In the following month, he filled most of his gaps in his education and understanding of how society worked as he read through over one hundred books. His reading tempo quickened to the point where he could devour several hundred pages in just a few hours while still retaining a clear memory of the content.

With newfound understanding, he managed to smooth out the incongruity that some felt around him when he behaved differently than normal people would.

The only thing that prompted him to leave the library were the lectures of the academics as he attended every single one, diligently recording everything.

He learned about literature, logic and rhetoric, penmanship, care of books and other academic tools, the history and laws of the kingdom, philosophy, theology, natural philosophy, and the common language of the continent, known as the Oberuan language…

In most of those, he learned only at a superficial level and was nothing in front of the other apprentices who had studied these topics for years, let alone the fully-fledged academics.

However, that couldn’t be said about the mathematics that intrigued him to no end.

When he didn’t understand it, it was frustrating to the point of pulling his hair, but once he understood the logic behind all of those unknown formulas, he started to enjoy the process.

He still wasn’t at a level where he could use it in real life, but he felt that he got much better.

And since this was the topic he focused on, he talked about it a lot with Mr. Korin whenever he had a lecture. This made Mr. Korin acknowledge him as a diligent student and have a good opinion about him.

Of course, he didn’t forget about his current goal, which was to become a full-fledged academic. From these one hundred books, sixty of them were the ones he needed to learn for the test.

Thanks to that, his medical knowledge sublimated as he read all those medicine books. It wasn’t because the knowledge inside was much better than what he knew. After all, while the legacy of Bakur was incomplete, it was still something desired by most. However, he had a different perspective. While the one he learned his entire life was more based on spirituality, the one he read in the books was based on pure logic and physical treatment.

Now that he knew both perspectives, he felt as if new doors opened to him.

He was looking forward to the examination that they would prepare for him. Illyan already visited Ollie and explained to him that he was prepared a few days ago.

Now, he just needed to wait for all three physicians to gather. Ollie told him it would take from one month to six months as those old men were unpredictable.

But he didn’t mind as he would just spend the time in the library.

The other times, Illyan was either in his room where he mostly slept or talked to Nord on some occasions or at the dining hall where he talked with him and Cara. That was his entire schedule. Waking up, meditating for hours, going to lectures if there were any, and then spending the rest of the time in the library until the evening when he would finally eat and go to rest.

While he didn’t mind Nord, he was looking forward to getting a proper room or even a house for himself.

He was already getting fidgety from the time he didn’t train his body properly. The only proper movement he had all this time was the rehabilitation of his weakened left arm, but that was already healed at this point.

There was no mistake, he enjoyed just sitting in a quiet room while reading, but it was also a fact that he liked to do some kind of action from time to time since he was growing as a warrior.

That made him wonder how the training of the soldiers in this town was.

‘Should I visit Terren for once with Nord and Cara? He became a trainee there…’

He just shook his head as he cleared his thoughts.

Illyan was right now in his room sitting on the bed while meditating. He cut the time of his meditation since entering the town from several hours to only one hour as it got extremely hard to meditate.

As the name hinted, [Nature Breath Method] was something to be used in nature. When he entered the town, the entire process of the meditation was similar to going through a quagmire.

It actually even felt that the meditation didn’t bring him any gains.

But he still preserved it as he felt that his mind got tempered with this kind of exercise. He also felt that his perception of nature itself was getting better.

If before he was in the sea, then now he was in the desert looking for the droplets of water. Once he got better, he felt that his method would go through another breakthrough.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

However, that would take too much time to depend on it. While he had time, it didn’t mean that others would wait for him.

Illyan already guessed that his luck was quite bad during his entire life. Maybe he was paranoid, but he didn’t plan to test the waters. He needed to find a way to get stronger as soon as possible if he didn’t want another misfortune to befall upon him.

The knowledge was important, but it didn’t give him any edge against his enemies. For now.

The first thought that passed through his mind was about those robed men. They definitely were strong. But it seemed most, if not all, of them left and even if they didn’t, they didn’t seem exactly friendly.

Because of that, some wild thoughts passed through his mind.

‘Should I just kidnap one of them if I see him?’ Once he thought about it, he started to really consider it.

If he kidnapped one of them and managed to get out of them the way they got stronger, then it would be for the best. If they didn’t cooperate, then he would dissect their bodies to find the truth. He did it hundreds of times with Kaoran. Only not with living people.

‘But those guys terrorize this place, right? Taking corpses and slaves. It seems that they are planning something foul.’

