On the stool beside the bed sat a stack of new clothes: grey-white linen undergarments, a blue-black woolen shirt, a black cowhide vest, a grey lambskin overcoat, black lantern trousers, and a pair of white woolen socks. Beside the stool stood a pair of black cowhide riding boots.
Lorist was quite pleased. Sister Louise knew his preferences—she'd chosen darker colors when buying the clothes, unlike some mercenaries who dressed in such garish outfits they looked more like clowns than actual clowns. Still, this new ensemble hadn't come cheap. It had probably set her back over a gold coin.
The clothes fit perfectly, and the boots were just the right size. He tucked the two daggers into the boot shafts, strapped the hand crossbow to his left forearm, buckled the shorter sword into the scabbard at his waist, and slung the longer sword diagonally across his back. After checking his coin purse and waist pouch and making sure he hadn't left anything in the room, Lorist locked the door and headed downstairs.
The lunch rush had already passed. Twenty-odd patrons still lingered in the common room, drinks in hand, listening to red-nosed Old Mike recite "The Sorrow of the Gods" in his deep, mournful voice. It was an epic poem about the war between mages and the gods thousands of years ago. The only flaw was that the author had taken the gods' side, condemning the mages—fellow humans—for waging war against the divine and lamenting the fall of the gods with great sorrow. Apart from this blemish, the poem was beautifully written, its plot twisting and dramatic, and it had always been beloved by the common folk. Countless bards performed it across the land, and it had been adapted into dances, plays, and sketches staged in taverns and theaters of every size.
Lorist found an empty table and sat down. Several patrons who recognized him raised their cups in silent greeting, which he returned before turning his attention back to Old Mike's recitation.
Sister Louise appeared at his table, lowering her voice. "I saw you sleeping soundly this morning, so I didn't wake you. The outfit looks quite handsome, doesn't it fit well?"
Lorist nodded. "Very comfortable. You went to too much trouble, Sister. What's there to eat now?"
"We got a batch of fresh cod this morning. Want me to fry one up?"
"Mm. Have Maidov pan-fry a cod fillet, bring me a bowl of rib soup, a plate of sausage fried rice, and a cup of dark plum ale. I need to report to the academy this afternoon."
"Coming right up. I'll tell Maidov to hurry so he doesn't delay you."
"Wait—" Lorist called after the departing Louise. "No rush about the academy. Sister, keep that second-floor room for me a few more days. I'll have my trunks and laundry brought over once they're cleaned. And pour Old Mike a cup of dark plum ale—put it on my tab."
After eating and drinking his fill, Lorist left the tavern and waited by the roadside for a moment before spotting a light, open-top hired carriage rolling past. He flagged it down. "
"You got it. Fifteen coppers—mind the step." The coachman in a brown uniform flicked the reins, and the dappled Dremond horse broke into a brisk trot.
Ten-odd minutes later, the carriage pulled up at the main gate of Dawn Academy. Lorist handed the coachman a small silver coin and told him to keep the five coppers in change as a tip. Amid the coachman's profuse thanks, he climbed down.
Dawn Academy was located in the western academy district of
A statue of a twelve- or thirteen-year-old girl wielding a sword to slay a massive wyrm at her feet stood before the main gate. This brave young girl was Loria, the Goddess of Dawn—the eldest daughter of Sigwa, God of Light and the Sun and War, and Daflyn, Goddess of the Silver Moon. In the mythology of the Galentea Continent, the Dark Dragon King of the Western Sea despised the radiance shed by Sigwa's chariot as the Sun God made his daily rounds across the world. He set a trap luring the five divine steeds drawing the chariot onto the Road of the Abyss. In that dire moment, young Loria stepped forth, battling the Dark Dragon King and slaying him, setting the five divine steeds back on the right path and allowing the Sun God's light to drive away the darkness. For this, she earned herself the divine title of Goddess of Dawn.
Dawn—the moment when darkness breaks and light is about to arrive. In the chronicles of the gods of Galentea, the Goddess of Dawn represents courage and hope.
