Watcher?

The social gala was abruptly terminated, and all the students were driven back to their dormitories. A colossal white tower rose from flat ground, and the surrounding area was cordoned off as a military exclusion zone. None of the students knew what that intruder signified; they had only seen him turn into a puddle of mashed potatoes before being scooped into jars and packed away by the professors, practically guaranteeing that the dining hall's mashed potatoes would suffer from sluggish sales over the next few days. Standing on their dormitory balcony, Sonia and her three roommates gazed at the distant, towering structure that nearly blotted out the night sky, momentarily dazed. Frankly speaking, though they knew of and had witnessed the mighty power of sorcerers, Jialesi had always been peaceful and prosperous, and the might of sorcerers had long since permeated their daily lives to the point where they took it completely for granted. Controlling the weather, suppressing earth tremors, regenerating severed limbs, accelerating crop growth... Such miracles had even become routine tasks for common occupations listed in the *College Graduate Employment Survey*. When you bathed in the glory of miracles every minute and second, taking them for granted was only natural. As for the sorcerer wars and miraculous spectacles in screen dramas, thrilling as they were to watch, they always carried an aura of unreality. Are they truly that incredible? Even if they are, what does that have to do with me? Yet at this very moment, the sorcerer apprentices of Sword Flower University finally caught a glimpse of that monumental might. Just moments ago, in a matter of mere minutes, a white spire hundreds of meters tall had risen from the ground, reaching toward the heavens. They had watched with their own eyes as the massive Stardrop Auditorium was swallowed by the white tower, soil and stone stacking upward like building blocks, the spire's pinnacle reaching up toward the starlight hanging in midair at a visible pace. Not a day, not an hour, but mere minutes! A magnificent structure that would take ordinary people years, or even decades, to construct had been completed by sorcerers in the time it took to finish a cup of black tea! "Did a Legendary Sorcerer intervene?" Lois murmured. "I don't recall any Legendary Sorcerer specializing in earth sorcery..." "Anyone who reaches Sanctuary or Legendary has long mastered broad analogies; simulating other arts through their own is commonplace," Ingrid remarked. "Take the wind art 'Wind-Eroded Yardang'—that's a miracle that uses a wind sorcery spirit to unleash the might of earth arts, carving colossal structures out of a tempest. "Not to mention that even in a secondary faction, a Legendary Sorcerer wielding Four-Wing sorcery power and Four-Wing sorcery spirits can display power far beyond our imagination. That intruder seems to be taken very seriously—people from other academies and even the House of Nobles have rushed over. With so many sorcerers gathered, erecting a giant white tower might have been no more than lifting a finger for them." "I noticed the Void Realm turbulence way earlier!" Adele clamored. "If I'd reported it promptly back then, would I have gotten a reward from the academy? Like exempting me from homework and my graduation thesis?" "The academy would reward you with free retakes," Lois said, poking Adele's forehead. "You failed two courses last semester. If you fail two more this semester, I'd love to see how your schedule fits together next year." "Don't worry! I recently learned a brilliant way to cheat. I'll never fail a class again!" "Are you serious? Cheating right under a professor's nose? What, are you a hidden Gold Sorcerer whose faction is 'binge-watching'?" "Hmph, just you wait and see." "Speaking of which," Ingrid looked at Sonia, "Sonia, how did you suddenly unfold your Silver Wings? Adding it all up, you haven't even been entering the Void Realm for ten days!" Lois and Adele stole glances at Sonia as well. Their curiosity was practically itching inside, but their relationship with Sonia wasn't close enough to probe for such secrets, so they had been waiting for Ingrid to bring it up. After all, it was downright terrifying. Everyone knew that Sonia had only begun swordplay training on the evening of April 12th. During her duel with Felix in the training hall, she had summoned the Wave Sword sorcery spirit and earned the title of 'Water Sorcery Department's Number One Swordsmanship Prodigy.' The very next day, Professor Trozan, having caught wind of it, took her on as a research apprentice. Then, she only began venturing into the Void Realm on the night of the 13th—and today was the 21st. A mere eight days! From an apprentice who didn't even possess void wings to an official Silver Sorcerer with unfurled Silver Wings, Sonia had taken only eight days! This speed was simply terrifying—after all, Rigan Carroll, who had strutted across the stage just earlier, was considered a genius of Truth University merely for having condensed most of his Silver Wings in his second year. Meanwhile, Professor Nidala's prize apprentice, Leonie, the 'Orange Dancer,' was hailed as having the makings of a Sword Saint just because she had unfurled her Silver Wings in her third year! Even the most talented young sorcerer needed a year or two traversing the Sea of Knowledge to condense enough sorcery power, yet Sonia had completed the process in eight days! If not for the realm restriction requiring