187 Shopping

"When the School of Royalty was established centuries ago, they transported alder, elm, Populus euphratica, white birch trees and much more from all over to make the campus green and ensure spring all year long…" Gazing at everyone’s confused expressions, Ye Qingxuan suddenly kicked the sapling beside him. "But there weren’t any indus trees, which had spread from the East two hundred years later!"

Crack! The tree trunk trembled and the tree was suddenly uprooted. It wanted to run and unbelievably fast. But the youth was even faster and raised his badge. Light flashed from the badge and landed on the trunk. With a shake, it disappeared.

Ding dong...The badge vibrated. Fifty more points were now his.

Everybody was completely shaken. They had never imagined that a graduating student was hiding right behind their butts! Ye Qingxuan gazed at them and stated, "The moral of this story is that illiterate people who don’t even know about botany don’t deserve to graduate." With that, he turned to leave.

There was a clatter in the hall in the distant, like something being kicked over. The people could not help but shiver. They looked over, but could only hear, "A trash can? How can there be such a clean trash can? Your mimicry isn’t up to standard. Go take this class again."

"…What’s wrong with him?"

Everyone stared blankly at each other in confusion.

"Should we go look?" someone made the suggestion that they would deeply regret in the following months. But—f*ck—they actually agreed!

-

Hum... There was a quake in the clouds and the expressions of all students in the enchantment changed. In the campus, someone in the volunteer crowd furrowed his brows and pressed something invisible in the air. A faint tune spread in all directions and reported back.

"Hurry, there’s only ten minutes. The enchantment’s going to change again.

"Ten minutes is enough." Banner raised his head. His eyes were emerald and the vertical pupils trembled. His body burned with glowing flames. His lower body was a gold lion and his tail had a dark green hook like a scorpion. Beside it was a youthful musician who had the same face but an entirely human body. There were two Banners, but their companions did not find it strange.

Seeing that Banner had called forth the manticore, his friends sighed in relief. Banner waved and the lion roared, galloping away instantly in the campus.

The manticore was the phantom beast unique to the Adrian family. Its talent was high sensitivity to the breaths of living creatures. Even with the double blockages of the requiem enchantment and mimicry, it could still sense all living things around it. Compared to others who had to use music scores and other methods, Banner undoubtedly had the biggest advantage. Furthermore, his brother Gavin had given him his former confidant to help in this trial.

Banner had broken into the top three in a few short hours.

"As expected of Gavin’s brother," an upperclassman at the front looked at him from afar and murmured. "His manticore is already humanized and he’s just gotten into the Musician level."

Humanization was a phenomenon unique to the School of Royalty. This school was a new branch of the School of Summoning. It was different in that Royalty had inherited the theories of Arthur, the most powerful Summoning musician. Because of this, it was also known as the Anglo School.

All phantom beasts summoned by Summoning musicians were demons created by the broken pieces of their consciousness and raised in their minds. The School of Royalty abandoned most beasts and focused on those that fit themselves the most. They developed the beastliness of these demons in their minds and gave them their characteristics, allowing it to be continuously refined.

In the end, it would practically become the beastly version of the musician. A well-experienced musician could allow himself to temporarily have some of the beast’s characteristics. But the other characteristic of the School of Royalty was that the beast could be from a different school than the musician! Those who liked destruction and creation would study Modifications on the side, those good at observation and predictions would study Revelations…

Taking advantage of the fact that the phantom beast came from the same source and heart, the two of them had an effect of more than two.

In the School of Royalty, there were also secret sublimation rituals that could make the phantom beast also study from the School of Summoning. Through these rituals, the musician could create a frightening wave of beasts whenever and wherever. This belonged to the secret occupation of the School of Royalty. Because of its feathering abilities, they were referred to as the "descendants of the phoenix."

"Looks like the School of Royalty is going to groom him next." The upperclassman Cullen stared deeply at Banner. It seemed that the new Adrian power could not be stopped. Five years later, the family would have two musicians. If both became descendants of the phoenix, the School of Royalty would be the playground of these two brothers. With Gavin’s skills, he might even be the concertmaster of the Royal Musician Division in fifteen years.

