family……

When she heard this familiar and unfamiliar word, Mary suddenly felt a little hesitant.

It wasn't until a few seconds later that she slowly remembered that she did tell her mentor her decision the other day and she wanted to see her family.

The young female mage pursed her lips and looked at her mentor hesitantly: "They are ..."

"Just upstairs in the living room," Daniel stared at Mary with yellowed eyes. "You'd better clean it up and especially your hair."

"OK ... OK."

Mary promised hurriedly, and then left the basement where the immersion tank was placed with some unwillingness. She returned to the first floor, entered the public bathroom, reached out and opened the water valve, and watched the clear water supplied by the magic pump from the metal pipe. The sound of flowing water calmed her down.

Her family members.

She couldn't remember what it was like when she left the house ... An ignorant little girl followed the older children to "explore" in the mountains, separated from her partners after the night, and stepped in The ancient tower of the magician has since changed her life and has cut off her connection with her family. Now, more than ten years have passed, and her childhood memories have long been obscured and weathered. The only impression she can still remember about "home", There seemed to be only a low, old house with a leaky wind, a dim lantern hanging from the doorway, and bedtime stories that scared children.

Unfortunately, in those thrilling bedtime stories, there is a lot of content about the black wizard, about the castle, about the monsters in the mountains and the magical slaves, which have become a reality in her ten years of life.

The water was flowing, and Mary held cold water and slapped it on her face.

She couldn't remember what her parents looked like, but she still wanted to see them.

Leaving the bathroom, the young female mage's mood gradually calmed down. She saw that her mentor had been standing in the corridor, stared at her face expressionlessly, and saw herself appearing. The old mage in black robe just nodded, They walked silently in the direction of the living room.

Mary followed closely.

They came to the living room door, and a servant immediately stepped forward and opened the door of the living room for the master.

Mary saw the sight in the living room.

The fireplace was burning quietly on one side of the living room. The red light from the fire was shining on the nearby copper rack. The dark red couch was placed in the center of the living room. A pair of dirty grey cloth jackets and hair had been worn. The old couple with gray and wrinkled faces are sitting on the sofa.

They were sitting very carefully, most of their bodies were outside the sofa, as if they were afraid to stain the luxurious furnishings here.

It seems that the mentor only brought her parents, but not her sister.

The old couple on the sofa also saw the people appearing at the door. They stood up almost instantaneously, showing an awe and charming smile to Daniel, and then they saw Mary standing behind Daniel. At this moment, they separated After more than ten years, the family finally met.

Mary stared at the old couple, watched their turbid eyes turn, her gaze fell on her robe, watched their humility and awe expression slowly, and watched them slowly bend down.

This series of actions is like conditioning.

"Dear Master Mage." She heard the couple calling themselves so.

Mary was a little overwhelmed. She heard Daniel speak next to her, with a cold tone: "This is your daughter, you don't have to salute."

The old couple stood up and looked at Mary with a hint of surprise, but there was still obvious tension in the surprise. Mary didn't know what she felt at the moment. Her lips moved a few times before she finally got out of her lips. Squeeze out: "Father, mother ..."

It uses very standard, civic-style pronunciation, and the words are more solemn, upper-level titles because no matter what her life in the past ten years, her tutor is always from the capital, with Zoran knowledge and education High-level mage, under the tutor's door, she has not learned other ways of speaking.

The rural habits she had encountered in her childhood were already blurred in her mind.

The old couple seemed to be stunned after hearing Mary's title to them, and then nodded cautiously, repeating dryly: "OK, OK, OK ..."

After everyone sat down on a few sofas, the living room quickly became awkwardly quiet.

Mary struggled to think about what she should say to ease the atmosphere, and it took a long time to organize the complete sentence: "At home ... are you all right?"

"Okay, okay ... enough food," the man with a hunched back nodded. "Are you okay? Is there enough food?"

"... I have nothing to worry about," Mary said awkwardly. "Do you ... still live in the country now?"

"Where can I go?" Said the old woman with wrinkles. "The house and the ground are over there, and the cattle."

"How did you get here?"

"The Master Master sent us to take us over," said the old woman, taking a careful look at Daniel. "Our carriage, a large carriage."

Then she looked at the robe on Mary's body again, and couldn't help bringing a trace of awe in her eyes, as if the awe had been deeply imprinted in her bones, so long as she saw something similar, even if she knew the person in front With her own blood relative, she would also be nervous nervously: "You are now a mage ..."

"Yes, I'm about to reach the middle rank ..." Mary said, but she wasn't sure if the old couple in front of her could understand what the middle rank meant.

"Okay, you ... you are promising," the humpbacked man nodded again, with a charming smile, glanced at Daniel next to him, and then withdrew his gaze, "You were brought by Master Master It ’s your luck to go, your sister, your brother, you are out of luck ... ”

Fortunately ... Mary suddenly felt like she didn't know how to face the word.

The topics that can be used for conversation seem to be over quickly, or the topic does not exist from the beginning.

Mary felt more and more uncomfortable, and she believed the old couple in front of her.

They are strangers, blood related, but thousands of miles apart. They sit in a seemingly close place, trying to talk about topics that both sides can feel harmonious, but they can't even pretend to be.

Shortly after the second embarrassment and cold start, the old woman began to look at the door frequently, and her husband became more and more agitated. They did not know how to hide their emotions decently. Mary could see through them at a glance. Thoughts and feelings.

Sitting in this "luxury" place for so long, the old couple from the countryside has been sitting upset. They did not feel any joy in reuniting with their daughter from Mary. They were only because of the order of a master mage. Every minute they come here is a torture.

They occasionally glanced at Daniel, and there was even a begging look in that look.

Mary stood up.

