Lafite's insistence against Alastair's request saved Glenn from being involved in the minute trivialities in managing a league. Glenn craved for getting his fill out of sorcery learning. This thirst was becoming stronger since he was accepted as a disciple by Sorcerer Norris.

After the gathering ended, Glenn escorted Lafite to her dorm and headed off to the Black Tower. He needed to get prepared before his appointment with his mentor a few days later.

"Glenn!"

Glenn stopped when he heard someone call his name.

It was Chris, and he had a girl with him.

"Oh, It's you." Glenn smiled to the girl gently.

The girl was flat-chested, and she had neither a pretty face nor fair complexion. But she seemed mature and walked with a calm gait.

Before the girl said anything, Chris patted Glenn on the back of his arm and explained:

"Glenn. Her name is Olivia. I bet you must know her. She wanted to thank you in person for saving her life."

Olivia was the girl whom Glenn met before he tried to enter the mirror house. Olivia had run to him for help in the dogfight of the students who were wrestling for the gifts. Glenn had lent a hand and saved her from being slaughtered in that brutal scuffle. What she failed to realize was that offering her a hand was a trap for capturing the boy who was pursuing her! Glenn was deliberately keeping still while waiting for Olivia to approach him because he was containing his powerful chain mark to not to scare off the boy.

"Glenn, thanks!" Olivia moved her lips. One could observe in her eyes the depth of her gratitude towards Glenn.

"We're school fellas! I felt obligated in so doing." Glenn said it out of courtesy. Rescuing her was not his intention for one thing, and for another, he was confused about why Chris was in company with Olivia.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Glenn bid farewell to the pair and sped off to the Black Tower.

Dickens welcomed Glenn with his bright smile and his usual ardent and affected grin. Yet the next second, his face fell.

"Glenn, you've freaked the sh*t out of me. I heard you had been in that damn interrogation room. That was madness. How could they treat a student like that? Are you all right now?"

Glenn shrugged but made no comments.

"So what can I get for you? What do you need for your experiments?" Delight was resumed on Dickens' face.

"I want something that can make me and my Gadflies -- the Symbiotic Insect of mine

-- link up stronger. Do you have something that have such effect?"

"Concord Grass will do, I think!" Dickens hunted through a small black case and yelled seconds later, "found it!"

Dickens passed the Grass to Glenn and stated, "About the microscope you asked -- a Sorcerer promised to give it to me within two months."

Glenn nodded a thanks and asked for a live monkey, which was then presented to him.

As Glenn was about to leave, Dickens hollered at Glenn to wait, although his voice betrayed his hesitation.

"Glenn--" Dickens drawled.

"Oh, Silly me! I forgot to pay!" Glenn pulled out a bag of stones.

"No, it's not that. I got something somewhere-- it's from a place way way off." Dickens faltered. "And actually, I'm not licensed to sell."

"What is it?" Dickens' wavering gesture roused Glenn's interest.

"Okay, wait a sec."

Dickens dragged a transparent box. Inside it were a dark ball and a crown-shaped Magical Tool. He then put them over the counter.

"This is a crystal ball for sorcerers that inhabit the Underground World." Dickens introduced.

Upon hearing "Underground World", Sorcerer Apollo's image came to Glenn's head. Apollo was the one who opened up Glenn's mind to sorcery! But ever since Apollo left the young students in Sorcerer Dior's hands at the Seer port and headed for the Underground World, Glenn had never had a chance to see or hear from him.

"Sorcerers here exploited elements along the path of sorcery learning. But for sorcerers on the Underground World, they used dragons to hone theirs, and the dragons had proved to be very practical weapons in the second Civilization War, which involved us and them."

"The Second Civilization War? Like an actual war between sorcerers?" Dickens' words beamed up Glenn's face, which signified his astonishment and curiosity.

Glenn had read from books that sorcerers on the Sorcerers Continent were not alone. They ran parallel to several other realms beyond this Continent, including the Underground World. But never had he hear it from a real person, not to mention a sorcerer war.

"Yeah, It's a war that came with heavy casualties. A lot of sorcerers died in that war."

"Did we win?"

"No, we lost!"

"Ah!" Glenn seemed hardly to believe that the Sorcerers Continent would be defeated, which he had unbreakable faith in. "How did we survive the war, then? Were the Underground sorcerers our enemy back then?"

"We just survived. That's all I know." Dickens appeared to have lost his clear-headedness in pitching his product as a salesman after mentioning the war. He sunk into his chair and looked into the crystal ball.

Catching sight of Dickens' careworn face, Glenn started asking about the crystal ball, trying to veer his focus away from that civilization war.

"So, what's the difference between our crystal ball and theirs? Is there anything special about it?"

"Theirs also indicates body constitution. That's the difference. Constitution matters in their sorcery learning mechanism since they command dragons to do things for them."

That being said, Dickens relapsed into his muddle-headedness.

Glenn reached out his hand and touched the crystal ball without hesitation.

The readings ran as follows:

"Mental Strength: 24 points;

Magical Force: 238~247 points;

Constitution: 4 points;

Stamina: 34~55 points;

Strength: 15~60 points;

Resilience: 22~24 points"

"This sucks! I only have a 4 point constitution?! That's an insult!" Glenn was dispirited.

"Yeah, 4 points is frustrating. And accordingly, your stamina, strength and resilience are a low grade, too. But these three are attributes of one's constitution. So they're directly connected, like our mental strength and magical force are correlated positively." Dickens went on to talk about the price. "I'm breaking school rules to sell this, so it's priced at 10,000 magical stones."

Glenn was in no short supply of stones. Dickens was killing with the aphrodisiac industry in the Black Isotta and more with the Love Vial designed by Glenn. He was selling more at higher prices, increasing Glenn's proceedings as the owner of the potion. Besides, Glenn had received huge rewards from killing students in the Test, and the total amount exceeded 20,000 magical stones.

"We have a deal." Glenn nodded. "Tell me about this crown thing."

"It's an amazing Magical Tool like a microscope. You can use it to examine your body--your internal organs and your circulatory system. But for this tool to act, you'll have to consume your soul power, so its use has to be sternly restricted to once a month!" warned Dickens. "Specifically, it's used when one was cursed, and the Tweeting Twig stopped the curing momentarily. This way, one can observe the interiors of hisher body to seek out why they are being cursed."

"This is such a spectacular tool!"