Chapter 103: One Million

Mentioning this year-level competition made Rolin feel a little amused, and the reason was his registration. Because he cultivated three disciplines, the fire, dark, and lightning instructors all wanted the right to sign him up. Given that Rolin had managed to return alive from the perilous Maya Mountains as a third-rank magician, the champion of this third-year competition was practically guaranteed to be him. As a result, whichever teacher secured his registration would receive a substantial reward, and for that reason the instructors actually ended up arguing over it.

In the end, a single remark from Harvey, the dark-element instructor, persuaded the other two, and they agreed to let Rolin register with him this time.

What Harvey said was, “The three of us can take turns handling Rolin’s registration. That way, we can all take turns receiving the reward. Why not?”

His words immediately won the approval of Sofit, the lightning-element instructor. He knew that among the three teachers, Rolin got along best with Teacher Menglu, next came Teacher Harvey, and he himself ranked last. If they rotated in this way, then he would still have a few chances to claim the reward; otherwise, it might all be snatched up by Teacher Menglu.

With Harvey and Sofit joining forces, Teacher Menglu had no choice but to agree as well. Since she had already received one reward before, it was now Harvey’s turn.

After the three teachers argued in front of Rolin for a while, they set this rule in place. Rolin, the party most affected, had no voice in the matter and could only sign what amounted to a surrender under the walls.

Tomorrow was the year-level competition. That evening, the four people from Dormitory 2015, along with Karina and Victoria, decided to hold a feast in their dormitory. Because Victoria and Rolin had gone to train in the Maya Mountains, they had not gone home for two or three years already. So they decided that after tomorrow’s competition ended, they would set out for home. Tonight’s gathering would count as their final feast of the year.

“Huh, Bill, did you tell your sister? Why hasn’t she shown up yet?” Gbaz asked anxiously.

“Of course I told her. She said she’d finish her training early today and then come here to eat with us,” Bill said.

Maler gave a sly grin. “Bill, you little rascal, you didn’t actually tell your sister and came here to fool us again, did you?”

Bill spread his hands in innocence. “Boss Maler, heaven and earth can testify to my honesty. Think about it yourself—over the past half year, my sister has come to several of these gatherings already. Have I ever lied?”

It turned out that the four people from Dormitory 2015 and Karina had all arrived, but after waiting quite a while, Victoria still had not appeared. The people in the dormitory could not help becoming anxious.

Just then, a knock sounded at the door. Maler shot forward in a flash, beating Gbaz to the entrance. At that moment, the rolls of fat on his body seemed not to exist at all.

Maler excitedly opened the door, and sure enough, standing outside was Victoria, the goddess-like beauty of the academy. He beamed with delight. “Victoria, perfect timing! We’ve just set the food out!”

The others at the table could not help rolling their eyes. Perfect timing? They had been waiting there for more than ten minutes already.

“Rolin, when I was coming back from training, I saw this old man standing at the academy gate. He said his name was Gegil and that he was your father, and that he had something urgent to tell you, so I brought him over.” As Victoria spoke, she walked inside. Behind her followed a middle-aged man whose body was a little stooped and whose hair was sparse. His face was lined with dozens of wrinkles, the look of a man worn down by years of hardship.

“Father, come over and sit down quickly!” Rolin recognized at a glance that the newcomer was indeed his father, Gegil, whom he had not seen for two years. Only now, the man looked far older than before.

“Ro, Rolin, I finally found you. Quick, quick, come with me!” Gegil hurried over, seized Rolin just as he was rising to make room for him, and dragged him toward the door.

Rolin did not know what had happened, but he still followed Gegil out of the dormitory, asking as they went, “Father, what is it? Why are you in such a hurry? What happened?”

Gegil’s eyes were red, and his voice was hoarse. “Hurry. Go see your younger brother one last time!”

At those words, Rolin’s head seemed to ring. He nearly collapsed, and quickly forced his steps to speed up as he left the dormitory.

“Fourth Brother, we’re coming with you!” Maler and the others had long since heard Rolin speak of his younger brother. They only knew he was suffering from a serious illness, and they had not expected it to have reached the point of seeing him one last time. How could they remain seated? They hurried out as well and mounted their own beasts.

Seeing his closest friends act this way, Rolin did not stop them. He helped his father onto the donkey, then leaped up himself. Fortunately, Little Black was a fourth-rank magical beast, so carrying the weight of father and son was no problem at all.

Under Gegil’s guidance, they traveled all the way to the largest medical chapel in Hez City, the imperial capital: Chuen Chapel. This was the most advanced center of medicine in the Europa Empire, a place where even some of the most difficult illnesses could basically be treated.

Along the way, Rolin also asked his father what had happened. It turned out that just this morning, little Hock had suddenly fainted again. After being sent to the small chapel in town, Dogg had said that there was nothing they could do at all. So, with his help, the family had brought little Hock to Chuen Chapel in the imperial capital.

But after several highly skilled physicians had examined him, they could only keep shaking their heads. They said that the amount of gold coins needed to save little Hock was beyond anything they could imagine, and even if he were treated this time, he probably did not have more than a few years left to live. So after discussing it, Gegil and Isha had rushed to the academy to bring Rolin the news.

Hearing that his younger brother might still be saved, though the amount of gold coins required seemed beyond what they could bear, Rolin’s heart finally eased slightly.

When they reached the chapel entrance, Rolin helped Gegil down from the donkey and hurried inside.

“Little brother!” Through a crystal glass door, Rolin could clearly see little Hock curled up on a sickbed. Because of the pain, his little face was tightly twisted, and his frail body shuddered from time to time.

Rolin’s vision blurred. He had not expected that after two years away from home, little Hock would be tormented by illness to such a state. He suppressed the impulse to rush in and hold the child tightly in his arms, because the physician had already said that after a period of emergency treatment, his brother’s condition had stabilized a little. Going in now would be extremely harmful to little Hock.

Inside the attending physician’s room, Rolin, Maler, and the others had all entered by now, while Victoria and Karina were softly comforting Rolin’s mother, Isha, whose eyes were swollen red from crying.

“Physician Tihwak, my name is Rolin. I am little Hock’s older brother. I would like to ask you how many gold coins it would take to save him?”

Standing before Rolin was a tall, short-haired middle-aged man. After hearing Rolin’s question, he considered it for a moment and said, “Rolin, in order to save your brother, we would need to gather several light-element physicians, consume a great amount of precious medicinal materials, and perform a large-scale light-element operation. Counting all the manpower and material resources, it would take at least...” As he spoke, he held up one finger toward Rolin.

“One hundred thousand gold coins?” Maler asked at once.

Yet Physician Tihwak shook his head and slowly uttered three words: “One million.”