"Just here," she whispered, "I ... have some magic experiments to do."

"Oh, oh, okay," the old woman stood up, "then ... then do your thing."

"Do you want to stay here for a few days?"

"No, no," the old woman waved her hands in a hurry. "The animals in the house still need to be looked after, and left to others for too long, we are not assured."

Mary didn't say much, just nodded slightly, and then left the room as if to flee.

Even after hiding in a nearby side hall, she realized that she had recklessly left her mentor, and if it was placed a year ago, it would probably cause terrible punishment.

Just as Mary realized that she had made a mistake, the door of the side hall suddenly opened and Daniel stepped in.

The old mage in black robes only glanced at Mary quietly and said casually: "I arranged for them to rest for a day elsewhere and I will take them back tomorrow.

"If you don't want to see them again, you don't need to see them during this time.

"After that, I will send someone to take care of their lives."

Mary lowered her head and cried, "... thank you."

"No need."

"Tutor, am I ... awful?" Mary raised her head boldly and looked at her mentor. "They are my parents ..."

Daniel calmly interrupted her: "They didn't want to come at first, and they didn't want to come to meet you until the apprentice I sent showed the identity of the mage and paid them a reward."

Mary was a little confused: "Remuneration ..."

"It's not anyone's fault," Daniel said calmly.

"Tutor, have you foreseen this situation for a long time?"

"Yes," Daniel said without a change of expression, "but this is your own choice and the situation you have to face, so I didn't step in."

Mary bit her lip, then lowered her head, looking at the robe on her body, and the silver badge representing the mage level near the robe collar.

It's not just more than a decade of separation that made the gap.

"Tutor, the extraordinary and ordinary people ... is the gap really that big?"

"In most places, that's it."

Mary lowered her head and did not speak again for a long time.

Daniel turned and left the room without disturbing his apprentices.

He also had the task assigned by his master.

...

Aldernan, a dark alley in the eastern district, a man with a beard cluttered, dark eye sockets, and plain looks was walking staggeringly through the streets.

The man exudes strong alcohol, carrying a cloth bag with food in his hands, and his hair seems to have been left unattended for a long time. The worn-out clothes on his body are just like the living standards of most people in this neighborhood.

The winter sky always darkens early. The dim sky has covered Aldernan, and the sparse magic stone street lights are illuminated from far away, illuminating the old and dilapidated streets in the Eastern District. Pedestrians on the road are scarce. People who have gone to work in the factory have not yet returned home. Occasionally, people who appear on the roadside are unemployed vagrants with suspicious signs. They are mostly low-level wives who have just come to the street.

The drunk man was walking down the street, and suddenly an inexplicable heart rushed to his heart, stopping the man in a worn coat.

He seemed to be holding the wall next to him because of drunkenness, but his right hand pressed quietly against his waist, and he quietly held a gold spike in his hand.

There is magic shimmer on the spiked surface.

A bearded tramp walked past him, and when the two passed by, the tramp suddenly turned his head and looked over.

In the eyes of the drunk man, the image of the tramp suddenly twisted and squirmed, and changed into a figure wearing a black robe with his face hidden in the shadows.

A voice passed into his ear: "Meet at 14 Iron Lane."

The drunkenness in the man's eyes had completely disappeared. He quietly put away the golden spikes, feeling another will in his brain quietly beating, and whispered while changing direction under his feet, "Yes, bishop."

The man turned away from the street, and on this road he had walked through, no bearded tramp had ever appeared, as if it was just an illusion from beginning to end.

...

A dazzling light cut through the darkness, illuminating a plain covered by overcast clouds. The plain was barren and dry, and the desolate building ruins and plant debris were buried by the wind and sand. The endless wind continued to blow through the whole world, and was abandoned in this ruin Between the heavens and the earth, countless shadow shadows are trekking on the plain.

Their expressions were numb and their eyes blank, as if the trek had no purpose or end.

And in the distance of the plain, at the end of the light, there is a splendid city. The city's palaces are towering, golden and brilliant, like the perfect city in myth and legend.

At high altitude, the two clouds suddenly appeared.

One figure was wearing a long white dress with an illusory lantern in his hand, and the other was tall and elegant, with dark hair and wearing Sven's monocle.

"Archbishop Selina," the elegant man wearing monocles said to the woman next to the lantern, with a little respect in his tone. "This area is the largest overflow projection found so far, and the only one found so far. Completely out of the city of dreams, the overflow projection generated in the 'imaginary number area'. "

"It looks like a ruin here, a ruin that has been around for many years," Selina Gor frowned. "All the previous projections showed the cities or villages in normal operation, and our The retarder also successfully controlled the time flow rate of the sandbox No. 1 to the same level as the real world. In theory, there should not be such a deserted area in the sandbox ... Archbishop Yuri, what do you think? "

"Perhaps, the historical process in Sandbox No. 1 has been split, and time is no longer linearly distributed," said Archbishop Yuri, thinking. "Perhaps the world inside it has expanded to such an extent that some areas are operating normally , Some areas have actually been deserted for hundreds of thousands of years. "

"... Unfortunately, this is just an overflow projection, and any interference we make here will not affect the operation of Sandbox 1."

Selina Gelfen said softly, she stared down at the plains shrouded in darkness, and then remained silent for a moment, gently swinging the lantern in her hand.

The entire overflow projection dissipates silently during the shaking of the lantern, and is restored to the basic black and white two-color grid lines, and the gray fog covering the sky.

"Call down Daniel next week," Selina said to the elegant man next to her, "I'll talk to him personally."

"So fast?" Archbishop Yuri was a little surprised.

"Yeah, faster than expected because the Daniel seems to have noticed some problems and is conducting some investigations privately, and just right, we can talk to him."

(Mama yeah !!!)