my age of magic

Chapter 206 6. The Forgotten Corner

It was a clean long street with many shops on both sides of the street.Most of the houses in El City are of brick and wood structure. Residents here like to build houses with red exterior walls, pointed roofs, and beautiful attics, just like small villas standing on the street. A small yard that is not too big. There is a lemon tree planted in the yard, which is covered with very small green fruits. It seems that the flowers on the lemon tree may have just withered. My adoptive parents live here .

I like the antique walnut furniture in the house, I also like those carved glass windows, I even like the small attic with bright and clean windows, and the dry and fluffy little bed full of soap smell.But the reason why I really chose this place is that this small attic can just see the villa of Sister Guoguo's house.

The adoptive father's name is Leant. He is a teacher who teaches swordsmanship. He teaches swordsmanship at a school called Stans War College in El City. He is a very gentle person with blond hair and wears sheepskins for training all day long. Leggings and a white shirt embroidered with lace, the beard is very clean.He rarely carried a sword except when he was in class.He told me to just call him by his first name.His wife, my adoptive mother, named Fanny, was a judge in the Court of Arbitration.But I think she prefers to do housework at home, and her fried onion pancakes taste great.They are not aristocratic families, they can only be regarded as ordinary families that have just reached the level of the rich, because both of them have very decent jobs, their monthly salary is quite good, their living conditions are very relaxed, and they are eligible for adoption.

I later found out why they adopted me, and they adopted me not because they ever lost a son or something, but because they had a daughter named Tracy who was three years older than me , currently studying at Steins College.The laws of the Green Empire require that women in the empire need to marry before the age of 25, otherwise they will be considered a violation of the law.Because the Green Empire is generally faced with the embarrassing situation of having too many boys and girls, this makes it difficult for girls in many families to find a suitable partner to marry, and even if they marry, it is not easy to have a happy marriage.

For the sake of their daughter's life-long happiness, they unexpectedly came up with a strange way.This is also what Fanny, the adoptive mother of the judge of the arbitration office, thought of adopting an orphan and cultivating his excellent moral character and good education since he was a child.In addition, in this way, Tracy and Tracy can grow up together and establish a good relationship foundation. Maybe my daughter will have a happy second half of her life in the future.Of course, this requires me to be able to come back from the battlefield alive.

In fact, this cheap elder sister doesn't like me. On the contrary, she always feels that I have separated half of the father's love and mother's love, and regards me as the enemy of life and death.Tracy's swordsmanship is very good, thanks to her adoptive father Ryan, but her character is more like her adoptive mother Fanny, introverted but with her own ideas. She usually likes to sit in front of the attic window and watch some " "Knight's Travels" and other books about adventure, but she never had the idea of ​​going out for adventure. She has her own circle of friends, and she doesn't mind if friends know me, so she always keeps silent about me.

The days passed day by day like this, I was like a bird in a cage, on weekdays, unless Fanny formally invited me, I would rather lock myself in the attic room and stay for a whole day.Leant and Fanny were very worried about this. They thought that I was a little introverted. Maybe it was a mild autism caused by early family changes. They often encouraged me to go out more and play with the children on the street. But even on the street, I just like to stand quietly on the side of the road and watch those children of my age. Those games are so boring to me.

Every year in November, when spring comes in the Green Continent, I will take a small trip with my luggage on my back. I will go upstream along the White Elephant River, at the three-fork intersection of the river near Sloit City, Turn around and go upstream along the Benma River until you reach the Baipu Cliff at the foot of the Pai Plateau, where you stand like a jade belt pouring straight from the sky.

During the first trip, Leant and Fanny worried for a long time. During the second trip, I was really moved by Fanny's countless reminders before I left.Leant even took the time to let me learn some sword skills.He felt that awakening the magic pool during the magic awakening ceremony is good, but after all, it is a one-in-a-million thing. If there is no awakening magic pool, then go to Zhanzheng College to learn techniques and tactics. Maybe it is a good idea to choose the same school as Tracy. .

