Vicente immediately understood why Asahel considered Ponddown small as he landed at the airport. Compared to Ravengarde—the largest city on the entire island—Ponddown was tiny.

Even so, Ponddown was still bigger than the Metal City Vicente left behind in the Seidel Kingdom, which, about a year ago for him, was the largest city on the continent, having a million inhabitants.

But even though it was roughly the same size in area and population—something visible with the movement of people in the streets—Vicente could tell that this place was superior to his city in every way!

With the special technologies of this world, where advanced information was known even by ordinary people and communications were practically instantaneous, a variety of services and products that didn’t exist in Polaris Realm were dominant in the cities of Light Cay.

On his way out of the airport, Vicente took the time to observe the movement of flying and ground vehicles within the city. The buildings in the vicinity had huge advertising screens on some of their faces. Coincidentally, he saw his face and the configuration of pentagrams on one of these buildings, which was advertising a local training center.

People on the streets and sidewalks wore holographic communication items on their hands while walking or even while driving their semi-autonomous vehicles at high speeds.

This was a surreal sight for a cultivator used to nature and a more feudal level of development.

The earthly part of Vicente’s mind had been making him adapt well to the place and even feel at home. But the cultivated part of him, related to the Polaris Realm, made him find this reality strange and wish for something simpler.

Having good technology for specific services was nice, but Vicente preferred a life in the countryside to the typical life in Light Cay.

He remembered his family in Polaris Realm as he felt about it. ‘When we unite again in the future, I’ll find an island that’s more like home and we’ll live in peace. Maybe I’ll raise some animals in my retirement.’ This thought made him feel strangely good as he saw on his ‘glasses’ a red band indicating the way to the place where he was supposed to meet Alicia.

The map that Zigam had given him was really useful, in and out of cities, something that had been a gift for this mission, but which would certainly be of great use to Vicente in his future in Light Cay.

{Master, two people have been watching you since we left the airport.}

Prisiche alerted him, pointing out to Vicente the two individuals that even he hadn’t noticed.

“How?” he muttered to her, not understanding how, even though he was masked, looked different from himself and had restricted cultivation, he could have been identified.

{There are two most likely options for the current situation, master. They don’t know who you are, and are after you for reasons we don’t know, or they know and potentially want to act against you because of who you are.}

One of the two individuals was a 3-Star Magus, and the other was a 2-Star Magus, something Vicente believed to be within his reach, but also close to his limit.

‘That’s not good…’ He hastened his pace, still maintaining his route to the property indicated for him to meet Alicia.

“What are the chances of them acting inside the city?”

{About 25% on the streets and 40% inside private properties. There is a sect outpost in the city. Do you want to go there?}

“No. That would alert them we know about their positions. We’d better see how far it goes. For now, I’m not desperate to seek help.” He showed no sign he was aware of the position of the two beings following him.

Moving on, neither of them would get closer than 100 meters to Vicente, until he arrived in front of a cultivation tower, where one of the largest training centers for magicians in the city was located.

Upon entering the Ancient Garden building in Ponddown, Vicente went straight to the administrative wing using his ID.

Luckily, the item he had with him said who he was only for the most hierarchically advanced in the force. For basic checks like the one he had to pass to gain access to the site, he was just one of many sponsored by the training center and the Manifold Family. ƒгeeweɓn૦vel.com

Thus, he soon arrived at an area where there was a large 3D map of the building, with the cultivation, trading and meeting areas of the building displayed in a special way.

The individual and collective cultivation and training rooms were close to 80% full, while the flow in the trading areas seemed intense at the moment. The meeting area, where one could barter, arrange future actions and exchange information, was the least flashy, with the least movement at the moment.

Looking at that 3D map of the building, Vicente ignored the over 30 people in the surrounding area, controlling everything in the training center, inspecting what was happening in much of the building.

‘The technologies in this place are so advanced that it’s possible for someone to have total control over the lives of others and influence them, even without coming into direct contact with them…’ Vicente felt a chill run through his soul, noticing that not only the two men following him were keeping an eye on him.

‘The Ancient Garden does this with those inside its building, so it’s to be expected that Stonewall does this at headquarters and the leaders of each city use things like this to monitor their inhabitants.’ This worried him. He didn’t like the idea of being watched.

“It seems you’re interested in the Training Tower Matrix,” said a woman as she stopped next to Vicente and waved in greeting.

“I am indeed. Do you always spy on your users cultivating and training?” He asked as he looked around the many rooms in use, which he could clearly see what each user was doing.

“Certainly. But we make that clear in the terms of use of our towers, when customers pay for their rooms.” She explained with a smile on her face.

“Nobody explained that to me.”

“You haven’t paid, so your sessions aren’t observed. You have the Ancient Garden’s guarantee that everything you do will be confidential,” she answered him.

“I see…” Vicente didn’t know if he could believe such a thing. “Anyway, I’m not here for that. I was told I could find Alicia here. Where is she? Can you tell me?”

“You’re talking to her.” The brown-haired woman, apparently in charge of this place, winked at him, before indicating with one of her hands. “Come with me. We’ll talk in a more private place.”