Ghostly light flickered within a gateway built of gleaming white bones. A gaunt figure in a black cloak stepped out of the portal, and beneath the hood was more cold bone, the eye sockets hollow and black.
Beside it, a towering Flame Demon skull suddenly blazed with fire tens of meters high, fiery serpents coiling through its nostrils and eye sockets. A woman in a deep-V robe strode out of the flames. Her skin was entirely teal, and her hair of writhing snakes let out a soul-chilling hiss.
Across the vast plaza, portals stood in crowded rows, some majestic and solemn, some crude and savage, some cold and terrifying. Every so often a torrent of multicolored mana surged outward, and genius mages of every shape and kind made their entrance.
Before a deep-blue, dragon-headed portal, a tall, dazzling blonde stood with her arms crossed. Every so often she pulled out a whole jar of slime jelly and tipped it down her throat.
Hum—
Amid the faint, barely-there sound, a flash of blue reflected in her emerald pupils.
The bored blonde's eyes went wide. She swallowed a pink jelly bigger than her fist in one gulp, smoothed the ends of her hair out of reflex, and in the blink of an eye put on the calm, mature air a teacher ought to have.
Two charming short-haired girls stepped out of the portal together. One of them recognized the waiting woman at once and greeted her sweetly:
"Good morning, Teacher Melodia."
"Morning, Li Fei, Annesia."
Melodia's eyes landed on the two girls' tightly interlaced fingers. "Come on, I'll take you to your lodgings," she said, feigning calm.
"Thank you, Teacher."
Li Fei sidled up without a shred of shyness and took Melodia's hand with her free one, and the three of them walked side by side.
Annesia's hand was smooth as porcelain and soft, her body a little cooler than Li Fei's. Melodia's palm was very warm and held on tighter, her skin firm and springy. Her long fingers wrapped around Li Fei's hand, hot and snug, and gave her the security only an older woman can offer.
They fell into step easily, and for a while nobody spoke. It was the first time either of the two little mage girls had set foot in the Main Academy, and they were too busy looking left and right, taking in the sights of the Magic Academy's headquarters.
The sky was a dreamy pale violet with a tranquil, bewitching beauty, which probably meant the Main Academy sat inside some Folded Space. The dense forest of portals, meanwhile, showed in the most direct way possible the depth of heritage in this ancient power, one that had carried on from the Mythic Age to the present day.
Never mind the staggering cost of building a stable two-way portal. The thousand-plus branch academies linked behind those portals were, on their own, a force so vast it made the heart tremble. Even the branch with the thinnest foundations had to have a High-Sequence mage as its dean.
And those were Knowledge Sequence beings… In many planes, the natives would have worshipped them as gods…
If only the Main Academy's dean were a beautiful lady too.
The thought flashed through Miss Top Courtesan's mind out of professional habit. Then she swung Melodia's hand and complained in a pouty voice:
"You've been so busy lately. You didn't even have time for a meal on my birthday. You dropped off a gift and vanished."
"You know how it is. Vice dean is a very important post. In an emergency, you can even take over control of the whole academy."
Melodia sighed. "So before taking the position, I have to go through systematic, strict training. Besides, the Main Academy has some rare resources. If I play my cards right, maybe I could…"
She didn't finish the sentence, but Li Fei got the gist. Before long she might have yet another High-Sequence admirer, one with a very respectable job too: vice dean of the Magic Academy.
A quality simp deserves a raised bet, of course, so Li Fei suddenly asked:
"So, Teacher, you live here too, right?"
"Mm."
"Can you bring family along? Like a girlfriend, for example?"
Li Fei stood on tiptoe and lowered her voice, whispering playfully into her teacher's ear.
"? I don't have… a girlfriend or anything."
Melodia's palm grew even hotter.
"Then couldn't Senior Sister Annesia and I just stay at your place, Teacher?"
Li Fei turned the tables on her. "We're entering the Folded Space tomorrow anyway. Instead of moving into somewhere strange, we might as well rest up and recharge in your dorm."
"I… I'm fine with either."
Meeting Li Fei's questioning glance, Annesia answered in a small, soft voice.
Melodia hesitated, but Li Fei only gave her arm a little shake, and her resolve melted at once:
"Well, it's not like it's out of the question."
On the whole, the customs of the Enros Continent were fairly open-minded. Still, it wasn't like Loxibrook, where you could toss a straight girl in and she'd come out brand new in three days.