Walking past the statue—which students privately mocked as "Wyrm Robs Little Girl"—Lorist stood before the main gate of Dawn Academy. To call it a "main gate" was generous; there was no actual gate frame, posts, or doors. In truth, the tree-lined avenue stretching before him, together with the statue of the Goddess of Dawn behind it, served as the entrance to the academy.
Lorist let out a quiet sigh and pulled a black iron badge the width of two fingers from his waist pouch, pinning it to his chest. The badge was shaped like a broadsword, its blade adorned with three silver stars—the badge of a
There was no help for it. Wearing a Combat Force badge was mandatory to enter and leave the academy; that was one of its rules. Professors wore professor identity badges, instructors wore instructor identity badges, and students wore student identity badges. All were required at all times. Lorist, as a dual instructor in both swordsmanship and Combat Force, wore both.
Up ahead, several boys and girls in Dawn Academy student uniforms came bouncing along the path, around fourteen or fifteen years old—probably new students just enrolled. Lorist knew that recruitment had taken place little more than a month ago. Looking at these young faces, he couldn't help but recall himself ten years ago, just as green and eager as they were. How quickly time flew.
The students barely glanced at Lorist at first. Students of his age were a common sight at the academy—even people in their thirties and forties could be found among the student body. But the moment they spotted the gold badge on his chest, they jumped and quickly stepped to the side of the path, bowing their heads respectfully.
Lorist smiled and nodded in acknowledgment, then continued on his way. At Dawn Academy, making way and bowing to instructors was the most basic requirement of etiquette.
Behind him came a burst of excited, whispered chatter.
"That's Teacher Locke—the legendary Black Iron–Gold instructor of our academy!"
"A Black Iron Three-Star Combat Force badge and a gold instructor badge—the rumors are true! I heard even Silver-tier swordsmen are no match for him. They call him Invincible Among Silver…"
"I really hope he's our Combat Force instructor. Three years running now, and every single student he's taught has awakened their Combat Force. The batch from three years ago are all Black Iron rank already…"
"I heard from the seniors that…"
"…"
On the Galentea Continent, Combat Force and swordsmanship represented power. Combat Force was divided into four tiers—Bronze, Black Iron, Silver, and Gold—each further split into three star levels. Above Gold Three-Star stood the Great Swordmaster and Sword Saint ranks. For someone like Lorist to remain stuck at the peak of Black Iron Three-Star for three or four years was utterly unprecedented. Aside from the Gold Three-Star peak stage, where advancing to Great Swordmaster required personal enlightenment, the Bronze, Black Iron, and Silver stages would typically see quick breakthroughs once a practitioner hit Three-Star peak. This was the main reason Lorist had become both a legend and a laughingstock at Dawn Academy.
Ten years ago, a carriage bearing the crest of a roaring bear had delivered a fourteen-year-old noble boy from the far north of the Krisen Empire to Dawn Academy. Maidov—the current fat head chef of the Red Crow Tavern—was still running a snack stall with his parents at the academy gate back then, and he clearly remembered the young noble who climbed down from that carriage. The boy's face was written over with a hundred and twenty kinds of defiance. His sidelong glance swept over Maidov's family like they were less than dirt, dismissing them with utter contempt. He was cold, cold to the very bone—the very pinnacle of arrogance.
Less than a month later, Maidov heard that the arrogant young noble had gotten into a conflict at the academy and been beaten so badly he needed three months of bed rest.
More than three months passed before Maidov saw the boy again. The arrogant youth was gone. In his place stood a bright-eyed, smiling boy with a sunny disposition, extending a hand toward him. "Hey, nice to meet you. I'm
It took Maidov a long time to figure out that Lorist had befriended him purely because he couldn't stand the academy's meals—the thin gruel, black bread, mashed potatoes, and vegetable soup served three times a day, every day, utterly unchanged. It had driven Lorist to Maidov's snack stall to scratch the itch for the hometown delicacies he craved.
Maidov would never forget the first time Lorist showed off his cooking at the stall. He and his parents had watched in stunned silence as Lorist took the humble ingredients they had on hand and produced dish after dish of previously unheard-of delicacies, impossibly fragrant and appetizing. His younger siblings had drooled at the sight.
