Land of Magic

9

Many people flocked to Dahanatan. They were all wildly different, but united by one common feature — most of them disappeared without a trace.

The new ordinary disciples passed through the stone archway. It took their breath away. A few hours ago, they’d climbed up to the school, but they hadn’t seen all the school buildings. Only now did Hadjar realize that what he’d seen had been just the tip of the iceberg. The vast expanses of ‘The Holy Sky’ School included not only a tower, an arena, and several other premises, but also vast fields, forests, hills, and parade grounds. And everywhere you looked, training sessions were in full swing.

Spurred on by the harsh shouts of Mentors, hundreds of disciples were fighting on the parade grounds. Others, sitting atop the hills, were deeply immersed in meditation. Waterfalls cascaded down onto their shoulders. They flowed down their hands and into a lake. Some were having philosophical lessons. They were sitting in a semicircle around a Sage, who was telling them about the path of cultivation. The disciples asked questions and he answered every one of them patiently.

There were plenty of various residential premises. Some were full and overcrowded, some were empty. Some looked very ordinary and even poor, while others were richer and seemed massive. Not far from the tower stood ten separate, very presentable houses. Even a noble wouldn’t have been ashamed to live in one of them.

“Don’t act so surprised, disciples.” Mentor Jean said, leading the group along a wide, yellow paved road. “Our School is open to visitors from the city. Officials and nobles often come here. Many of them were once disciples of our School. I will say that the medallion you’ll earn once you graduate will remain with you for the rest of your life.”

“What do we have to do to graduate?” One of the girls asked.

Mentor Jean laughed.

“Young lady, you’ve just gotten here and are already dreaming of your final exam? Everything in due time. What was I talking about... Oh, right. We are open to any visitors. However, there are also visitors who’ve never worn our badge. That’s why we have the veil that hides a large part of ‘The Holy Sky’ School from the rest of the world.”

“But why?”

 Jean didn’t turn around. Hadjar, walking at the front of the column of disciples, felt that the Mentor’s aura was hidden. Even so, it was clearly at a level beyond that of Traves in his true form. It was stronger than the aura of the inner circle disciple, Dalit, from the exam. “In addition to the Tournament of Twelve, which will take place in just a few years, Schools sometimes go to war with each other for resources or for the title of the most prestigious School. So, we don’t see much point in supplying potential enemies with any information.”

Hadjar had heard a bit about the wars between Imperial schools. They were always waged with the tacit approval of The Darnassus military. However, there was one immutable law (because of which the School floated above the city): the war mustn’t spread beyond the territory of the attacked school. Otherwise, the punishing hand of the Emperor would ‘caress’ both institutions.

As they strolled along, Hadjar listened to Jean and looked at the other disciples. Most of them, like him, wore silver tokens on their chests. Gold ones were much rarer, emerald ones even rarer, and you almost never saw wooden ones. Due to some strange custom, the wooden tokens were reserved for the personal disciples of the School Masters and Mentors.

Every time he looked at the cultivators around him, Hadjar couldn’t help but compare them to the only measure of power he knew: the Shadow of Traves and Traves in his true form. Most of the disciples with the emerald tokens could fight Traves’ Shadow on equal terms. Some of them could even hurt it. A few of the inner circle disciples who’d participated in the exam could probably defeat his Shadow. But only Mentor Jean could’ve fought Traves in his true, dragon form.

 Jean pointed to a row of simple, four-story buildings:

“Those are the dormitories of fully-fledged disciples. Everyone has their own room, with everything they need for meditation and personal cultivation.”

Hadjar quickly counted the windows. It turned out that, on average, about three thousand fully-fledged disciples lived in ‘The Holy Sky’ School at any given moment.

“On the opposite side,” Jean gestured to the right. They saw two-story buildings that were far more luxurious. “Are the homes of the inner circle disciples. The rooms there are much more spacious and comfortable.”

Hadjar made the new calculations: about a hundred and fifty people.

“And those are the private homes of the top ten core disciples.”

“Top ten core disciples?” The same girl who’d asked the first question asked.

“Yes,” Jean said. “There aren’t many core disciples in the school. There’s rarely more than twenty of them. Most of them are at the top of the Jade Cloud list.”

“And what’s that?”

Jean smiled, but his eyes were full of gloom, doom, and overwhelming boredom.

“All in due time,” the Mentor answered. “By the way, only the inner circle disciples are allowed to leave the school grounds freely. They often use that privilege, and some of them even live in the city.”

Einen and Hadjar looked at each other. There was no doubt that the islander had also tried to count the number of various disciples. However, it turned out that their information wasn’t particularly accurate. Give or take twenty to thirty people.

“By the way, I forgot to tell you this.” Hadjar guessed he hadn’t forgotten, and had omitted the information on purpose. “As soon as you accepted the Academy badge, you took an oath not to divulge the information you receive here. This applies not only to any information about the School, but also to all the Techniques and knowledge that you may master during your time here.”

Hadjar touched his medallion involuntarily. In principle, there was nothing too worrisome about such an oath. It didn’t bind him in any way, and it was a perfectly normal precaution.

“Now, let’s continue our introductory session in the Treasure Tower.”

Such a simple, but oh so mesmerizing name — the Treasure Tower.

 

  

Up close, the tower looked even more imposing than it did from a distance. It was conical in shape and had seven floors. Images of dancing dragons, soaring phoenixes, and peacocks swirled around its facade. The latter were a symbol of the Empire. Its coat of arms was a depiction of a peacock feather assuming the form of the ‘power’ hieroglyph.

 “Gatekeeper.” Mentor Jean bowed low.

“Young Jean.” An old man wearing a grey, patched cape smiled. He sat on a chair near the entrance and looked dispassionately at his possessions. “I haven’t seen you here for a long time.”

“I was here yesterday, Gatekeeper.”