That meant if they were back in Loxibrook, Melodia daring to live with two pretty female students would send her already-negative teacher ethics score plunging to a new low. But here at the Main Academy, a few girls living together raised no eyebrows. Nobody's mind would go to strange places first. They'd just think the teacher and students were very close.
"On second thought, forget it."
Li Fei seemed to have changed her mind, and said considerately, "You work so hard, Teacher. It would be awful if we disturbed your rest. I was too forward just now. I'm sorry."
"It's fine, really."
Melodia looked away and began explaining, a little nervously. "Accompanying you two is my task for today anyway. If you stay with me, it'll be easier to talk through any spell problems… The place the Main Academy assigned me is pretty big, and when you get tired of studying spells, you can just sleep."
"Then it'd be foolish to refuse. Better clever than polite, right?"
Li Fei's smile was a little sly, and it made Melodia realize she'd been toyed with. Her face went red.
"Thank you, Teacher."
Annesia hadn't noticed the two exchanging glances and thanked her obediently.
"So, do we rest at my place first, or go somewhere else?"
Melodia asked.
"Do you have anything planned, Teacher?"
"I do."
Once the talk turned to business, Melodia snapped right back into the serious, brisk manner she wore in class. "Assemble at the Main Academy plaza at eight tomorrow morning. Until then, your time is your own.
"But the Main Academy's dean has said that the secret to becoming an outstanding mage is to cherish every minute. Nicole had you come early, so of course there are some tasks."
"As Silver and Gold tier academies, you're allowed to use some of the Main Academy's Transcendent facilities. Normally you'd have to apply in advance, but since you're already here today, you should definitely seize the chance."
"I don't recommend the Five Great Cathedrals or the library. There's too little time. If you're interested, you can stay a while after Folded Space B-01 closes. The Spell Altar isn't suitable either."
"So the places I recommend are the [Holy Fountain] and the [Dream Mentor]. If you're curious, you can also take a look at the Inner Market, the [Mana Spring] and the [Blessing Stone]."
Textbooks weren't read for nothing. The moment Melodia finished speaking, Li Fei recalled what each of those Transcendent facilities did.
The [Holy Fountain] permanently raised your mana cap. The amount was small and you could only benefit once, but no mage would turn down more mana.
The [Dream Mentor] was a special Transcendent structure that sealed away a spark of wisdom from every past visitor. Touching it benefited your cultivation and could grant inspiration. The same Transcendent could visit different [Dream Mentors] and benefit each time, and Enlos had at least a hundred of them. Anyone with money and time could visit them one by one and "pour wisdom into the crown of the head" until even a total dud reached Sequence 8 or Sequence 7. Of course, the textbook stressed that the better your Aptitude, the greater the gain.
The [Mana Spring] restored mana quickly, a treasure ground for training spells.
The [Blessing Stone] was like Loxibrook's Rainbow Altar or Fairy Ring, bringing a stretch of good luck.
As for the Inner Market, it was obviously where the Main Academy's gentlemen and ladies of magic did their trading.
Li Fei didn't dither and quickly made up her mind:
The first two places were definitely worth checking in at. The Mana Spring could be skipped, since a day's work wouldn't raise her spell proficiency much. The Blessing Stone and the Inner Market were worth a look too, and wouldn't cost much time anyway.
Li Fei laid out her plan to her teacher. Annesia had a different idea, and said awkwardly:
"I'd like to visit the Main Academy library. There are a few classics our branch doesn't have…"
"All right. Come with us first, and once we've visited the necessary places, I'll take you to the Magic Library."
Melodia gave a light snap of her fingers.
So under the violet sky, the tall, striking older sister led the two unfamiliar little mage girls along as if she knew every stone, and soon they stopped before a stone figure.
The figure had its eyes closed and a kindly face. Its head was smooth and hairless, like a stone Buddha, and it gave off a peaceful, gentle aura.
Li Fei touched its round belly with a fingertip. A sudden, clear-minded feeling of enlightenment struck her, and her crimson Fortune surged, baring its fangs and claws.
The stone figure kept sleeping, as if the woman before it, a walking omen of misfortune and evil, hadn't disturbed it at all.
Li Fei glanced at her Luck stat, up by two points for half a month, and quietly decided to visit the stone figure once more before they left, so she could go home and hit the gacha.
The three of them soon moved on. A fine crack spread silently beneath the stone figure's feet.
