Chapter.4 Eyelids (6)
Grumbling –
The sleep is getting further and further away. The water, illuminated by faint candlelight, recedes into the distance, and pitch-black darkness surrounds the son-in-law.
‘It’s an incredibly deep well.’
The professor shook his tied legs as he looked at the surface of the water that was now starting to look like small dots. There was no sign of upward movement.
‘If this happens, I have no choice but to wait until they really pull me up…’
How many minutes will I have to endure? No, what’s the use of holding your breath underwater like this in the first place? You’ll be lucky if you don’t get rabies.
Grump – Grump –
’78 79….’
When I stay still in the water, my pulse starts to sound unusually loud in the extreme silence. The blood seemed to be flowing unusually vigorously, and while I was aware of that, I imagined the image of my heart beating slowly –
the pulse getting slower and slower. In the midst of the serenity like a mesmerizing view, small red eyes rose like a lantern along with a sweet scent. It felt instinctive. That ‘that guy’ has been singing disgusting songs in my ears constantly for the past few days.
The eyes shining in the dark drew a thin line.
‘We met again…?’
What a fucking bastard. Annoying infectious agent. Wasn’t the infectious agent something like a cell? Is it possible to talk to me like that? Or is it an illusion caused by lack of oxygen?
‘Giggle…’
It’s an unpleasant laugh. What’s so funny?
‘You… always think a lot of useless thoughts.’
what?
‘Whether I’m really in your head… your fantasy… what does it matter? No matter what, you have no choice but to talk to me…’
Mama’s boy, who is only a month old, speaks well.
‘I was born and raised in your head… so I can speak as well as you… with my mother…. It’s been so long since I fell… I am a Sephora who was originally made to work alone… Now I can’t feel my mother’s call… that has been whipping me for a long time… I feel… not bad…’
Deeply. sinking deeper. I was able to see the guy’s face at the edge of my consciousness. Small, billowing black smoke. Two eyes shining bright red above them.
‘Being free from something… is a good thing… you too… right? ‘It was nice to be free… wasn’t it?’
….What an unlucky thing to say. Well, you can’t pretend to know anything about data chunks in games.
‘Giggle…’
A large black lump stirred. Eyes that draw darker arcs. A small mouth emerged from between the smoke-like bodies. A mouth without lips, with teeth clearly visible, was smiling.
‘Giggle… You’re still thinking about that useless thing… Whether it’s data… Fantasy… It doesn’t matter… Because I’m in your consciousness… In your deep memories… your subconscious… I saw everything…’
The professor could instinctively know. What he thinks about is the memory he thinks about.
And that he feels happy about being reminded of that.
Knock
Knock Knock Knock Knock Knock Knock Knock Knock Knock Knock Knock Kkuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Tuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Tuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Tuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Kuk Tuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Tuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Tuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Tuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk
Kuk Tuk Kuk
Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Tuk Kuk Druk It pierced my heart. Bright red emotions came out.
‘I know better… than you… you consider your mother’s death to be your deepest darkness… but there is something much deeper than that…. Since I came this far…. let’s meet for a moment. ‘Why don’t you go ahead and do it?’
My father who died for me. My mother who died because of me. And in that feeling of guilt…. the two people met again…. I….
‘I missed you, right? Did you miss it so much that you didn’t know what to do? So that’s why it was like that, right? Look. It doesn’t matter. Really fake. ‘That’s not important?’
must be killed We need to pop that bastard’s eyeballs, twist out his tongue, and eliminate him from this world.
‘Giggle… If you live in that much pain… what’s left? A life where death feels like rest? ‘Where is the meaning in life, where self-destruction follows like a label every moment I think of happiness?’
Boom! Grrr!
The water is rising. The space of consciousness twists and shrinks, and water begins to rise between it.
‘Time is up…’
I will kill you. I will kill you…!
‘No need to rush….. You will eventually hand yourself over to me…. Shell…. Giggling.’
Boom!
My heart is burning. My throat hurts, my chest hurts, and my lungs are squeezed with pain, and I feel like I’m being dragged along, and the light that was small like a dot suddenly grows bigger and –
wow!
It threw me back to reality.
“Wow! Cough! Kehehe! “Cluck, cluck, cluck!”
“3 minutes 52 seconds. It was close, right? There will be no aftereffects because we calculated it by listening to the heart sounds transmitted through water. Ah, I guess I’ll have to unblock my mouth. “Because I have to spit out the water.”
“Cluck cluck! Hehehe! Wow!”
“To have a will strong enough to change the way the world works, you first need an unwavering belief in yourself. To do that, you need to look at your own darkness. “That deep, cold darkness is a very good environment to reflect on yourself.”
