"Wake up," the man said with an annoyed voice. "It's time for our deal."
Shang slowly opened his eyes with annoyance.
The two of them had argued for way too long.
In the end, they had come to a deal.
Shang could sit on the ground for the night, but when people would begin to show up, he would sit on the chair.
Shang stood up, pulled the chair over, and sat down.
"Was that so hard?" the man asked.
"I can also just sit on the ground again," Shang answered with an even voice.
"Hmph," the man only snorted.
In the next couple of minutes, Shang saw the sky slowly light up.
The braziers had been put out a couple of minutes ago, and Shang heard the first faint noises of movement from the surrounding houses.
pᴀɴdᴀ nᴏveʟ It seemed like the 500 or so people directly living in the city had their houses adjacent to the academy.
A couple minutes later, Shang saw the first people exit their houses. They walked with practiced ease to their destinations.
"Bakers and smiths," the man said. "They have to wake up very early."
"Mhm," Shang muttered.
Some minutes later, the sky became bright enough that even a normal person could see in the streets. Due to the high elevation and the walls, the dawn couldn't be seen from within the city.
Some more minutes later, more people began to exit their houses as they all walked in the direction of the city center. Those were probably all the merchants and other artisans.
WHOOOOM!
Suddenly, a loud horn echoed throughout the city, and Shang looked up.
"That's the signal that the gates are being opened," the man explained as he stood up. Then, he walked over to the gate and simply pushed it open.
"It wasn't locked?" Shang asked.
"Why would we lock it? I'm here, after all," he said.
The man stretched a bit as he fixed his clothing. He had to appear presentable to the students.
Some minutes later, Shang heard the sound of a horde of people moving, and a couple of seconds later, Shang saw several youngsters and children walk towards the academy.
Some of them were ten-year-old kids.
Some were already adults.
Some wore bronze uniforms.
Some wore yellow uniforms.
Some walked in groups.
Some walked alone.
However, one thing was the same for every student.
They all wore at least one weapon on their person.
Shang received plenty of different gazes from the passing students. Some of them looked with confusion at him, some with interest, and some with disgust.
"Hello, teacher!"
"Good morning, teacher!"
"Finally done with work, huh?"
Many students greeted the middle-aged man beside the gate.
The children were very polite, while the older ones were more casual.
The teacher gave some polite and curt replies while the students passed him.
"Quite popular, huh?" Shang commented.
"Tch, they only respect my status," the man answered quietly, "but at least they respect something."
"Do you want to start with that topic again?" Shang asked.
"Hmph," the man harrumphed without saying anything more to Shang.
Shang kept looking at the passing students.
They just didn't end!
In fact, the entire street was crowded with people. It was almost like a festival was taking place in the city.
By now, the city had also become very noisy and loud. The number of guards on the walls had also multiplied by several times.
Suddenly, Shang saw a shadow.
The shadow of a person had just jumped from the wall, right into the academy.
"That's the dean," the teacher said when he noticed Shang's gaze. "He oversees the security of the city by night and leads the academy during the day."
Shang's eyes widened in surprise. "Doesn't he need to sleep?"
The teacher only snorted. "People on his level don't need to sleep any longer. Don't forget, the dean is the most powerful warrior in the entire world."
That's when Shang remembered everything he had been told of the Warrior Academy.
Right! The strongest warrior in the world stayed here!
The only warrior that had ever managed to reach the Fourth Realm, the same Realm as Duke Whirlwind!
Shang felt a feeling of wonder when he realized that he had just caught a glimpse of the most powerful warrior in the entire world.
It had only been a glimpse, but that glimpse had meant taking a glimpse at the current peak of physical fighting.
After a couple of minutes, the flood of students slowly subsided. Yet, what replaced the students were the teachers.
Shang saw several people in silver uniforms walking down the street, talking with each other.
They didn't wear armor, but their uniforms were obviously designed to also be used in battle. They seemed light but powerful, hard but flexible.
Some of the teachers were also talking with some older students. Obviously, the barrier between teacher and students wasn't as stringent when the student reached a certain age.
After all, they were all adults at that point.
BOOOM!
Suddenly, a loud explosion came from the top of the city walls.
Shang looked over in shock, and he saw a gigantic ballista on top of a wall.
He saw several soldiers standing around it, all looking over the wall, into the distance. Two of them wore silver armor, while the others wore bronze armor.
The sound had obviously come from this ballista firing.
A second later, the guards high-fived each other.
"Sometimes, Spear Storks fly too close to the city," the teacher explained. "They are Beasts in the Third Realm, the Commander Stage. We can't always send soldiers to hunt them down, so we kill as many as we can from the city."
Third Realm.
Shang was reminded of the Earth Fruit Hedgehog and the Old Ice Octopus in Duke Whirlwind's garden.
Such a majestic beast had died… just like that?
At this moment, Shang finally realized what kind of place he had come to.
The most powerful warrior in the world was here.
Over a hundred real Mages were here.
Who knew how many Commander Stage Warriors were here.
Beasts on the level of the Earth Fruit Hedgehog were regularly killed by some random guards.
The difference was just too vast.
In Duke Whirlwind's garden, the Earth Fruit Hedgehog might as well have counted as a God.
On the outside, Beasts on General Stage had reigned supreme, and Shang had nearly died to one of them.
The most powerful guards had been in the General Stage.
But here…
Here, Commander Stage Beasts died on the daily.
Commander Stage Beasts were nothing special in this place.
Shang couldn't even fight a General Stage Beast, but he had entered a place where not even Commander Stage Beasts were special.
For the first time, Shang felt like he was far out of his depth.
On the outside, he had been a force to be reckoned with. Not even the real bandits had dared to attack him after they had known of his location.
Every beast except for the most powerful ones had been under Shang's mercy.
But here, Shang was only a common youngster.
Every single guard in the city could easily kill him.
There were even several students in the General Stage.
Shang was in a different world.
"Oh? Who's that?" one of the teachers asked the teacher beside Shang.
"He came at night," the teacher answered. "He wants to have the special exam."
"Oh?" the other teacher answered as he looked at Shang.
Shang was taken out of his thoughts, and he looked at the new teacher.
"I have time right now," the other teacher said.
"Follow me. I'll take care of your exam."