Karl Yale

Karl entered the Ivory Tower at the young age of 11. Spending four years as a preparatory acolyte, he learned how to read, to behave and to serve as an acolyte's paige. This acolyte was none other than Dorian's own father, the current Count Sylvester. Although the latter didn't have much talent in magic, he still graduated from this forsaken tower, and returned as a proud lord who revived his family's glory.

Karl, as his paige, also went through many hardships. Cursed with only grade 1 talent, he had to work harder than others, and consume twice as much resources as the others in order to reap minimal gains. Over the years, his motivation started to decline and it had been over five years since he last medidated. He had accepted his fate as a beginner acolyte. After reaching 50 years of age, his improvements were abysmal anyway.

Instead, he studied. Few could boast being as knowledgeable as he was, for he spent most of his days in the library, learning new magical theories and studying spell matrixes. He was probably the only acolyte in the tower to have mastered three spells and studied them beyond their limits. His efficiency when casting spell was as good as that of a grade 3 talent magician, even though he was sloppy and lacked magical control.

Yet, he was going to die in a nameless expedition led by some brazen youth who was not even a third of his age.

Missing one arm, grunting in pain, Karl could see his vision turn blurry.

'Is this how I am going to die?', he thought as he looked straight into the abnormally huge wolf on top of him, feasting on his missing arm.

Any of the acolytes in the expedition could tell that this pack of wolf was not ordinary. Not only were the wolves following formations, something that even humans would have trouble to do with proper training, they were also particularly ferocious and strong. These wolves were trained. And the strangest part was that they weren't trained by humans, for there was no marks of beatings and abuse. They were trained by their own Alpha.

From the corner of his eyes, Karl could see youths from the Law Enforcement Faction trying to survive. The body refinement acolyte, Jean, was wielding his sword like a barbarian, while Elizabeth was trying to wave off a smaller wolf with a dagger, her healing spell utterly useless in such large-scale battles. Meanwhile, the fat William was desperately trying to run away, but three wolves were chasing him.

It was only a matter of time before he would die.

As for their leader, Arthur, he was nowhere to be seen. He said he was shooting them from above, but this was unlikely to work even if he happened to be a genius archer. What they needed was an army, rather than acolytes capable of casting two or three spells in such a battlefield.

'I have been too naive...How could we try to cross these plains in this season, where wolves are famished and especially ferocious? Natives know how to hide from them, but acolytes like us aren't very used to travel...What a pity...If I had a better leader, we might have survived', Karl thought, making Arthur the reason for their losses.

Arthur, however, was having the time of his life.

More than thirty minutes had passed since the battle began, and he had already killed over eighty wolves. More than half of the pack had already died, and he finally ran out of arrows.

Seeing his team being on the verge of annihilation, he was smiling like a devil.

Unwillingly, his morals disappeared. Faced with the ecstasy of leveling up fast and quick progress, he wanted more. He wanted to become stronger, faster. And the quickest way to do so was to kill fellow human beings. They were worth dozens of times more than monsters and magical beasts.

*SPLASH*

Arthur was cutting through the wolves as if they were made out of butter rather than flesh and bones.

Seeing this scene of a valiant armoured knight easily cutting through enemies, Karl had a tiny hope in his mind: 'Will he be able to save us?'