I, the wizard, the foolish Buddha

After some time, when everyone had finished recording, the instructor gathered them and asked two questions.

The first question was, how many statues were there in total?

The second question was, what kind of statues were they?

"167," the blond freshman said. "There are 167 in total, including wizards and apprentices."

Wallace smiled and said, "I haven't studied the statues, but these 167 statues all look like heroes. Judging from their actions, many of them seem to be fighting something."

The red-haired freshman, not wanting to be outdone, said, "I have studied statues. These statues employ the Verrocchio carving concept, which makes their images very generic—so it creates the illusion that everyone has known them for a long time."

Roland's pupils suddenly contracted.

Suddenly, Roland realized something: 'No, no, they're not hallucinating! They weren't just studying the air! They were also studying the statues!'

'What I saw were twelve statues of knights suffering. What they saw might be statues of other sufferers!'

It turned out that in different people's eyes, the number and appearance of the statues in the passage were different.

Roland had just felt that Leonard and the others were studying the air.

But in Leonard and the others' eyes, Roland was also studying the air!

Leonard nodded and said, "Speaking of which, these statues do look familiar. It's as if I've seen these people before—Roland, what did you see in the statues? Don't be shy."

Roland hesitated slightly, then chose to tell the truth: "I only saw 12 statues—12 angels wearing knight armor."

Everyone was stunned.

"It seems Roland is having mental problems," the blond freshman laughed. "There are no such statues here at all."

"There are," Catherine said. "There are knight statues, 12 in total. Of course, there are also statues of wizards, apprentices, and priests. There are 167 of them."

Roland thought to himself, '12 plus 167 plus 8... we came to the Brown Fern Forest with a total of 187 people! Among them, 179 people suffered!'

'Their images were recorded in the passage!'

At this time, Wallace frowned and asked, "Lady Catherine, are you saying that there are actually 179 statues here? And we only saw 167 of them, and Roland only saw 12 of them. Why is that?"

Catherine said, "You can only see 169 statues because you have a karmic connection with those 169 people—those 169 people should all be wizards from our academy.

Roland can only see 12 statues because he only has a karmic connection with those 12 people.

I can see all the statues because... because I am the organizer of the team. Before entering the Fern Forest, I had a karmic connection with all 179 people."

Everyone was confused—Leonard and the others no longer remembered those 167 people. They didn't know about the suffering, so they were still puzzled.

Catherine ignored them. She believed that whether these people understood or not was not important. What was important was that Roland understood.

So, she no longer dwelled on this question, but looked at Baron Hall and asked a question: "Hall, how many statues of sufferers are there here in total? I mean, how many people have been here?"

The Baron shook his head and said, "There are a total of 37,576 statues. They are densely packed, all glaring at the Garden of Suffering at the end of the passage. And I don't recognize any of them."

Over the years, the Baron didn't know how many times he had come.

He thought that every time he came, only he and Julie or Anthony were in the team.

But in reality, every time he came, there were many, many people in the team.

The Baron said, "When I first came, Julie told me that she had used her compass to count the statues here, and the number exceeded 700,000—each statue was the size of a fingernail, all glaring at the sealed land at the end of the passage."

"But when I held the compass and counted the entire passage, I only saw 3,287."

"The second time I came, there were 1,936 more statues in the passage."

"Later, every time I came, the number in the passage would increase a little. At first, it increased by hundreds or thousands, then by hundreds or dozens. Until today, the number of statues has only increased by 179."

"Adding these 179, that's a total of 37,576 people... no, that's 786,530. They are all heroes who once fought against the Abyss Lord. They have been completely forgotten by this world."

The Baron shook his head and said, "I have forgotten who they are, but I think all my friends, everyone I could find, has died here."

The Baron was not the initial team organizer; he was just an unlucky guy who joined the team because of Julie.

But gradually, he was the only one left in the team.

He took over the heavy responsibility of the pioneers and became the organizer of the team.

In fact, when the Baron explored the Brown Fern Forest three months ago, he and Anthony were not the only survivors. More than 300 people came that time, and 14 people survived.

Those 14 people were Baron Hall, Anthony, and the twelve Holy Knights (angels descended into the knights' bodies).

Baron Hall once said to Catherine after entering the ruins—My life has been very unsuccessful. You are my only friend who is willing to come with me to die.

He has more than just Catherine as a friend!

There are thousands upon thousands of friends who are willing to die with him!

Those 37,576 people are all warriors who are willing to follow the Baron here!

But people have completely forgotten everything about them.

Roland thought to himself, 'No wonder, no wonder the Brown Fern Forest incident is so serious, but only the Baron, Anthony, and the Baroness know about it!'

'Because everyone who knows about the Brown Fern Forest besides them has suffered!'

'These heroes have completely disappeared and are completely unrelated to this world.'

'There are thousands upon thousands of them. They came here one after another, and then fell into the abyss forgotten by the world in suffering!'

At this moment, Roland finally understood how the demonic hand in the sky withered—780,000 heroes once came here one after another to prevent the descent of the Abyss Lord.

Now, most of the Abyss Lord's will has been expelled back to the abyss with the sacrifice of countless heroes, leaving only a sealed remnant.

However, there still needs to be a final group of heroes willing to come and die to completely expel the remnant.

Today, 187 heroes have come to this place.

179 of them sacrificed their lives on the road, building a road to the sealed land.

Now, there are only 8 people left in the team.

In the future, some of these 8 people may be killed by demons, or some may be killed by their companions. But none of them will suffer again.

These 8 people are Roland, Catherine, Nall, Anna, Baron Hall, the blond freshman, the red-haired freshman, Wallace, and Leonard.

They are the last eight people, and some of them will complete the final mission for those heroes.