Volume 4 Chapter 10: The New Home of the Great Wizard

  "Look, madam! That fat old man opposite us is really weird. At his age, he's still learning from young people to run naked. It's simply shameless!" A small vendor stopped haggling and shouted in surprise at the customer.

  "Look at all the fat on him, his width is even bigger than his height. His figure isn't even as good as my old man's, and he still has the nerve to show it off, what a shameless person." The middle-aged aunt who came to buy vegetables turned her head, took a glance, and spat a mouthful of saliva onto the street with great disdain.

  "Buddy, I bet that poor old guy is being hounded by loan sharks," a seasoned vagrant boasted to another vagrant living in a cardboard box. "Back when my company went bankrupt, those ruthless guys didn't even leave me with a pair of underwear... now they seem somewhat more civilized..."

  "But look at his underwear, it's all shriveled up, as if even that thing had been cut off. Is this what you call civilization?"

  "It seems even more uncivilized."

  "Mom, Mom! There's a big meatball that can walk! Wow, the meatball can even talk!" A little girl jumped up and down, pointing at the conspicuous target while trying to get her mother's attention.

  "Shut up, you little brat! That must be some old man who escaped from the mental hospital. You'd better stay away from him, or you might catch his madness and nobody will want you!" The middle-aged woman carrying a basket quickly picked up her child, covered her eyes, and fled as if escaping an epidemic.

  ……

  After receiving a "warm welcome" from the Continental Congress, the poor Archmage lost several tentacles and was left with only one tattered underwear, having to walk around Emon Harbor bare-chested while enduring strange stares from passersby. Behind the Archmage followed a group of idle onlookers, including some famous figures in the city, but not one of them wanted to lend him clothes to cover himself, instead revealing malicious smiles.

  Half-elf loli Ail's position is closest to Owo. She holds the large robe of the great wizard, which has been torn with many holes, as if showing off her spoils of war, and follows behind Owo's fat butt, jumping up and down from time to time. Occasionally, she would take out gems that had been removed from the clothes and play with them. Great Druid Vinnie, on the other hand, only got a few tentacle-like appendages that seemed to be rotting, emitting a foul black aura that looked like it would cause stomach problems just by looking at it, so he was not very happy, occasionally using the tentacles to randomly whip Owo a few times.

  Following closely behind Owo, but at a slight distance, were Chairman Zena, Tanith, Isabella and others, each with the same evil smile of schadenfreude, savoring Owo's embarrassment as if they had some deep-seated grudge. And so the great Mr. Owo could only continue to swing his hips. In the whispers of the citizens, he was showing off his ancient, several-thousand-year-old, Grade-A buttocks, preserved with preservatives.

  Fortunately, the urban area of Emon Port is not too large, and the great wizard soon ran naked to the military camp in the suburbs, where he saw the super luxurious residence and transportation prepared by Fili for him:

  A three-story building, perfectly suited for the dead to live in, floated in mid-air about a dozen yards above the ground. The foundation was stuck to a room filled with mysterious nuclear-powered machinery using glue. It had an air of a heavenly palace. The building itself was resplendent, covered in all sorts of cheap stickers and colorful lace. It had a modern style. In the gentle breeze, it swayed gently and poetically - could a house made of cardboard not sway?

  Under this magnificent floating city, a creature resembling a black dragon from afar and a skeleton dragon up close was lying down. Upon closer inspection, it appeared to be a bizarre organism that had just been skinned alive. It lay weakly on the filthy muddy ground, occasionally squeezing out a pile of vomit emitting a sour odor from its swollen belly, which seemed to be pregnant with the earth. Its lower body was constantly excreting waste, so it had no choice but to lie in its own vomit and feces, a sight that made one feel nauseous.

  Under such poor sanitary conditions, it is naturally impossible to have a majestic appearance. Not to mention the silly look on his face, but the bony body didn't even have a single dragon scale, instead, there were large patches of white skin lesions. Some had even become inflamed and ulcerated. A few workers were holding their noses against the strong stench, trying hard to brush black paint onto its body, making it look more like a black dragon.

  "This, this is the floating city you gave me? And this thing is also considered a dragon?" Owo pointed at the strange building above his head, and then at the black dragon Holmes who was vomiting nonstop after eating too much. With a trembling voice, he made an indignant accusation, "You let a great wizard like me live in such a broken thing? Do you think I'm a homeless person sleeping in a cardboard box in the park?! Why don't you try living here yourself?! I'll sue you for fraud, for mistreating employees, for..."

