After the old witch fled in panic, Camus said calmly, “Her perfect body’s upper limit is only at the level of a third-rank wizard.”

Saul laughed, “Isn’t a third-rank wizard impressive enough?”

Camus’s lips moved slightly, as if she had different thoughts, but in the end she said nothing.

Except when studying and researching, she never expressed any opinions.

Like a sealed box, making it impossible to see through what was truly hidden within.

After a moment, Camus spoke to Saul again: “You’re the same—you need to adapt to the third wizard body transformation and cannot relax your requirements for yourself. Improving magical power is important, but advancing mental strength cannot stagnate either. You need to enhance your body’s capacity for spiritual entities to avoid being overwhelmed during the formal transformation.”

Saul knew Camus’s advice was important, and indeed he hadn’t been slack in his own improvement.

“I know. Ever since establishing the wizard tower at Rhine Lake, I’ve been constantly fishing for spiritual entities in the lake, using them to strengthen my mental power.”

Previously, Saul’s mental strength could rival that of an ordinary second-rank wizard; now he had already surpassed ordinary second-rank wizards.

However, because of this, the number of spiritual entities in the lake was also declining dramatically, causing the time needed for soul fishing to grow increasingly longer.

Camus stared at Saul’s face, seemingly confirming the changes in his spiritual body and physical form.

After a moment, she withdrew her gaze without offering any evaluation, instead changing the topic.

“Besides attempting to fuse large quantities of souls, you also need to activate your locator. Perceive it, familiarize yourself with it, apply it, and finally incorporate its characteristics into yourself. This will help you advance to second-rank.”

Saul understood this principle, but it was easier said than done.

Especially since his locator was the Death Wizard’s Diary.

“My locator’s characteristic is predicting death, foreseeing the future… applying the locator’s traits to myself. Does this mean I need to possess prophetic abilities too?” Saul couldn’t help but smile bitterly at the thought.

When a locator was too powerful, it could sometimes be troublesome.

The sigh that had just escaped his lips was suddenly drawn back in by Saul.

“Wait! Can I really not prophesy?”

Saul suddenly remembered that in his first year after arriving in this world, he’d had several strange dreams.

Among them, the dream of the maid turning into a puppet and Sid searching for him in the morgue both carried somewhat mysterious qualities.

If combined with the dangers he encountered afterward… calling them prophetic dreams wasn’t entirely impossible!

Saul stroked his chin, falling into deep thought. “At that time, the dreams I had seemed to have some meaning of foreseeing danger. Could I really have talent in this area?”

Saul had never studied prophetic magic.

First, he had the diary and didn’t need it himself; second, he was advancing too quickly—he hadn’t even finished learning knowledge in his own field, so naturally he had no time or energy to study other temporarily unnecessary knowledge.

Moreover, after he began systematically studying magic, he rarely had such dreams anymore.

It was as if once a complete knowledge system was established, instinct would actually degenerate.

Saul’s thoughts gradually drifted, and Camus stopped speaking as well, seemingly unconcerned with Saul’s condition.

The underground first floor fell completely silent.

Advancing to second-rank wasn’t a task that could be completed in the short term. After thinking for a while, Saul let himself off the hook and focused on the knowledge and experiments at hand.

He went upstairs and used soul fishing to extract a bit of pollution from Justin’s body, preparing to take it back for experiments.

He just hadn’t expected that moving even this tiny amount of pollution would cause the pollution source in Justin’s body to suddenly rage, immediately worsening his injuries.

Fortunately, Justin understood his own physical condition very well and quickly controlled the situation’s development, though he would need to rest quietly for some time.

While he was injured this time, it also confirmed that Saul was quite capable of dealing with pollution, which strengthened his confidence.

After Saul helped Justin recover, he took the newly obtained pollution downstairs. The entire three-story wizard tower was left with only Justin.

When night fell, Justin, who had been lying down all afternoon, suddenly climbed up from the wooden bed.

