Qin Lun carefully looked at the horned eagle under him, this large bird had dark green feathers, two forked gray horns on its head, and sharp beaks and claws. Adult Hippogriffs have wingspans of up to five meters and a wide back that allows them to sit in a saddle and can ride up to two people.

Known as the Horse Carriage of the Air, the Hippogriff is strong enough to carry a variety of goods and passengers. Some races also train them to be combat airhorses, slightly inferior to griffins.

These specially trained horned eagles are smart enough to follow their own flight routes. They have a sturdy leather cord tied to their saddle to hold the occupant in place, allowing any adventurer to ride a horned eagle as long as they are not afraid of heights.

Because Qin Lun and his party were in a hurry, they did not take the way of two people riding together, but one person and one horned eagle, striving to reach Candle Castle as much as possible.

Qin Lun looked down from the sky and saw that most of the creatures on the ground were only the size of ants, and the river was like a crystal line of water, shining silver in the sun. With the breeze blowing, I only feel refreshed for a while.

Unfortunately, this new trip ended in just over three hours, and soon a blue appeared on the distant horizon. It was the color of the sea, and they finally returned to the shores of Sword Bay again.

"Archipelago?" As the Hippogriff approached the shoreline, more than thirty islands of different shapes appeared on the surface.

Most of these islands are steep cliffs covered with dense vegetation and trees. The cliffs are full of dark and hideous reefs, and dark red coral formations can be seen underwater.

It's probably not accessible to fishing boats, as there is no place to dock and disembark, and the reefs are unruly enough for any adventurous boat to sink to feed the fish, and only flying mounts can land on these cliff islands.

The closest island to the mainland of the small archipelago is the largest of them all, and although it is surrounded on all sides by steep walls, the top of the cliff is very flat, and there stands a huge hexagonal bastion, which should be the famous Candle Castle.

In fact, in addition to the island where the Candle Keep stands, there are also many mage towers that resemble lighthouses on other islands. They vary in height, but at times they can be seen with a flickering magical halo, a common shield for mage towers.

On the way to Candlekeep, Linda introduced the mage towers to everyone.

The six towers on the hexagonal walls of Candle Castle are the mage towers exclusive to Candle Castle, and the mage towers on the islands around Candle Castle are only partially owned by Candle Castle, and the other part belongs to some big ~ mages who cooperate with Candle Castle.

For various reasons, these big ~ mages are not willing to stay in Candle Castle for a long time, so they only sign an ordinary cooperation contract with Candle Castle. They offer different services to Candle Castle in exchange for the knowledge they need.

Some of these services are part of defence work, while others are simply the provision of goods and research.

With Linda as the lead, the seven horned eagles lined up in a neat line, hovering over the archipelago for a week, and then landed towards the island where the Candle Castle was located.

Because there is a certain area of forbidden space in the sky above the Candle Castle, except for some specially marked flying mounts, other horned eagles cannot enter it. They can only land at the foot of the island's cliffs, which are surrounded by more than a dozen large eagle stables and visitor registration offices.

The island where Candlefort is located may be different from the other archipelago islands in that it has an artificially paved gravel road. The stone path winds around the island's cliffs and ends at the main entrance of Candlefort.

The stone path is not very wide, probably only for three people in parallel, and no mounts are allowed here, only walking up the mountain. According to Linda, this is to pay homage to this temple of knowledge.

With the exception of Linda, everyone else started climbing the mountain with a sense of curiosity. The stone path was not long, and after about half an hour, everyone saw the huge bastion at the end of the road.

Different from what you can see in the sky, when you stand at the front gate of this stone castle called Candle Castle, you realize that it is so huge and magnificent.

The walls of the fortress are made of large blocks of stone blocks as white as jade, and the whole body is almost seamless, smooth as a mirror. Because the entire fortress is covered with a composite protective magic, there is no living environment for fungi and insects on the walls, which is similar to the Eternal Purification Technique, and there is no need for manual cleaning.

The city wall is more than 50 meters high and about 10 meters thick, with square colored crystal windows in the middle and upper parts, and a conical dome covered with glazed tiles at the top, without a female wall in the usual sense.

According to Linda's private introduction, the outer wall of Candle Castle not only functions as a city wall, but also has two rows of private rooms facing each other in the middle, mainly for research scholars and guards, after all, the central library, which is the main library, cannot accommodate so many people.

The main entrance of the castle is very atmospheric, about ten meters wide, and is composed of two 10,000-pound gates, which can only be opened by using a huge winch and iron chain. It has four side doors on each side. This main entrance is not open most of the time, and visitors and insiders need to enter and exit through the side door.

