16 - The Mage Guild of the Capital

It took 2 whole months to reach the capital.

Although the territory was right beside the duchy, the duchy itself was huge, and the capital was in the center of the king's territory.

The nobles owned land around the kingdom, whereas the area around the capital and at the center of the kingdom was owned by the royal family.

Of course, the noble's land was also further owned by the royal family, technically.

In that time, Ixtra managed to get further into sealing magic, and had essentially reached the limit of what he could cast with his amount of demonic energy. Any further spells required more energy than he had, even for one cast.

With this, he could seal someone at his level without even having to fight them. Although it would empty out his energy reserves, so would a fight. In comparison, this would allow for him to remain unscathed in the process.

As a demon, Ixtra also had a sturdy physical body, so he could go on fighting with that once his demon energy ran out, and wait for it to recharge as he fought with just his physique. Then, he could recast and defeat his enemy is one movement.

This made him much stronger than before among those of the same level, almost unbeatable even, but against someone of a higher level, it didn't help much.

Still, it was a major buff. Plus, sealing magic couldn't just be used to attack.

There were also unsealing magics in the book, and he was abke to use those to unseal a few of the books I had.

There were some interesting things in there, but nothing I could use right now.

So on we went, and we finally reached the capital.

Immediately I noticed what had been missing from my life for so long now.

And not only were there some, but there were even too many.

That's right, as I neared the capital, the compass map hologram showed the legendary golden dots, and not just a few.

Bewildered, I did a rough estimate, and there had to be thousands of treasures in the capital city!

'?????'

What was going on?

Moreover, most of them were moving.

There was only one thing in the capital city that matched with the dots I was seeing, and as I neared the entrance and saw a mage loitering around in their recognizable dark red robes, I confirmed my hypothesis.

It was the mages.

The mages of the mage guild in the capital were all considered treasures, or at least something they held on them at all times was.

Looking over at the [157/1000] figure on the hologram, and then at the dots on the map, I had an absurd and psychopathic thought for a moment before shaking myself out of it.

'Even for a moment, to think I thought of something like that. No! I'm not that kind of person. I'm sure there's a better way to fulfill the quota. Who knows? Maybe it's a held item and I can just steal it without any bloodshed.'

Calming down and entering the city, there were two key structures that stood out.

One was, of course, the royal palace, but the other one was the mage guild's headquarters, which was a tall, lumbering tower that reached high into the sky.

Looking around, indeed, every mage of the mage guild was a dot on the map.

Since I had come to the capital to find out the mage guild's secret to spellcasting anyways, this worked out all the better.

After a while, I arrived in front of the tower.

Stepping inside, there was a luxurious lounge area where some mages were chatting, and a front reception desk.

The tower's rdius was huge, dozens of meters, and it was almost 100 meters across in diameter.

Behind the reception was a platform with a giant magic circle inscribed on the floor, and one could see mages stepping onto it and disappearing or suddenly appearing out of thin air and stepping off.

Amazed, I walked up to reception.

"Hello, how may I help you today?"

"I'd like to become a mage of the mage guild."

"Oh, alright. Do you know any magic spells to prove your worth as a mage? If not, the mage guild also offers paid training, but you must be a knight who's entered the explosive heart stage first."

"I have entered the explosive heart stage. I also know one magic spell already."

"Oh, really! Would you care to tell me which spell?"

"It's one called [Lock Seal]."

"Hmm, [Lock Seal], I've never heard of that one before. Would you mind demonstrating it for me? Granted it won't cause damage to the building."

I had anticipated this, so I had brought a lock along with me.

Taking it out, I cast [Lock Seal] and the locked closed on its own in an unnatural way.

"Interesting. You are qualified to become an apprentice mage of the mage guild. However, there are a series of steps to becoming a fully fledged mage. If you follow me, I will take you through those now."

The reception lady started walking towards the giant magic circle platform, and I followed behind.

She tinkered with a screen, like the one that appeared for the compass change log, and suddenly my vision went fully white.