It has been the fifth year since I came to El City. When I walked out of El City with a travel bag on my back, I saw Fanny’s worried eyes in the glass window of the door. She has been feeling more and more worried recently. As we get along longer and the relationship between each other is getting deeper, she is more and more worried that one day I may leave without saying goodbye. She covered her mouth and tried not to let her tears flow down. When I turned my head to When she waved goodbye, she could still nod to me with a smile on her face, and I knew that there must be tears in her eyes in the frosted glass window.

I said to myself that I must go and come back quickly this time, so as not to worry Fanny.In fact, I don't know why I always have to take such a trip every spring when it is about to pass.Maybe it was because those memories were deeply engraved in my mind, I thought to myself: maybe I was thinking that one day I would suddenly reunite with Sister Guoguo at the foot of the Baipu cliff.

...beautiful dividing line...

Starting from El City and walking northwest along the White Elephant River, there is a corner that has been forgotten by the world in the mountains that stretch for dozens of miles. It is called the cursed land.

It is full of blue-spotted weeds that even yellow sheep don't like to eat, withered and leafless blood-sucking trees that can suck the blood of humans and animals, burnt fruit trees with blue flames burning all over their bodies, and other things. mutant plants.The vegetation here is very special. Many plants will cause people to contract some strange diseases if they are eaten by mistake. According to legend, tens of thousands of years ago, a strong man from the hell demon clan died here. His body turned into The mountains stretching for dozens of kilometers, his flesh and blood nourished the land here, turning the originally fertile mountains into barren land.This place and the surrounding area are not suitable for human survival, so it is almost forgotten by the people nearby.

Four years ago, I accidentally broke into this place along the Benma River, only to find that this place is different from other places. The soil here is black and shiny, and when I step on it, it seems that grease can seep out of the soil.The plants here are very novel to me, and most of them are species that I have never seen before. There is almost no introduction to these plants in the old Kuru's parchment scroll plant encyclopedia, so everything here makes me Feeling extra curious.

Every year when I travel, I will stay here for a few days to study new species here.

In the depths of these mountains, there is an abandoned old castle. In fact, this old castle manor built on the mountain is not too big, but when I found it, it seemed to have been abandoned for many years.I have asked the residents outside the cursed land about this ancient castle. Many people do not know its existence, and the residents near here are very afraid of the cursed land, thinking that the cattle and sheep have eaten the meat of the cursed land Grass will go crazy and die, and generally seldom come here, so I am not very familiar with the situation here.

It wasn't until later that I followed Leant to the library of Steins College and found a document introducing this cursed land. I realized that the original area of ​​this area was only a few kilometers in size, and after countless years of evolution Afterwards, this cursed land actually expanded little by little, but this process was very slow, so slow that people couldn't detect it.And the old castle in the depths of the mountains was originally built on the edge of the cursed land. There used to be some magicians from the magician union who studied magic plants and magic potions lived here. This castle was the original observation station stronghold. , and in the nearly a hundred years since then, dozens of magicians have come here one after another, trying to unlock the secrets of the magical plants here, and want to study and discover some new values ​​​​of the plants here, but it is a pity To put it bluntly, most magicians almost returned without success, and slowly the cursed land gradually eroded the land around the castle, making it more and more barren and inaccessible.Gradually, even the magicians forgot about this place, so there can be an abandoned castle here.

However, every time, this ghostly castle is the best place for me to camp. At least there are some stone houses here that can keep out the rain, and those vampire trees that can move in the mud in the wild don't like to come to the castle. In this area, every time I was chased by those half-animal, half-plant blood-sucking trees, I would hide here in the castle.

The reason why I have been able to linger here is that there is a burnt fruit tree that I feel very familiar with. It is a big tree that is constantly burning in flames. The burnt fruit tree has no leaves. As if it had been carbonized, the branches were covered with bright red fruits, and the whole tree was wrapped in blue flames. Any animal or plant that touched the burnt fruit tree would be turned into ashes.

The old Kuru once guessed that I was abandoned after being eaten a burnt fruit, so when I found out that I could see this kind of weird plant here, it aroused my strong curiosity and wanted to know more about these plants. Look at the strange plants. These plants are obviously not native species here. These strange plants are more like plants from the hell world.

