Warlock Apprentice

“You don’t know?” Greya grew doubtful. “Wasn’t it YOU who hid an item in the illusion?”

Item? It took Angor several seconds to realize that Greya had mistaken the source of Mystery energy as an actual Mystery item.

“Uhh, Lady Greya, I only placed a ‘sensation’, there is no real thing.”

“Sensation? Sensation…” Greya repeated that word and slowly nodded. Earlier, she did have a theory that Angor might have done such a thing instead of showing her a Mystery item for real.

But she still could not believe it.

“How did you do that? This is impossible for you unless you’ve become a—”

Angor no longer knew how to answer Greya’s questions for he could not tell her about Spotty.

Sunders suddenly interrupted them by asking, “Care to explain what this is all about?”

Angor silently sighed in relief.

Greya rolled her eyes. “I guess I’m not the only one with questions. Your student kept a lot of stuff from his teacher, eh?”

She meant to be sarcastic, but it sounded more like jealousy.

Sunders glanced at Angor.

Did he do something to annoy a wizard again? Impressive… to think that a truth-finder wizard like Greya would become so begrudging.

Sunders decided that he’d ask Angor about the details later.

But Greya saw through his mind. “I know you’re going to pester Angor in private again. Forget it. See for yourself.”

She glared at Angor and activated her brooch to expand the illusion, which covered all three of them.

Angor and Greya immediately saw through the thick mist that covered their visions and appeared on a small path.

The mist was an “entry test”, which asked for the viewers of the illusion to remove their spirit defense first. Anyone who refused to do so would not be allowed to enter the illusion.

Greya looked at the “starting cave path” and raised an eyebrow. She thought the illusion would take her to the Mysterious Mountain since her progression took her there.

Is this because we have more than one person coming?

“See that?” She said to Angor, “Your professor doesn’t trust you. He won’t open up his mind like me.”

Greya did not explain how the illusion worked beforehand just so that she could embarrass Sunders like this. Of course, she never expected to damage the relationship between these two gentlemen—she simply wished to find a chance to annoy Sunders.

“So, if that fool ever abandons you or gets into trouble and dies, you’re always welcomed to come to me.” Greya put a hand on Angor’s shoulder and showed an “I got you!” expression.

“I thought this dark night is used for hiding logic flaws, but I didn’t find any amateur mistakes. Remarkable.”

Sunders was somehow standing right behind them and was inspecting the surroundings curiously. “If I die someday, I believe Angor would have already become someone more powerful than you. Besides, nothing kills me easily, as you already know.”

You should forget about stealing Angor from me. Sunders said the last part using eye language.

Greya looked away and rolled her eyes.

Sunders joined Angor. “What’s the purpose of this illusion?”

As he believed, every illusion existed for a reason, such as killing or trapping enemies, or in some scenarios, entertaining someone, which was the case for Angor’s music boxes.

However, Sunders had not discovered Angor’s intention for making this one yet.

There was no way Angor would put something pretty to look at in Greya’s brooch. Telling from the ambiguous questions Greya just asked, Sunders knew that there was something important happening.

“Purpose?” Angor scratched his head. “I followed Lady Greya’s instructions, that’s it.”

He meant to say that the illusion was only following Greya’s request. He, as an alchemist, was simply finishing the order of a customer.

“What did she ask you to do?”

“That the illusion should contain the ‘sensation’ of the Nightmare Realm, and—”

“And creative,” Greya finished the answer for Angor. “So far, Angor satisfied both perfectly. No offense, but even if we do not consider his alchemy skills, he might be able to make his illusions more ingenious than yours, Mister Phantom.”

Again, Greya would like to frustrate Sunders’ ego when she had the chance, by using Sunders’ “profession” as a deadly weapon.

Sunders was checking the illusion without speaking. From here, he could not see where Angor’s “creativity” was, nor could he sense the ambiance of the Nightmare Realm.

He looked up at the moon.