The humanized manticore roared once again. It rushed out from a collapsed library, a trembling dictionary in its mouth.

"Very good." Banner took the dictionary and placed his school badge on it. The dictionary crumbled and vanished with a flash. It was yet another idiot who thought he could turn into a book and hide in the library to hide from the searches.

"Number thirty-seven," a student helped Banner count.

The badge vibrated and made a crisp sound. With the press of a finger, a light display jumped from the badge, showing the results of all students. Of the top ten, Banner was the first. He was three hundred points away from second place.

There were not many students like him who had an enormous amount of resources and underwent Deva sensing to officially become a musician after a few months in the school. Usually, those at this level could already request graduation. In fact, there were many in this class that paid money but were still in the Rhythm level.

With help from Gavin’s followers in the student council, it was natural that he was first. Banner reread the top ten list multiple times. After confirming that the white-haired b*stard was not in it, he nodded in satisfaction.

"What about that guy I told you to watch?" Banner asked.

"That Easterner?" Cullen thought for a moment. "The last message was that he argued with his female companion and seemed sad. He sat down and didn’t move."

"He’s like this because of a girl? I thought too highly of him." Banner sneered and put his school badge back. "Then let him keep spacing out. We need to hurry. The enchantment’s going to change soon. Everyone group together and don’t get lost."

Under his command, the people crowded over. Someone cast a music score to connect everyone. Cullen lowered his head and hummed something as he bent over to draw a white line on the ground. The head and tail of the line connected, forming a ring around all of them.

The moment they finished, the bell sounded in the air again. The ringing resonated. The seemingly tangible bell stirred the air, creating ripples that spread outward. Everything in its path blurred.

In the shaking, everyone’s visions swam. In their dizziness, they could only feel the white mist rise out of nothing and swallow everything.

Before, the students were able to transform freely and the setting was in the campus that everyone was familiar with. It was time for the students to grow accustomed to the trial. But now, the short period was over.

All graduating students must choose a ballot and accept the object they were required to mimic. The setting would also be transformed into a random corner of the city, according to the aether memory read by the Requiem. Without a doubt, everything would become more complex and unfamiliar.

The mist changed dramatically and the bell rang.

Commotion could be heard deep within the mist, like the low voices of passerby and the loud voices of peddlers. The mist dispersed quickly and the blazing sun once again shone down on everyone’s heads. They were met with a dense stream of people.

Within the slowly disappearing white ring, Banner’s group were jostled and squeezed. They could barely stand straight. Looking around themselves, their expressions turned ugly.

"F*ck," Cullen muttered. They had really hit the jackpot this time…

Under the bells of the tram carriages, the crowd surged at the large intersection. The passerby bustling against each other turned into a dense wave of people. There were peddlers pushing their carts along the road, fortune tellers sitting in the messy alleys with their crystal balls and homeless beggars with ragged overalls and shirts.

A carriage brushed past them. The old elite inside leaned on his cane and glared at the passerby outside. There was also a strange family emblem branded into the side of the carriage. It really looked like some elite’s carriage.

"Hey, what are you all doing there?" A mounted policeman wearing a copper helmet walked. He knocked his baton against his shoulder and examined them. "Is this your first time in Avalon? Stop blocking traffic."

They jumped to the side as if they had just woken from a dream and watched as the carriages galloped across the street on either side under the policeman’s conducting. Was this really the Royal Academy of Music?

Cullen sucked in a deep breath, confirming that he had not seen it incorrectly.

Yes, welcome to the heart of Avalon, the most flourishing part of the city—Queen’s Avenue!

-

Amidst the dense crowd on the long street, Ye Qingxuan stuck his hands in his pockets and strolled lazily, looking around. He hummed an unclear tune and murmured some words. At times, he would suddenly grab a person created from the enchantment and ask some questions like a prank. He would walk, stop, touch around and look around.

In the end, he even stopped by the old man playing an instrument on the street. He knew the man was fake, but he still pulled some coins out and tossed it into the man’s hat.

Behind him, the cautiously following students exchanged confused glances. Someone asked quietly, "It’s already been half an hour. What is he doing?"

"…" The students were silent. Someone asked weakly, "Maybe he’s…shopping?"