Chapter 132: Initiative

[Vengeful Spirit, Evil Spirit, and Wraith are same thing. Wraith seem cooler, so I decided to use this name]

Of course.

Saul nodded repeatedly, his eyes even showing a hint of anticipation.

Although his job required him to leave the East Tower before eight o'clock, since the head of the entire Wizard Tower was here, who would care about such trivial rules?

"Let's talk inside," Gorsa said, raising his chin slightly.

Saul followed the tower master's gaze and turned around, realizing that they had both returned to the second floor of the East Tower, standing in front of the third corpse chamber.

At this moment, the burly man had just opened the scarlet door and was pushing a cart out from inside.

As soon as he saw Gorsa behind Saul, his entire body froze in place, as if he had been instantly petrified.

Saul, standing in front of him, could clearly feel the giant man's emotions shifting from fear to sheer panic.

But Gorsa merely waved his hand, signaling the burly man to continue his work.

Receiving the order, the burly man immediately resumed his task, pushing the cart forward.

However, his movements were extremely stiff, like a machine that hadn't been oiled in years.

Watching the burly man awkwardly disappear down the corridor, Saul finally followed Gorsa into the corpse chamber.

By the time he entered, Gorsa was already standing by his experiment table, examining Saul's research equipment and notes.

Hearing Saul walk in, Gorsa turned around and asked with a smile, "Mind if I take a look at your notes?"

Saul quickly nodded. "Of course."

He had already removed anything unsuitable for outsiders to see before leaving the chamber.

Gorsa picked up Saul’s notebook, which contained records of his body modification experiments, and casually flipped through a few pages.

Saul tensed up, feeling as if he were a student whose homework was being personally graded by the principal.

Gorsa soon placed the notebook back in its original spot, turned to face Saul, and leaned against the table.

He smiled. "By now, you must have realized how fascinating the soul is, haven’t you?"

Fascinating? Perhaps, for a powerful wizard like the tower master, it was.

Saul put on a flattering smile and nodded eagerly.

"The original purpose of modifying skin to enhance magical power ended up creating a new type of spirit resin when a small amount of soul fragments were added. The idea is rather unconventional, but overall, there are no major issues."

"What surprises me more is that you’ve already learned to remove impurities to enhance the quality of the spirit grease. I thought you'd need to reach Level Two and study this field before you could even begin to grasp it."

Gorsa clapped his hands lightly. "Your progress always exceeds my expectations. Through self-study, you’ve successfully performed body modifications and even refined the spirit resin. I also heard that you have a knack for learning wizardry and have far surpassed other apprentices at your level."

Faced with such praise from the tower master, Saul felt no shame.

Although his success was partly due to the diary and the algae-like entity, it was even more dependent on his relentless effort and his willingness to risk his life.

Gorsa beckoned him over. "As a reward, you may ask me any question that troubles you in your studies."

Saul was overjoyed.

But after the initial excitement, his mind went blank—he didn’t know what to ask.

After taking a moment to organize his thoughts, Saul finally asked a question that had been bothering him for a long time.

"Tower Master, do you know there's a wraith in the library?"

To his surprise, Gorsa tilted his head slightly and denied it. "There is no wraith in the library. I wouldn’t let apprentices die so meaninglessly."

He chuckled. "If you're referring to the entity by the fourteenth bookshelf… that is your fear, not a sp."

"My fear?" Saul was completely caught off guard by this answer.

The first time he had seen the figure lying beneath the bookshelf, he had been genuinely terrified. He even went back to check again later, and sure enough, the figure was still there.

Saul couldn't make out the person's face, nor could he tell whether they were alive or dead, but he still didn’t dare to get close.

Every time he approached, his heartbeat would accelerate, his breathing would become labored, and cold sweat would trickle down his forehead.

"Is it because I subconsciously associated that bookshelf with books about wraiths, leading me to believe there was a ghost there?" Saul muttered to himself.

"You’re actually afraid of ghosts?" Gorsa slowly turned his head, his gaze sweeping across Saul’s laboratory, which looked like a crime scene straight out of a horror movie. "That… is rather unexpected."

Saul followed Gorsa’s gaze, looking at his own workplace, which resembled a gruesome haunted house. He suddenly felt embarrassed.

Could he explain that what he feared were the ghosts from horror movies in his past life—the ones that were completely unstoppable?

But Gorsa didn’t mock him for it. Instead, he asked seriously, "Saul, do you remember the definition of ghosts in The Cognition of All Things?"

"'That which cannot be fully controlled by a subjective consciousness is a ghost; that which is controlled by another subjective consciousness is a monster.'"

"Correct. But most importantly, ghosts are a combination of dissipating spiritual energy and lingering consciousness. I call this combined form a soul."

Saul listened carefully. At that moment, the tower master seemed just like a teacher, effortlessly guiding the conversation back to a lesson.

"You asked me about a wraith in the library because you wanted to borrow books, didn’t you?"

"Yes," Saul admitted.

Due to his research on spirit resin, he needed access to the books in that section. However, because of the figure beneath the bookshelf, he had always been too afraid to get too close.

He had assumed that the entity was a wraith whose knowledge exceeded his current capabilities, which made it seem extremely dangerous.

Gorsa interlocked his fingers. "Then let me ask you one more question. If you were to truly encounter a wraith, how would you resist it?"

---

"If I really encountered a wraith, how would I resist it?"

Saul closed his eyes and asked himself this question once again.

He still remembered the three strategies he had proposed at the time.

The first was brute force—directly shattering the wraith's spiritual body, consuming its energy, and forcing it to dissipate.

The Zero-Rank Death Magic Strike worked on this principle.

The second method was erasure through consciousness—causing the wraith’s already fragmented awareness to dissipate, either actively or passively.

Some wraiths disappeared automatically once their lingering obsessions were fulfilled, following this exact mechanism.

The third method was something Saul had come up with on the spot—a combination of the first two.

If the wraith was weaker than himself, the first or second method would work.

But if the wraith was overwhelmingly powerful, neither brute force nor waiting for its obsession to fade would be viable options.

Saul recalled his experiences of sealing soul fragments with spirit grease and the diary. He speculated—could he lure a wraith into the spirit grease, separate its awareness from its spiritual body, and then destroy them individually?

This was only a theoretical guess, no easier than killing an enemy above his level.

But when Gorsa heard Saul’s third strategy, he was silent for a few seconds before suddenly breaking into laughter.

The laughter grew louder, echoing through the entire second floor of the East Tower.

It was the first time Saul had seen the tower master display such strong emotions.

And he had no idea why—was it mockery or approval?

Even now, Saul didn’t know why Gorsa had laughed so hard that night.

But the tower master had acknowledged his idea, merely saying, "That method is incredibly difficult to achieve."

That night, Gorsa had patted Saul on the shoulder and told him, "But wizards should challenge the impossible. Your answer pleases me. Once you reach Level Two, I’ll give you a reward."

Saul didn’t know what the tower master would give him, but he knew one thing—if he couldn’t deal with this wraith today, he’d never live to see that reward.

Saul closed his eyes. The laboratory and Tower Master vanished.

When he opened them again, darkness surrounded him.

His limbs were numb—completely immobile.

But he could still feel his body.

"I’m not dead?"

Then realization struck.

"No… I didn’t let the wraith possess me. I… absorbed it in to myself!"

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