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The top floor of the tower had a brightly-lit fireplace that repelled all the bone-piercing cold, bestowing potent warmness into the room. Newborn fire sprites chased each other happily while they explored the world around them with great curiosity.

A series of footsteps suddenly scared all the sprites for good. They instantly swarmed back into the fireplace and pretended nothing happened.

The door was pushed open, revealing a man with a devilishly charming look.

He inhaled the warm air in the room and enjoyed it briefly. He then set his gaze upon the fire sprites who were trying to blend in with the fire by keeping their twinkling eyes shut.

“Jaja...” The man licked his lips with a long, serpentine tongue without minding the naughty creatures.

When they felt safe again, the sprites poked their tiny heads outside and looked at a workbench nearby.

A series of strange-looking materials scattered on the surface, along with a blond lady with blue eyes. She wasn’t moving.

The woman had a fishtail covered in silver scales as her “leg”. A mermaid.

The man was going to start reconstructing the mermaid’s body when he was stopped by another series of footsteps. The hasty frequency immediately reminded him of a young apprentice he found by chance last year—Toya.

As he expected, a short boy around the age of seven showed up at the door.

The chubby boy had dark skin and a feather headwear. He wasn’t wearing anything on top; a tiny skirt with colorful totems made from beast skin covered his groin.

Toya came from a primitive tribe clan. He had been away from home for a year now, but the primordial and naive temperament on him was still clear to be seen.

The boy approached his professor on hurried steps, which caused his calves to jiggle. “Professor! Something’s happened!”

The boy’s clear eyes showed visible panic.

He then saw the naked mermaid on the workbench and blushed before he quickly covered his face.

However, his little hands didn’t do a good job at it. He was still peeking at the mermaid’s upper body between his fingers.

“Hey, get rid of your drooling.” The man in the room waved a hand at the boy.

With a start, Toya wiped his mouth, only to find nothing at all.

“You bamboozled me again, professor!”

“Now speak. What brought you here?” the man asked without stopping his work.

“Oh, right! It’s Mister Diablo. Dodo told me that he’s beaten up by Lady Isabella!”

While speaking, Toya picked up a tiny creature that had been hiding behind his back.

It was a cheetah cub that had a small horn growing on its forehead. However, at its current size, it looked more like a cat than a cheetah.

When faced with the red-haired man, the creature was clearly terrified. Its tail went stiff, and its ears fell flat.

“Em? Diablo angered Isabella?” The man raised an eyebrow.

Isabella said Diablo’s a “coward”. Diablo’s only been back for a day, but she already approved that he got guts?

The man placed a glowing finger on Dodo’s head.

Green ripples emerged from the cub, which allowed him to read its memory fragments.

A moment later, the man grew excited as his tongue wormed around his lips faster and faster.

“Jajaja... look what I’ve found! A splendid specimen. Jajaja...”

...

Meanwhile...

Angor fell into a trance when his last-resort move was easily countered by Isabella.

Not long ago, he was happily making plans for the remaining months of this year, but now, he was already wrestling with death...

He wasn’t prepared to experience such a drastic change of events at all.

He clearly knew that Isabella could easily end his life, but for some reason, he didn’t feel stressed at all.

He was only sad for his unfinished promises. There were still Krakoks inside his bracelet, who hoped to find a new home and start their new lives. Pity, they were going to die even though they had barely left their starting point.

After breaking Angor’s Nightmare Domain, Isabella began slamming Angor’s body around using pure strength. It wasn’t long before Angor was tortured by a good number of wounds. Broken flesh and bones covered his form.

When there was barely any fine skin on Angor, Isabella finally dragged him closer to her face.

“Keep struggling, won’t you? Come on, keep it up. It’s more fun that way.” Isabella laughed maniacally. Her laughter gradually joined with her second, giggling “background voice”.

Angor had completely no strength left. He couldn’t even show his hatred to Isabella now. This was the fate of weaklings in the wizarding world—to become rotten bones with nothing to fight back.

Using what remained of his consciousness, Angor spat at Isabella’s face.

Something flashed between them. The spit mixed with blood was blocked by a simple barrier and slowly dropped to the ground.

“That’s not nice.” Isabella kept smiling. “That’s all you can do to keep your dignity? How useless.”

She felt bored at Angor’s unresponsiveness. It was like beating up a dead pig. Pointless and unentertaining.

“Alright... Guess I’ve had enough.”

Isabella chopped at Angor’s neck with an enchanted claw.

He saw the bloody attack coming and closed his eyes as he waited for death to claim him.

But even after several seconds, he still didn’t feel what he expected to feel. Instead, he sensed his body being tossed onto the ground again.

Calmly waiting for his death didn’t mean he’d give up all hope. He would like to stay alive longer, if possible.

The first thing he saw after reopening his eyes was the giant moon hanging in the sky.

Looking lower, he saw Isabella looking at someone with a surprised expression.

It was a beautiful figure who released a golden glimmer under the moonlight. The figure blocked Isabella’s previous attack with a round shield.

Someone saved me?

Before he could think further, Shadow suddenly rushed to his side and dragged him away.

“Now run! We’ll split, and you can use that skill to hide again!”

While not stopping his movement, Shadow looked back at the golden figure who held off Isabella bravely. “Keep her busy, Naga! For as long as you can!”

The man looked determined.

“Yes, Master.” Naga glanced back. Her elegant and stern face contained a small trace of kindness.

Shadow’s eyes watered a little as he kept dragging Angor until they entered the woods on one side of the path.

Angor couldn’t move anything on his body since Isabella had misplaced a good number of his bones. Shadow kept running while casting Heal at Angor occasionally.

Angor felt greatly relieved for escaping imminent death. At the same time, he couldn’t believe what just happened. He thought the only thing that prevented Shadow from killing him was the magic covenant, and he wasn’t expecting the man to save him for real.

“But what about Naga? There’s no way she can...”

“Shut up! I don’t want to hear it!” Shadow screamed.

There was no doubt that Naga would lose against Isabella sooner or later, and there was only one outcome waiting for her.

Shadow inhaled to calm his mind. “Sorry for yelling... Just, don’t speak. Get up as fast as you can, and use your invisibility thing to get away.”

He believed that if what Isabella said first was true, Angor could escape safely if they didn’t use their Spirit Bond.

And since Angor still had hope, Shadow decided to sacrifice Naga to buy some time.

“... Thank you.” Angor nodded and gave Shadow a meaningful look.

“I said I owe you a favor for helping me get Naga, and I’m returning it. We’re even from today and on, ya know?”

Angor didn’t directly help Shadow with the mission, but the man knew that he would never succeed if Angor didn’t get him out of the blood prison or prevent Felicia from destroying his plan.

“Put me down, I’m okay now. Let’s split, now,” Angor said.

“Stay well. Don’t you die on me!”

Shadow began dashing toward the wizard tower of his professor, while Angor activated Infinite Reticence again and moved to the depth of the night.