The Wizard World

Angele dragged Fra into the cart before she could react—he helped her dodge a broken blade that was flying to her.

"Wake up!" Angele tapped the girl’s cheeks to make sure that she was aware of the situation.

*BAM*

It sounded like something exploded outside; they could see the bright-red light. The intense light illuminated the whole cart.

A ball of golden flame exploded in the dark forest and quickly turned into waves of red flames. The waves were spreading in all directions and the earth started shaking after they hit the trees.

The carriages, carts, and every object around were all pushed away.

Angele’s cart was pushed three meters to the left; the wheels left a trail of dark marks on the ground.

The leader of the black cloaks was in the center of the explosion, his body broke into pieces and half of his head was on the ground.

"Amber... You shall not escape..." The leader’s voice was still echoing in the forest; the high-pitched voice sounded like it was from a woman.

*PA*

Heli stepped on the broken head and looked at the noble woman who was standing behind him.

The noble woman slowly lowered her right hand; there was a white ball in her left hand. There were complicated golden patterns on the surface of the ball. The woman smiled after she noticed that Heli was looking at her.

"This is a high-level holy bomb I purchased from the church. Not bad, eh? It deals great damage to ghosts and magic creatures but it won’t hurt normal things."

"It’s powerful, yeah." Heli looked at the white ball; he was still a bit scared. He watched the bomb explode and thought that he was going to die in the golden flames. Although he was blown away by the impact, he was not injured.

The woman was about to say something else but they heard footsteps from the forest again.

Angele raised his head and looked at the forest.

’They’re from the church?’ Angele’s brow furrowed, he did not expect to find people from the church here. They had not bothered him for a while but they were here again.

Fra was in Angele’s arms, her eyes were wide open. It seemed like she was still thinking about the battle—after she defeated the bandit by luck, she was so scared that she could barely move.

In the deep forest, a group of people in white armor were approaching the caravan. They were surprised after they saw the battlefield. Their leader was a female knight; she glanced around and her sight fell upon Heli.

"Found you, send the signal!" She talked to the knight beside her and stepped forward, drawing her sword. A thin white glow quickly covered her blade.

The female knight was moving forward without any hesitation. She started slow but her speed increased gradually. She swang the sword several times in the air, lowered her body, and charged at Heli.

"Die! Heretic!"

Angele thought the church was going after him.

Heli remained silent, however, he turned around and started running after seeing the female knight’s face. The feminine man just followed after Heli but it seemed like he was not going to offer any help.

"Miss Diana, I’ll see you around!" Heli shouted. Heli and the feminine man charged into the forest first, the female knight followed after them.

The ground was covered with dead bodies of guards and bandits. The noble woman just stood there with her brow furrowed, it seemed like she was thinking about something. She then looked in the direction Heli left and remained quiet.

Some of the guards that were still alive cleaned the area. It seemed like they were used to the deaths of their colleagues. Things like this were common to them.

Angele straightened his back and glanced at the noble woman, then whipped the ox once.

The leader of the guards was talking to the woman, it seemed like he was asking for additional payment.

Angele was not concerned, he did not say anything and just traveled to the forest on the other side.

The wheels of the cart spun as the cart quickly entered the forest, disappearing by the corner.

As Angele sat on the driver’s seat, blue light dots flashed in his eyes. He changed the direction slightly and went around the whole area. He started heading in the same direction as Heli.

The noble woman’s caravan was no longer there and the man with green eyes also disappeared.

The only things in his sight were the vibrant green trees; the golden light from the sun shined upon the cart and Angele’s outfit. They could hear strange voices from random beasts.

"Where are we heading to?" Fra raised her head, she was still holding the sword in her arms.

"Find a random place and stay there for the rest of our life," Angele gave a random response.

"Huh?" Fra was confused.

Angele turned around and pinched her cheeks. "Do you really think we’re going to do that? There are prizes on our heads so we should stay away from the church. We need to find a safe place to lay low, there’s no way that we can follow our original plan."

