A chilly wave of aura first spilled out when the jade box was opened. The temperature in the warehouse decreased rapidly, causing Han Shuo to shudder involuntarily again. He quickly refocused his concentration on the item within the green jade box.
It was a verdant ball. Its surface like an emerald, winking with ephemeral green light. There was a red dot inside, like a drop of roiling blood, oscillating randomly within the ball.
His mind suddenly hurting, Han Shuo only felt that his mental strength started draining expeditiously towards the ball. It felt a bit like when he was using necromancy magic. With the injection of Han Shuo's mental strength, the surface of the ball shone with even more green, and the blood-red dot in the center abruptly let out a small strand of red light.
Pain! A keenly honed dagger savagely stirred up Han Shuo's brains. With the loss of his mental strength, Han Shuo's mind hurt like a living hell. He had never endured such cruel agony in all his years of life.
In the midst of this extreme pain, Han Shuo should have fainted dead away, but the eerie thing was that Han Shuo's mind was clearer than it'd ever been. Han Shuo even felt that because his mind was more awake than ever, it was exacerbating and infinitely magnifying the agony.
Both of his hands clutching his head, Han Shuo was like a wild beast being slowly cut by a thousand, a million knives. He emitted a raspy, low roar that didn't sound like it could come from a human. Han Shuo's mental strength continued to slowly flow towards the round ball, along with the continuation of the inhumane pain.
At this moment, the tendons stood out on Han Shuo's forehead, neck, and exposed arms, like multiple worms wriggling in his body. His body had started filling out a bit, and his muscles were now tensed with explosive power.
As Han Shuo felt that his mental strength was about to be completely drained, the magical yuan within his body flowed from his neck to his brain. As the magical yuan entered his brain, that was already splitting open from pain, the soul searing agony seemed to increase ten times in intensity.
The mental strength that had vanished with fleeting speed into the ball, came crashing back like a huge wave rolling onto shore, drowning Han Shuo in an instant. He could finally endure it no more and fainted.
He felt the weariness of a ten thousand kilometer march after he slowly woke up, but his brain was abnormally awake. When his eyes refocused, he took a look around and discovered that even the grain in the wooden door in front of him seemed quite clear.
He gave a light "eh?" as the changes within him stopped him in his tracks. The last time he had felt this way was when he gained mental strength after a series of coincidences. He had also felt that his senses were heightened then, and hastened to concentrate his mental strength again upon noting that this feeling had returned in force.
Exuberant joy immediately blossomed on his face, as he thought, the saying of what doesn't kill you makes you strong is true! Even that amount of danger hadn't been enough to end me just now, and now I've mysteriously benefited from that disaster. He could feel that his mental strength had increased in spades, and was much more potent than the amount of mental strength he'd labored to increase over the past two months.
These mystifying things had truly happened, shocking Han Shuo beyond belief as his gaze fell once more onto the dark green ball. The faint green luster on its surface seemed to have dimmed somewhat, but the drop of red within it was even more vibrant.
He frowned as he backed a few inches away, and made a close observation of the verdant ball. He suddenly felt that this ball was very similar to something. After a few moments of thought, he started in fright and made a sudden inspection of the ball. It was very much like an eyeball, and the more he looked at it, the more it seemed to be one.
The dot of red within the verdant ball seemed to be an eye sizing Han Shuo up, giving him an exceedingly creeped out feeling. He shuddered rather violently as he closed the jade box with all the hair on his neck raised. A sharp click rang out as the jade box locked itself again, and the key, that had been stuck in the indentation, automatically bounced out.
Han Shuo shook his head as he banished the association between ball and eyeball from his mind. The more he contemplated the matter, the more he thought there was something strange about this ball. If it wasn't for the magical yuan circulating to his brain today, his mental strength would have surely been sucked dry by the ball, and he would have broken underneath the inhumane pain. He would have been truly driven mad and become an idiot.
But when the magical yuan had made its way to his brain, the depleted mental strength had come rushing back like a river running upstream, and had even been greatly improved and increased. This made Han Shuo feel that the ball was even more uncanny and unpredictable. He could vaguely feel that this ball was no ordinary object, otherwise Duke would have hardly killed Dylan for the jade box.
As for the verdant ball within the jade box, Han Shuo could not fathom what its purpose was, but because the ball had almost turned him into a real idiot, his heart still jumped with fear when thinking about it. He stored the jade box underneath the bed again, planning to experiment with the item inside once he had figured out what it was.
The next day.
Han Shuo woke up feeling that his body was in much better condition than it had been the day before. He caught a glimpse of Carey and Borg from afar when washing up, the two were cleaning the statues on the way to class. They seemed to have woken up a lot earlier than usual, as they kept yawning, even at this time of day.