After his logic and rhetoric lecture, Illyan unknowingly made his first but poor excuse for a horrible act that he had in his mind. Marking them as evil men gave him inner justification to go after them. After all, he still had some bottom line in the corner of his mind that was built over time with good people around him.

But they were not here anymore to hold him back…

In the next few days, he didn’t stop reading, but he took some of his time going around the town looking for a good place to practice.

Because of the effect of [Blood Feeding Technique], he couldn’t practice it either. He needed some abandoned place where he could be alone for days if needed.

He found some of these, but they were too ruined for him to live there.

During these times, he also looked around for a way how the soldiers trained themselves. But it seemed like it was classified information.

That made him a little expectant. After all, if it was classified, then it should be good, right?

Because of that, one day he started talking to Nord more than normally.

Nord was already in his bed groaning. Illyan at first thought he was beaten or something, but it seemed like it was something different.

“What happened?”

When he asked lightly, Nord cast his eyes at him.

“Academic Natasha is so quiet that I had problems hearing her even in the first row! Cara also had the same problem! No, it seemed that every apprentice had the same problem…We asked if anyone knew what she was talking about, but they just shrugged their shoulders. It is such a pain…”

When he complained, Illyan immediately understood. In his mind, an image of the old woman who was mumbling under her nose about the law of this kingdom appeared.

“Why didn’t you ask me?” Then he felt a little weird that Nord didn’t come to him. After all, they could be called acquaintances or even friends. At least superficially.

Nord rolled his eyes.

“You are always at the back of the rows. How could you hear anything?”

When Illyan heard this, he almost snorted in amusement.

He took out his notes and gave them to him.

“Here you go.”

Nord took them and casually looked at what he got. Then his eyes widened as his mouth twitched.

“You recorded everything?”

“Yes.”

“How? You couldn’t possibly hear her if the ones in front seats didn’t!”

“I just have better hearing than average.” Illyan shrugged.

Nord held it firmly in his hands as he looked at Illyan.

“Can I borrow them?”

“That’s the reason why I took them out.”

When Nord heard Illyan’s words, he revealed a delighted expression.

“Thank you! I will rewrite as soon as possible and then…”

“You don’t need to. The topic is quite simple so I don’t have a problem with it and don’t need it.” Illyan said with an impassive tone.

“But…”

“Just buy me a good meal or something. It has been a while since I ate something different than the food in the dining hall. I need some change. We can go out with Cara and meet the other two. Garran and Terren. We didn’t see them for a month…”

Illyan gave a suggestion while hiding his ulterior motive. He planned to talk to Terren about the Knight Training he was going through.

Since he didn’t plan to use Cold Energy ever again, he needed to find another way to temper himself. He would also like to learn the ways of the weapons that he never used.

For example, swords. Most of the soldiers he saw used them, and so he was interested in wielding one. He already used a similar jagged blade in the past, but that was just a long knife at most.

If the techniques of knights would be sub-par, then he would need to focus on those

robed men only.

After Nord agreed with him, thinking that it would be a fine idea to rest their minds after the mindless study, he visited Cara and decided that tomorrow they would visit Garran and Terren. As they didn’t have a way to contact them, they could only surprise them as they would visit.

The next day, after another lecture, they gathered together and left the institute.

At first, they went at a leisurely pace, but when they noticed the burly guys walking around, they picked up the tempo.

“Damn it, why are they everywhere?” Cara muttered resentfully.

“Probably because the guards are not doing anything.” Nord guessed.

Illyan also felt tired of walking on his tiptoes because of such weaklings. The guys walking around were from the same organization that he met on his first day in this town.

He didn’t care much about them, but it was irritating and even a little amusing that they acted as if the world belonged to them.

Illyan investigated a bit and found out that there were at least two memorable gangs in this town that the mayor or anyone else didn’t do anything against.

One of them was the Venomous Viper Gang. They were a gathering of small-time criminals who blackmailed, raped, and stole. It was just a pile of vermin.

On the other hand, the second organization was called Heart Bearer Gang. They were the ones collecting the fees around for protection. But other than that, they actually protected the civilians against the other gangs. That made them feared but not that hated. Other than that, they were known for giving loans to poor people. Those loans were obviously one big scam which made the poor people despair even more. They would then squeeze all the worth they had until they would make them debt slaves. While frowned upon, it was actually a legal thing to do so in this kingdom.

And since giving a slave to the authorities would give you a certain sum based on what person it was, this was easy business for them which made them extremely wealthy in a short time.

As for what would happen to those slaves, Illyan was already aware.

They would be taken away to the capital by those mysterious men…