After Eureka left the ice room, Leon went to Angor with a totally confused look as he had no idea what the “Vitalizer” and Angor’s “Inscription card” were. Eureka allowed him to take care of Jon’s coffin in the past years, but she never told him anything else.
Even so, Leon wasn’t going to ask something he couldn’t understand.
“Angor, you have something to revive Jon?”
“No. It can only prolong his life for some time. I need to find other methods to save him for real.”
“Do you have a clue yet?”
“No...” Angor shook his head. “But I’m sure there is something. Wizards always have countless amazing tricks for various purposes.”
“Best of luck then.” Leon put a hand on Angor’s shoulder.
“I’ll stay here in the next few days to work on how to achieve the Triple-Knitted method on Jon. I was tasked to recruit new talents before I came here, and there is such a talent currently staying at George’s. Go to him and find him lodging. You can either bring him back to the manor or find an inn in the town.”
“I’ll do it in a minute.” Leon nodded.
When left alone, Angor took out his draft papers and began inspecting Jon’s overall condition using his spirit power again. There was a ton of data he needed to record in order to figure out how to properly use Vitalizer liquid and the Inscription card to maintain Jon’s balanced state.
According to Eureka, if he were to use the card on Jon and provoke the corruption into tainting Jon faster, he would have to know how to improve Jon’s vitality as well as the amount of Vitalizer to be used.
Calculating the liquid amount wasn’t hard since he had his tablet for help. As for mending Jon’s body... this was quite troublesome when Jon was already in his worst shape. Angor had to use harmless methods to slowly tend to Jon’s every organ while keeping up with the speed of corruption.
As Angor fully focused on the immeasurable computation, Eureka had retreated to a wooden stilt house at the southeast of the manor. The house was built along the slope of a small hill, supported by several sturdy stilts that perfectly kept most the structure suspended in midair.
It was Jon who designed this house himself. After he was sent to the ice room, however, Eureka chose to use this place as her temporary lodging.
“Leon’s little brother, huh?” She looked toward the direction of the ice room while smiling. “Isn’t he an interesting boy. Right, Brulee?”
An owl landed on the windowsill nearby and folded its wings.
“He saw me through back there. He knows I’m not going to catch up with his speed when he can use gravity power, so he tried my limits on purpose.” Eureka stroked the owl’s plume gently. “And that familiar of his... You’re both birds, Brulee. Why do you look so weak compared to that one?”
The owl hooted loudly to protest.
“Alright, alright! You’re different.”
The owl kept “speaking” while pointing its short wing at one of its eyes.
“Your eyeglass? Don’t worry, I’ll get to it.”
Previously, Eureka was going to ask Thewis to bring another monocle for the owl, but she changed her mind when she noticed Angor’s wealth.
“He has a space storage in that bracelet. Ordinary apprentices can’t afford something like that.”
She heard footsteps and saw Leon coming to her.
“You have something to say so soon?” She didn’t seem surprised by Leon’s visit.
“Miss Eureka.” Leon bowed down. “Can you tell me what you and Angor were talking about? What’s so special about Jon?”
Leon knew there was something very important he had been missing out. From what he saw before, Eureka wasn’t interested in Jon at all, and she never visited the ice room in many years.
Eureka flipped a strand of hair behind her ear. “You’ll naturally know once you go to the world of wizards. But I guess it doesn’t hurt to tell you now. First, you should know about the origin of humans...”
Leon listened to Eureka’s explanation as his eyes went wider and wider.
He thought Jon was only a traveling wanderer who was forced away from home, but according to Eureka, Jon was a human exception who would break down many existing knowledge systems and conventions in this world!
Leon finally realized why Angor looked so “obsessed” during dinner. He would do the same if he had known that someone so important fell into the hands of other powerful wizards.
“Miss Eureka, could Jon be the child of someone who traveled to another world, and when he came back, he’s considered an ‘intruder’ of our world?”
“No. Human bloodline is always recognized here, no matter how far they or their ancestors go. Jon doesn’t belong to this world, I’m sure of it. He’s a human who originated from somewhere unknown.
“Now leave, if that’s all you have to ask.” