Salisbury Plains, southern England.

The moonlight illuminates the stars and the earth, and there are no mountains, hills, or rivers on the vast upper plains, and there are only weeds and vines that stretch endlessly.

In this peaceful, empty, lonely place, the air also seems to have a cold and isolated smell.

A cloud of air suddenly distorted, then quickly transformed into an oval portal that shimmered with a faint blue light, and Ian Yugis strode out of it.

In front of him was a thick, gray mist that could not be dissolved, and Ian strode forward, leaving behind him the overlapping mist that swirled around him.

The large cloud of mist slowly dissipated and subsided, like broken fragments of time, casting mottled points of light on the grass, and the scenery in front of Ian's eyes brightened little by little.

A towering old castle gradually appeared in front of his eyes, and Ian looked at the translucent film above the castle, and a reassuring warmth permeated him.

The castle is made of heavy white bricks and stucco that juts into the sky and looks like a lighthouse in the moonlight.

At the foot of the castle, there was a ring of low walls, within which there were several low buildings and a row of apple trees, and in the embrace of night, the castle was filled with gray-white mist, and they floated in and out silently, swirling around the tower, as if the remnants of ghosts danced in the sky.

It doesn't belong anywhere on earth.

Ian silently walked into the castle, through countless flights of stairs and corridors, all the doors opening for him automatically, even those that were locked, bolted, and even sealed by rust and time.

With a single gesture, all obstacles vanished, the rust melted automatically, and the hinges were as bright as new. In a few places, there were ancient, but still shining, guardian runes, and he paused in front of them, chanting the right spell and forming the right handprint, and the little magic that remained on the runes collapsed, leaving the path unimpeded.

Skirting a long spiral staircase and walking upstairs, a simple and rough laboratory is revealed.

Everything here seems to be the product of centuries ago, the walls are covered with lattice-like windows, but they have obviously not been wiped for a long time, the moonlight barely shines in, and the interior is pitch black; The rough wooden furniture was covered in oil and dust, piled with all kinds of instruments, some dried apples were used as paperweights to keep the paper from flying away, and rows of metal wires were densely packed on a world map, arranging dozens of intersections, each fixed with pins, as if to represent some kind of meaning.

Ian looked at the small table next to him, with a few gnawed apples and a plate of chicken bones, a pile of leftovers that had apparently been left unattended for days, indicating that the owner of the place had no sense of time.

In the distance, a tall, burly figure with his back to Ian, as if studying something, stood alone in a coarse cloth robe adorned with simple decorations.

Suddenly, in a corner of the room, a little red light began to flicker, and in the next second, the red light suddenly expanded, lighting up one ring after another, and a strong sense of crisis instantly hit Ian's heart!

He chanted a spell and held up a strengthened version of the energy shield, and at the same time, a bright light erupted silently!

In the next moment, a large amount of shattered metal swept through like a storm, and Ian could almost hear the beat from his energy shield, which blocked the bullet-like fragments, but some of the impact that could not be offset was still dizzy on the shield, but fortunately the impact only lasted for a moment, and everything calmed down after the fragments were swept away.

The man turned, he looked at the aftermath of the explosion, and frowned, "Magic always goes wrong. ”

"Yes, teacher." Ian said respectfully.

"It just so happens that I haven't cleaned up the house in a long time." The man's ghostly emerald green eyes, his dark eyebrows furrowed, and he raised his index finger and tapped at the nearby tabletop.

A silvery white light burst from the edge of the house and quickly swept the whole room, sweeping away all the rubbish, everything shining as if it had just been built, and even the windows were clean again.

The silver light carried all the garbage to the edge of the house, turned into a small black hole, and then continued to devour itself and disappear.

"You sit down first, and I'll be fine right away."

Ian nodded and sat down in his chair.

The man had a rune stone in his hand all the time, and he adjusted it, tested it once, adjusted it again, and tested it again.

Those eye-catching eyes were full of focus and patience.

Ian waited silently.

It wasn't until the rune stone in the man's hand glowed pale blue that it looked like a calm light that he breathed a sigh of relief and placed the rune stone on a table.