The side doors on each side are two steel golems that are more than five meters high, and this kind of golem uses magic crystals as the driving core, and has been endowed with a certain amount of artificial intelligence by the rune master. The golem has no facial features, but is inlaid with a shimmering green image crystal, which is equivalent to the function of an eye.

At the left and right ends of the city wall, the two mage towers connected to the city wall in the lower part are towering into the sky, nearly a hundred meters high, which is completely different from the weather you see when you are on the back of the horned eagle.

Seeing the stranger coming, one of the four golems walked towards them with heavy steps. Linda hurriedly stepped forward and took out the nameplate she had just obtained at the registration office at the foot of the mountain and handed it to the Golem to scan.

Although the little girl is also an insider of Candle Castle, these steel creatures do not have friendships, have no nameplates, and will launch an expulsion attack after three warnings.

Ask the Golem to inspect the visitor's nameplate, and the side door of the Candle Castle will automatically open. As you pass through the side door of Guò, the crowd looks around curiously.

After entering the interior, they found that Linda was right, the walls of Candle Castle were indeed different from ordinary walls, behind the side doors was a wide porch, and there were rooms with closed doors on both sides, which did not look like the inside of the city walls at all.

"Linda, you're back!" The group followed Linda out not far away, and a surprised greeting came from the opposite side.

It was a female mage in a black robe and monocles. Her hair was messy like a chicken coop, and she was holding a stack of books in her arms. Although the robe on her body is not dirty, it is very wrinkled and ugly, like the thick lenses at the bottom of a beer bottle, which makes her feel like she is wearing a brown eye patch, and the image is really rustic and sloppy.

"Dear Lady Lennie, I'm back!"

To everyone's surprise, in the face of this small, imageless female mage, Linda, who had been grinning all the way, as if she didn't care about anything, bowed respectfully, and shook her little hand behind her back vigorously, signaling everyone to salute with her.

Qin Lun and the others were not stupid, and immediately leaned over and saluted with understanding.

"Alright, Linda, since you're back, let's go and see your teacher, he seems to be a little angry."

Lady Leni waved her free hand and walked on, holding the book. Because the books in her arms are stacked too high and block her vision, she will be seen mixing garlic under her feet from time to time, but every time she staggers and can stand firm again, it is very worrying to watch.

"Linda, is that Lady Leni ......?" asked Mastasia tentatively.

"Lady Lenny is one of the eight Great Readers of Candle Castle after the Guardian of the Chronicles and the First Reader, and the seventeenth Prophet and Great Sage in the history of Candle Castle!" The corners of Linda's mouth twitched, and she said expressionlessly.

Hearing Linda's words, everyone couldn't help but twitch, only to feel that a great image of kindness and humility in their minds collapsed......

However, as Linda travels along the way, everyone notices that the scholars passing by don't seem to pay much attention to their appearance, and some even wear a set of patched robes.

The vast majority of the scholars at Candlecastle are magicians, and they are naturally not short of money, but are too lazy to go shopping in mainland cities, and all their time is devoted to their favorite causes.

Of course, sloppy and strange like Ms. Leni is still rare, and nerds are nothing, but if a nerd is combined with the attributes of an otaku, it seems to become one of the most terrifying creatures in the world.

"Where do we go next?" After walking for a while, Qin Lun took the lead in breaking the silence.

"I'm going to see the teacher first, do you see the magic door in front of you? It is the toll office of Candle Castle, and if you want to enter the underground labyrinth to borrow a long-distance teleportation array, you must pay a large fee. Linda pointed to an oval magic door like a water mirror a hundred meters ahead.

"Pay the fee? Do we need to pay for coming with you? Mastasya asked curiously.

"Of course, the rules of Candle Castle are no exception even for the Guardians of the Scroll, so how can I have the right to exempt you from the fees!" Linda blinked slyly, "Okay, I'll go first!" ”

The little girl ran away like a gust of wind, leaving a group of people looking at each other, and faintly feeling that something was wrong.

"Ahem, Mastasia, this operation is based on your alliance of harpers, you should be rich, right?" Qin Lun looked at the highland elves with expectation.

"Huh? Don't you have any money? Mastasya's eyes widened and she stared at Qin Lun innocently, "Don't lie to me, when you left the Troll's Claw, I saw you take out a lot of Rich Gold Coins for Rick and Siever!" ”

"Hehehe, trouble!" Qin Lun turned his head to look at Ciel and Rand, and the three of them smiled bitterly.