The party of twelve, including Han Shuo, were overwhelmed by the magnificence of the city gates when they arrived in the city of Zajoski. The gates were all extraordinarily palatial and made of the strongest rock. They were, the colour of dried blood, and no one knew if it was because too much of it had soaked the stones.
Numerous guards in full body armour patrolled the walls, several metres above the ground. All sorts of defences could be seen on the walls.
From a distance, the city gates looked like the open, fanged mouth of a bloodthirsty magical creature, devouring everything under the sun. Several sharp, cold hangnails, like the sharp teeth of the creature's month, peppered the walls. Their cold light sparkled in the sunlight, giving the people an incredibly chilling, spectacular feeling.
The two inky-black, grand gates, refined by who-knew-what, were open. The entrance to the city was huge, enough for ten horses to walk in side by side. It was quite crowded outside the gate, and various mammoth and strange magical creatures were slowly making their way through the entrance into the city, with all sorts of people and things on their backs.
These magical creatures were bigger than any beasts Han Shuo had seen before. They were about five metres tall and about ten metres long. Their skin was dark brown, and their heads were shaped like elephants. Their faces were covered in wrinkles, with two curved white tusks protruding from their cheeks. The tusks themselves were a metre long.
"This is an earth dragon, a gentler type of magical creature. They are easily tamed and move slowly, but can carry heavy loads. They're a popular means of transport in the Empire. Merchants use them to transport heavy loads and to trade with different regions. Fanny explained with a smile as she saw many students looking at the earth dragons in amazement.
"Master Fanny, take care of them while I go check in at the officers' quarters. I'll also borrow some battle steeds, otherwise we'll never make it to Drol by nightfall on foot." Gene looked at Fanny with sparkling eyes and spoke with a smile. His gaze fell on Fanny's beautiful face and didn't leave it for a moment.
The entire Necromancy Major knew of Gene's feelings for Fanny. Fanny herself was well aware, but never said anything. Gene wasn't in a hurry and seemed to want to move Fanny with his sincerity. He often used different ways to express his feelings, and staring at her for long periods of time was one of them.
Han Shuo cursed privately when he saw Gene's unfettered gaze. In Han Shuo's mind, Fanny had long since become his personal property. Of course, he would be annoyed if other people looked at her in front of him, but at the moment, he was just an errand slave and wasn't strong enough to show his strength. So even though it annoyed him,
He had to control himself.
"Mm. Go on, I'll watch them carefully." Fanny gave a lukewarm reply and agreed with a smile, avoiding Gene's fiery gaze. She turned her head to look at the magnificent city walls and said with emotion, "Although I've seen this many times, I'm always proud of the Zajoski city gates when I come back to visit. It's because of these sturdy gates that the fierce orcs have always retreated with nothing to show for their efforts."
Han Shuo was weighed down with all sorts of items and was about to drown in it all. Everyone had stopped at that moment except Han Shuo. He bent and then straightened his legs, twisted his wrists, and repeated the same boring movements.
"Bryan, what are you doing?" Amy stood next to Han Shuo and saw the piles of items moving along with Han Shuo's body. It caught her eye and she asked in surprise.
The others noticed his movements after Amy had spoken and also turned their attention to Han Shuo, a confused look on each of their faces.
"Nothing much, I'm just feeling a bit sore and moving around will help!" Han Shuo replied calmly with a stupid expression on his face, truly looking more than a little stupid.
"Fool, be careful. You're carrying valuable items. If you accidentally break one, we wouldn't be able to cover the losses even if we sold you." Bella frowned and said coldly.
"Bella, you're such an idiot. These things are quite strong. How could they break so easily? No one allowed him to carry anything really precious or fragile." Lisa gave Bella a look of disdain and replied sarcastically.
"You ladies are always fighting... stop it. We always run into some kind of danger, big or small, when we travel to train in the outside world. You should stick together as a team or we'll have problems later on." Fanny frowned and tried to separate the two when she saw that Lisa and Bella were about to argue again.
Han Shuo completely ignored Bella's cold sneers and continued to repeat these boring actions. These moves hadn't been left behind in Chu Cang Lan's memories, but were muscle building actions that Han Shuo had seen before. In order to further improve his body and break out of the 'solid realm', Han Shuo used every second to train his body.
After a while, Gene returned with an ugly expression and empty hands. As he walked over to Fanny, he said angrily, "Damn it! They asked me for money!"
Fanny's elegant eyebrows knitted together and she spoke in surprise at hearing these words. "Our Babylonian Academy of Magic and Strength is the cradle for the knights, warriors and mages of the realm. We nurture so many talents for the Empire every year. Even many of the guards and mages stationed in the city of Zajoski have graduated from our academy. There's a protocol between the Academy and Zajoski. How dare they not lend us battle steeds?"
The guard offered to lend me the steeds when I said I was from the Academy. When I showed him my credentials and he saw that we were from the Necromancy Major, he actually made fun of me. He demanded fifty gold and said that we wouldn't get the steeds if we didn't pay. He added that our Necromancy Major had never cultivated any talents for the Empire, so we shouldn't get any free benefits. Gene was furious and bit off his words.