The man looked up, he had a nose like an eagle, blue eyes like stars, his age looked between old and middle-aged, his long hair tied in a ponytail dragged straight to his back, when he was young, his hair may not have been so white, but now, his gray hair, in the dark room, looks so eye-catching.

Ian knew that it was due to the physical pressure caused by the great power contained in his body, a phenomenon that was not uncommon among mages.

His clothes were inlaid with fine silver threads, and the workmanship was so natural that it was impossible to see at first glance. The pattern seems to have become an entrenched dragon again, alive and ready to fly into the night sky.

But apparently he was too sloppy, his scarf was stained with food scraps, his socks were high and low, and his boots were not buttoned properly, and as a result, his long trousers dragged to the floor.

The mage glanced at Ian, and his eyes, which were still focused just now, instantly turned into a sculpture of a god, just and ruthless. Those kind eyes now look like they hide a fury as well. The thick eyebrows were intertwined, like a thundercloud accumulating.

However, Ian knew that this was his norm, that he was both a hermit and a tyrant......

"How's your new buddy?" The mage's voice was low, but beautiful.

"They're all fun."

"Don't underestimate your new friend, it's not just magic that can reach the origin of the world in this universe." The mage said earnestly.

"Yes, they are all strong and ...... Incomprehensible. Ian carefully chooses his words.

"I am a posthumous son, my mother remarried, no father and no mother, so I am psychologically distorted, lonely and aggressive, short-tempered, sensitive and suspicious, cautious, whatever others say." The mage glanced at Ian, his voice deep and slightly teasing, "Although I don't intend to change my personality, you don't need to be like me. ”

"Yes, we get along pretty well."

"Ha, it's not bad, Isaac's apprentice, he actually gets along well with others?" The mage smiled self-deprecatingly, "According to my experience, ordinary people only have awe and admiration for the mage, and they don't really like you. ”

"It's actually very simple, most people are keen to be around fools, and very few people want to be around smart people and look like idiots, just like many mages like stupid little animals."

"But since you said those transcendents get along well with you......"

"That might just be really good." Isaac grinned.

Then his smile quickly retracted, like the waves of the ebbing tide: "Is there any progress on your research?" ”

"No, Rhaegar and Qi Xiao are both simply powerful and powerful, their lifespan depends on their perfect physical condition, and Alina should be a master of life magic, these are not in our research."

"Isn't there another Frenchman?" Isaac said as he grabbed a piece of chicken from a silver plate on the table and put it in his mouth. And before he raised his hand, the table was empty.

"In my opinion, if that Frenchman continues to fight, it will be difficult for him to live to be seventy years old." Ian said calmly.

"Well, life, eternity, immortality, these are very interesting things, I lived for four hundred years, but I don't know if it's a gift from God, or a curse from the goddess of fate, you are my proudest apprentice, I hope you can succeed."

"The reason why I am where I am today is because I stand on the shoulders of giants." Ian Ugis said humbly.

"That's your achievement, it's not about me." Isaac waved his hand and continued to gulp down, and it was clear that he was really hungry.

"I found it interesting in New York that there was a man who was able to keep -- coming back from the dead and staying young." Ian looked at Isaac and said with a smile.

"Uh-" Isaac stopped chewing, he thought for a second before looking up, "That's because of the overlap of time, not universal. Nature and its laws are hidden in the darkness of the night, and what you have to do is to grasp it, not the exceptions. ”

"I'm afraid there's nothing left to study on this planet, we've been studying its knowable parts for four hundred years, and at first we were ecstatic to pick up a few beautiful shells, but now, the vast ocean of truth is out of sight."

"But, child, nothing has lost hope."

"The old chapter is over, but the new one has just begun." Isaac pointed to the sky, "Go through the stargate and go to the other side of the world." ”

"Compare, experiment, observe, find the universal laws that govern this universe, explain it, use it, become its master."

Ian thoughtfully walked out of the castle gate, a hand raised, and chanted a string of incomprehensible spells. At first it was a rhythmic rhyme, then it grew louder and louder, shattering the silence around it. The wolves in the mountains in the distance heard his chant and instinctively howled in response.

Soon, the lights of New York came to his attention.