…
After saying goodbye to the stone figure, the second stop of the Main Academy tour was a crouching stone beast.
The beast had four limbs and lay quietly on the ground, large and long-bodied. Though carved from stone, it gave off a light, graceful impression, like a stretched-out cat. Long dragon horns grew from its head, and its crimson eyes weren't fierce at all. Instead they gave off an ancient, profound air, as if it had lain asleep here since the dawn of time.
"This is the [Dream Mentor]," Melodia said, stopping to explain. "Touch it, and it will spark inspiration and enlighten your wisdom."
"What creature does the statue depict? I've never seen anything like it."
Li Fei asked humbly.
"Some say it's the progenitor of the dream demons, and others guess it's a subspecies of dragon. But to this day nobody has found a living [Dream Mentor]. There's a rumor, though, that at the feast of the Year of Mist, a certain Supreme sensed a living Dream Mentor watching the battle from the darkness. Unfortunately, he was locked in a bloody fight with a powerful foe and had no attention to spare, and by the time the dust settled, the Dream Mentor had left no trace."
Melodia gazed at the stone beast and murmured, "The end of the Mythic Age buried too many truths… Never mind, let's not go into that. Touch it. With your Aptitude, you should gain a great deal."
"Mm."
Li Fei nodded lightly and reached out to touch the sleeping giant cat.
Her consciousness was yanked into deep darkness. She felt as though she were drifting in the depths of a starry sky, with no sense of direction or gravity, and countless points of light danced around her.
She tried to grab them, but the glimmers that seemed within arm's reach always slipped through her fingers.
After a moment, the darkness receded and the light returned. Li Fei stared at her palm, dazed and a little bereft, then glanced at her panel.
[You visited the Dream Mentor and gained 1,000 EXP.]
That's it? A thousand EXP was worse than a hundred Moonlight Wolves.
Wait, no!
The better the Aptitude, the greater the gain… and my Aptitude happens to be 1…
Could it be that visiting a [Dream Mentor] grants EXP at a hundred times your Aptitude? Of course, other people don't have a system, so what they get would be insight into Transcendent laws, spell proficiency, that sort of feedback…
"How was it? Pretty great, right?"
Melodia patted her shoulder, cutting off Li Fei's racing thoughts.
The blonde teacher looked longingly at the [Dream Mentor] and sighed. "You know, when I first came here, I had exactly one thought in my head."
"If only I were Martin Jack's daughter. I could travel the world, scatter money visiting every Dream Mentor on the continent, and maybe the High-Sequence bottleneck would melt away…"
Clearly, high-Aptitude geniuses and low-Aptitude duds rated the [Dream Mentor] very differently.
If Li Fei's guess was right, geniuses with Aptitude over a hundred could gain tens of thousands of EXP in a single visit. Peerless prodigies like the Twin Stars and Gwona, who could charge up to High-Sequence by their own efforts in their twenties, or those like Gnaea and Chloe who had long since ascended to High-Sequence, would gain at least tens of thousands of EXP from one visit, maybe more. Melodia was a little older, but her Aptitude was probably not much lower than theirs. She had no powerful backer, after all, and limited resources had slowed her growth.
Either way, for Transcendents of that caliber, visiting all hundred-plus Dream Mentors in Enlos really could carry them past a fairly major bottleneck.
As for Bai Mengtian and Nicole, they didn't even care about this stuff. Their handmade gear alone could add a thousand Aptitude, and heaven only knew how high their own was. There was no bottleneck a single stretch of closed-door cultivation couldn't solve.
"Mere external things."
Facing Melodia's yearning gaze, Miss Top Courtesan glanced at her pitiful thousand EXP. She was sour inside, but showed not a hint of weakness, and her tone stayed calm. "We should strive to improve ourselves."
"Truly… a great creation."
Just then, Annesia opened her eyes too and sighed in admiration, mana glimmering in her gaze.
She knew full well the huge stone beast was lifeless, yet she bowed earnestly to the [Dream Mentor]. "Thank you for your guidance. I've gained so much."
Then the introverted white-haired girl, who'd had few chances to speak up on the way, mustered her courage and tried to start a conversation with her junior:
"You must have gained even more than I did."
Li Fei: …
The Spell Encyclopedia Lady felt she'd just been needled, but she had no proof.
"Indeed."
She brushed the topic aside and turned to leave, not even bothering to hold hands anymore. "Let's hurry to the next stop."
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