Abium quietly followed Berold and finally found his allotted room on the third layer. Along the way, he talked with Mage Berold and gathered some important information about the Magic Tower.
There were ten layers in this tower. The first layer was simply a reception and dining area. The second and third layers were for accommodations and regular classrooms for apprentice mages.
The Fourth and fifth layers were for special departmental halls like the alchemy room, ritual chamber, dark arts laboratory, rune research department, etc. Then, the sixth layer was for the library and exchange counter.
Beyond that, even first-tier mages weren't allowed to enter.
He also asked about the Chaos crystal, which Berold gave to the goblin earlier, and found out it was the main currency for the academic mages.
One Chaos crystal was equal to 100 white gold coins!
If he wanted to get back to the Royal Capital, he had to pay chaos crystal or white gold coins to Grold.
'Thankfully, I have more than a hundred chaos stones in my space ring.' All of them were his loots from the pocket dimension.
'Still, I need to be careful. Demons haven't showed their appearance yet. If I take out those crystals and use them now, I might end up in more troublesome situation.' He thought inwardly.
Right now, it was cold and vacant in the dorms. As Abium walked inside the empty corridors, his hair stood on the end as he listened to the echoes of his footsteps.
Soon, Berold stopped his footsteps and turned his gaze towards the nearby door.
"This is your key." Berold said as he gave a key and a separate leather bag to Abium and walked away from there.
Meanwhile, Abium caught the key and the leather bag and arrived closer to the door.
Then, he took out the key and looked at it.
It was a heavy, silver key labeled '345' on the head.
He casually extended his right hand, placed the key into the keyhole, and turned it towards the left side.
A heavy metal clicking noise echoed in the gloomy corridor, followed by a creaking noise.
As the large door opened, the darkroom automatically produced light.
Abium quietly stepped inside, placed the leather bag in the living room, and inspected the interior.
The dormitory was a little large, like a house, and it was divided into three partitions, a bedroom, living room, and washroom. They were even a new blanket placed on the bed; it looked prim and proper.
Abium first examined his dormitory, moved towards the living room, and sat on the sofa.
Then, he took out the leather bag and checked the things which Berold had given him before.
"Hmm, there is a set of grey robes, a badge which has a red-bird symbol on it and a map of the institute."
He first changed into the grey robe and decided to check the astral realm first. He sat on the concrete floor meditatively without any delay and closed his amber eyes.
He soon recited the secret chant, entered the astral realm, and glanced around.
But to his shock, he noticed that many white clouds appeared around his surroundings!
Although it wasn't equal to the amount he had seen in the pocket dimension, he felt that it was pretty abnormal here.
'It must be due to the presence of the Magic Tower.' He thought.
'Yes. Every magic tower has such a mechanism to gather the surrounding spirit essences. In truth, the density is too low here.' Azolla's voice echoed in his mind.
'You can talk to me even when I'm in this Astral Realm?' He couldn't help but ask.
'Of course, lad. My core is in your soul, so it's not strange.' Azolla paused for a moment and then added.
'Gather as much spirit essence as possible. If you notice any red colored essence instead of white, avoid it. It's called Negative essence and is quite harmful to your soul.'
'Got it.' Abium nodded, looked around the surroundings, and soon zeroed his gaze on the nearby white cloud. He then took a step forward and started walking towards it.
Still, it took him more than 5 hours to reach the nearby cloud.
'It appears to be floating only around 5 to 10 meters away, but it's taking too much time.'
For the next 24 hours, he stayed in the astral realm and absorbed four spirit essences before waking up.
He hurriedly opened his status bar and checked how much his spirit attribute had increased.
'Only one point?' He couldn't help but frown.
'The more you absorb the spirit essence, the harder it will become to increase your spirit attribute. Still, your speed of absorption is ten times faster than a normal mage due to your unique soul.' Azolla's words made him pause in surprise.
'Unique soul? What do you mean by that?'
