Justine was clearly terrified, clutching his arm tightly, “Ivan, save me, you must save me.”
“What happened?”
Gazing into the distance at the dormitory area to the left, Ivan noticed that it was in disarray, not as if someone had breached the castle.
Pearney didn’t bother with the two of them and jogged over to check out the situation.
By Ivan’s side, Justine seemed to have grasped a sense of safety. Enjoy new chapters from M-V-L
After taking several deep breaths, she said with a pale face, “Thomson is gone. He was walking to the dormitory entrance, and just as he was about to step through the door, he just—suddenly exploded into pieces, with blood and bones flying everywhere. Walls and doors were destroyed; my door too was demolished. Something burst in.
You didn’t see what happened just now; it was too horrifying, too horrifying.
I don’t want to end up like that. We are truly siblings in practice; help me out, will you? I want to go back to Flying Fish Port, I need to see my mother; her health is really poor, she can’t be without me—”
At this moment, she had completely lost her former pride.
“We will go back,” Ivan hesitated for a moment, then extended his arms to embrace Justine, who was beginning to lose control of her emotions, and patted her back. “Trust me, we will definitely return to Flying Fish Port.”
“Okay.”
Justine looked up at him with tears in her eyes and nodded emphatically.
Pearney quickly ran back, looking annoyed at the two of them embracing.
She stared wide-eyed at them; Justine, feeling embarrassed, took a few steps back and turned to fix her clothes.
Pearney, looking rather upset, said, “Someone ended up like Aaron. Another apprentice was also badly injured by the aftermath, I heard his name is Finkel. Aren’t you going to take a look yourself?”
“There’s nothing to see.”
Ivan looked at her speechlessly. It was her own fault for running off so fast. This young lady didn’t seem as sharp as she appeared, and in fact, gave off a slightly unreliable impression.
Pearney looked at him suspiciously, “What is that look you are giving me?”
Ivan said, “It’s a look of admiration, praising your bravery for remaining composed. You are stronger than Justine in this respect.”
Pearney responded, “Is that so, haha, I am used to such small scenes.”
Justine turned back around, her face no longer showing the disheveled appearance from before. She moved to stand close to Ivan, eyeing the somewhat familiar stranger in front of her. Observing the other’s face, which was more attractive than her own, she began to feel quietly wary.
Pearney introduced herself graciously, “I am Pearney, we’ve met before.”
Justine immediately recognized her, her eyes lighting up, “It’s Miss Pearney, it’s been a long time.”
“Indeed, it’s unfortunate to meet again under these circumstances. I am glad to see you, Justine.”
“Me too, sorry for my earlier impoliteness.”
“Don’t worry about it, you’ve been braver than most people.”
Ivan had never heard that these two were particularly close. Watching them energetically chatting, he felt somewhat redundant standing there.
At that moment, someone emerged from a house in front, dressed in a bulky apprentice robe, making the two women stop their conversation.
Eckerz glanced at the three of them before turning and walking away.
Ivan noted the scale-like cracks on his face and the back of his hands. His appearance was strange, and his aura even stranger; clearly, he was not in good condition, which explained why he had been out of sight for so long.
Eckerz couldn’t be considered anything but unlucky: first, his home was ransacked, and he lost important items that maintained his stability; then, he had to share the burden of Toyennes’s curse, one blow after another leading to his current predicament.
Days passed by.
Ivan completed the crafting of the Physical Strength Potions, succeeding a total of 8 times, which amounted to just over a 30% success rate.
Apothecary Skill Experience Points increased by a hundred or so, and accompanying it, Energy Particle Skill improved a bit.
[Apothecary Skill: lv3(179/300)]
[Energy Particle Skill: Lv1(59/100)]
[Curse Skill: lv0(5/10)]
He was somewhat baffled by Curse Studies, and now he dared not casually tap into the curse power on his arm; the Experience Points were completely gained passively.