“Cough! Heheheheheheuu-”
“Professor? “What did you see?”
What did you see? The professor, taking a deep breath, remembered. okay. I saw something. A being that looks into each and every memory you don’t want to recall again and tries to show them to you.
“Never again…”
After spitting out all the water, the professor growled at Roman like a wounded animal.
“Never again… don’t even think about putting me in there…”
What had crept into his mind was much worse than he thought.
***
Day 6 of Count Mandalius’ Pension.
“Fuha!”
“4 minutes and 45 seconds. “You’ve felt a lot!”
Roman looked truly happy as he watched the professor leaning against the edge of the well and greedily swallowing his breath.
Of course, the professor spewed venom from his eyes and said, ‘Don’t do it!’ Count Mandalius said, ‘Then stop it.’ There was no way I could say that.
From that day on, the professor was thrown into the well every day at lunchtime, and fortunately, after the first day, ‘that guy’ never spoke to him…
“Uweeeek! Hehehe! Stop! help me! It’s my fault! “I don’t know what I did wrong, but stop it anyway!”
Thanks to this, the professor was able to focus on the pain of drowning.
“Ha ha ha ha ha! Increased acquisition time is an important indicator! This is proof that your body is becoming familiar with water before enlightenment comes! “The training is starting to pay off!”
“training? It sounds like training! I really almost died this time! I saw a flash of light! Was this the identity of the remaining 30%?! I don’t remember, but I saw something amazing! “People with wings were looking at me and seriously discussing issues like immigration!”
“Well, I understand to some extent. When I first received that training, I tried to just hit everyone, including wizards and bastards, and run away. Ha ha ha ha ha!”
“It’s already been three days and what is this? Mana? I can’t feel a thing, and all I know about the water is that it’s cold, dark, and scary! “This is all I have!”
In response to the professor’s fierce protests, Roman shook his head as if it was okay.
“That’s enough. Because it’s training for that. You said that in order to become a magician who controls water-based mana, you must first become familiar with water as if it were your own body, right? “When you were doing drowning training, wasn’t there a moment when your mind suddenly relaxed and your body felt relaxed and relaxed?”
The professor nodded without realizing it. There was. Quite a lot too. As I desperately struggle to go up, the moment I think, ‘Ah, is this the end?’
“This is a phenomenon that occurs when the fear that has reached the deepest part of the heart reaches its end and becomes lost and disoriented. In essence, fear comes from the unknown. “When you embrace your fear so deeply that you no longer know what you don’t know, understanding begins to take its place.”
“Uh… do you know that such a situation is usually expressed as ‘just before death’?”
Isn’t death responsible for the unknown in the fear of the unknown? That’s the moment you face death.
“That’s it! ‘Just before’ death! The goal of this exercise is to move back and forth with one foot in that near-death state, completely eliminating the practitioner’s fear of water and at the same time making him or her familiar with the water. Well, it was quite dangerous. “Isn’t he alive and well like this?”
The professor was left speechless by Roman’s shameless attitude.
“Let’s take a short break and then go right back in again.”
“?!!!”
“The key to this training method is to be a little harsher so that you don’t get used to it.”
“Yay ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssww-bbbbbbbbbbbk!”
“Ahahaha! It’s okay to curse! Even at the Magic Tower, the rule during this training is to pretend not to hear any curses spoken to senior wizards!”
“Uuuu…”
The professor closed his eyes tightly as he watched the well approaching.
***
8th day of pension.
There was no need to cut off limbs anymore, as the experimental materials were no longer needed. Instead, recovery time was replaced with drowning body training. Now I go into the well in the morning.
“Don’t refuse water! Humans build their bodies from their mother’s amniotic fluid before birth! Water is our origin, so do not think of your body and water separately! The moment when you feel the water touching your body like your skin! “Professor, you will become a great water wizard of the Reedflow school!”
“Roman! wait for a sec! Even so, 10 minutes is too much! “People need to breathe to live!”
“Don’t hold your breath and take the water!”
“Now wait a minute! In fact, when I enter a narrow, dark space, my hands and feet tremble and I break into a cold sweat-”
“Aha! I used to experience the same symptoms when I was a training wizard! This is a good direction! “The goal is just around the corner!”
“Oh no! “It’s not like that!”
“Let’s go~”
“Roman! “Roman wizard-burgrrrrrrrrrrrr!”
Churrrrrrrrrrrrrr-
plop!