But these questions are a bit too deep for a child like me.Two years ago, when I passed the cursed land, I met an interesting old man, his name was Moras, he was a wood magician, and the subject he has been studying recently is "Magic The difference between plants and mutated plants", in order to be able to write an excellent paper, this old man has been here for more than half a year, and he is also very curious about me, so I had to make up a lie saying that I was A lost child, who didn't know why he came here, was actually chasing a hare at first.Later, the old man stayed me in the castle for one night, and gave me some delicious dried fish, and sent me out of this cursed land in person the next day. I think he is a A very kind magician and scholar. When I passed the cursed land again, I never saw him again.

In the past few years, Sluyte Province has been invaded by those barbarians on the ice and snow tundra in winter. Many men in the villages around the city were captured by those barbarians and went to extremely cold places as miners.This caused many peasants in the countryside to be displaced. Many people were very dissatisfied with the Duke of War in Sloitt Province. They thought that the Duke of War might be too old, so he connived at those barbarians and should be in power. The big men in the army stood up and led the North Wind Legion to teach those barbarians some lessons and tell them to go back to the north bank of the White Elephant River.

More extreme people who lost their homes believed that since the aristocratic class in power was unable to protect their own safety, they had no reason to collect taxes.This group of people began to fight continuously. They even killed the tax collector sent by the city of Sloit, burned down the village, and hid in the mountains to become bandits.

One day, I suddenly discovered that the old castle in the cursed land had become the stronghold of those bandits. They were really good at finding places. I guess those members of the Sloitt Guards would never find it here. , But for me, this is not a good thing. This place was once regarded as my own back garden, and it was suddenly occupied by people, which made me very upset, but I had nothing to do with them.

Sister Guoguo once said to me that if I can't awaken the magic pool in the magic awakening ceremony and become a magician, then I might as well hide myself and become an ordinary person.Otherwise, those sorcerer mages who peep at my magical talents will swallow me even the bones, so I don't plan to deal with these poor and hateful bandits.

They are a group of cowardly people who were bullied badly by the barbarians on the ice and snow tundra and the nobles of Sloit City, so they acted like bandits and turned their heads to bully the residents of the ordinary villages around them.For someone like me who is officially a resident of Ayrtown, I prefer to trust the Ayrtown Guard Battalion, although they are just as bad.

...beautiful dividing line...

Pushing aside the messy weeds, I poked my head out of the grass, reached out and pulled off the grass leaves sticking to my face, and there was a whole blueban grass on my head, like a bird hiding in the grass The guinea pigs in the pile, my whole body is still buried in the black mud-like soil. Although I wear a moisture-proof and waterproof sleeping bag outside my body, this feeling is still not very comfortable. The soil on the cursed land smells very bad. There is a smell of asphalt.

Seeing the bandits in charge of patrolling, sneaking into the castle of the cursed land, I was suddenly a little curious, what happened to make these mountain thieves who hide in the cursed land all day long The thieves are so nervous?You must know that half a month ago, when I went to Baipuya, these bandits still looked like they were eating and waiting to die.But after more than half a month, the security here is so heavily guarded that even a fly can't fly past.

You must know that this is an inaccessible and cursed place, a place that is almost forgotten by people, and the more the bandits are like this, the more they want to hide it.Originally, I wanted to hurry back to El City so that Fanny would not worry about me. I thought she must not have had a very good dinner these days.But seeing the appearance of those bandits aroused my curiosity. I really want to know what is hidden in the castle that makes them nervous like this.

Seeing that the bandits had gone far away, I carefully took out a handful of raisins from my pocket and stuffed them into my mouth, and took another mouthful of water.The sugar content of raisins is particularly high, which is a good product for quickly replenishing physical strength.Perhaps these bandits have never found me hiding in the dark, but I have sneaked into the castle several times in the past two years, and I am quite familiar with the situation of bandits in the castle.

But their leader is not an ordinary person, he is a wanted magician. I don't know how strong he is, but obviously he is not doing well in managing this group of bandits.It only took me two nights to figure out how the bandits patrolled.

At dusk, taking advantage of the interval between the bandits changing guard, I sneaked into the castle from the side door at the back.

