Number One was busily trimming grass and flowers in the garden again. It was supposed to serve Sunders as a house butler, but it had not seen its master for a long time.
Again, it tended to the house alone, just like when Sunders wasn’t here in the last decade.
Gardening, cleaning... there were no changes except that it also needed to provide food and water to the Krakoks. And since the only other guest in the mansion, Angor, left in the early morning, the machine butler had nothing else to do.
A teenage girl suddenly appeared at the manor’s entrance, along with a group of fluttering butterflies.
Number One quickly went to Sunders’ study and spoke through the closed door, “Master, a guest is visiting.”
“Send her away...” Sunders replied in a tired voice.
Number One complied and told so to the girl. But as it turned around to head inside, it saw the same girl, who was dressed in a showy violet fur overcoat, was already inside the garden.
“Sunders... aren’t you going to welcome an old friend?” The girl ignored Number One and walked toward Sunders’ location.
“You... what are you doing here?” Sunders’ fatigued tone came from inside the shut study.
“Let me in, will you?”
When she received no response, the girl rolled her eyes and pushed the door open. Number One quickly hurried over to stop her.
“Oh, come on. Your master didn’t say no, did he?” The girl pushed Number One away and entered the room.
Number One tried to follow, only to get bounced away by a small forcefield.
“Close the door,” Sunders ordered.
Pong!
Number One floated in front of the door for a while before returning to the garden to continue its work while several wizards that were passing by wondered what was going on.
“Hey, that Rune Monitor looks rather sad. Wait, how’s that possible?”
...
Inside Sunders’ room, the girl immediately found Sunders who was sitting in shadows.
“Wait, your face...?”
“Speak. What do you want?”
The girl tilted her head and feigned a confused look. “Do you know who I am?”
“Greya... both of us are truth-finders. We don’t recognize people by their looks.”
Greya smiled. “Yup, I do have something to ask, but...” Greya then inspected the gentleman’s form carefully. “I’m sure you aren’t exactly problem-free.”
“It’s not your business. Just tell me what you’re looking for. Do note that I won’t be free to help with anything in the coming century or so.”
“A soul morph and... manifestation taking over?” Greya suddenly grew puzzled about something.
Sunders lifted a hand and grabbed Greya’s neck from a distance. “Did you come here to die?”
Greya coughed. “Come on! This new body has not attained wizard level yet, and you already want to kill me?”
Sunders released her while he gave her a really murderous glare.
Greya calmed herself down. “I don’t mean to exploit your privacy. It’s just... I can feel what’s going on inside you.”
Sunders’ eyes glowed as he surveyed Greya’s soul space. There, he saw another small, weaker soul beside Greya’s own soul.
“Heh. You took her body but did not eliminate her soul. With someone else to disturb your condition, you will not regain strength any time soon.”
Greya shrugged. “I came just so that I can ask for some advice regarding this matter.”
“The soul is at apprentice level. You don’t need my help to kill it. Or are you looking for another solution?”
“Yes. I want your help to look for my real body. I like it better compared to this shortie.”
“I don’t have time for it. And I don’t believe I’m obliged to help you.”
Greya chuckled. “Of course I’m not expecting free help. If you agree, I’ll let you borrow this current body of mine, who is also a Gourmet. After giving her some training, she’ll be at wizard level. What do you say?”
In this world, people all found it a great honor to have a Gourmet wizard or apprentice under command. Such talent was extremely rare, which was also the reason why Eyeless was sold at such a high price at Twilight Auction.
Until today, Brute Cavern had found only a few Gourmet apprentices but zero Gourmet wizards. The apprentices all quitted Brute Cavern and joined Candy House in the end. Brute Cavern retained no Gourmet legacy at all.
Greya, a master Gourmet wizard, was now offering her own student as a payment. Anyone would believe that such a gift could provide more than an honor to Sunders—if everything went well, Brute Cavern might finally see their own group of Gourmet wizards.
Greya was confident that Sunders was wise enough to see how valuable her offer was. However...