At the time, Maidov's stall sold nothing more than boiled apples, boiled edamame, roasted potatoes and sausages, plus some braised lamb offal and other drinking snacks—enough to earn a few large silver coins a month and barely get by. After Lorist started coming around, the stall quickly became a must-visit food destination among the students. Its iron-plate grill and sausage fried rice swept through the entire academy district, and business boomed.
Young Maidov worked hard to learn what Lorist called his hometown's traditional recipes, and Lorist held nothing back, telling him that Maidov had a genuine talent for becoming a great chef. In young Maidov's heart, Lorist's homeland must have been the legendary, mysterious land of fine cuisine. He hoped that one day he could make a pilgrimage there with a devout heart.
Eventually, Lorist could no longer bear Maidov's pestering and relentless probing about his hometown. He told him with perfect seriousness that these dishes were not traditional delicacies from his hometown at all. They came from a cookbook passed down through his family—a secret recipe collection of dishes that mages had enjoyed thousands of years ago, which his ancestors had obtained through sheer chance. Unfortunately, many of the original ingredients could no longer be found, so he had simply adapted the recipes using available ingredients and common cooking methods.
Only then did Maidov give up his dream of making a pilgrimage to the land of fine cuisine.
Time flew like an arrow. In the blink of an eye, five years passed. Maidov's parents, having made a small fortune, grew tired of the hectic city life of running a stall. They bought a small farmstead in the suburbs and took Maidov's younger siblings off to tend the fields, while Maidov himself was hired as head chef of the Red Crow Tavern at a handsome salary. Lorist was nineteen at the time, at the Black Iron Two-Star Combat Force level. His exceptional swordsmanship had just earned him an invitation from the academy to serve as a probationary swordsmanship instructor—a first instructor position, with a bright future stretching before him.
A laughingstock. A swordsmanship prodigy. A Combat Force waste. Such was the perception of Lorist.
Apart from the minor, obscure academies, virtually all instructors at any institution of repute possessed Combat Force of Silver rank or above. At a top-ten academy on the Galentea Continent like Dawn Academy, even probationary instructors were Silver Three-Star. For someone like Lorist, with his Black Iron Combat Force, to hold gold instructor badges in both swordsmanship and Combat Force was utterly unique—and naturally drew mockery and hostility.
His gold Combat Force instructor badge had been earned because, for three consecutive years, every single student in Lorist's Combat Force introductory classes had awakened their Combat Force. This one-hundred-percent success rate was completely unprecedented. Even when a Great Swordmaster had once led a Combat Force introductory class, only twenty-five of twenty-six noble students had awakened—the last one was deemed to have too thin a bloodline. That result had been hailed as the highest ever achieved. Typically, a Combat Force introductory class would consider itself extremely successful if two-thirds of its students awakened.
Lorist's first Combat Force introductory class had seventeen students—not a single noble among them, all commoners. No one else wanted to teach them, so they were pushed onto Lorist. Within a single semester, all seventeen had awakened their Combat Force, shocking the entire academy. The following year, his class had thirty-odd students, and again every one of them awakened within a single semester. By the third year, the class had swelled to fifty-nine students, more than a dozen of whom were noble enrollees who had come specifically because of his reputation. Most notably, three of them were students who had previously failed to awaken their Combat Force.
Failing to awaken Combat Force didn't mean it was impossible to ever do so—the success rate for subsequent attempts was simply extremely low. But as the third semester drew to a close, all three of these previously failed students, like everyone else in the class, successfully awakened their Combat Force. This caused an uproar not only at Dawn Academy but at every other academy in Morant City. Lorist became an overnight legend. Three consecutive semesters with a perfect awakening record made it indisputable that he had earned the gold Combat Force instructor badge.
As for the gold swordsmanship instructor badge, Lorist had won it through duels. Over those three years, he had fought nearly a hundred duels against Silver-ranked students and instructors at Dawn Academy without a single defeat—not only earning a tidy sum but also earning the title "Invincible Among Silver."
Walking along the tree-lined avenue, Lorist thought back over his ten years at the academy—the gains, the losses, the sweet moments, the bitter ones. For a moment, he was overcome with emotion…