When it settled and I could see again, I was in a large room with an old man.

He had a long white beard, and his mage robes were all black instead of dark red.

"Guildmaster, we have a new recruit. He seems promising."

"Oh? Well if Sia's saying that, I'll believe it. Come, have a seat. I'll go over the procedures with you. Sia, you can leave."

"Yes, sir."

Bowing, the receptionist named Sia turned around and promptly left.

Nervous, I walked up to the desk where the old man was sitting and sat down in one of the chairs opposite him.

"Hehe, no need to look so nervous. I am the guildmaster of this very mage guild, Arthur Noyman. Please, be at ease."

Hearing his words, I indeed calmed down. I was by no means a weakling. I didn't even have to be so nervous, right?

"Yes. It's a pleasure to meet you sir."

"Likewise. So, you want to be a mage of the mage guild, do you?"

"Yes."

"Well, as I'm sure you can understand, our mage guild can't just let anyone in. We require certain conditions to be met. Here, this is a paper outlining those conditions."

Arthur took out a large parchment with a contract of sorts written on it.

There were only 4 conditions.

A. As a member of the mage guild, to not leak the secrets of the mage guild.

B. As a member of the mage guild, to help the mage guild in case of emergencies.

C. As a member of the mage guild, to do one task for the mage guild per month (exceptions apply for difficult tasks or long tasks that take longer than a month to complete.).

D. As a member of the mage guild, to uphold the honor of magecraft in the continent and be at least a 3rd circle mage.

"Ah, for the last condition, we can train you for that. Worry not."

The conditions certainly made sense. However, there were some issues already.

I was sure they would use magic to enforce the agreement somehow, otherwise their secret would've been out by now.

The last condition was no big deal, I was even thankful they provided training, albeit I'd have to pay. The 3rd was also not that big of a deal. I could do some work here and there.

However, the issues came with conditions A and B.

It didn't really matter if I told anyone else, but what about Ixtra and Tom? Ok, Ixtra was always watching beside me, so even if I didn't explicitly tell him anything, he would know. And you could argue mayne Tom wouldn't be very helpful if told of the mage guild's secrets anyhow.

You could argue those. But, helping them in an emergency? It would be fine if I didn't, but if I ever planned to steal whatever it was that was a treasure that every mage in the city had on them, then how would I be able to help in the emergency when I was the one who caused it?

That was also a hidden meaning behind helping in an emergency, which was to not cause it in the first place.

Troubled, I asked a very important question.

"What happens if I break one of the conditions?"

Arthur's eyes narrowed and showed a dangerous light. The conditions were reasonable. They didn't ask for the hest results, besides condition D, they just asked that you try your best.

Given that, it wasn't a normal question, since most mages wouldn't think much of the lax conditions and would agree immediately.

Unless...you were planning to break them.

"I'll be casting the 5th circle spell, [Lower Realm Contract]. For anyone below the plasmic mana realm or the equivalent, even me, will have all the mana in their body stripped away and be unable to awaken mana again in their life. Moreover, they will forget all about the secrets they learned about in the mage guild."

My thoughts twirled as I understood the key point.

'So as long as I get plasmic mana, or become a 7th circle mage, I'll be able to break it. Alright. It's not the best, but it's worth a try. Plus, he doesn't know it but Ixtra's right here. Seems Arthur can't sense him. Even if I do break the contract early and forget something, Ixtra won't. As for the mana...well, I'll just try my best not to break the contract early.'

Agreeing to the conditions, I signed the contract, and Arthur cast [Lesser Realm Contract].

Immediately, a black fog appeared in the air above us, and a head poked out.

The right half of its fave waa covered in a purple-black haze, and the right side had an eye with a very large iris and pupil.

It opened that eye wide and the pupil "let out" a magic circle from its depths, more intricate than any I had seen before.

Thr magic circle enlarged more and more and crushed down onto the contract paper, shaking the desk.

The magic circle glew brightly, and I had to cover my eyes.

