Angor left Rosebed to head back to Tree Spirit Garden, where the resource center was located. There, he received the reward for completing the recruitment quest. It wasn’t much, but it was better than none.
Next, he entered The Tributary to pay Iron Granny a visit.
Brute Cavern was a large place with many powerful wizards, but there weren’t many people who earned Angor’s true respect. Iron Granny was one of those that Angor respected.
The old woman’s home didn’t look any different than before. A small, cozy living room, hot tea that smelled like flowers, and more flower pots.
She didn’t look surprised by Angor’s visit at all. After showing Angor to a seat, she prepared her tea and was ready for some pleasant chat.
“Rein told me you’re going to the Abyss Plane.”
“I have my reasons, ma’am. It can’t be delayed.”
“No, I’m not stopping you. Though you should be ready for the consequences of your decisions. That place is several times bloodier than the worst part of the wizarding world. This is not an overstatement. Thanks to Mister Monkey, there are now demons wandering around the outermost areas. Stay cautious at all times even if you’re only going to the safer zones.”
“I will.”
“I’ll just stay here and pray for your good health then. By the way... Sumesh spoke highly of your Morning Dew. You should prepare more for him because he’s sure to ask you for your tea if you see him.”
“I have it here.” Angor took out another teabox from his bracelet. “For you, granny. I made sure I’m well stocked back home.”
Iron Granny accepted the gift with a smile and immediately went to her stove. “I’m glad Phantom Island finally has a sociable young man like you. I have known Sumesh for several decades, yet he never brought me presents. Not once.”
She went to pour a fresh cup of steaming Morning Dew, removed some water from the edge of the cup, and dripped a water drop on Angor’s hand.
“Consider this a return gift of mine.”
A gift? A drop of water? Angor looked at the liquid in confusion.
Strangely, the water did not flow down his skin like real water. Instead, it shrank into a perfect sphere and remained balanced.
Curious, Angor sent his spirit power to check, and he was startled by the overwhelming yet comforting energy contained within the object.
He didn’t know what this thing was, but the energy was used for healing, that was for sure.
“Using it equals casting Resuscitation on you. As long as you’re not completely gone, it will bring you to your top condition,” explained Iron Granny. “Of course, only one chance.”
Angor widened his eyes in shock. Many people had told him that Iron Granny was a “veteran” member in Brute Cavern, which meant she must be really strong. But it was still amazing to see her storing the power of a level-1 spell into a water drop so easily.
Today was fruitful. Angor only planned brief stopovers at Leona and Iron Granny’s places. He never thought he would receive so many awesome presents.
“Gods. The professor said something about how the whole organization will become generous once I join the higher rank. Guess it’s already happening?” Angor mumbled on his way out.
With nothing else to do, he thought about flying back to Phantom Island on his Gondola.
But he changed his mind by entering a sky bus instead. He had not used the public transportation in the organization in a while, so he would like to spend the rest of the day relaxing.
However, he quickly regretted his decision as several apprentices also joined him on the bus. At first, they talked about their recent studies and new cantrips. Even if there were loads of flaws and mistakes, it wasn’t Angor’s concern. But things grew slightly worse when these people became sarcastic and began verbally attacking each other either openly or scrupulously, until the bus was as noisy and chaotic as a wet market full of merchants yelling for customers.
The whole sight didn’t look very different from a pointless debate among boring teenagers trying to work out who was boss.
Supernatural or not, human nature did not change easily.
After bearing with the annoying chatter for ten minutes, Angor quickly got off when the bus had arrived at Falling Cloud Stop.
The “sky bridge” that led to Phantom Island was just to the north. Though that was not where Angor was going. He moved to the south, where a giant floating island was just across a short path.
The Cloud Library was that way.
He didn’t go there out of random. It was because Nausica’s letter reminded him of another friend, Sailum, whom he had not seen for over a year. Nausica once said something about how Elder of Books in Cloud Library might know where Sailum went.
It was Elder of Books who told Sailum to go for “Sage Morph”, which ultimately resulted in Sailum buying the Azure Bloodline while disregarding all the danger and risk it might bring. By visiting the library, Angor was going to try his luck. As commonly known, Elder of Books simply wouldn’t accept visitors normally.
The library was divided into 8,329 sections by using teleport arrays and space-extension runes. Instead of searching aimlessly, Angor directly headed to “Section 7925”, where he found Elder of Books last time. If he failed, he would simply pick some random books to read to kill time.
He once thought about using his Dream Whelk to “copy” all the books into the dream wasteland. But he realized this was quite impossible because there were powerful security measures protecting the books. None of his items could prevent them.
He might find an excuse such as he was “trying out the useless Mystery item for fun”, but it wasn’t a good idea—people would get suspicious nevertheless.
He walked through several more sections without finding his target, so he decided to quit.
...
There was a “mushroom house” at the end of Weald Street, where Freud, Sunny, and Alda usually lived.
Today, however, they had a guest with them.
When the fruit brew on the stove was fully cooked and was sending a nice smell into the room, Alda and Sunny reached for the pot eagerly.
“Manners, you two! Didn’t I tell you to behave when Mister Padt is watching?” Freud scolded them before giving Angor an apologetic look. “Sorry, sir. You know, these two can only smell food in the dream wasteland, so they can be a little hoggish.”
Angor nodded. Compared to Alda and Sunny’s behavior, he was more surprised by the fact that the dream wasteland could allow the deceased to taste meals.
But for now, he would let Freud handle all the relevant research.
“When are you leaving for the Abyss, sir?” asked Freud.
“In two days. That’s when the escort team of Moonfrost Union will arrive.”
“I see... I wonder whether he can make it.”
“Um? What do you mean?”
“I talked to Rossum yesterday, who said the leader of Ashen Traders, Beals, will travel to Brute Cavern to look for you, sir. Can he get there before your departure?”
Angor frowned. Whatever did Beals want?
If they found clues about Cassini, they could ask Freud to pass the message, which was also what Angor told them to do. What made Beals want to go over all the trouble?