'Well, it's not possible to move in the astral realm at your level, lad. But you did it even before creating your first spell model. That itself is an anomaly. For example, an apprentice mage will stay in the same place and wait for the spirit essence to come towards him, not the other way around. He can move only when he enters the realm of Official Mage, and his movement speed would be more like a snail.' Azolla added calmly.
'Anomaly… Is it due to the 'Time Divinity'?' He asked.
'I thought of the same. Although I don't sense any divinity in your body, I did feel a trance of divine power when you battled against Count's soldiers. Anyway, it's doing no harm to your soul, so you don't need to worry too much about it.'
Abium nodded at Azolla's remark, stood up from the floor, and moved towards the attached bathroom. He quickly took a bath and soon felt hungry.
At that moment, a knocking sound came from outside.
'Who?'
He walked towards the entrance door, unlocked the door from inside, and soon noticed a grey-robed mage standing outside.
He appeared to be around the same age as him, had wavy black hair, unique red eyes, a lean face, and looked around 175 cm high.
"You are?" Abium looked at him up and down and asked in puzzlement.
Meanwhile, that grey-robed mage smiled and spoke politely.
"I apologize for disturbing you, Mister. I'm Ron, also an apprentice mage like you. I heard that a newcomer shifted to the dorm next to my own, so I thought of paying a visit."
"Oh?" Abium raised his eyebrows and then greeted him.
"Hello, Mage Ron. I'm Abium, and I arrived here yesterday."
"I heard it from other students. We're pretty much excited to meet a true elf." Mage Ron said as he widened his grin and then asked.
"Are you perhaps planning on going to the dining hall now?"
"How did you know?" Abium showed a surprised look and asked.
"Why are you surprised about it? It's already lunch time. So, I made a possible guess." Ron let out a chuckle and added.
"I am about to go there too. Let's go together."
"I couldn't ask for anymore." Abium smiled gently, closed the door before locking it, and started walking in the gloomy corridor.
"The dining hall is on the first layer. And everything there is free."
Ron spoke as he led the way and soon asked.
"Where did you come from? I'm from Keris Kingdom."
This time, Abium suddenly froze.
"What do you mean? I thought every apprentice mages of White Tower came from the Peral kingdom, though."
His sudden question made Ron stare wide-eyed, and soon he burst into laughter.
"Hahaha. You knew nothing about our institute, right? Well, the Peral kingdom sponsoring this institute makes your statement half correct. And our headmaster is also from the Peral kingdom, but that doesn't mean everyone here is from the Peral kingdom."
Noticing Abium's puzzled look, Ron shook his head and began to explain.
"There are few mages from other kingdoms also studying here, Abium. Our institute is not only responsible for protecting the Peral Kingdom but also the Keris and Sladel Kingdom."
'Oh? Now that I think about it, I never even heard of any friction happened between these three kingdoms. No wonder.'
Abium thought of asking even more questions but soon noticed that they had already reached the first layer.
As they stepped down the staircase, Ron suddenly thought of something and asked.
"Oh, right! Who is your mentor?"
"Professor Zivior," Abium replied without putting much thought into it.
"Alchemy?"
Meanwhile, Ron was seemingly startled.
"Is it difficult to learn Alchemy?" Abium was a little worried.
He knew nothing much about alchemy but didn't have any other choice.
'Maybe I should ask Professor Zivior to change my department. No, it's better to learn more about Alchemy and other departments before making a decision.'
As he was in muse, Ron started to speak.
"Not only Alchemy is difficult, but it also requires a large number of resources, ingredients, etc. Even a mage from the prestigious noble family will think twice before choose this department. Well, if you become good at alchemy, you may earn a lot of money through concocting potions. Still, it's a risky department and will suck your money dry in a single month." Ron's reply made Abium frown deeper.
'What the hell? Although I'm pretty rich now, I don't want to take a risk.'
While he was in deep thoughts, Ron moved toward the serving area, took a large plate, and spoke.
"Don't put too much thought into it. Take whatever you want and eat first!" While saying this, he moved towards the nearby dish and started serving himself.