Chapter 18: Borrowing Money to Grow

“Did he offend someone?” Saul asked.

“I heard he brought a high-level Elvish book with him, thinking he could study it just because he became an apprentice. In the end, they found him in the flowerbed this morning.” Keli leaned close to Saul and deliberately used a raspy voice to spook him. “I heard he cut his own legs into several pieces and buried them in the soil like plant roots. When they found him, he had nearly bled to death.”

“Can he be saved?”

“Who knows? He was already taken away when I got there,” Keli said with some regret.

“Aren’t you scared?” Saul looked at the young girl in front of him with a bit of surprise.

Propping up her chin, Keli murmured, “I already knew what the wizarding world was like before I came. It’s not so different from home. People just die for no reason sometimes.”

That crazed new apprentice was just a small episode. Keli quickly switched the topic to her experience visiting Mentor Gudo with a bucket yesterday.

“…I feel like Mentor Gudu is pretty willing to teach me, but he just can’t stop vomiting. The big bucket I brought was nearly waist-high, but it still filled up in less than an hour. I really don’t get how he eats so much!”

“Heh…” Saul was both grossed out and amused.

Keli suddenly tilted her head and looked at Saul. “You’re finally smiling. When you first came in, you looked like a walking corpse.”

Saul’s smile faded a little, and he rubbed his face with his hand.

So he looked that haggard?

Only someone as straightforward as Keli would say it out loud.

The one in charge of the “Basic Knowledge of All Things” class was a Second Rank apprentice.

He was skin and bones, with sunken cheeks he looked even more corpse-like than Saul.

He didn’t care much for class interaction, just droned on in a flat tone, reading directly from the book, making Saul drowsy.

So, Saul just opened the book and started reading on his own.

He hadn’t had time to preview today’s material due to yesterday’s whirlwind of events.

“Basic Knowledge of All Things” was a mashup of biology, chemistry, history, and geography.

Anything worthy of being recorded in a wizarding textbook had some mystical elements.

For example, in the botany section, Saul read about a herb that could increase a person’s magic.

But the cost was becoming a mindless puppet, more like a tool for extracting magic crystals than something that helped people.

There were ten volumes in total, each one about ten centimeters thick. There was no way to read them quickly.

Saul picked what interested him most and read while occasionally stretching.

At one point, he noticed Keli’s former tag-alongs, Doze and Rocky, whispering next to Duke.

Keli showed no reaction to this.

“What are you looking at?” Keli followed Saul’s gaze and also noticed their little scheme.

She curled her lip. “They’re trying to isolate you. So childish, like kids.”

The class had basically turned into a self-study session. People had started studying material from other courses.

The Second Rank apprentice at the front had only read the first section aloud and then quietly started reading another book, completely ignoring the class.

“No wonder I didn’t see any senior apprentices here. They must’ve known this class was pointless,” Keli muttered, regretting not having brought other books with her.

“Keli, can you lend me some magic crystals?” Saul finally mustered the courage to ask after some hesitation.

“What do you need magic crystals for?” Keli asked cautiously. “I don’t do one-way trades with no return!”

“I want to borrow two books from the library.”

“Someone just went crazy from reading the wrong book, and you’re not scared?”

“I won’t read recklessly,” Saul said sincerely. “But I really need some specific books right now.”

Keli didn’t ask exactly what books he wanted. After a moment’s hesitation, she poured out five black, semi-transparent, diamond-shaped pieces from her purse.

“I can only lend you five. In three months, you have to pay me back… pay me back…”

“Ten.”

“Deal!”

“Need a loan contract?”

“Of course!”

Saul tore a page from a blank notebook, and they completed their first financial transaction.

The first class ended, and the second was the highly anticipated Runic Construction.

Runic Construction was the foundation of spellcasting.

But to everyone’s disappointment, the instructor was again just a Second Rank apprentice.

This guy was even worse. He only demonstrated the most basic rune drawing once, then told everyone to practice on their own.

Most of the newbies barely understood and asked him to repeat the explanation, but he demanded payment for a second round!

When Saul heard it cost money, he gave up asking.

He recalled the knowledge points just covered and felt confident he remembered them clearly, so he began visualizing the first basic rune in his mind.

With eyes closed, the rune appeared crisply in his mind.

He opened his eyes, a bit stunned.

“Did I just… memorize it?”

To make sure it wasn’t just visual memory, Saul picked up a pen and drew it on blank paper.

He compared it to the book.

Exactly the same!

Even the curve of each line matched!

He closed the book and tried again, this time using a special pen and ink. Following the instructor’s method, he began infusing magic into the pen tip.

This part was tricky.

Magic had to be an even output and coordinated with mental control to construct a proper rune.

A mistake in any step would collapse the rune and turn it into just another doodle.

Saul focused intensely.

And then—

Success!

Although it was only drawn on normal paper, the rune shimmered with magical luster, and its magical fluctuations were clearly perceptible.

“You… you actually did it?” Keli’s eyes widened in disbelief.

She had been planning to pay for another explanation, but now, seeing Saul succeed on his first try, she suddenly felt maybe she could get it too if she pushed herself harder.

Saul didn’t hear her. He was already focusing on the next basic rune.

The second—

Success!

Big success!

The third—

Success!

The fourth—

…Failure.

Saul frowned.

The failure wasn’t because he remembered the rune wrong… it was because he ran out of magic.

His magic could only sustain three runes?

Or was there a problem with how he outputted it?

Saul finally experienced just how dangerous insufficient magic could be.

No wonder Kongsha thought she had him cornered. No wonder Mentor Kaz didn’t even bother looking at him.

Saul’s chest heaved for a few moments before he calmed himself.

“What’s there to panic about?” he told himself. “Didn’t you already make up your mind?”

Saul took out the crystal ball and the “Human-Monster Movement Diagram” and began meditating to restore his magic.

Low magic had its upsides too… It’s that he could recover fast.

You had to learn to see things rationally.

Saul’s success in drawing three runes had already caught the whole class’s attention.

Not just the new apprentices… even the seniors and the instructor were shocked by the string of magical waves coming from Saul’s direction.

Some newcomers who had planned to spend crystals for private lessons hesitated when they saw Saul enter meditation after drawing only three.

Maybe his rune construction had some flaw? Besides, you couldn’t just interrupt someone’s meditation.

In the front row, Duke’s eyes gleamed. He whispered something to his two companions, grabbed his runes, and headed to the front, Most apprentices brought some crystals with them from home.

The instructor seemed pleased that Duke was the first to approach and whispered a long explanation, which made the others envious.

Duke kept nodding and wearing expressions of sudden realization like, “So that’s how it is!”

In the back corner of the classroom, Angela’s big, adorable eyes slowly slid from the podium to the rear, finally landing on Saul, her expression filled with interest.

(End of Chapter)

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