 'escort' isn't that kind of escort, but..." Caelan motioned for Theron to lean closer and whispered an explanation.
Theron's face filled with disbelief. "You're just a commoner—would a noblewoman fancy you?"
"You don't believe me?"
"No! What can you do to prove it?"
Caelan thought for a moment, then casually constructed an image in his mind: a portrait of himself embracing two voluptuous, naked noblewomen, which he then projected into Theron's mind palace.
Because it was a static image, even with the Weave's vicious weakening, it still appeared relatively clear in Theron's mind palace.
Theron stared blankly, his face slowly turning crimson. A moment later, he bent over and slowly shuffled back to his seat. A few seconds after that, he suddenly tilted his head back, gushed two streams of blood from his nose, and toppled to the ground.
"Huh? Darkgrain seems to have fainted?"
"Why did he faint?"
"Never mind, send him to the infirmary first..."
"..."
After a flurry of activity, Theron was carried to the academy's infirmary by enthusiastic classmates, leaving Caelan sitting in his seat, lamenting the scarcity of proper education in this world—a mere low-quality image could defeat a talented young man from a common background.
Indeed, in this world, nineteen-year-olds were still considered youths, at least within the academy.
His mind palace reacted; his mental fortitude and mana seemed to have increased slightly—truly just a little. If he hadn't used his Illusionist ability to set up a measurement, he wouldn't have even noticed.
"Huh? This works too? So, can I enhance myself by spreading... adult entertainments?"
Caelan fell into deep thought, clearly seriously considering the feasibility of this plan. However, after a brief mental experiment, he gave up. If static images had such low quality, once converted to moving pictures, perhaps only white, red, and black pixels would be left moving around—it would be utterly pointless.
After the break, the instructor came to inform everyone to go to the fire element gathering array to absorb fire mana. Since Caelan's highest affinity apart from Illusion magic was two-star fire, he naturally enrolled in a class focused on the fire element. The five elemental schools all relied on absorbing elements from the air and converting them into one's own mana. The converted mana could theoretically be used to cast spells of any element, but the prerequisite was still having the relevant affinity. For example, Caelan, without Nature affinity, couldn't cast life magic.
The group arrived in a grand procession at the mana gathering array. The dense fire element made the air inside the chamber appear reddish. Not only Caelan's class, but also several other classes gradually walked in, using their talents to absorb the fire element from the air. Caelan naturally absorbed it according to the method in his memory. After about thirteen or fourteen minutes, he felt an uncomfortable heat in his body, indicating that his absorption for the day had reached its limit. Caelan quickly stopped absorbing and walked out of the gathering chamber.
All the students spent about the same amount of time absorbing elements; some with better talent even spent less time. When Caelan walked out, he realized he was already one of the slower ones in the class. After the remaining students emerged, the instructor led everyone back to the classroom.
For the rest of the time, everyone could do as they pleased.
Caelan's deskmate, a boy named Dorian Thatcher of House Cleaver, pulled out a box from his desk drawer and looked at Caelan, saying, "Caelan, how about we play a few rounds of Warlord's Challenge?"
"Boring. I'm not playing."
Warlord's Challenge was a very popular board game among humans on the continent. Although it had been passed down for countless years, its overall gameplay was similar to hierarchical capture games or predator-prey mechanics. It had some strategic depth, but very limited. In Caelan's opinion, it was quite uninteresting, so he naturally wasn't interested in playing.
"Ah? Caelan, you've changed. You used to love playing." Dorian expressed his surprise, then indignantly went to find the boy in the front row to play with.
Caelan thought for a moment, then suddenly asked, "Have you ever heard of 'chess'?"
Dorian and the guy in the front row named Lucas Wheaten of House Greenloaf both shook their heads, indicating they hadn't heard of it.
Caelan himself hadn't seen any memories of chess in his inherited memories, which was why he asked these two. Seeing that they hadn't heard of it and didn't know, Caelan asked a few more people and found that indeed no one knew. He figured the First Emperor had never introduced it.
" chess is something I accidentally learned. This is what it looks like." Caelan said, then with a wave of his hand, he conjured a chessboard onto the relatively empty desk. Compared to the previous image of one man and two women, this board was much clearer. At least the lines of the board and the red and black characters on the pieces were clearly visible, and it consumed less mana.
"Its rules are like this..."
"Soldiers can only move forward, not backward. Before crossing the river, they cannot move sideways, but after crossing, they can..."
"Cannons attack by jumping over one piece..."
"Elephants move in a diagonal two-square pattern, and horses move in an L-shape... What, you don't understand 'L-shape'? Look, for example, if I'm here, I can move to these points in these directions..."
"Advisors can only move diagonally within this palace..."
"The General and Marshal cannot leave this fortress area..."
"..."
"Well, those are the rules. Did you remember them? Didn't remember any? Dorian, sit in front of me, let's play a match and get familiar with it as we go."
Dorian obediently walked to the front row and sat down, picking up the pieces to play against Caelan.
"Look, if my cannon moves here, you can use your horse to defend here."
"Chariots should come out early—beginners find chariots very powerful..."
"Cannons can only attack by jumping one piece. Are you trying high-arc bombardment, jumping two?"
"Your chariot still dares to move? Didn't you see I put your General in check?"
"Your horse is gone."
...In just over ten minutes, Dorian had already lost several games. People had gathered around to watch, and after these few rounds, everyone understood the rules fairly well and started offering advice to Dorian from the sidelines.
"Move here, move here! You can capture Caelan's horse here."
"No, you should move here. Caelan has already blocked the path with his chariot, so you can only go this way."
"See? I told you, but you didn't listen to me. Your horse is dead again."
"..."
"..."
"Hey, haven't you heard 'A true gentleman stays silent while watching chess'? Haven't heard it? Well, now you have. Don't disturb the players' concentration!" Caelan couldn't help but tap on the table.
The crowd fell silent for a moment, but it didn't last long. Soon, they were enthusiastically offering advice to Dorian again, collectively resisting the attacks of Caelan, the tyrant.
Caelan, helpless, once again cornered Dorian. Seeing his opponent surrender, he tossed the pieces aside and asked, "I'm not playing anymore. Who wants to try?"
"Me."
"Me."
"Me, me."
Finally, the strong and sturdy Marcus shoved aside the weaker students and sat in Caelan's spot, arranging the pieces on the table. He chuckled, "Dorian, you weakling, watch how I handle you."
"Hmph, I'm already familiar with the rules and gameplay. Do you think I'll still lose to you?" Dorian wasn't about to back down.
The surrounding students divided into three groups, offering advice to both players: one group helped Dorian, one group helped Marcus, and one group helped both sides.
For a time, the classroom was raucous, attracting not only the attention of the students within the classroom but also other students from other classes who were passing by.
His mind palace received an extremely slight mana feedback. Caelan's spirit lifted. He had everyone clear space on a few nearby tables, then with a wave of his hand, several more chess boards appeared on the tabletops.
Then, without even needing Caelan to call out, the people who saw them immediately rushed over and sat down, eagerly beginning to play.
After responding to student requests and conjuring a few more boards, Caelan watched the students playing, feeling the increasingly obvious mana feedback in his mind palace. Some came from the students playing, some from the onlookers. Although all were very faint—completely incomparable to what Theron had contributed earlier—they were continuous.
Perhaps he had found the path for an Illusionist.
PLZ THROW POWERSTONES.