Chapter 15: Come on! Let's all go

Chapter 15: Come On, All of You, Come At Me!

Saul’s finger rested on the puppet.

He couldn’t bring himself to pick it up, and he couldn’t just leave it either.

“Why do I always get these death premonitions? Am I just that unlucky, or… is this just how things are in the Wizard Tower?”

Slowly, cautiously, Saul let go.

He didn’t transform into a puppet lying on the floor.

“Looks like the puppet can’t take over my body on its own. It needs me to open the cabinet... or maybe I need to be facing multiple puppets for it to happen.”

Saul skirted around the puppet, planning to grab the small trash bin.

“If you don’t want to go back into the cabinet nicely, then I’ll just toss you like the trash you are!”

But Saul had celebrated too early.

The hardshell book floated out again, glowing with fresh lines of text:

> Lunar Calendar, Year 314, May 21.

Because you slacked off, you threw the puppet into the trash bin.

While it was the place it belonged, the little bin can trap garbage, not cursed tools.

When you returned to the lab the next day, it looked like a hurricane had hit.

Enraged, Senior Mark wouldn’t hear a word of your explanation. He licked off all your skin, flesh, and organs…

You became a skeleton.

Your left hand was delighted.

Saul jumped back and snatched the puppet up from the floor.

“You damn thing—so putting you in the cabinet means death, and not putting you in the cabinet also means death?!”

He gripped the doll tight, really tempted to crush it with all his strength.

But the puppet was tough. With Saul’s current strength, he couldn’t even tear off one of its limbs.

He gave up.

Because just now… it had smiled.

There was no death warning this time, but Saul couldn’t shake the feeling that smashing the puppet would not end well.

“I’ll carry it out of the lab and ditch it somewhere else.” Saul thought, testing the idea.

The hardshell book gave no further warning and quietly returned to hover at his left shoulder.

“Hoo…”

Saul exhaled in relief.

He turned around to inspect the final section of the room so he could leave immediately.

But just as he turned—

Crashhh—

Behind him came the sound of objects clattering to the ground.

The glass cabinet stood wide open, and dozens of puppets had spilled out onto the floor.

Saul turned his head—and inevitably locked eyes with one of them.

“Save me… save me… save me…”

“Save me… save me… save me…”

“Me too… I want it too…”

“Save me… save me… save me…”

In an instant, it felt like hundreds of voices exploded in Saul’s mind.

He didn’t care anymore about tomorrow’s death warning from Mark—he turned to run.

But just as his feet left the ground, his entire body lost balance and crashed to the floor.

Bang!

Saul tried to get up, only to realize his limbs were as stiff as wood.

A numbing sensation was creeping from his arms and legs, spreading slowly to his torso… to his brain...

“No!”

Saul suddenly remembered Mentor Monica’s teachings about meditation and forced himself to recall the human-monster walking diagram.

Even though he didn’t have the book or the crystal orb, he gritted his teeth and forced himself into a meditative state out of pure survival instinct.

The chaos in his ears dulled slightly, though it didn’t vanish.

The numbness receded from his organs, back to his limbs.

If Monica were here now, she’d be shocked—Saul’s spiritual gift was even greater than she had imagined.

But Saul still couldn’t stand.

His arms and legs were frozen stiff, like wood.

“No—my left hand still works!”

He realized his skeletal left hand was still flexible—it could bend and grip.

He poured all his strength into that one arm and began crawling across the floor, trying to escape the puppets.

But the moment he moved, he couldn’t maintain meditation.

The numbness started creeping back up.

Pure meditation wouldn’t solve this. Eventually, he’d exhaust his spiritual strength and fall deeper into danger.

So Saul abandoned meditation entirely and focused solely on crawling.

Left arm, crawl. Drag. Crawl.

Only when the numbness reached his chest did he pause to meditate again—forcing the stiffness back to his limbs.

Like this, switching between crawling and meditating, Saul painstakingly inched his way toward the lab door.

His left hand finally reached it.

“Heh… that live experiment saved me after all.”

The door opened inward. He’d need to rise up to grab the handle.

He pushed with his left arm to support himself, trying to brace against the wall—

But suddenly, the door opened on its own.

From the other side, Mark’s half-face appeared, peering downward, his eyes wide and white.

“Saul, what are you doing?”

A familiar face, but Saul felt like he’d plunged into an icy lake.

His whole body froze.

From his position on the ground, he could see it clearly.

That wasn’t Mark.

It was just a thin flap of skin, sticking out from the middle of the door.

That “face” didn’t even seem to realize it had been exposed. It kept glaring at Saul.

“The lab’s a mess. Where do you think you’re going? Get back in there and clean up!”

Off to the side, the red trash bin flipped open on its own.

Clack.

A pair of ghastly white hands gripped the edge.

Their knuckles were sharp, veins bulging—climbing upward with great force.

Behind Saul came a wet rolling sound, inching closer and closer.

Something was crawling toward him.

Saul’s teeth began chattering.

Even after becoming a mage apprentice, he still couldn’t escape this helpless, powerless, waiting-to-die fate.

The hardshell book burst to life again, flipping wildly.

But this time, it didn’t even stop.

Every page it turned had just one massive character on it—"Death."

Not a cause, not a scene.

Just the final result.

It wasn’t even bothering to describe how Saul would die.

“Heh… haha… HAHAHA…” Saul started laughing.

“Why does death always come for me? Is my meat that delicious? Hahahaha…”

He was losing it.

“Come on! All of you, come at me! Let’s see who’s scarier once we all turn into freaks! Come on! Hahaha—”

SLAM!

The door swung wide open—the heavy impact smacking into Saul’s forehead and knocking him over.

“Ugh!”

His laughter broke off in pain.

He grabbed his forehead reflexively.

“…Wait. My body can move?”

The hardshell book quietly returned to its place over his shoulder.

No time to question it—Saul quickly looked up.

The fake face on the door had vanished.

In its place stood a man wrapped entirely in pink bandages, walking into the lab.

Only a pair of silver eyes were exposed.

Everything else—ears, nostrils, even hair—was tightly bound beneath those bandages.

As those silver eyes locked onto Saul, he froze mid-crouch.

His mind went completely blank—not even fear registered.

Fortunately, the man in pink only glanced at Saul before lifting his head toward the lab.

He spoke softly:

“Go back.”

Then he looked at Saul again.

The cold in his eyes faded, replaced with a calm, clear gentleness.

“New apprentice. Why are you spending the night in the lab?”

“Spending the night?”

As the words entered Saul’s ears, his senses returned.

He twisted his neck toward the sand timer on the wall—and saw, to his shock, that it was already past eleven at night.

“But when Senior Mark left… it wasn’t even six. How is it already eleven?”

From Saul’s perspective, he hadn’t been alone in the lab for more than half an hour.

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(End of Chapter)

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