Warlock Apprentice

Angor already learned something about a Soft Larva egg from Sunders.

A “Soft Larva” was a particular monster worm natural to Abyss Plane. These worms obeyed a strict social class system. They weren’t very powerful in terms of strength, so they were mostly used as alchemy material and test subjects by wizards.

A Soft Larva was potentially valuable because of the presence of Mutation Larva among them, which facilitated a certain cantrip called Transform.

The time and effort required to study a real spell and a “cantrip” were vastly different. To master a spell, a wizard might need many centuries, while a cantrip only asked for several months, as long as someone’s talent didn’t go against it.

However, there was one exception among cantrips—Transform. It was commonly believed that Transform was as complicated to study as real spells.

This cantrip was used for changing someone’s appearance. The user could either turn as small as an insect or become as big as a giant. But it only affected appearance. The user would not receive any changes in strength.

There were two ways to use Transform. One was to study the cantrip by normal means, which was the “hard” way. Whoever wished to go through this had to gain knowledge about biological structures, imitation, mana control, anatomy, precise scheduling, and nearly a hundred more subjects. It would take apprentices their entire lives to gain enough expertise.

The second method was to “cheat” one’s way around it by using the skin of a Mutation Larva.

This way, a user only needed to cast the cantrip model to transform his or her body. The larva’s skin would take care of everything else.

Due to such convenience, most wizards would use the second method to cast Transform, which quickly brought a drastic decrease in the population of Mutation Larvae.

These larvae were already scarce. After being hunted down for thousands of years, they almost went extinct in the wizarding world. Even the most renowned auctions had not provided them in recent years.

The “Soft Larva egg” Angor received from Kanter was a little different from Mutation Larva.

Soft Larvae all had one single commanding presence like how ants worked, while Mutation Larva was only one type of them. It was yet unclear whether Kanter’s worm egg could become a Mutation Larva.

Even so, a Soft Larva was already costly among wizards.

The current question was whether Angor could hatch the egg at all.

He thought about it and placed the egg inside the worm nest, which was the second gift he obtained from Kanter. Angor had no idea how to help the egg hatch, but he believed the nest could do something about it.

Once the egg was kept safe, he prepared to keep the nest in his bracelet.

Something suddenly clicked outside the room. Angor looked around and saw the room window shaking against the wild wind. The rain outside had become heavier.

Creak!

The window bolt gave in and snapped, causing raindrops to enter the room.

Angor’s bed was placed not far from the window. His legs were soon wet from the rain. He placed the worm nest down and went to close the window again.

Before he could, he saw a pair of green spots shining in the dark just outside the window.

Next, a shadow appeared on the balcony.

Angor couldn’t recognize the shadow under the curtain of night, but those bright red dancing shoes and a giant bowknot all suggested who had come.

“Keely?” Angor frowned and called.

The shadow made a flip and swiftly landed inside the room.

It was Keely, who was still wearing the same getup. The light spots Angor saw earlier were actually the eyes of her black cat.

Her hair was completely drenched by rainwater, which stuck tightly on her forehead.

“Do you need anything?” Angor frowned again. He felt troubled by Keely’s sudden visit as well as the improper entrance, but when thinking about her professor, he still tried to be polite.

Keely kept her indifferent stare at Angor as if she were trying to remember the last detail of Angor’s face. She finally spoke when Angor almost lost his patience.

“Luna has remembered your pheromone. I’ll come to you once we enter the purification garden. Don’t run too far,” Keely said in her gravelly and cold voice with her cat in her arms.

“Luna… you mean… ” Angor pointed at the kitten.

“Yes. Also, know your place. Stay away and don’t bother me or my professor before the garden opens. Otherwise… I’ll end your life.” Her expression abruptly turned cruel.

Angor couldn’t take it and also showed a fierce look. The woman made the whole matter look as if he were begging for help. Yet in fact, they didn’t even know each other until today. Besides, Angor never planned to get involved with Lilith’s Clan or Kanter.

“I wasn’t going to visit you anyway,” Angor said as he dropped his usual manners. “I see we both agreed on something, and we might as well keep it that way after the garden event as well. I mean, I’ll not go bother you, and you will not come to me. Let’s stay clear of each other’s way.”

It was true that Angor felt greatly offended, but he still used relatively polite words in front of a lady.

“Good. As for the garden, just listen to my orders.”

Keely turned away. Before leaving, she glanced at the worm nest sitting on Angor’s bed.

“Do not fail my teacher’s alchemy request; otherwise, you’ll face the consequences.”

The woman leaped onto her broom and entered the rainy night again.

Angor didn’t know whether he should scoff or laugh at the weird encounter. Also…

Did Kanter ask me to make stuff? When?

When Keely had left, Angor placed several illusion nodes around his window just in case. He never had such intruders in Bogula’s base, and he wasn’t expecting one at his teacher’s house.

Also, it was clear that Sunders allowed Keely to go inside.

…

Sunders called Angor the next morning.

The gentleman said nothing about Keely’s visit last night. He only took Angor into the Gravity Garden again. This time, they landed on a small slope instead of the outdoor library.

There was only white mist around that blocked their view.

“Show me your Nightmare Domain and attack me. I need to see how much you achieved in the last half year.” Sunders lifted his cane and pointed it at Angor.

Angor nodded. He quickly expanded his Nightmare Domain of a luxurious castle and swallowed Sunders inside.

He gained extensive knowledge about how to wield his Nightmare Domain after reading The Mystery of Nightmare Domain, such as mixing different nightmare illusions with all sorts of tactics. He planned to use his strongest moves to beat his professor.

Of course, nothing worked. At all.

Angor expected much. He only wished he could receive some more advice from Sunders.

The gentleman remained still for a while to inspect Angor’s Nightmare Domain.

“It has grown, but there’s almost nothing new in it.”

Everything shown by Angor came from The Mystery of Nightmare Domain. The only thing worth noticing was how Angor learned how to block someone’s senses, which could achieve many interesting effects such as muting someone or arousing the victim’s desires.

Apart from this, Angor only recreated the tactics taught by the book. It didn’t mean Angor did a poor job, but he might need some more creativity.

Of course, considering how much time Angor spent in the wizarding world, he already mastered different skills at an amazing speed, even more so than the other two students of Sunders. But at the same time, Sunders had higher hopes for Angor.

Which meant Sunders would get harsher about Angor’s training.

“Nonetheless, you should read The Mystery of Nightmare Domain as carefully as you can. But I wish you can also create your own path before turning a wizard. Those who only know how to follow books can never find the truth.”

Angor nodded. He fully knew what those words meant.

After the small test, Sunders brought Angor to another spot in the gravity garden. It was the “lab room” according to Sunders.

A good number of equipment and devices scattered about. Angor managed to recognize some of them since these had something to do with alchemy as well.

Labs weren’t only for alchemists. Almost every wizard had his or her own place for commencing research. Spells, magic theories… Almost everything required trial and error.

A personal laboratory was a critical facility for wizards. There might be wizards who didn’t need a home, but they still needed their labs.

Sunders took out a glass chamber large enough to contain a human and asked Angor to go inside.

Next, he injected nutrient fluid, which was vital for keeping a body alive, into the glass chamber as he demanded Angor to eject his soul.