The foundation of the illusion was quite fragile. It might confuse level-3 apprentices or weaker beings, but a wizard like him could break through it with a lift of a finger.

Of course, he wasn’t going to do such a thing since Greya was obviously trying to “enjoy” the illusion willingly.

I’ll just wait and see.

Greya moved to the stone stump and poked at the bells to make them ring. “Angor, did you design a different bus stop for each section?”

“Yes.” Angor nodded.

“The one in Witch’s Town… It took me a REALLY long time to find it.”

Angor thought about his little trick and chuckled. “I didn’t mean to make it too hard, Lady Greya. It’s supposed to be a fun secret.”

“Your ‘fun secret’ isn’t so fun to me when I wasted all that time.” Greya pretended to be angry, but she quickly gave up when she saw Angor being apologetic for real. “Fine. I’ll just consider it a small diversion on my travel.”

As they talked, Cat Bus came running at them.

Sunders stared at the strange vehicle, which looked like the unrestrained invention of a child. “Bus stop… So, this is the ‘bus’ you were talking about?”

Angor was a little embarrassed now. “Yes, sir. This is Cat Bus, who will help us get around in the illusion.”

Greya was already stepping into the bus. “I’m going to the Mysterious Mountain. You two want to tag along?”

Sunders shook his head. Judging from Greya’s actions, this “Mysterious Mountain” might be the final stop that held the biggest secret. Before going for it, Sunders would like to look around Angor’s illusion for a bit more.

Angor decided to stay with his professor. As a student, he certainly couldn’t escape when his teacher was going to examine his “homework”.

Greya told Cat Bus to bring her away. “I’ll be waiting there. Don’t take too long!”

After Greya left, Sunders copied her earlier action and sounded the bells as well.

Soon, another Cat Bus came to them.

“Cat Bus at your service. Where are you heading to?” The creature-vehicle looked at them using its eye-lights, which were a little bit too bright in the night.

“To Witch’s Town,” said Sunders, after checking the map.

…

Sunders didn’t say anything on their way, which made Angor a little nervous.

“Professor, I, um, I didn’t copy the exact Witch’s Town to my illusion. Since you know, I didn’t get to explore that place for real, so most of the scenery you’ll see later were made-up.”

Instead of commenting on Angor’s words, Sunders began telling Angor what he observed till now.

As Greya said, there were no obvious flaws in the illusion. However, Sunders noticed something else in the mountain woods.

“These woods look similar to what is growing in Fairy World. You copied from there, right?”

Angor nodded. He did bring a small part of the landscape in Fairy World into the illusion. However, most of the elements here such as the tarred road and “ordinary” bus signs were taken from films from Earth.

“Nice observation and memory skills. I see your travel in Fairy World did more help than harm to you. Using what you learned during your journey, you can construct better and more realistic illusions. Nature is always your best teacher.”

Sunders was very content to see Angor’s capability to learn. While it was true that master Illusionists were more free with their illusions, an apprentice like Angor had to base his illusions on solid logic.

Upon sensing the rich “nightmare ambiance” in Witch’s Town, Sunders was intrigued to realize that his student had divided the illusion into different sections, just like how the Nightmare Realm worked.

They traveled through the mist-covered town while Sunders carefully inspected it.

He didn’t show it, but deep inside, he was very pleased to see Angor recreated the ambiance of the Nightmare Realm almost perfectly in an illusion. Angor was probably the only individual in this world who could do so.

Anyone, including other truth-finder wizards, would admire such an exquisite illusion should they have a chance to see it.

After generally seeing through the entire town and experiencing the “nightmare stories” like Greya, Sunders gave Angor his final remark. “Your talent allows you to seize control of someone’s emotions by using nightmare illusions. However, such a ‘change of emotion’ is based on your own experience. For example, the terror I saw earlier is based on your mental conditions and how you comprehended what ‘terror’ is. The illusion will not work as intended if you always assume someone’s vulnerability using your own.”