“I, don’t, have, time, for this.”
Sunders was never someone to talk in the stead of the organization, and he had no interest in adding to Brute Cavern’s resources.
Greya’s expression froze.
“Are you sure? I know it’s a difficult task, but to you...”
“Don’t let me repeat again. Now off you go.” Sunders opened the door and waved Greya off.
Greya’s expression changed many times as she struggled to make up her mind.
“I see. I’ll change my offer then.”
Sunders waited for her answer patiently.
“I can solve your soul morph problem. Surely you know about my unique spell ‘Artificial Life’, right? Using the abnormal energy inside you, I can make a dish that helps you tackle the issue.”
Sunders grinned, which was a rare thing to happen.
He allowed Greya to enter his study just to wait for such an offer.
Sunders had an urgent problem, which he had been suppressing in the last month. He did not know for how long he could prevent “him” from coming out, and Greya might be able to provide the only thorough solution.
In fact, Sunders had made a complicated plan to “lure” Greya into making the offer first. And he would gladly accept it since Greya also seemed anxious about retrieving her body.
“You’re willing to pay your precious time in exchange for that chunky carcass of yours?” Sunders commented.
“Chunky? Oh, hoho no. It is called ‘plentiful’, or sexiness, my friend,” Greya joked before putting on a more serious look. “So, how about it? I just offered a great opportunity that I don’t have many left in my life. I don’t have anything else if you say no again.”
Greya was considered a truth-finder wizard just because of a unique spell she created called “Artificial Life”. This spell had helped her create many new life forms, such as Section Ephemera, Twisting Protozoa, and Toby.
Apart from “creating”, the Mystery-level spell could also be used for reverse-engineering certain magical effects, and the spell could also create a dish that recreated that effect. Section Ephemera was invented by Greya for such a purpose.
But it couldn’t recreate just any effect she wanted to. Firstly, the complexity of the dish had to be within her skills. And secondly, dishes created in this way were mostly supplementary, one-use meals. Above all these, Greya could only perform this art once in every 50 years or longer.
It took her more time to create harder dishes. To make the “live dish”, Section Ephemera, she spent nearly an entire century.
Even with so many restrictions, Greya’s “Artificial Life” was one of the most flexible supportive spells recorded in history. Many wizards, including Sunders, still remembered the amazing omen brought by Greya on the day she created this spell.
And since that day, Greya was acknowledged as another truth-finder wizard who turned Candy House into a paradise for Gourmet talents.
Sunders did not know how much hardship Greya went through to make such impressive achievements. He did know that “Artificial Life” was potent enough to remove his imminent problem.
“Alright.” Sunders nodded in the end.
Greya smiled in relief. “Then you’ll have to bring me my body. I can’t perform Artificial Life without it.”
Sunders suddenly got a bad feeling. “Where is your body?”
“Inside Nightmare Realm.”
...
Greya slowly explained the bizarre adventure she experienced.
Telling from the legendary-level monsters she encountered, Sunders assumed that Greya did not reach the core area of Nightmare Realm. She probably ended up at another outer region like Nether City.
Greya was pretty surprised when she heard Sunders’ conclusion. That was a legendary monster and a dozen lackeys that were just a little bit weaker, and they only came from an outer area? Whatever does the core area look like?
Little did she know that someone already answered her question. On the day when Angor explained his talent test inside Barbie’s Restaurant, what he told everyone was the core area of Nightmare Realm. At least Sunders believed so.
Sunders frowned after listening to Greya’s story.
It wasn’t hard for him to enter the Nightmare Realm, but he couldn’t say so when he had to steal Greya’s body from the hands of a legendary monster. And even if he somehow managed, he wasn’t sure whether he could physically bring the body back to reality.
This was why he needed Angor to retrieve Singularity Dispersive Meditation, as he couldn’t take something in Nightmare Realm out using his own hands.
I either need Greya to accompany me so that she can get her own body back or...
Naturally, he thought about his young student again.