"Oh, yeah..." Fra finally realized that she was a wanted criminal and the sad memories came back to her again. She wiped the sweat off her face using the sleeves; some of the potion was also removed from her face.

The black birthmark on her forehead already turned gray—the birthmark would fade away soon.

"Where should we build our camp then?" She wondered.

Angele did not respond, he just pointed in a direction.

Fra looked where he was pointing at.

In front of the vibrant forest, there was a snow mountain standing there quietly. The tip of the mountain was surrounded by white mist.

The snow on the mountain reflected the sunlight; the light almost blinded Fra.

"That’s a tall mountain..."

Angele smiled and patted Fra’s head.

"Check our inventory and see how long we will last on the mountain. Also, we need to feed this ox."

"Sure..."

Fra started checking the items in the cart.

Angele closed his eyes and started his daily routine. He was still searching for a way to enter the portal of the painting.

The portal he observed would change slightly every day; the color of the portal would change slightly due to the energy waves and return to normal after a while.

Angele’s long research helped him to find the secret, he noticed that the energy wave was what decided if the portal would accept unknown things or not.

He tried to figure out how the energy wave worked and when the energy wave was the weakest so that he could send his mentality wave deep into the portal.

Analyzing the force field was the hardest part, there were so many waves and frequencies he needed to record. The whole process would take him a long time. The biochip indicated that only two percent of the analysis was completed. If he wanted to explore the portal using his mentality wave, it would still take a long time.

It was already afternoon when Angele opened his eyes. The orange sunlight was coming from the sky, Angele and the cart’s shadows were long on the ground.

’Eight hours passed. Progress saved.’ Zero’s voice echoed in his ears.

Angele inhaled deeply and checked the surroundings. The tall trees had brown tree trunks and were slightly wet. The leaves on the branches were dark-green and some of them were covered with white frost.

The ox already stopped moving and its tail was swinging in the air.

The place was deadly silent, there was no insect or creature making noise.

Angele glanced around and jumped off the cart. He looked at Fra—she was sleeping in the cart with the sword in her arms.

He walked around the cart and stopped in front of a bush. He slowly reached into the bush and suddenly grabbed.

*PA*

He grabbed the neck of a young leopard and moved it out of the bush.

*Roar*

The young leopard was struggling in Angele’s hand and trying to scare Angele away with its voice. It kept scratching Angele’s skin using its claws but nothing worked.

"This area is terrorized by black leopards? Maybe I can follow it to..." Angele dropped the leopard and it landed safely on the ground.

The leopard stood up and ran away immediately.

Angele followed after the leopard for about two minutes and saw a small river ahead. On the other side of the river, there was an arched gate that was made of wood. The gate was built in the hill, it looked like an entrance to an underground tunnel.

There were yellow stripes on the tightly closed wooden doors. The edges of the gate were white and there were two torch stands on both sides of the gate. There was no torch on the stands but Angele could see the ash left on them.

Angele slowed down and looked around the river. The river came from the hill and was running down the forest. The river was so long that Angele could not see the end of it.

The river was around two meters wide and there was water grass in it.

"That’s it..."

Angele was not concerned about the leopard. He returned to the oxcart and drove it to the gate. It took him about ten minutes to finish the process. He let the ox drink water by the river and returned to the cart. He closed his eyes and started resting.

The sky was getting darker and darker. Two gray shadows appeared by the river after a while.

The one in the front was Heli, there were bloody wounds on his face. He was carrying a weak man in gray on the back while moving forward slowly.

The feminine man was following after the two with a blank expression on the face. The white outfit he was wearing was still clean but Heli’s outfit was greatly damaged.

Heli raised his head and looked at the river, he quickly found Angele’s oxcart.

"Cough..."

The man with green eyes was dying on Heli’s back. He spat out some blood, which splashed on Heli’s shoulders.