Uncovering them when the glow disappeared, the magic circle had become smaller and placed itself on top of where I had signed my signature, overlapping it.

The guildmaster took the paper and rolled it up, before placing it to the side and saying,

"Now that that's done, I can be upfront with you. Our mage guild actually has a secret. Only one secret, but it's enough to shake the world. I wonder if you eant to hear what it is?"

Nodding my head, I said, "I do."

The guildmaster got a large smile on his face that looked eerie on his old and wisened face, and he stood up before walking to the magic circle platform.

"Do you know what this is?"

I shook my head.

"It's a 'magic elevator'. It uses the 6th circle magic, [Teleport], to go up and down the tower floors. I'm one of only 3 mages in the whole guild that can repair it if something goes wrong. Come on, get on."

Getting on, he showed me how to work the elevator. Channeling my mana in a certain way would allow the "console" to show up, from which I could choose which floor to go to.

"I have more options than you as the guildmaster. You can only access the most basic parts of the tower. Well, truthfully, there's only a few floors that require special privilege. Alright, now let's go to the library."

Nodding, I waited for him to go, but he didn't.

Looking over at my confused expression, he said,

"What? You need to learn to use the elevator. You do it. It should be available to you now."

Doing as he said, I was indeed able to open the console and click the option to go the the library.

Suddenly, the same blinding light from before shown and when I opened my eyes, there was a library floor in front of me.

Stepping forward, the guildmaster said,

"It's not the largest library, but it is the most valuable. Come with me. There's one book in particular you need to see."

Following behind, he led me to a room in the back that was sealed with sealing magic.

The guildmaster used a complex looking magic spell to open it.

Inside was a single book on a pedestal in an otherwise empty room. On the compass map, this book was shown as a treasure.

Taking it, he showed me the title.

[Asteroth's horrible attempt at a mana cultivation technique, that one time]

'...'

Why did the title seem a bit against the whole "divine treasure that can shake the world" aesthetic?

Suddenly, I felt Ixtra grow restless in my shadow. Thankfully, Arthur didn't seem to notice.

"Confused? I was too. Everyone is. Let me explain. According to this book, there was once a great demon named Asteroth who tried to create a 'mana cultivation technique'.

She, according to the author, did a terrible job, so she left it behind and never did anything with it, and one of her friends, another great demon who's name we do not know, wrote this book to detail out the technique and make fun of her in the process.

Although it's said in the book to be a horrible and failed technique, it's effects are leagues better than anything else in the kingdom! This is the secret to our mage guild's success. I wonder, do you want to try reading it?"

Ixtra was practically jumping in his seat, his seat being my damn shadow, and I could sense just how restless he was.

Nodding, I walked up to the guildmaster and held open both my hands in front of him.

"Please allow me to read it, guildmaster."

I bowed my head slightly as I did so.

With a gratified expression, the guildmaster handed the book to me and said,

"Read it and practice. I'll take it back tomorrow. Make your own copy if you can't memorize it fast enough, but remember to burn the copy after you memorize all of it. I trust you know what happens if you try and leak it out to anyone."

The guildmaster walked back to the magic elevator and teleported away.

'Wait, does he have to use the elevator when he can just cast [Teleport] on his own anyhow?'

Shaking my head of the useless thought, I focused on the task at hand.

The fact the book hadn't been spread by accident was a miracle, I thought, given how he said I could copy it until I memorized it.

Excited, I walked over to a couch, but before I started reading, I asked Ixtra what he was so restless about.

"Asteroth, The Asteroth, hello?! That's one of the original demon kings, demons like me look up to her as our role model. How could I stay calm?!"

Well, look who had a side to him I never knew about.

I guess it made sense though. From what Ixtra had told me in the past, Demon Kings were only weaker than Demon Gods, which, by the word "god" on the title alone, one could tell how strong they were.

A technique made by a being right below the level of a god. I wondered what it would be like.

Even if it was a failed technique.

With that thought, I told Ixtra to settle down, and I started reading.