In the end, the Old Witch still gave Saul one month’s time.

Even though from the beginning, she had already decided to give Saul a month to study.

A month before, a month after—nothing seemed different, yet everything somehow was.

The Old Witch escorted Saul back to his cage with a blank face, not uttering another word the entire way.

Saul followed closely behind her, looking somewhat uneasy, as if afraid she might change her mind halfway and retract the one month she’d granted him.

This time when Saul was brought back, the other “cellmates” all looked over.

When they saw Saul had returned alive, they finally stopped treating him like air.

“He actually pulled it off…” muttered the wizard in the cage to the left of Oqili, who had never spoken to Saul before.

The giant and the dwarf also followed Saul with their eyes. In their gazes, there was surprise, fear—and a deep sense of worry.

As Saul passed by, the barbarian suddenly burst into a loud, unpleasant tune, even hooking his foot on the overhead bars, attempting to hang himself upside down.

“Quiet!”

Smack! 

The Old Witch mercilessly drew a wooden stick and lashed it hard at the barbarian’s foot clinging to the bars.

With a thud, the barbarian crashed to the ground, silently clutching his foot and wailing in pain.

Saul noticed that the sole of the man’s foot, struck just once, had a long strip of skin torn clean off.

That wooden stick seemed as if it could devour flesh.

The room, previously bubbling like boiling water, instantly fell back into deathly silence.

The Old Witch shoved Saul into the half-height cage, still glaring at him with a vicious look.

“Remember, you only have—cough cough—one month. Either you complete the task I gave you, or one month from today… lunch comes with meat!”

With that said, she turned and left, her retreating figure still radiating an overbearing presence.

But Saul, just locked back into the cage, gripped the bars with both hands and looked at the Old Witch’s back. A faint smile flashed in his eyes.

After the Old Witch shut the main door and left, the others in the cages looked at Saul again.

This time, the first to speak was Oqili.

“Looks like your performance pleased the Old Witch,” he said, examining Saul with a probing gaze.

Saul withdrew his expression and lowered his head with a bitter smile. “Pleased? Which eye of yours saw that? I didn’t even complete her task. Who knows what’ll happen in a month…”

Oqili looked puzzled at first, then gradually showed a thoughtful expression.

The wizard on Oqili’s other side muttered under his breath, “The Old Witch actually softened up?”

He glanced at Saul a few times, then looked down and said with unclear meaning, “Maybe our new companion pleased her in… other ways.”

Before Saul could react, Oqili’s face visibly flashed with disgust. He glanced sideways but said nothing.

The others remained silent—the barbarian gave no reaction, while the giant and the dwarf looked at Saul with something close to eagerness. But since they didn’t speak the same language, Saul couldn’t understand their muttering.

Eventually, everyone lost interest in Saul again and slumped back into their hunched positions.

Only then did Saul slowly bury his head into his arms, a faint, satisfied smile creeping over his face.

Just as he had finished researching the perfect-body modification for the wizard’s experiments, a new idea had suddenly sparked in his mind. And for this idea to take shape, he needed time—more importantly, he needed materials and tools…

Saul thought he’d have to wait until the daily soup ration to see the Old Witch again.

But only about ten minutes later, she suddenly burst in.

She wasn’t pushing a cart, nor carrying anything—she merely stormed up to Saul’s cage and gripped the bars, scrutinizing him from head to toe.

Just when Saul thought she was about to speak or assign him a new task, the Old Witch turned and left without a word.

Even when she returned later to serve the soup and took Oqili with her, she still didn’t say another word to Saul.

After Oqili left, another wizard curled his lip at Saul and said, “Tch, figures. Got excited for nothing.”

Saul still said nothing. He merely glanced at the wizard who buzzed around like a fly, then closed his eyes, pretending to meditate.

Inwardly, he was communicating with the other consciousnesses.

“Our modification plan has no flaws, right?”

[An: This plan combines the Bloodrose family’s century-long research in flesh magic with Master’s Soul Resin techniques. With Master’s high-speed simulations, there’s no way she can spot any flaws.]

The perfect-body modification scheme researched by the Old Witch was indeed difficult. An ordinary First Rank wizard would never be able to tackle such a challenge.

But Saul wasn’t an ordinary First Rank wizard.

In the years he spent at the Wizard Tower, he had devoted massive energy to studying body modification. Later on, he even delved into Gorsa’s experiments related to vessel construction for reviving Yura.

His knowledge and insights in body modification and body crafting surpassed many Second Rank wizards.

And just before entering the Borderland, he had received the Bloodrose family’s ultimate modification blueprint—Flesh-Soul Fusion—from An.

In terms of knowledge reserves and practical experience in this field, Saul was on an entirely different level than the Old Witch or Oqili could ever imagine.

Not to mention, he still had the diary—the Dead Wizard’s Diary—which held the power of absolute veto, capable of directly revealing whether the end of a line of thought was correct or not.

So within just one day, Saul had forcefully pushed forward the experimental progress that the Old Witch, Oqili, and the others had been struggling with for years.

In fact, they were not far from completion.

But when Saul broke down the final step, he deliberately held back—leaving himself a trump card.

Truthfully, completing the entire modification formula didn’t require a month at all.

Some unknown time later, Oqili was dragged back by the Old Witch.

Once back in his cage, he sat facing Saul, staring blankly for a long time without speaking.

It wasn’t until the others seemed to be asleep that Oqili suddenly pressed his face against the bars, glaring at Saul.

“How did you come up with a solution to the racial attribute incompatibility problem?” Oqili asked in a hushed voice, as if not wanting the others to hear.

Saul, who had been meditating with his eyes closed, moved over kindly to the edge of his cage, close to Oqili’s side.

“I once saw my master conduct a similar experiment.”

“Who’s your master?”

“Uh… you probably don’t know him.”

Although the title of Wizard Tower Master carried some weight, Saul figured that with Gorsa’s personality, the chance of running into enemies was higher than running into friends.

“I think we could work together in the future…” Oqili’s voice dropped even lower.

After a good night’s sleep…

Saul stretched lazily.

Unable to perform deep meditation in the cage had at least let him enjoy some real sleep.

From that day on, whenever the Old Witch conducted experiments, she would take Saul and Oqili out together.

They spent the first two days verifying that Saul’s theory was indeed practically viable. Then they began conducting experiments following Saul’s formulas and reasoning.

The Old Witch’s temper clearly improved. Even when the barbarian went into another fit, she no longer beat anyone.

While Oqili didn’t contribute much in terms of problem-solving, he was meticulous and precise in executing experiments, saving Saul a lot of tedious groundwork.

As the perfect-body modification gradually got on track…

A few days later, the Old Witch suddenly discovered her supply of materials had run low.

“Why are we going through them so fast?” she frowned, hands on her hips. “Is it because of all the extra control groups we’ve been running?”

“I’m going out for a bit,” she said, walking up to the two busy wizards and interrupting their work.

Though she was reluctant to leave at such a crucial moment, she had to take the risk to avoid delaying progress.

“Ah… alright,” Saul responded, reluctantly setting down the charcoal pen in his hand—he disliked how little ink water pens carried, so he had made his own charcoal pen.

But just as he put down the pen and braced against the table to follow her, he realized she wasn’t moving.

“What’s wrong?”

“This time, you’re not going back into your cages,” the Old Witch grinned, though her eyes remained cold. “Continue your research here. But don’t even think about running. No matter how far you go, I will drag you back.”

“Is that so…” Saul smiled happily. “Don’t worry, I won’t run.”

(End of Chapter)

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