Carey and Borg flashed eager smiles and greetings from a long ways away when they sighted Han Shuo, also reminding him to speak to Master Fanny as early as possible.
After downing his breakfast and listening to another lecture from Master Gene on the foundations of magic as he swept the hallway for the necromancy classrooms, Han Shuo walked directly towards the training fields.
"Bryan, Fitch is in the training field asking Master Fanny some questions regarding magical knowledge. Please speak to her soon, or the two of us are really screwed!" Han Shuo bumped into Carey and Borg at the door, the two had just finished cleaning the training fields, and pleaded with Han Shuo as soon as they saw him.
Han Shuo nodded as he said lazily, "Alright alright, I'll go find Master Fanny now."
Fitch had some bad blood with Gene, not to mention that Fitch was already a journeyman mage. Therefore he naturally had no need to continue to listen to Gene's foundational knowledge classes.
Fitch was gazing at Fanny on the side, completely mesmerized. Love, desire, and the light of greed mixed together and sparkled in his eyes. His eyes kept roaming over Fanny's beautiful body, and he didn't even notice Han Shuo's arrival.
"Fitch, watch this. Even with my eyes covered, I can still command dark creatures to seek out the correct target based on previous memory." Fanny's eyes were covered as a few zombies bypassed several obstacles, using the clubs in their hands to land hard hits onto wooden targets as she spoke.
Focused on teaching, Fanny naturally had no idea that Fitch was not paying any attention to her words. Fitch's attention was purely concentrated on her beautiful curves.
Upon seeing that Fitch completely ignoring Fanny's explanation, and that his gaze was continuously combing over her body, Han Shuo thought silently that no wonder this kid has failed to advance to adept class even after multiple tries.
Judging from the situation, Fitch must have used additional tutoring as an excuse for some alone time with Fanny. Fanny's covered eyes must have something to do with instructing Fitch on how to use his heart to command dark creature attacks.
Han Shuo noted quite a few obstacles in the surroundings as he walked over, carefully avoiding all of them as he moved towards Fitch and Fanny.
Just as he was about to reach Fanny and Fitch, Fitch suddenly awoke from his idiotic stupor and turned his head slightly. When he saw that it was Han Shuo, a hint of unconcealed disgust appeared in Fitch's eyes.
Fitch followed that up with a movement of his staff, and two lines of an incantation in a low voice. Some of the obstacles on the ground suddenly seemed to be alive, as some withered, broken, white bones came hurtling towards Han Shuo's butt. Some ropes also tightened onto the bones and came flying with them, seeking to entangle Han Shuo like a snake.
Han Shuo's body was a bit weaker than normal after the events of last night. His panicked dance of evasion was a bit messy, was finally tripped by a rope that suddenly appeared and stumbled towards Fitch and Fanny.
At this moment, Fanny was still concentrating her mental strength on directing the dark creature's attacks, and her mouth kept summarizing her actions. Although her ears caught a few sounds, she paid them no heed.
Seeing that he was about to fall onto Fitch and Fanny, Han Shuo's still reached out wildly for something to stabilize himself even though his heart was calm, but at this moment, a trace of a cold smile tugged at Fitch's lips. He raised his staff slightly and aimed it towards the falling Han Shuo, obviously up to no good.
Panicking inside now as well, Han Shuo forcefully twisted his body to the left in mid air, trying to avoid Fitch's attack. When his body started falling towards Fanny, the results of Han Shuo's magic training came to bear as his body miraculously stopped after sucking in his waist and pushing out with his stomach.
But, Han Shuo didn't manage to retract his randomly flailing right arm in time, and it landed on Fanny's pert, well rounded butt. The ecstasy of supple, tender, well-filled out curve immediately traveled the point of contact between Han Shuo and Fanny, back to his brain.
In curious coincidence, Han Shuo actually gave a light pinch, before realizing what he was doing and backing up violently. He understood the insanity of his actions just now and was extremely frightened, thinking that there was no way Fanny would forgive him. Why had he pinched her butt cheek — even though it had felt wondrous!
As he practically flew in retreat, Han Shuo looked at Fitch, who glaring back at Han Shuo with eyes spitting fire and a body trembling in rage. It was as if Han Shuo had committed something terrible such as murdering Fitch's entire family. Fanny also exclaimed in shock and immediately ripped off the black cloth covering her eyes.
Fanny is never going to forgive me now. Shit. Shit. Han Shuo thought.
Pa pa! Two slaps. Fitch had been furiously staring at Han Shuo when two red palm prints appeared on his face. Fanny was enraged, and stared at Fitch with killing intent, her lofty breasts heaving and she raged, "Damned Fitch, how dare you take advantage and violate me!"