Besides apothecary, he put much more thought into incubating insect eggs, following Toyennes’s instructions. He used one quarter of a nutrition potion, water, and a small amount of his own blood as the incubation liquid, infusing a certain amount of Mana daily.
He noticed changes in the insect eggs, but he didn’t know how many days it would take for them to hatch.
Latterly, he took some Physical Strength Potions to settle accounts with the little green winged snake, who showed a great potential to become a capitalist, offering him only two Physical Strength Potions as compensation.
The little green winged snake brought a new recipe from Toyennes—Endurance Ginger Water, which was a step above the Physical Strength Potion, with the effect of replenishing both physical strength and lifeforce.
From nutrition potions to Physical Strength Potions, and now Endurance Ginger Water, he had reason to believe this was a series of related potions. Toyennes might have had higher-quality recipes, which tantalized him.
But he knew that given Toyennes’s character, the likelihood was slim. From the current three potions, it was apparent that they were of little significance to him and didn’t matter much.
The little green winged snake provided him with only twenty servings of Endurance Ginger Water, advising him to use it sparingly, whereas he received a hundred servings each of nutrition potion and Physical Strength Potion.
…
Outside the castle, in a certain subterranean cavern.
“Toyennes must be trying to find me by now. He probably can’t figure out how I severed the connection with the curse mark. He must be panicking because events have spiraled beyond his control, heading in an unpredictable direction, hahaha.”
There was a grey iron obelisk in the center of the cavern. At this moment, Billerie was wrapped around it with his snake body, and it seemed that the injuries he had suffered a few days ago had already healed.
Under the grey iron obelisk, the ground around it had been smoothed out, and a four-armed ape was drawing runes and patterns on the ground, with the grey iron obelisk at the center of these runes and patterns.
“He’ll never think that the misdeeds he perpetrated in the past and the evils he committed will turn into shadows that envelop him, and these shadows will bring him death, hahaha!” Billerie slithered up and down around the iron obelisk, intermittently bursting into manic laughter.
If a sorcerer were present, they would recognize that Billerie’s bestial nature was greatly suppressing his human nature, making his emotions difficult to control, and the injuries from a few days ago weren’t without consequence.
“He also won’t expect that I could find the real heart of the island sorcery array below ground. He’s just a despicable thief; all of his arrangements will be used by us, becoming spears thrust towards him. It’s too funny, hahaha.”
“He is the scum amongst sorcerers, a wretch that can only hide on a little island on the sea. Why should someone as shameless as him be allowed to live? Kill him, kill him, I must kill him, hahaha.”
“——“
The raucous laughter echoed throughout the cavern, while the four-armed ape turned a deaf ear and continued its task undisturbed.
After a long while, Billerie finally ceased roaming; his serpent body was covered with frost that had spread from the grey iron obelisk. He crawled down from the obelisk with a dark expression, well aware of his own condition—only able to suppress it to some degree with the help of the iron obelisk.
As he thought about his current plight, the hatred in his heart grew even more intense—all brought upon him by Toyennes.
A good while later, the four-armed ape spoke, “We don’t have enough materials, the sacrificial array arrangement requires more resources.”
“The original ruins and the nearby sea have been searched over and over, picked clean a long time ago. Unless we venture into the castle for a search.”
“The defensive array within the castle was arranged by that person, with the power of the island’s grand array, and is also an independent sorcery array. Without the relevant control items, it may hinder our plans.”
After pondering for a moment, Billerie said, “I shall contact Miss Pearney to cooperate with us inside.”
The four-armed ape said nothing more and kept busy with its work, as the runes sacrificial array was still incomplete.
Billerie spoke, “What about my previous proposal? If we merge, our power would definitely increase manifold. We wouldn’t need any sacrificial array to kill that person. You too desire to personally strike down the one who discarded you like a pair of worn-out shoes, right?”
The four-armed ape acted as if it hadn’t heard, and silence fell upon the cavern once more.