  Although he yelled himself hoarse and shook all over, as if even the fat on his body was going to be shaken off, others apparently had a completely different view.

  "Not bad, quite thrifty. This dead octopus is worth living"

  "Ah, yes." Chairman Zena stroked his chin and nodded in agreement. "The decorations seem to be a bit too much, I think just pasting some old newspapers would be enough."

  "You damned octopus, how dare you say that the work of this young lady is for homeless people to live in?" Aier sprang up like a cat whose tail had been stepped on, pointing at Owo and scolding loudly, "I spent half a day working hard to build such a comfortable doghouse for you, but you're still not satisfied. If you're not happy with it, why don't you try building one yourself?"

  "The cost of building the floating city should be deducted from Owo's salary, and the feeding and medical expenses of the black dragon should also be borne by Owo." Rennie immediately thought of a new plan to save military expenses and took out a small notebook to record it.

  "And don't forget about my labor costs!" El raised his small hand, and several craftsmen who had been dragged in to work for free also nodded hastily.

  "You're a thousand times more venomous than vampires, you exploitative bastards!"

  "Your words are returned to you, aren't you even more evil than a vampire, a witch?"

  ……

  Although he was unwilling in his heart, Owo still had to move into the cardboard house floating in the air under the strong pressure of the bureaucratic system. As a result, that night, the military camp was attacked by human cannonballs - Owo jumped too hard on the bed and ended up crushing the cardboard bed along with the floorboards underneath, screaming as he fell to the ground, also collapsing several barracks. Fili had to send him a set of pajamas with feather fall magic attached, and used hardening magic on some of the floorboards, temporarily solving the problem of insufficient load-bearing capacity.

  Compared to sleeping, taking a bath was an even bigger problem. Due to the "Great Wizard's Pride" (Fili was very suspicious of how Obo could still have this), Obo insisted on not bathing with the soldiers in the large public baths, unless they agreed to let him enter the women's bathroom, which was naturally rejected without hesitation. The bath-loving fat witch had no choice but to think of a way to build his own bathroom. However, the hardened cardboard was still cardboard and couldn't withstand water, and it was also difficult to attach the Feather Fall technique to the heavy bathtub. As a result, poor Obo fell through the wet cardboard several times, along with the bathtub, from the floating city, and was battered half to death.

  But what's admirable is that despite all the hardships, Owo still refused to give up on his plan to take a bath in the sky. Now he simply hung the glass bathtub with ropes directly under the floating city, one end tied to the engine room, and just like that, he started taking a bath in mid-air without any cover, not caring if he would catch a cold. In the end, he even pulled along some "special ladies" from the city to soak in the bathtub with him, completely without any sense of shame. To prevent affecting the daily routine of the troops and to avoid corrupting the young female soldiers' minds, Fili had no choice but to move the floating city outside the military camp, letting Owo do as he pleased there.

  The fate of the old black dragon, Holmes, was more miserable than its new master. After a period of overeating and getting a bad stomach, this guy was subjected to absolute dietary control under Owo's hands, and his nutritional status plummeted rapidly. Soon, poor Holmes became so hungry that only the skeletal remains of the dragon were left, with even the skin moss falling off due to extreme malnutrition.

  If it weren't for Phil's intervention, Holmes would have been taken back from Auro and sent to the temple for recuperation. It seems that this "black dragon knight who turned over a new leaf" really would have starved to death. As for Auro's mount, a small bear was chosen from the unlucky bear squad to take its place, but it was said that after just a few days, it was affected by the evil aura of the witch and became mentally ill, so it had to be controlled with puppetry in order to move at all.

  However, with Owo's joining, the giant bear corps finally got an experienced magic combat instructor, and no longer had to adopt the very inefficient method of learning warfare in war. Under the suggestion of the great magician, the few mages in the corps were organized into a lean and mean magic strike team, and all the available magical weapons were also distributed to those who could best utilize their power. After a short period of intensive training, the magic strike team consisting of 20 mages and 50 elite warriors quickly rose from militia level to professional warrior level, with progress so rapid that it left everyone speechless. As a result of this achievement, Owo's cardboard house evolved into a wooden board house within a week, and continued to transition towards an iron sheet house stage.

  In the gradually warming spring of DR1991, New Tryzel was putting on a terrible system that couldn't adapt to the state of war at all, making preparations for the impending new campaign. As two legions took shape, Chairman Zena gradually gained confidence in responding to inquiries from the central government and asking various states for supplies and military expenses, her voice growing louder. The footsteps of a new round of war were getting closer and closer.