Training Addict Magician in a Growth-Focused Story

Training Addict Magician in a Growth-Focused Story

EP.29 The Lair of the Ancient Magician (6)

Leon swept up all the items inside the training room.

He also packed the books he hadn’t had time to read yet.

Although he had ascended his realm as quickly as possible, quite some time had still passed.

‘About three weeks…?’

If he had been unconscious for a long time, it might have been even longer.

“Fly.”

Leon donned the golden wings, floated the ancient wooden staff in the air, and held several scrolls in his hand.

“Come out.”

A translucent orb floated beside Leon as he murmured softly.

This was a spell that could harmoniously handle the four elements upon reaching the 5-star level of Arpina, allowing the translucent orb to transform into a summoned creature of the desired attribute without needing to summon a separate creature.

Since summoning it beforehand would only drain mana, it was better to summon it in advance.

Having finished his preparations, Leon pulled the lever.

Boom—

The door, which seemed immovable, began to open.

When the door opened enough for Leon to see the situation outside, six golems waiting in front of the door simultaneously turned to look at him.

There were six golems just in front of the door.

By spreading his detection magic widely, Leon could sense a total of fifteen golems.

Ten armor golems and five gargoyle golems.

They stared intently without attacking immediately.

‘The moment I step outside… they’ll probably attack.’

When Leon had first been summoned here and used detection magic, he had figured out that the structure in front of the door wasn’t much different from the original passage.

There was a long corridor with rooms on either side at regular intervals.

However, fifteen golems were wandering in that corridor.

It was regrettable that this training room was situated right in the middle of the corridor.

‘There should be stairs at the end of the corridor…’

Although his detection magic couldn’t reach beyond the door at the end of the corridor, he could infer based on the structure so far.

Another fact he could infer was that the exploration of the lair wasn’t completely finished yet.

If the exploration had been completed, there wouldn’t be golems stationed in front of the door like this.

It seemed that the lair didn’t have just one corridor.

‘I don’t need to deal with all of them.’

He had no intention of fighting all fifteen golems.

He still didn’t know the power of the gargoyle golems.

In any case, recovering the wooden sword was his first goal.

As Leon stepped outside, two armor golems in front of him charged at him.

Leon immediately used the acceleration of the golden wings to soar high to the ceiling of the corridor.

At that moment, a gargoyle looked at Leon and opened its mouth.

A magic circle appeared in front of its mouth, and dozens of invisible spikes shot towards Leon.

“Thunderbolt.”

Leon created three Thunderbolts simultaneously and threw two of them towards the wind spikes.

Boom—

As the two orbs collided with the leading wind spikes, electricity spread widely, creating an explosion sound.

However, the wind spikes weren’t coming from just one direction.

The other three gargoyles belatedly shot wind spikes at Leon.

One remaining gargoyle seemed to be preparing another spell, as its magic circle glowed but hadn’t manifested any magic yet.

Leon dodged the spells with acceleration again and pointed his finger at the gargoyle preparing another spell.

The remaining orb flew towards it.

Bang— Crackle—

Although the spell didn’t cause significant damage, it disrupted the magic circle in front of the gargoyle’s mouth.

“Black Orb.”

When Leon called out the nickname he had given, the translucent orb took on a brownish hue.

The magic wasn’t perfect yet, so it didn’t fully transform into the original 4-star earth summon.

‘Let’s move to one side and use Blink when the stairs come into view.’

Leon began moving in the direction he had decided.

“Spit.”

Each time an armor golem leaped towards him, the brown orb gathered and hurled stones.

Though not highly damaging, the increased power since his apprentice days was effective in preventing the golems from reaching Leon.

He blocked the gargoyle golems’ spells with Thunderbolt and the armor golems with the stones shot by Black Orb.

He also used Thunderbolt or Thunderstrike to check the gargoyle golems preparing large spells.

If wind spikes surged from an unavoidable direction, he blocked them with D-grade scrolls.

Leon currently had five D-grade disposable scrolls.

This was the total number of scrolls he had obtained as general quest rewards over four days.

By the time two Explosion scrolls were used up, the end of the corridor came into view.

Leon immediately infused mana into a Blink scroll.

The objects connected to Leon’s mana were teleported with him.

With his increased mana, he no longer needed to hold each item in his hands.

