Damian looked at the maid in disbelief.
He's only eleven!
Damian pushed the heavy cart into a separate room that was too small to be considered a room and slammed the door shut in front of the maid, who seemed ready to do anything.
The maid straightened up and pouted sadly.
At that moment, the maid responsible for delivering books to 603 approached, pushing an empty cart.
She looked at the young servant standing outside the door with empty hands and was somewhat surprised. "Didn't she let you in?"
"He didn't; I think he's too small to consider such things."
Damian didn't know that the person outside the door had considered him prey and was taking every book, reading it with a happy face.
Each of these books is very thick.
Some introduce magical animals, plants, and minerals into this world.
Some describe the characteristics and legends of some common ghosts and monsters.
Some are like foreign language textbooks, but they are as complex and difficult to understand as English-Euskara dictionaries.
There are also photographs, but the ones inside are all rare and terrifying; if you look at them for too long, they might even cause nightmares.
After leafing through nearly every book, Damian went to look at the things covered in black velvet.
There's a crystal ball that he's seen before, but it's not pure black, but rather transparent.
There's a set of glass or crystal test tubes and a small crucible.
There's also a large wooden box, divided into more than a dozen compartments containing different items; there are several sets of clothes and an unranked wizard apprentice badge.
These things were introduced in the apprentice manual. Damian took the manual, compared each item one by one, and finally understood everything.
Damian pinned the apprentice badge to his coat and ran his fingers over the slightly rough texture.
Thinking about tomorrow's first public class, Damian took out a copy of "Wizard's Language: An Introduction to Wizard Knowledge," sat down at the long table, and started previewing it.
But at that moment, the black book floating to his right side caught his eye.
"[… Era Calendar of The Great Mage Flamme, unknown moon year, you have survived for 3 days.
You're lucky; you've inherited an impressive legacy of magical spells and methods to make yourself strong, which you should use as soon as possible. Death is just around the corner, and you have nothing to defend yourself with; my recommendation is to train your friend and learn a basic spell, the simple purple lightning.
Don't be discouraged; although it's the easiest spell to learn, I assure you that as long as you train it to perfection in five years, it will be a powerful spell that you can make many more variations of…]"
Damian froze, staring at the words in the black book, about to say something, when suddenly the book he had been thinking about appeared in front of his eyes.
"Modified Violet Lightning Breathing Method and Spell." Damian watched as the spell was recorded on one of the black pages of the floating book.
"[… Violet Lightning Spell: A purple lightning bolt descending from the sky, causing damage to enemies and temporarily stunning them.
Because you are too weak, you have a different version that you could use once you learn to manipulate your magic.
Growing Lightning Finger Spell: A bolt shoots out from the tip of your finger; by maximizing the ring you have in your possession, you can unleash a powerful attack that, as long as it is understood, will make you invincible...]"
Damian immediately understood much of the simple spell that the black book had written for him to learn, so after understanding this spell, he wanted to use it but restrained himself.
After all, he had only recently learned that he would become a wizard's apprentice, and Damian didn't want to hurt himself while training. Besides, he first wanted to learn that breathing method that would teach him to keep his magical aura hidden so as not to scare anyone.
Seeing that there were no windows in this room and no one could see him, he knew he had plenty of time before tomorrow, so he decided to first memorize the breathing method.
Damian knew he wasn't weak; he had discovered that the previous owner of this body had a great deal of well-controlled magical power, but he didn't know what it was until he received another part of his predecessor's memories.
From what he had remembered a few moments ago, his parents were great wizards who controlled lightning and fire as if they were gods walking the earth. However, the city where they lived was one of the border ones, and they received a devastating attack where all the demonic generals as well as the Demon King attacked.
The memories were vague, but he knew that someone had brought him to this magic tower, not far from where the demons were trying to advance into the human realm.
"They were very strong," Damian thought as he looked at the magic particles surrounding his body.
At this moment, for some reason, he knew that he would avenge his parents' deaths; yes, they were his parents. Upon obtaining his predecessor's memories, for some reason, he felt pity and anger, so as a thank you for being able to continue living, he would fulfill the promise his predecessor made long ago.
"[ShadowStorm Breathing]"
This was the name of the breathing technique to move magic within his body and completely suppress it; the ring also had an isolation function, and as long as there were no powerful wizards, no one could notice the magical exhaustion here.
While memorizing this breathing method, Damian had lunch, brought by a servant, and continued learning this complex method.
Classes would start tomorrow, so he couldn't stay up late, but Damian wasn't worried about that.
After a few hours, Damian stretched his waist, and the muscles of his body began to groan in pain, but he was in good spirits and didn't feel lethargic or tired.
After passing the mental strength test to become a wizard's apprentice, he discovered that his energy had increased significantly, as if some valve had opened in his body.
During those days when he was still a servant, he worked until midnight, was pulled out of bed at four, and then got up to work.
At that time, he never felt like he had slept enough.
But right now, that was changing, so he prepared to spend the whole night learning and practicing.
"Is it my imagination? It seems like my mental strength and magic are much stronger than before." Damian knew this was due to reading, but he hadn't practiced yet. How exactly had his strength increased so noticeably?
Shirtless, Damian wasn't surprised to see all his muscles marked. This had happened after that potion Syndra gave him came into contact with his hands; it seemed like the function of that thing was to increase muscle size to avoid dying from hand-to-hand combat.
Wizards had a weak physique; this condition forced them to have a vanguard supporting them in battle, but that would change somewhat if they had a strong physique.
"Well, I want to train..." Damian murmured, very excited.
Whether in a room or in a hallway, the intensity of the candle illuminating his body could be dimmed, but it should not be extinguished.
This is common sense that even servants know.
Lying on the bed, Damian was a bit excited again.
This bed is about a meter and a half wide, making it much more spacious and comfortable than the large bunk where he used to sleep.
Damian stretched his arms and legs in an attempt to occupy the entire bed, but now he was young and very thin, so there was only enough space for him to lie on his side.
"[… Era Calendar of The Great Mage Flamme, unknown moon year, you have survived for 3 days.
You have memorized the ShadowStorm Breathing method and seem very excited, but for this method to be more effective, you must do it my way."
Damian looked at the instructions behind him and felt confused. Wouldn't anything happen even if he didn't attend classes? Then how would he learn?
Everything was too confusing; how exactly would he learn about magic if he skipped apprentice classes?
But refocusing his attention on this book once more, he thought that somehow it was pushing him to become stronger in the shortest time possible.
Well, he had lost a lot of time, so he shouldn't delay further.
"All for my future..."