Throw it into the water without any bottom or end. Well, it’s not water with any special ingredients, it’s just a well full of water. Every time I die and come back to life, I think, ‘In fact, I’m not creating a wizard, but maybe I’m conducting a unique thought experiment?’ I thought about it, but
t-ring-!
[Characteristic – Water Mana Friendliness (47% in progress)]
Since this works, it’s a problem again… It’s not that it’s not, but the feeling of clothes wet with water or solution sticking to each other isn’t that unpleasant these days. Unless you can’t breathe, being in the water is cool and you don’t get any distracting thoughts –
‘Aaaah! ‘What was I thinking!’
shit. I guess water seeped into my brain.
***
14:00.
After the drowning body training that started in the morning is completed safely (symptoms of fainting, dizziness, hallucinations, and vomiting fall into the safe category), I have a late lunch with Roman.
Today’s lunch menu is Dalamia sashimi, jelly made by squeezing the skin of freshwater eel, and other seaweed.
“Hey Roman?”
“hmm? “Why are you doing that?”
“Didn’t we eat together the past four days?”
“Yes.”
“Then I would like you to explain why the only menu items are raw fish, cold vegetables, seaweed, and cold processed fish!”
It was good at first. This is fresh raw fish that you can’t even dream of in reality. But that only happened once or twice. I even came out shivering in the cold water for three meals a day, and the only food I was given was cold fish. As I passed by, I saw other wizards slicing steak into hot soup, but why are we eating this fish?
‘fish? water? wait for a sec. No way…’
“Is it possible… that this is also a water-type wizard…?”
“Are you asking the obvious? A water wizard is a person who is no different from water. Don’t you think putting something into your body that doesn’t come from water would be a bit… bad? So, instead of eating grains and meat from the ground, we only eat what we can get from the water. Oh, of course, in an uncooked state so that it doesn’t come into contact with fire.”
It’s crazy. This guy, no wizard, is really crazy.
“‘Wouldn’t that be bad’? thing? Has it been proven? “There are negative effects if a wizard eats food that is different from his or her properties?”
“Um…there’s nothing particularly proven.”
“Then why!”
“Because he’s a wizard. As soon as the thought ‘I think so’ settles in my head, it already becomes a rule that the wizard must follow.
Asceticism is the easiest way to justify your beliefs and actions. “It hasn’t been proven, but wizards who started this way of eating said they felt like their mana flow was a little smoother.”
“@#)(*&!$&(*)!!!!”
The professor swore, spitting out the foulest and most horrendous swear words imaginable in his head. If he escapes from here, he will have to visit the Magic Tower of the Reedflow school that developed this training method. I will find you. I will find you and bury all the people responsible for spreading this crazy thing, along with the tower.
***
Morning of the 9th day of pension.
Drurrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr-neb-
“Are you ready?”
“Don’t ask me that, just You’re craving it, right? Don’t you know that even when you’re about to get hit, it’s even scarier right before you get hit
?” “Hahahaha! You’ve gained quite a bit of confidence now! Just look at it. It gets easier if you do it, right?”
“I just learned how to adapt.”
“Hmm! Excellent. It’s a posture!”
Cluck!
Plop!
How many times has this happened? Slowly, I’ve become completely accustomed to this. Seeing how my bloated body gets used to the tasteless meal after being in the water for almost half of the day, I can see that a true person is a person with survival skills. I feel like this is a high-ranking creature.
As I get used to the work, I have time to spare. After the drowning body training, I almost didn’t need a break, so I had some time to look around.
‘There is no more work on the hinges of the iron door. It’s corroded to the point where it shouldn’t be done. The hacksaws are rusted enough. There’s enough of it. The problem is when to escape…’ We’ve also
given some thought to countermeasures against infectious agents. If that’s the case, If this works, we will be able to suppress the infection even after escaping from here.
Boom!
The professor was sinking into the water and drawing the internal structure of the mansion, which he had seen with his eyes over the past few days, on the status window. It had been really comfortable being in the water for a few days now. Now, spending time out of the water is even more uncomfortable.
‘My room is on the first basement floor, the well is two rooms next to it, and the dining room is one room next to it. It seems like Marquis Mandalius usually stays in the lab located in the deepest part of this basement. The problem is… it’s the door that goes up to the ground.’
After yesterday’s training, he pretended to panic and ran outside, looking for a way out.
‘The direction the wizards were moving in after dinner time, which can be seen briefly when they usually move. I’m not going to sleep here, so if I go in the direction the wizards were moving at late at night…’
What I found was a staircase leading down to the first basement floor and an exit blocked by iron bars.
‘It’s not difficult to leave the room. I also prepared some useful weapons. The problem is with that iron bar…the one with the key…isn’t it Isaac?’