As long as they were connected by mana, they could enter the Orb together.

There was indeed a door at the end of the corridor.

Leon quickly pulled the lever and floated back into the air.

“See you later.”

He gripped the Orb.

‘It’ll take about 30 seconds for the door to open…’

Leon spent 30 minutes replenishing his mana and rechecking his equipment before emerging from the Orb again.

The golems that had been looking around all turned to stare at Leon again.

“Fall.”

Boom—

The leading armor golem staggered as it was struck by the lightning bolt.

In that moment, Leon used his last acceleration to enter through the door.

Standing in front of the open door was another armor golem, its head bowed. As Leon emerged, it raised its head.

“Thunderbolt.”

Leon extended three fingers, and an electric orb formed on each one.

He threw all three orbs simultaneously.

Boom— Crackle—

It was definitely different from the apprentice-level magic that had no impact.

The armor golem staggered and knelt.

“Thunderstrike, Thunderstrike, Thunderstrike.”

Lightning bolts fell consecutively from the ceiling.

Boom— Boom— Boom—

Crash— Crackle—

After about three strikes, the armor shattered.

Leon breathed heavily, feeling the exhaustion from the massive drain on his mana.

“Ha, it’s really tough…”

Although he hadn’t fully achieved the perfect Secret Art level, Glory of Thunder was quite specialized for offensive magic.

To think it took six hits to take it down.

Of course, a Mystic level magician would probably handle it without much difficulty.

“Yet the exploration isn’t over?”

Leon glanced around, puzzled.

‘Stairs going up.’

Leon thought that the place where he had been summoned was definitely deeper than the original location.

It made sense, as it was a completely personal training room.

He thought he needed to go up to find the wooden sword, and fortunately, there were stairs going up.

If they had been stairs going down, he would have had to consider running to the opposite corridor.

‘I might have had to spend a day inside the Orb to reset the acceleration wings…’

Leon took only the helmet of the armor golem, replenished his mana inside the Orb, and then climbed the stairs.

“Uh…”

As he reached the top of the stairs, Leon gaped at the sight before him.

Instead of a corridor, a wide plaza spread out.

The walls of the plaza were lined with stairs going up and down side by side.

There seemed to be at least twenty of them.

The stairs Leon had climbed were just one of many.

Leon circled the plaza.

There were no people, nor any traces of mana.

‘Is there only one plaza like this?’

There might be more.

Or, descending one set of stairs might lead endlessly downward.

After some contemplation, Leon chose a set of stairs based on his instincts and climbed.

Fortunately, the stairs weren’t blocked by a door.

Given the structure so far, this wasn’t unusual.

Upon reaching the top, he saw a corridor, but the problem was that it was hard to tell if this was the original corridor he had been in.

‘I did leave all the doors open…’

Even if he had explored, he wouldn’t have closed every door behind him.

Leon descended and climbed another set of stairs.

After repeating this about four times, he found a corridor with all the doors open.

‘The room where I got caught in the light was the last room…’

As soon as he climbed the stairs, the room that came into view was probably that room.

He inspected the area in front of the room door, but the wooden sword was not there.

Leon did not approach the door directly, instead, he started inspecting the room across from it.

‘This is it!’

Leon recognized the familiar room as he put the remains of the golems into the Orb.

‘Fortunately, it was connected to the plaza…’

Or there might only be one plaza.

Now, it seemed more plausible that it extended endlessly below.

While inspecting other rooms besides the magic circle training room, Leon was certain that this was the corridor he had been in right before he was summoned.

Then, Leon spotted the wooden sword lying alone in front of a door located about midway.

About to run towards it in joy, Leon realized there was movement nearby and quickly activated his invisibility cloak.

The noise wasn’t from just one person.

Several people had approached the wooden sword.

One of them looked down at the wooden sword and then picked it up.

They slowly started moving towards where Leon was.

Seeing their unfamiliar faces, Leon realized they were not from the Widia School.

Their magical robes bore completely unfamiliar symbols.

‘I think I saw something like this during the exchange event…’

“Hmm, I thought I felt something over here.”

“Is that so? I didn’t feel anything… By the way, why did you pick up that wooden sword?”

The man holding the wooden sword used detection magic, and finding no issues, he replied,

“We’ve come up empty-handed so far, and this was the only thing I picked up.”

