The days passed quickly. A cool breeze came from the west, carrying autumn with it.
Almost a month had passed since me and my home-buddy Caras started living together. Each day was filled with more laughs and smiles than the previous.
Right now, I am writing a letter to my dear readers. "Dear Webnovel staff. I think that 4400 words should qualify me for an entrance in the WPC 278. Dear readers, you better make me happy and follow my story, or I can't promise Caras' well-being.
Sincerely yours, Dorian."
"Wait, didn't you think telespectators were watching us?" Theodore asked, confused by my letter.
"Yeah, but Steven was right. It's crazy to think there are people watching everything we do. Readers are much more reasonable. Could a person watching us on Tv even understand what's going on with all these different personalities?" I answered, proud of my reasoning.
"..." With the voices finally shut, I sealed the letter and delivered it to the crackling fireplace. The light paper ignited and pushed up by the warm currents flew slightly before falling as ashes.
"Watching stuff burn has made me hungry. Caras, make me a sandwich and don't you dare Cosby it, or your ass is next." I ordered the pudgy man acting as my footrest in front of the fireplace.
With a grunt of pain, he went to the kitchen. Meanwhile, I read the magician's diary.
In the beginning, I couldn't make sense of any of its weird squiggly characters. But after Caras volunteered to teach Theodore to read and write, the shared memory ability that linked all of us personas taught us too.
With his perfect memory and academic interest in learning something new, it took Theodore barely three weeks before he could read a dictionary by himself and supplement the lacking vocabulary.
He also experimented with the in-built translator inside of hour head. Whenever we speak to a native of this world, he wouldn't hear the words we used, as proven by the fact that they would always change some terms in synonyms when asked to repeat.
For example, when I gently asked Caras for a sandwich and to not Cosby it, lacking the cultural context, he heard, "don't drug it."
Truly marvelous.
Back to the book.
It turned out to be the diary and experiment journal of a young apprentice, Rodel Hash, starting his journey into the magic world.
It started with a page filled with the excitement of being chosen to learn under a certain "master Orwell." The two traveled the world together, looking for hotspots where to gather mana and supernatural phenomena to study.
Master Orwell spent idle time on the road retelling his life experiences and stories he heard in the passing.
The pages written in neat calligraphy summarized every lesson given by Orwell and Rodel's experiments and observations. Orwell's lessons grew sparser as he flipped through, and Rodel's experiments took their place. Even the tone he used to describe his master cooled down as he went forward.
A small entry described a fight between the two of them.
"I can't believe that obstinate goat refused my offer! I managed to reach his level after a few years, and yet he doesn't see a problem with it. His methods are flawed and unambitious. Following him, I'm also destined for a life of mediocrity. Yesterday I was inspired during a dream to devise a way to open a portal to the netherworld to harness its energy. Why should we run around looking for scraps of mana when we could seize the source! Tomorrow I'll prove to him that my method is better, and then our roles will reverse. I, Rodell Hash, will become the master!"
I could feel the foreboding almost oozing from the pages. Imagine having a dream about summoning something from hell and thinking it was a good idea.
Next to the entry, a diagram he was familiar with filled an entire page, a summoning formation, however, he could spot various flaws, and the outer circle was missing!
"Yup, someone bout to die."
The next page started as expected.
"Master Orwell is dead. The beast that came out of the formation proved too strong to suppress. I used all the mana accumulated for two years and barely stalled him for a few minutes. Thankfully master Orwell heard us and managed a powerful sneak attack on the monster.
With what must have been 30 years of painstaking mana accumulation in one spell, he managed to explode his heart and vaporize the left side of his chest! Yet, it still managed to emit a shrill shriek that devastated my master and half a mile of forest. I mourn my mentor's death but, at the same time, can't hide my adoration for the beast."
"The power to ignore bullets and blades, to play with other's lives as he pleases. That's what I aspired to achieve when I embarked on this journey, and IT WILL BE MINE." The last four words reeked of insanity and were underlined three times. A drawing of a monster accompanied the entry.
"That's a sweet ass entry." At three meters, the fellow demon towered a smaller drawing of an average man. A crown of horns grew around his head, and his spine extended into a scorpion tail. The part that had drawn the most curiosity and had even been drawn twice was a little gem growing in the middle of the beast's chest muscles.
According to the little wizard, the five-colored diamond was able to store vast quantities of mana. On the other hand, the horns would steadily produce and gather mana seemingly out of nowhere.
According to previous entries, Rodell's ever-expanding spell repertoire ranged from elemental spells to sinister methods that excited Dorian. The most lethal of the bunch worked like a microwave, instantly vaporizing blood inside a body and causing it to rupture the body from within.
And the big man here apparently effortlessly survived something like that! "Damn, I also wanna go around like the hulk smashing people and stuff."
Caras came back and offered me my sandwich. I sent him to wait in the corner as I kept reading.
Suddenly, the ink started wriggling, forming the portrait of a man. Its deep eyes left even the stoic me with quite an impact.
"Raimi, how are your-" The ink portrait stopped as he noticed a person different from his student flipping through the pages.
"Who are you? Where is my student, and why are you reading my diary?" The voice demanded loudly.
"Wrong number, man." I quickly closed the book on his face. "Nice quick-thinking, Dorian. Once again, you saved the day." Theodore mocked as the book started shaking angrily.