Chapter 501 - 249: Lindong
The dim blue light of the lantern illuminated the boy’s panicked face, and the scene before him made Franky’s scalp tingle, but he quickly noticed a clue from the boy’s eyes.
His gaze was abnormal.
Although Franky had already walked up to the boy, his eyes remained fixed in the distance, as if something was approaching him.
Suddenly, Franky thought of something. He raised his hand to grab the boy’s arm but went straight through his body, while the boy seemed completely unaware of him, staring intently not far away.
Someone is coming.
Franky heard footsteps behind him and shone the lantern in the direction, but there was no one there.
On the other hand, this discovery slightly eased his mind—for some unknown reason, he saw a vision from the past, perhaps caused by whispers from the arcane network or remnants of some ancient magic he wasn’t aware of.
But then, a new question emerged in Franky’s mind.
If what he was seeing was a phantom from the past, then who was the other person entering now? In his memory, he had stayed here until all the mentors dispersed, which took him most of the night, and when he left through the secret passage, it was almost dawn.
And...
Why did he come here?
Franky cleared his thoughts; he had discovered a sneaky student during his evening patrol openly violating the school rules, secretly using the Floating Technique to escape over the wall, slipping all the way here, completely ignoring the curfew imposed by the Disciplinary Committee.
He had issued a series of new school rules to regulate the students’ behavior because the academy had become unsafe recently.
Franky passed through the boy and looked in the direction he was staring.
There was nothing there, and he still couldn’t remember encountering anyone there that night.
Soon, the boy reacted, forced by the approaching footsteps to crouch and run deeper into the maze.
It was inexplicable, just like the current state of the academy.
From the first day back at the academy, Franky sensed danger, as if an invisible shadow loomed over the academy. But when he carefully investigated, he found no clues; it remained the academy he was familiar with, and everyone seemed normal.
Perhaps it’s some sort of guidance.
Franky hesitated; he was no longer the impulsive teenager he once was. He looked in the direction the boy’s silhouette disappeared, where the truth might be hidden, or it could be a trap luring him. For the Elemental Shaper and former Mole Club members, nothing is a better bait than curiosity.
Reason told him he should report these findings to the headmaster.
But...
Can the headmaster truly be trusted?
This was the question that arose from the first day Franky returned to the academy. If not for Lindong, seen as a "freak", the headmaster was the greatest Elemental Shaper he knew. Wise and knowledgeable, the headmaster always remained calm regardless of what happened at the academy. More than eighty percent of the Ministry of Magic’s personnel were students during the current headmaster’s tenure.
But this time returning to the academy, Franky’s admiration for the headmaster shattered.
The headmaster was still the same, always composed and unruffled, yet his slightly clouded eyes seemed to hide some secrets.
Soon, Franky made a decision.
He turned and walked in the direction the boy had vanished toward, where the echoes lay. He held his wand, ready for any emergency.
In theory, he was beneath the island, and aside from the black ancient tree, he knew not whether the maze had another entrance. After walking a while, he raised his wand to mark the walls along the way.
Yet when the blue glow lit up the dusty walls, a familiar sight once again awakened his deep-seated unease.
It was obvious that someone had done this before him.
The red claw marks on the wall were his usual marking style, using simple camouflage to avoid being discovered by pursuers.
He could no longer find the boy’s figure, but the claw marks on the wall became his best guide, and subtly, his buried memories showed signs of awakening. Franky sensed he was getting closer to the truth, but he wasn’t excited about it.
Sweat seeped into his palms, strengthening his grip on the wand.
In the adult world, truth often means danger, even death.
The end of this path leads to the core of the black ancient tree, where the roots grow denser, and unconsciously the surroundings show no signs of life, the passage ahead becoming narrower, the roots writhing like organs.
The red claw marks vanished, but Franky was certain he had been here before.
Perhaps he had marked the roots too, but they were concealed by the passage of time.
From the depths of darkness, a brightness emerged, brighter than his magical lantern.
He immediately extinguished his lantern, raised his wand, and stepped closer to the core of the labyrinth. At the end of this path, someone awaited him.
Not his past self, but an old man with white hair and beard, wearing a mage’s robe, standing with his back to Franky, gazing intently at a sphere suspended above him, the source of all light, rotating slowly and occasionally echoing.