When the students heard his words, they too found a common enemy and shouted angrily, calling for revenge against the guard. It seems that the feeling of contempt was hard to swallow. These students were already a little resentful of having joined an unpopular major, and now that they were being ignored, they could hardly contain their anger.
"Forget it, take fifty gold for him from the funds. These guards have lived here for a long time. On top of that, our major has really gone downhill and has a lower status in the academy. It's no wonder they think less of us. I will report this matter to the Dean when I return. Let's not get into a fight with them now. Fanny shook her head, said a few conciliatory words with a dejected look on her face, and finally gave Gene this answer.
Gene disagreed with Fanny's words at first, saying that they could not allow such arrogant soldiers to strut around, but after a few soothing words from Fanny, he sighed slowly and shook his head, gloomily accepting fifty gold coins from Fanny's hands and walking to the side of the city gates.
Han Shuo watched a few people, then looked at the despondent Fanny. He glanced at the distant guard and swore to himself that one day, through his hands, the Necromancy Major would return to its former glory and the people would tremble in fear at the sound of a Necromancer.
"Do not be depressed. No one dared look down on us when the Necromancy Major was at its height. It's just that for a while the Necromancy Major suffered from the ostracism of all the Majors. Legends tell of a great magical war that caused many casualties among the necromancers and the loss of many incredibly powerful spells. This led to the decline of necromancy.
Our journey to the Dark Forest this time is in search of a graveyard I've heard rumours of. It's said that a wise mage who studied necromancy for many years once resided in the graveyard. If we can find the graveyard and obtain the magical tomes of necromancy within, we may be able to change the current situation of the necromancer. Fanny spoke words of comfort as she saw the students becoming melancholy.
Many cheered up as they heard Fanny's words, expressions of joy and amazement on their faces. It seemed that they were all ready to give their all to this time's outing.
Seeing the eagerness on everyone's faces, Fanny let out a silent, involuntary sigh. Although news of the discovery of the graveyard had spread, the person who discovered it died not long after leaving it.
The Dark Forest was vast, and searching for anything in it was like looking for a needle in a haystack. Even she didn't have much hope. Besides, if such a place were actually discovered, it would surely attract a horde of adventurers. It would be a bit unrealistic to think that the power of her band of twelve would be able to retrieve what they needed at this time.
Fanny only wanted to comfort everyone with her words. The main purpose of this trip was to test the students' understanding of necromancy and to help them realise magical knowledge in the real world.
"Huh? Aren't those people from Necromancy Major? Are you adventurers too? Hehe, why are you all standing here?" A sweet voice sounded from afar as the necromancy students were lost in their own thoughts.
It was Irene, the Light student from last time, and a few other Light students and teachers. Her ardent follower, Claude, was also mounted on a large battle steed and came clattering in from the distance.
"None of your business. Don't fall off your horse now." Lisa looked at Irene with contempt and sneered back.
"Hehe, I know, you couldn't have borrowed any battlesteeds. Ai, that's a foregone conclusion. Your necromancy major hasn't contributed anything to the empire, so of course it's a bit inappropriate for you to use the empire's resources without paying!" Irene chuckled charmingly as sarcasm and mockery filled her holy features.
Although Lisa and company were furious, they couldn't find the words to retort when Irene spoke the truth. They could only grit their teeth and seethe inwardly.
"Hello Master Fanny." Light Adept Mage Beacher was mounted on a battle steed and greeted Fanny with a smile.
"Hello Beacher, are you also heading to the Dark Forest for adventure?" Fanny smiled in return and commented lightly.
"Yes, we are planning to travel to the Dark Forest and hunt down the magical creatures that often plague the villages around the forest. We'll be testing the students' mastery of magic and at the same time giving something back to the Empire. Ha, we're off, see you later!" Beacher replied in a gentlemanly manner, but Han Shuo could still see a hint of disdain in his eyes, as if Beacher looked down on the necromancy crew.
Gene finally brought over six battle steeds after Beacher and the Light Major folk rode by on their large horses. Gene's horses were obviously inferior to those of the light major students, both in size and number. It seemed that even after paying fifty gold more, the necromancy major still couldn't get equal treatment.
But the necromancy group numbered twelve, while there were only six battle horses. So each horse had to carry twice as much. The students looked at each other and quickly paired up, leaving Han Shuo, Fanny, Gene and Bach as the odd ones out.
Bach, you and Bryan will share a horse while I ride one with Master Fanny. Gene's eyes darted quickly and he became overjoyed as he connected the dots. He smiled happily at Bach.
"No! I'm definitely not riding a horse with that dirty errand slave!" Bach held a grudge against Han Shuo and immediately shouted in dissatisfaction.
Everyone knew Gene's thoughts. This was a golden opportunity to get close to Fanny. He was about to react angrily to Bach's shout when Fanny suddenly smiled. "Since Bach is unwilling, I'll ride with Bryan."
"Heh heh, thank you Master Fanny. I'm coming!" Han Shuo was elated and brushed past Gene happily, striding quickly towards Fanny.
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