I Arrived At Wizard World While Cultivating Immortality Chapter 820: Moving In and a Meeting
Walking on for a stretch with Varon, Jie Ming found that across the whole plane there were very nearly no ordinary intelligent beings to be seen apart from wizards.
Whether trimming vegetation or handling cleaning, it was all autonomous puppets of every different form.
They carried out their respective tasks in perfect order, at a level of automation plainly a good deal higher than the automated city of Noren Academy No. 1.
Leading the way, Varon introduced things with a smile as he went:
“This is a new plane the Void Architecture Academy opened up specifically for this academic exchange conference. All the infrastructure was built to the highest specification, and whether it is spatial stability, ecological environment or experimental equipment, it is all first-class configuration.”
“Of course, if you are more accustomed to using your own experimental equipment, we also provide transport and installation services…”
Answering Varon as he spoke, Jie Ming let his gaze travel over both sides of the road.
Mixed in among these wooded hills were a good many rare plants from different regions, many of them native only to the other three great powers.
And these plants, which ought to live in utterly different environments, were now rooted together in the same soil, each growing lush and green, without the slightest mutual rejection.
That fact alone was enough to demonstrate the Void Architecture Academy’s attainments in ecological synthesis and spatial environment regulation.
Seeing interest flash in Jie Ming’s eyes, Varon immediately explained from beside him:
“The founding concept of the Void Architecture Academy is the hope that different civilizations, different lives and different laws can all find the place that belongs to them within the same world.”
“Impressive!” Jie Ming nodded in admiration.
The two walked on and soon arrived at a spacious, brightly lit reception hall.
A fair number of attending wizards who had arrived early were already gathered inside.
Some of these wizards were registering their information; others were clustered around an announcement light screen looking over the conference schedule.
A few more were in the lounge area off to one side with drinks in hand, discussing the latest published papers in low voices.
When Jie Ming walked into the hall, a good many eyes turned toward him as one.
Some recognized the style of the robe Jie Ming wore, and their eyes brightened somewhat, curiosity in their expressions.
None of them came forward rashly, though; they only nodded in greeting from a distance.
Varon adeptly completed the registration procedures for Jie Ming, then took a silver-white document case from an attendant doll and handed it to Jie Ming with some ceremony:
“These are your conference materials. Inside are your formal attendance credentials, the conference handbook, the schedule of topical discussions, the list of attendees, and full access to every public experimental zone open for this exchange conference…”
At that point he suddenly lowered his voice somewhat. “Also, at your level of access, if you require any special experimental equipment or rare materials, or wish to arrange an exchange with any Mentor, you may contact me directly.”
Hearing that, Jie Ming’s eyes lit up. “That… would that not be too much trouble for you?”
Varon pushed up his spectacles and said very earnestly, “Please do not feel any burden about it. The Academic Exchange Committee has always held that a good academic environment is itself an important research resource, and particularly for a wizard of your boundless potential, we will meet your requirements as far as conditions permit.”
Jie Ming took the document case and nodded lightly:
“Then for the period ahead… I am in your debt.”
“Not at all.” Varon smiled. “It is our duty, and my honor.”
He then went on leading Jie Ming through several shaded colonnades, stopping at last before a freestanding building.
The whole building was white as jade, its walls climbed by vines that gave off a faint blue glow and swayed gently in the light breeze, setting the whole place off as tranquil and elegant.
Varon pushed open the door and invited Jie Ming in.
The space inside was far broader than it had looked from outside, plainly the work of mature spatial expansion technology.
The laboratory at the very center was a good several thousand square meters, various experimental platforms arranged in neat rows, while the room on the other side was a large cultivation zone where over a hundred sets of cultivation pods of every kind ran quietly.
Beyond that there was a rest area, a library, a meditation room and a recreation room, all fully provided.
In the recreation room, indeed, besides amenities of every sort including a swimming pool, there stood the newest model of Star Ring Federation magical network terminal, along with a complete set of immersive virtual reality equipment.
Varon introduced it with a smile. “This is an independent experimental residence the committee prepares specially for high-level participants. Familiarize yourself with the place first, and if there is anything else you need, contact me at any time.”
Jie Ming nodded his thanks. “Thank you.”
“Then I shall not disturb your rest.” Varon gave a bow and made to turn away.
Before leaving, though, he added one reminder: “I hope you can rest well during this period, because there will probably be a good many people wanting to meet you shortly…”
With that he turned and left. The door closed gently, and quiet returned to the whole building.
“A good many people? It seems this academic exchange conference will be livelier than I expected. That does interest me,” Jie Ming thought to himself.