I always get stuck here. No matter what I do, I can’t think of a way to subdue the Marquis. How do you defeat a magician who has mastered water magic, which is said to be the most stable in the 6th tier, with just your bare body?
Tiring-!
[Trait – Water Mana Friendliness (95% in progress)]
‘Is this going to make me a real wizard?’
The water-based mana affinity rose rapidly at some point, but stopped at 95%. Perhaps the ‘enlightenment’ that Roman emphasized so much is the remaining 5%.
‘It’s enlightenment… I still don’t know anything? ‘Water is water.’
Roman says that you come to know it naturally, but even now that water has become as familiar as your own body, it doesn’t feel like you understand it.
‘….Tsk. If I escape, I won’t be able to get private tutoring like this. If you go out, why not try swimming?’
-Cow.
While the professor was enjoying a swim and checking his plan, he heard a sound loud enough to echo the walls of the well.
‘hmm? what? The shock was enough to make the well underground cry. Did something explode in the lab?’
Coooooo!
Boom!
I heard it again. A fairly heavy collision sound. It may be an accident or mistake once, but if it happens repeatedly, it’s a different story. The professor slowly rose to the surface. From the moment my water affinity exceeded 80%, I was able to move my body in this way even without moving.
Sigh!
“Woooo! Roman? Is there something going on outside-”
“Get down!”
“What…!”
Without having the power to ask, the professor stuck his head back into the well.
Sgt!
The upper part of the well was cut off at an angle by a wart-like paw.
‘Mute.’ ! It’s not just an infected individual, it’s a level 7 or higher that combines genes!’
Tap, tap, Odok!
Roman’s hand was bent and a hand sign was made. The hand that made the hand sign was turned toward Mute, and Roman, who dipped the other hand into the well, finished chanting.
“Dorman Baldanis’ penetrating wave!”
Ahhhh!
The well. Some of the water gushes out, splits into four branches, and pours down on the mantis-like Mute.
“Keuee! Kiik!”
‘That’s a real magic spell.’
Isaac only cast the starter word ‘Sleep’, so he didn’t have a chance to observe it properly. The stream of water rushed at him fiercely, creating a hole in Mute’s body, and began to gradually burrow in. Mute, who was struggling, soon calmed down.
Whaaaaaa!
Sigh!
A familiar dull pain. And a feeling as if information is being forced in.
‘The sound of footsteps on the ceiling of the door. Countless footsteps. All the wizards are moving. And this unique bursting sound… Magic? A battle has occurred? This isn’t just one! ‘
The professor hurriedly looked around. The mental breakdown that had been focused only on his head was ringing in all directions simultaneously. “
Suddenly!
” Practical magic is not my specialty and it is difficult.
Roman, who cut the rope binding the professor with a small dagger, spoke with an expression of urgency he had never shown before.
“I don’t have time for professors. “You must avoid it quickly.”
“What happened-”
Wow!
With an earth-shaking sound, dust fell from the ceiling of the underground research building.
“Kyaaaaaak!”
“There is no time! They’ve burrowed into the ground! The city is now in chaos!”
Kwaaaang!
The noise of the battle was getting closer and closer to where Roman and I were. Roman rummaged through his pockets and put something in my hand.
“I want to help you, but I also have to go up and join. I have to do it, so I don’t have time. This is the key to the facility. It will allow you to enter the room where anesthetics, mute blood, and other chemicals used for experiments are stored. Don’t go out, but stay hidden inside to suppress infection. Even if this place is taken over, you won’t be able to get out. “Once this is sorted out, I will come to the rescue.”
“Hey! Roman! Wait a minute!”
Roman ignored me calling from behind and ran straight outside. After a while, a sound like a water tank bursting was added to the noise of a fierce battle.
Squeak.
The professor, lost in thought as he looked at the key for a moment, went straight out of the well room and into the room with the bathtub. He started running.
‘They said they dug a tunnel. It will be difficult for Turan, who already has no troops, to stop it. Even if the wizards fight hard, the best they can do is break through the siege and escape.’
As if confirming the professor’s guess, the sound of magic being cast was getting farther and farther away, but the sounds of the mutes scraping metal were getting closer.
‘I can’t go out anyway. I still need the things here to prevent infectious agents.’
As soon as the professor arrived in the room, he immediately jumped into the solution, then closed the wooden lid next to him and completely submerged himself in it.
‘They said other cities are also fighting, so it will be difficult for reinforcements to come. Turan has fallen. For now… hide here. ‘There is no choice.’
The professor quietly held his breath as he heard the pounding sound getting closer.
***
