Chapter 106 - A Bowl Cannot Hold a Bucket of Water
Shelly clumsily got up from the ground, his eyes wide with disbelief.
"You're from the Wizard Tower?"
Saul knew he looked young, but he didn't bother explaining. Instead, he used Mage Hand to lift the letter from the floor and send it precisely into Shelly’s hands.
"Hold onto it this time." Saul’s smile disappeared, and his voice dropped an octave. "Drop it again, and I’ll twist your head off along with it."
Shelly instinctively clutched the letter tightly.
He looked down and confirmed that it was indeed an official document from the Wizard Tower.
Taking advantage of Shelly’s distraction, Saul whispered to Penny, "I’ve thought about it. If we want Ada to be happy in the future, it’s best if you stay with him."
Penny tilted her head up. Her eyes, now a dull gray rather than their original silvery starlight, opened slightly.
Saul had taken Penny’s eyes, along with her ability to perceive the world through dreams.
For an ordinary person, this might not be a bad thing.
"Just wait for me a bit, Penny. Once I’m done here, I’ll take you home."
Penny nodded. She reached out, fumbling until she found Saul’s clothes, then gripped the hem tightly.
Meanwhile, Saul kept a portion of his attention on Shelly. Though the man was reading Master Rum’s letter, he could attack at any moment.
Saul couldn’t be sure whether the Wizard Tower’s reputation was enough to intimidate this so-called Level 1 apprentice, who hadn’t even mastered the basics.
After all, ignorance breeds fearlessness.
Just look at this wild apprentice’s reckless plan.
Trying to refine vengeful spirit to increase his magic?
Was his mind not chaotic enough already?
Shelly finally finished reading the letter, his face alternating between pale and flushed.
"Sir," Shelly forced himself to suppress his emotions and respectfully bowed to Saul—the boy who didn’t even look old enough to be his son. "Please allow me to put on some clothes. Receiving you like this is too inappropriate."
"No need. I don’t care about such trivial formalities."
Saul’s response made Shelly freeze mid-step toward his clothes.
Shelly looked at Saul in disbelief, as if wanting to say something.
But Saul cut him off before he could open his mouth. "I don’t know where you got this ridiculous method for creating vengeful spirit. But I can tell you right now—it won’t help you break through to Level 2."
On the way here, Saul had listened to the old madman’s story. He realized that the town leader was making deals with the barbarians, and that their shamans had unique methods for refining vengeful spirit from ordinary people.
That made Saul suspect—was this apprentice, Shelly, trying to use barbarian methods to advance to Level 2?
That was why Saul had remained passive so far—he wanted to see what the town was planning with his own eyes.
Looking at this Level 1 apprentice now, with his pale, waterlogged, corpse-like skin, Saul knew one thing for sure—Shelly had been using vengeful spirit to boost his magic for at least a year or two.
Even though Saul didn’t know the exact method, he could deduce from the principle that one of the side effects had to be the chaotic interference of countless vengeful spirit's consciousnesses.
That meant Shelly was constantly living in a nightmare.
Paranoia, despair, madness, breakdown…
Without a proper method to control it, his mind would eventually collapse.
From that, Saul also deduced part of the reason for the Grading Sound Fruit shortage.
Grinding Sound Fruit ≈ Tranquilizer
Shelly was likely using Grinding Sound Fruit to suppress his increasingly unstable spirit.
But suppression could only last so long—eventually, it would explode in a far worse way.
Shelly looked shocked by Saul’s words. But the flicker of doubt in his eyes told Saul that he wasn’t fully convinced.
It was the classic "You don’t understand, this is my family’s secret method" mindset.
"What’s your name?" Saul asked abruptly.
"I’m Shelly, sir."
Shelly’s hands twitched awkwardly, unsure where to place them.
When he was alone or in control, he enjoyed this unrestricted, primal state—free from judgment.
But under someone else's gaze, feeling overpowered, his current nakedness made him feel like a helpless lamb waiting to be slaughtered—freshly shorn, at that.
Saul noticed his discomfort, but he had no intention of letting him get dressed.
Who knew what bizarre tools might be hidden in his clothes?
"You had a companion, right?" Saul continued the conversation while contemplating his next move.
"Yes, sir. His name is Uni—he’s also a Level 1 apprentice."
Saul asked again, "Were you both cultivating the Grinding Sound Fruit?"
"I was mainly responsible for that. Uni is better at combat."
Then that meant he couldn’t just kill one and leave the other.
Saul made up his mind.
"Do you know the conditions for advancing to a Level 2 apprentice?" Saul tapped his toe against the ground.
Shelly hesitated but still answered, "Magic must reach at least 45 Joules, and I must successfully construct a Level 1 spell."
"What’s your current magic level?"
"44 Joules, sir."
No wonder he was in such a hurry to sacrifice another girl. He was desperate to break through.
"If I’m not mistaken, before you killed that girl yesterday, your magic was already near 45 Joules, right?" Saul’s toe traced idle patterns on the floor.
Since Penny had excellent hearing, he avoided using words like refining or extracting.
"Y-yes, sir…"
"Even if I hadn’t shown up today, you still wouldn’t have been able to reach 45 Joules using her."
Shelly gave Saul a doubtful look again.
"Your spirit body is too fragile to contain all your magic. The vengeful spirit you refine are weak, and you lack the power to control them. So when you reach the critical threshold, the excess magic just dissipates."
A wild apprentice like him had received only fragmented knowledge at best.
"But… but…" Shelly stammered, half-understanding but instinctively resisting.
Saul decided to put it in terms he could understand.
"A bowl cannot hold a bucket of water."
Shelly froze.
Saul himself had struggled with magic bottlenecks, but his case was different—his magic talent was limiting him, not his spiritual endurance.
Shelly’s issue wasn’t impossible to fix. But now wasn’t the time to tell him how.
"I think you understand what you need to do now." Saul stepped forward, making Shelly flinch.
Then, Saul’s voice turned cold.
"But I still don’t understand… If you’ve already pledged loyalty to the Wizard Tower, why are you still making deals with the barbarians?"
Saul stomped his foot heavily, making Shelly jolt.
Shelly finally looked up, his face twisted in a bitter smile that was uglier than crying.
"Because you people… only take our Grind Sound Fruit and do nothing for us!"
He suddenly dug his fingers into his arms, dragging them down in a brutal slice.
Blood sprayed out, along with a series of gray, girl's ghostly faces.
They floated out of Shelly’s wounds, their expressions blank and lifeless. Their legs remained embedded in his flesh, stretching thin like balloons tied to his body.
"I have no way out anymore!" Sherry roared.
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