Jie Ming then went to the library, set the document case on the desk and opened it.
Looking at the names on it, some unfamiliar and some familiar, he lifted the corner of his mouth in a slight curve.
He closed the handbook, and rather than hurrying to study the conference contents, he headed straight for the bath.
He had been in a state of tension these past few days, and it really was time to relax properly.
…
…
Toward evening, as the last trace of golden-red afterglow at the horizon sank slowly behind the mountains.
Following the route in the conference handbook, Jie Ming passed along several paths winding through the woods and came to a restaurant tucked away deep among the buildings.
The restaurant was unremarkable.
The whole building was wound about with great swaths of faintly blue-glowing vines, their leaves swaying gently in the evening wind like a waterfall of flowing starlight.
He pushed the door open, and a faint smell of spices met him.
The interior was not large, holding only a dozen or so long wooden tables.
The distance kept between tables was exactly right, neither making the place feel empty nor leaving anyone feeling crowded.
Warm yellow light spilled softly down from crystal stones set into the dome, laying a warm tone over the whole hall.
Jie Ming picked a seat by the window at random, from which he could look out over half a valley.
Lights were coming on in the distance, buildings of every different style dotted among the wooded hills like stars scattered across a night sky.
An attendant doll came soundlessly to the table and set a menu before him.
Jie Ming leafed through it idly. Most of the ingredients on it were things he had never seen, but each dish came with a detailed description.
He simply picked a few dishes marked “Void Architecture Academy specialty,” and ordered a pot of moonglow flower tea, said to ease mental energy fatigue.
The attendant doll bowed slightly. “Please wait a moment.”
With that it turned and left.
The tea came quickly. Leaning back in his chair, Jie Ming drank it and studied the other guests in the restaurant.
He had come rather early, so the restaurant was still fairly empty, but a few wizards were already gathered together discussing something in low voices, now and then waving a hand to project a complex rune structure into midair.
Just then a tall, slender figure came walking straight toward him.
Jie Ming raised his head, and on seeing the newcomer clearly, was slightly taken aback.
The man before him was tall and lean, wearing a loose silver-gray robe.
The edges of the robe were embroidered with exceedingly fine spatial runes, layer upon layer of pale blue glow flowing slowly along the tracery, as though the entire robe were resonating continuously with the space around it.
His cheeks were somewhat gaunt, his cheekbones slightly high, his eye sockets a little sunken, and his gray-blue eyes were deep, his expression that of a man forever working through some exceedingly complex problem.
Standing there, he released no deliberate pressure of any kind, and yet he gave off naturally a presence impossible to ignore.
That was not the pressure that comes from strength, but the composure and confidence that form of themselves after long standing at the summit of some academic field.
The man came up to the table.
“Wizard Jie Ming?”
The voice was low and steady, but the tone was far too direct; there was, one could say, no note of pleasantry in it at all.
Jie Ming, not in the least put out, nodded. “I am.”
Confirmation received, the other pulled out a chair without ceremony and sat down opposite, the motion as natural as returning to his own laboratory.
He did not so much as ask whether it was convenient.
Once seated he leaned forward slightly, hands folded on the wooden table, those gray-blue eyes looking straight at Jie Ming.
“I am Savien. The Self-Stabilizing Field Regulation Protocol you published has been a great help to me.”
He did not speak fast, and yet there was an excitement in it he could not suppress.
“The most troublesome problem in spatial experiments is not building the experimental environment but maintaining it. Absolutely stable, absolutely sealed, and able at the same time to withstand the impact of high-level spatial laws; there has never been a mature solution for an experimental platform of that kind.”
“Your Self-Stabilizing Field Regulation Protocol happens to solve exactly that problem.”
Just so: the man before him was the very Wizard Savien he had seen that morning.
Honestly, on seeing the man, the fingers Jie Ming had resting under the table curled slightly without his meaning them to, and a distinctly peculiar sort of nervousness quietly surfaced.
How to put it?
Considering that of all those textbooks he had once studied, thick enough to serve as murder weapons, more than half carried this man’s name in the author column, the other party could fairly be called the principal author of his student days’ course books.
The feeling was less that of meeting a top-level power and growing nervous than that of a student running into his teacher.
Jie Ming felt now rather like some unlucky student at a final examination whose invigilator has suddenly been swapped for the professor who set the paper, and who has then sat down directly opposite to watch him answer.
He settled himself quickly and produced as natural a smile as he could manage. “Your reputation precedes you, Wizard Savien. The textbooks you once wrote were a great help to me as well, and I am truly honored that this small technique of mine could be of use to you.”