Chapter 22: The Necessity of Having a Special Skill
Chapter 22: The Necessity of Having a Specialty
Saul successfully landed the job of handling the third stage of corpse processing. The cost? The maid girl lost her throat.
He also received a leather outer robe from Katz.
Though a bit stuffy to wear, it saved him the trouble of worrying about blood and flesh splattering everywhere. Much easier to clean.
Katz required Saul to report to the corpse chamber between 3 and 7 PM daily but nothing from the chamber could be taken out. That included corpses.
So Saul no longer needed to go to the lab. He wasn’t getting anything done there anyway, nor was he learning much.
If he submitted enough materials, he would earn bonus rewards. Katz believed Saul’s capabilities had already exceeded the pay grade of 3 credits, so in addition to the base wage, he added a performance bonus to encourage him.
This was already considered an extremely high wage for a Level 1 wizard apprentice.
Normally, only once a new student mastered all the basic knowledge were they considered a full Level 1 apprentice.
Besides earning one credit from passing the monthly assessment, the rest had to be earned by completing tasks assigned by the mentors.
While the Gorsa Wizard Tower was large, the number of tasks suitable for apprentices was still limited.
The safer ones usually paid 1–3 credits per month. Riskier ones could range from 4–7 credits.
And anything offering 7 credits per month usually meant that even a seasoned Level 1 apprentice might die doing it.
Without some sort of survival trick, no ordinary person dared accept them.
Saul’s job wasn’t completely without risk, either.
According to Katz, by the time a corpse reached Saul, it had already gone through two rounds of processing.
The most dangerous first round was handled by a Level 2 apprentice who tried to remove any threats from the body.
The second round was handled by a veteran Level 1 apprentice who had mastered basic wizardry and could cast a few 0-tier spells. They could defend themselves and identify most of the usable materials on the body.
Saul, however, got this third-stage job by sheer luck thanks to his uncanny “corpse loot” ability.
The third stage wasn’t very dangerous, but it also didn’t pay as much. Still, if he kept up the same pace as today, earning 6 credits a month wasn’t out of reach.
That’s the value of having a specialty.
Katz didn’t understand how someone like Saul—whose sensitivity to dark elements wasn’t just weak but probably below passing—could be so keenly perceptive to abnormalities in corpses.
He could only conclude that Saul had an innate sensitivity to spiritual entities.
Low dark-elemental perception but high spiritual sensitivity—put bluntly, it meant he was prone to seeing ghosts.
Saul himself didn’t know why he could perceive strange visions during meditation, but understanding wasn’t necessary. What mattered was that it worked.
When he had time, he wanted to ask Keli if using different meditation diagrams might yield different effects. Could some diagrams even help increase the speed of meditation?
As a beginner, everything still needed to be explored. And clearly, the mentors and senior apprentices had no intention of handing out free knowledge.
The first day went smoothly thanks to Katz’s direct guidance. Saul quickly got familiar with the basic layout of the third-level corpse chamber.
Now that he’d finally found a third-stage worker, Katz was in a pretty good mood and even offered Saul a bit of instruction.
He noted that Saul’s spiritual aptitude was excellent—he learned runes with remarkable speed and precision, and had no trouble entering a meditative state.
Even when it came to learning the Noah language, Saul showed a solid talent for linguistics.
With that kind of ability, Saul could’ve succeeded in any regular profession.
But for a wizard, lacking magical aptitude was like being a blade that couldn’t cut—reduced to a plaything, used and discarded at will.
Unless he had some miraculous stroke of fortune, or a chance at a body modification.
But considering even Level 2 apprentices often died during the procedure, what were the odds a Level 1 could survive?
Practically zero.
Katz’s teaching enthusiasm flared up quickly—and burned out just as fast.
Before long, he left Saul alone in the chamber, warning him to leave the second floor of the East Tower before 8 PM. Best not to linger in the tower at all after dark.
Saul respectfully saw him off. Once the door closed behind Katz, he turned toward the conveyor belt.
He wrestled with himself a bit.
Now that he was alone, pulling that lever to summon another corpse took a fair amount of courage.
His hand hovered over the lever for a solid minute… then he yanked it down.
Clank-clank-clank—
The conveyor belt rumbled to life, but nothing appeared.
Puzzled, Saul tried again.
Still nothing.
Just as he was about to pull a third time, a male voice came from beyond the black leather curtain.
“Quit pulling it—no more for today.”
“…Got it.”
“Check the lamp at the window. If it turns white, that means there’s new cargo.”
“Ah… Thanks, senior.”
Sure enough, there was a small candle fixture at the exit curtain, blending in with the rest of the room’s sconces.
All the others glowed bright white, but this one flickered a dim, dying yellow.
Something Katz hadn’t mentioned—likely because he wasn’t the one managing the daily operations here.
Since there was no work, Saul didn’t linger. He quickly left the chamber.
The big guy at the end of the hallway was still slumped against the wall like a corpse.
But Saul noticed the guy’s nostrils twitch slightly.
He was alive.
Compared to his first day, Saul’s second day as a wizard apprentice passed surprisingly peacefully.
The next morning, during class, Saul went to find Keli.
“I’ve got ten magic crystals now.”
“Repay your debt.”
She stretched out her left hand.
“Do you want one credit, or ten crystals?”
Keli’s eyes lit up. “You got a job?!”
Saul nodded.
“I heard from the mentor yesterday—besides passing the test, apprentices can also take on internal positions to earn credits.” She rested her chin on her palm. “But my mentor told me not to look for a job and just study. I don’t even have a single credit yet.”
That’s because you don’t need a job to pass.
A bitter thought passed through Saul, but he quickly buried it.
“So which do you want—credit or crystals?”
“Credit, obviously!” Keli practically pounced. “Damn, I haven’t even seen what a credit looks like!”
Credits weren’t like coins—you couldn’t just pass them over during class.
The two of them headed to the registry next to the ninth-floor library in the East Tower to officially transfer the credit to Keli’s account.
Then, they returned their attention to class.
The second period was a meditation class. But instead of Monica, a female Level 2 apprentice stood in for her. After briefly introducing a new concept, she sat cross-legged on the podium and started meditating.
Any apprentice who tried to approach with crystals in hand was met with a cold glare.
So once again, the class dissolved into self-study.
Without guidance, some students formed small groups and began discussing together, the classroom growing steadily noisier.
Keli remained seated beside Saul.
Saul looked at the Human-Monster Walking Diagram in his book and suddenly remembered something.
“Keli, which diagram are you using for your meditation?”
“Page three—Mystic Flower of the Secret Realm.”
“Can you meditate without a crystal ball yet?”
“Of course not. My mentor says if you can do that, your spiritual strength is basically at Level 2.” Keli was surprised. “You can already meditate on your own?”
Saul shook his head. “Only a sort of semi-dreamy, half-conscious state. I can’t absorb elemental particles yet, but it stabilizes my mental state.”
“Damn, that’s amazing.” Keli gave him a big thumbs up. “If I try meditating without a crystal, all I see are a bunch of chaotic lines.”
She leaned over. “Which diagram do you use? Do different diagrams affect progress?”
“Page seventeen—the Human-Monster Walking Diagram.”
“…Huh?” Keli looked puzzled and flipped through her book. “Wait, our books aren’t the same? I don’t have that page.”
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