However, mortals did not care. They only wanted their children to join a wizard so their families could enjoy fame and prosperity over several generations.
This was the reason why wizards tended to stay low among mortals. Otherwise, something bothersome would always find them.
Prome was naturally the center of attention with his bright robe. He sighed and prepared to chase them away. If not for Angor, Prome would have used his flying vehicle to come here so he would never get troubled by these mortals.
Usually, when something similar happened, Prome would simply display his power and blow the nuisance away with a spell. But according to Dave, Angor preferred more gentle means, so Prome planned to deal with the mortals in a peaceful way this time.
Prome put on his display as a seasoned master and prepared to accept all the flattering first. Before it could happen, however, a giant explosion came from the boiler room.
“Huh, the boiler exploded?” Prome wondered.
Everyone looked toward the source of the ruckus, including the mortal nobles.
Thick smoke came flowing out from the boiler, covering the entire train station in a matter of seconds.
“Dammit. Cheap mortal shit,” Someone yelled in the smoke.
“Let’s go already, under the smoke’s cover.”
“I can’t see the way! Lemme use something to clear it first… Hey, wait. That’s no smoke. My spell didn’t work.”
Prome frowned and felt something wrong. Before he could look into it, someone patted him on the back.
In the next second, all the smoke, noises, and blown boiler suddenly vanished. The air was still hazy, but nothing troubled their view.
“Man, Angor, next time you do an illusion, try to remind me earlier, alright? You always scare me,” said Dave as he joined them. “I almost ran outside with everyone else if you didn’t tell me otherwise.”
Prome looked back and saw it was Angor who touched him.
“That’s an illusion?” Prome finally realized what just happened. Now that he thought about it, the scene looked so wrong in many ways—the boiler would never produce so much smoke in such a short time.
But the illusion still tricked him for a good moment!
Prome stared at Angor, somewhat terrified of the boy’s potential.
“Just a simple illusion so the nobles don’t drag us down. Let’s go,” said Angor as he nodded to Prome.
The three of them left the station and heard someone who was left behind cursing loudly.
“This ain’t real smoke!”
“It’s fake! Someone used an illusion!”
“F*ck it! Who the hell did this shit?”
“Hey! How do you get rid of this thing? Shouldn’t it go away after I discovered the truth? I can still see the smoke!”
Dave looked back at all the level-2 apprentices stumbling inside the train station. He was startled as well when he realized Angor used something so simple to trap so many people who were of a higher level.
He was glad that Angor was his friend, or he would be wandering aimlessly in the illusion like everyone else.
“Um, what about those people?” Dave pointed to the confused apprentices.
Angor shrugged. “My illusion only covered so much area. They can always walk out of it, or they can wait for someone to discover the illusion nodes and break them.”
“But what about mortals?”
“I only used enough mana to sustain the illusion for five minutes. They can wait it out.”
“Good job you did there,” Prome commented. “If you go for the tower now, I believe you can reach the top without relying on your alchemy weapons or Toby.”
Angor shook his head. “People will get wary if I use illusions too much. I still need weapons to compensate for my lack of strength.”
As they talked, Angor sensed that his illusion was breaking apart.
“Someone found the nodes,” Angor wondered who managed to break his illusion so fast. But on second thought, he should leave as fast as possible so no one learned that he was the “culprit” behind this. “Anyway, we should go.”
Soon, a group of apprentices covered in dust rushed out of the train station furiously.
“Come on out, bitch! Whoever you are!”
“I’m so killing this bastard today!”
Despite their yells, the “criminal” was gone.
Among the angry crowd, a woman wearing tree leaves as decorations spoke to her companion. “I think that was a Melodious Illusion… Didn’t you learn something like that before?”
“It was. But whoever deployed the illusion was a lot better than me. He blocked our senses with some unknown effort. But he didn’t keep doing it, or we’d have a hard time escaping from the illusion.”
The speaker was a woman who only wore a transparent silk veil and violet cloth which covered her breast and back door. “It must be someone really talented in illusions. Not every illusionist can block our judgmental senses with such ease.”
“An Illusionist… You can find many illusionists among Occultists. I wonder which master did that,” said the leaf woman with a tilt of her head.
“I smell no blood. He only used an illusion to get rid of the annoying mortals. Good job, I must say. He got rid of the flies, and gave a lesson to these arrogant apprentices.” The silk woman leaned on the shoulder of her beautiful companion. “Lady Daichese… you mentioned something about a strange treasure, right? May I check it out?”
“Daichese” shook her head. “No way, Anna. I’m going to use this thing to buy a glass of White Orchid Potion. The moment you see it, you’ll try to steal it.”
The woman in silk, Anna, curled her lips. “Come on… What’s so precious that I can’t even take a look?”