I hid in a pigeon coop in a tower of the old castle with ease, quietly waiting for the night to come.If you don't enter the castle before nightfall, once the gates of the castle are closed, it will be difficult for ordinary people to sneak into the castle. Even if I can climb the cliff-like stone wall outside the castle, it will take a lot of trouble .

It has been a long time since pigeons have been here in the tower building. Since I felt that the view here is wide, it can shelter from the wind and rain, and the location is very hidden. It happens to be hidden behind a protruding attic, so I decided to clean it up. Fan, and then put some ordinary supplies, unexpectedly become a good hiding place now.

When I hid in the pigeon coop and fell asleep, I noticed some movement in the courtyard of the old castle. Usually there is no one here.

A carriage drove out from the courtyard of the old castle, and a woman dressed as a cook held a magic wand inlaid with magic crystals in her hand and was helped into the carriage.A person wearing a magician's robe followed behind. He stood in front of the carriage and did not follow into the carriage. At this time, the fat woman who looked like a cook suddenly turned around and said to the magician: "I am going to Shiluo this time. Yite City, it will take about three days, you take good care of that old guy, don't let him run away."

"Understood, Teacher Carlisle. I will do as you ordered!" the magician below said respectfully.

Mrs. Calle narrowed her eyes, letting a sweet smile appear on her fat face, lightly waved the magic wand in her hand, and said softly: "Very well, if we can succeed this time, we don't have to stay here anymore." This ghost place, well, the time is almost up, it's time for me to set off!"

An owl flew out of the carriage and disappeared into the dusk night.

And after Mrs. Carlyle, who looked like a fat cook, got into the carriage, the driver sitting in front of the carriage waved a long whip, and let the black carriage drive out of the castle. It was dark and I couldn't see that Where did the carriage end up heading.

But I know an important piece of news: Sure enough, these bandits seem to have captured a very important person.

In fact, I was just out of curiosity. I wanted to see what happened in the castle to make these bandits so nervous. In fact, my sense of justice has not reached the point where I insist on saving people. I seem to be alone. You can come and go freely in this castle, but I don't think I have the ability to bring the people in the dungeon out of the castle safely. Having said that, I don't want to take care of this matter. I think my ability is limited, so it's unnecessary Get yourself in too.

But it's rare that the tower here is dry and ventilated, much more comfortable than sleeping in the wild in a sleeping bag, and I don't have to be wary of those blood-sucking trees here, so I fell asleep unconsciously.

I was woken up by the sound of a girl crying.At that time, I was sleeping very sweetly alone, and I seemed to dream that Sister Guoguo was riding a horse and taking me for a ride on the Xinghu grassland, but when I woke up, I found that I was just in the tower building, whistling around. The cold wind, the wind blowing after night became very cool, made me shiver all over.

I cursed in my mouth: Damn bandits, you really can't let people relax for a quarter of an hour!
It was a normal thing to rob goods and women, but the noise in the middle of the night even woke me up, which was a bit too much.Even so, I'm still not prepared to cause trouble.

But when I was hiding in the pigeon coop and looking out, the window of the attic in front of me happened to be pushed open, and a girl crawled out from the attic, holding a white quilt in her hand, and was desperately going to the window. Climb outside the attic.By the bright moonlight, I can clearly see her smooth toes stepping on the tiles, shivering from the cold wind.At this time, she was looking towards me, and I happened to stick my head out and look out at this time. Under the moonlight like snow, we looked at each other...

"Morayal, where else can you escape? Do you want to fall from the attic here? Well, I can guarantee that everyone here will see a corpse of a woman without any clothes in the yard tomorrow. , Haha, I think we should let the old man Moras take a good look, I wonder if he will be very sad?" A man's voice came from the attic behind, and it was in the courtyard in the evening with the cook The magician who talked to the mother-in-law.

I really wish I hadn't heard this sentence, or hadn't met that girl face to face at all!I quickly made a silence gesture towards the girl, and she covered her mouth in shock. Obviously, she just regarded me as a little bandit in charge of guarding in the castle, but she never thought that I would actually fight her. A gesture, so to speak... The girl named Morayal covered her mouth, but she had a look of surprise on her face...

(End of this chapter)