The middle-aged man swung the wooden sword around and clicked his tongue.

“Ah, tsk. Thought we found something, but what is this crap…”

“Maybe the lair’s owner intended to give it to another golem? Like the sword that the armor golem had.”

“This useless wooden sword with no abilities?”

“Wasn’t it an artifact?”

“I thought I’d use it if it had any abilities, but… you take it.”

“No thanks. Do you still see me as that idiot from my apprentice days?”

“Watch your mouth. Who do you think pulled you up and raised you?”

The middle-aged man carelessly threw the wooden sword.

It bounced a few times on the floor and came to a stop in front of another door.

It looked pitiful, abandoned like that.

‘So, that’s why you were treated like this.’

Leon understood why the wooden sword was in front of another door.

Other magicians must have picked it up a few times, realized it had no abilities, and discarded it.

“There’s really no one here. What’s going on? I definitely heard something.”

“Maybe you were just tense?”

“It’s natural to be tense when exploring such ruins.”

The middle-aged man shook his head.

“You’ve got a long way to go. Just think about what those Widia bastards did. We were caught off guard. It’s better to be cautious.”

“True, we’ve already had two fights in other areas, haven’t we?”

“Of course. Those bastards have no sense of honor. We’ll probably fight every time we meet them.”

“It’s a headache. The exploration keeps getting delayed.”

“That’s because of the troublesome magic circle underground…”

The group of five, including the middle-aged man, passed by Leon and inspected the training room where Leon had been caught in the magic circle.

But nothing happened as they looked inside and then turned around.

‘Why… isn’t the teleportation magic circle activating?’

While Leon pondered the reason, they descended the stairs.

Leon waited for a long time before deactivating his invisibility and grabbing the wooden sword.

“Whew…”

It took a long time, but he finally had the wooden sword in his hand.

“Things went better than expected…”

From what he overheard from the other group, it seemed the exploration of the ruins was still ongoing.

While it would be best for Leon to be discovered naturally rather than suddenly appearing alone from Widia…

‘Being too greedy isn’t good either.’

Even if he suddenly appeared in Widia via teleportation, he had the plausible excuse of the teleportation magic circle.

After all, he had entered the lair suddenly because of the teleportation magic circle, and he had been abruptly transported to the training room for the same reason.

Since he planned to claim he had awakened his magic due to the lair, he needed to handle everything boldly.

Just as Leon finished his thoughts and stood up with the wooden sword in hand, he heard numerous footsteps approaching from the direction opposite to where the middle-aged man’s group had disappeared.

In the blink of an eye, they were close enough for Leon to see their faces, which were pale with fear.

“Hey, if you don’t want to die at the hands of the witch, run away now!”

Before Leon could react, it happened in an instant.

Without any warning, a black fireball struck the spot where the people were running.

Boom—

A massive black fireball exploded at that spot.

The shockwave reached where Leon was standing, causing his clothes to flutter wildly in the wind.

The dense mana wave, more than the hot air, left Leon breathless.

The magic had appeared without any forewarning.

‘No incantation!’

At least a Mystic level magician.

Leon immediately grabbed a teleportation scroll and infused it with mana.

“…”

However, the flow of mana was abruptly cut off.

When Leon looked up, he saw a woman with long black hair that had appeared out of nowhere.

One of her eyes was covered by her hair, and she was holding her palm out towards Leon.

‘Mana interference?’

This was impossible even for a beginner in Insight…

Leon couldn’t continue his thoughts any further.

Instinctively, he touched the Orb with his finger.

Leon vanished from the spot without a trace.

Simultaneously, black flames erupted from the ground.

“…”

The blazing flames subsided in an instant.

The woman, who had retracted her magic and stared at the spot for a while, tilted her head to the side.

—

Author’s Note:

Here is a new character illustration.

The name will be added to the notice once it is revealed!

*

There are revisions to the terminology related to stages. (I mentioned this in the previous chapter, but I’m repeating it for those who missed it.)

For stages above Secret Art:

Early, Mid, Late -> Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced

The terms have been changed to better fit the concept of “급 (級).”

For example:

Raidera – Insight Beginner

Arpina – Mystic Advanced

Leon – Arcane Beginner

I apologize for any confusion caused ( )

See you in the next chapter.