He walked to the open space in the center of the room. Golden light spread beneath his feet, and a new metallic regular tetrahedron gradually formed, enveloping Justin’s entire body.

Inside the sealed space, Justin raised his right hand and rolled up his sleeve.

In the middle of his forearm was a shallow bruise.

His left fingertip transformed into a small blade, lightly sliding along the bruise. The skin and flesh immediately parted, but no blood flowed out.

In the gap between the red muscle fibers, a red seed the size of a sesame grain was faintly pulsing.

Just like a living heart.

Justin observed the heart for a while, and seeing its vitality undiminished, relaxed slightly.

“I cannot die yet,” he thought. “The continuation of the Black Night Royal Family cannot end with me.”

Justin pressed the wound. Worried that magical fluctuations would be conspicuous, he didn’t use magic but let the wound heal naturally.

After a moment, confirming that the skin and flesh had reconnected, he restored himself to normal, dismissed the golden tetrahedron, and sat back down to meditate.

That night, Saul, who habitually used meditation to replace sleep and only truly slept when occasionally mentally exhausted, chose to lie on the soft bed made of mushrooms.

“Suddenly trying to sleep with a specific purpose, I’m actually having insomnia.”

After lying there for a long time and unusually failing to fall asleep, Saul stood up again.

“Relax,” Penny comforted Saul with giggles in his mind. “If Brother Saul really can’t sleep, I can help you.”

“No. I’m worried that other forces intervening might affect the nature of the dream.” Saul refused Penny’s suggestion, took several deep breaths, lay back down, closed his eyes, and fell into contemplation.

Saul wanted to have prophetic dreams, but he also knew this matter had little certainty.

Moreover, from his memory, prophetic dreams generally appeared when he was in dangerous situations. Although Saul was currently in the Borderland, he didn’t face any major life-or-death crisis for the moment.

After all, the diary hadn’t issued any warnings.

“But the diary’s warnings are also incomplete. As long as I can survive the crisis myself, even if everyone else dies, the diary probably won’t provide warnings.”

He couldn’t rely entirely on the diary for judging danger.

Gradually, his attention was diverted, and drowsiness slowly surged up.

He actually fell asleep bit by bit.

…

Saul opened his eyes and found himself standing in a gray, hazy world.

He was positioned high in the air, looking down at the earth.

“This place is… the Borderland?”

Saul looked down and saw the familiar mushroom forest and Rhine Lake surrounded by the mushroom forest.

The pristine white Purity Wizard Tower stood on the island in the lake’s center, appearing somewhat hazy.

“Boom—”

The earth trembled.

Saul hurriedly looked toward the source of the sound.

In the mountain range behind him, there was actually a giant slowly walking!

The giant was covered with milky-white bells, but the bells made no sound as it walked.

A wave of heat came from Saul’s left side. Saul looked over in confusion and actually saw a great fire spreading across the entire plain.

Heaven and earth seemed to be burned to ash by the flames, and within the ash countless human faces were writhing and wailing, extending toward the sky along with the black smoke.

Saul unconsciously followed the smoke upward with his gaze and saw a flying shadow in the equally gray sky.

The flying shadow was moving away from Saul at great speed, seemingly fleeing. But as it flew, it suddenly shot toward the sky at an even faster speed.

No, it was more like falling.

Falling toward the endless sky, until even Saul’s gaze could no longer capture it.

After the figure completely disappeared into the sky, Saul faintly heard a desperate and piercing wail.

“What’s happening?” He unconsciously spoke aloud, hugging his arms with both hands, falling into inexplicable fear.

Then he felt something was wrong. Looking down, his two hands and the arms they were grasping had only black skeletal frames remaining!

The tattered wizard robes fluttered in the wind, and the body revealed beneath the robes had no flesh whatsoever.

Saul fearfully raised his hands to touch his own face.

Bone against bone created a hoarse grinding sound.

(End of Chapter)

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