one's sorcery faction to advance to the gold realm before a sorcerer could possibly ascend to Two Wings, Lois even suspected Sonia might become a Gold Sorcerer before the rest of them could even become Silver Sorcerers. To be frank, if someone hadn't suddenly fallen out of the sky, the undisputed star of tonight would unquestionably have been Sonia. And if the academy hadn't declared a campus-wide lockdown requiring all students to remain in their dorms, their room's threshold would have been trampled down by hordes of visitors by now. Condensing Silver Wings and sailing ten thousand li across the Sea of Knowledge in eight days—how on earth had she achieved that? Sonia was feeling a bit of lingering fear herself. She hadn't actually wanted to expose herself so early, but Rigan had asked whether the sorcery power she condensed amounted to even a single feather. Under the constraints of the summoning ritual, she had been forced to summon her Silver Wings to prove herself—at this moment, Sonia would never admit that she had harbored any urge to show off back then. Her sorcery power was, of course, thanks to the fact that over the past two days, she and Watcher had been using the 'Secret of the Vortex' to generate vortices. Even though vortices created this way covered shorter distances and were quite difficult to produce, Watcher could reliably locate three or four knowledge creatures a night. Over three nights, the two of them had created several vortices and both unfolded their Silver Wings. This was originally a great thing, but Sonia had been a sorcerer for such a short time that revealing it was excessively frightening. Moreover, she wasn't sure if the academy would covet the 'Secret of the Vortex.' If it were purely factual knowledge, she wouldn't have minded turning it in—the school would at least give her a reward of some kind. However, the 'Secret of the Vortex' was a secret poison. The more people who knew it, the deeper the poison took hold of those who possessed it. Currently, drinking water tasted as foul to Sonia as swill; she was certainly unwilling to share the secret and make drinking water even more agonizing. "Because I encountered a vortex," Sonia said, controlling the amount of information revealed by her truthful answer. The others let out an enlightened "Oh," asking no further questions, their faces awash with envy and jealousy. They likely assumed Sonia had stumbled upon an ultra-long-distance vortex that condensed her Silver Wings in one go, without ever imagining she had encountered multiple vortices. After all, who would guess that someone could win the grand prize several times in a row? *Clang!* Suddenly, the sound of shattering glass echoed from the starry sky. Everyone looked up to see a woman in azure robes flying toward the colossal white tower. Moments later, explosive booms resonated from the tower, accompanied by expanding ripples of rainbow light—a battle had erupted! "Was that female sorcerer flying toward the tower... Her Holiness the Church's Saintess?" Adele said in surprise. "I think I saw her when I attended the Grand Festival last year..." Lois asked, "Adele, are you religious?" "No, but the nobles of Jialesi always have to attend all kinds of holiday festivals." Adele watched the top of the tower, which radiated a festering glow. "Nothing was happening just a second ago... Could the Church's Saintess have gotten into a fight with the professors?" The others couldn't join in at all; they knew even less about the Church than Adele did. In the Starry Country, the Church was a contradictory institution. On one hand, it was indisputably the sole state religion—no other faiths existed—and it presided over all ceremonial festivities. Even the Empress's coronation required the Pope's confirmation. Yet at the same time, the Church kept an exceptionally low profile. It engaged in virtually no missionary activities, cultural works such as screen dramas or operas about the Church were extraordinarily scarce, and believers were practically nonexistent. Even these female college students only knew that the Church worshipped the Starry Law Master, but had forgotten the Church's full name. Was it the Starry Church, or the Astral Church? "Time for a bath," Adele yawned. Sonia suddenly remembered something. She opened her miracle bracelet and checked the time—it was already 11:30 PM! In the past, she always had to enter the Void Realm at 11:00 PM! With no time to remove her makeup or bathe, Sonia lay down on her bed and sought the Gate of Truth within her Wave Sword sorcery spirit. With the campus-wide lockdown tonight, going to the Meditation Building was out of the question, but she was now an official Silver Sorcerer. Even without the aid of the Meditation Building, she could easily locate the Gate of Truth! Close eyes... Gate of Truth... sink consciousness... enter the Void Realm! The sequence was the same as always, yet before Sonia even opened her eyes, she felt cold seawater enveloping her—nauseating, just as sickening as studying at home in her childhood while being surrounded by mocking gazes. Opening her eyes, what greeted her was not the familiar boat or the familiar stranger, but eternal, unchanging white mist and the deep, pitch-black Sea of Knowledge. Looking around, she was completely alone. The surroundings were frightfully quiet. Disregarding the nausea, Sonia swam around the area, but the scenery reflected in her eyes remained unchanging. An indescribable panic washed over Sonia's heart. "Watcher?"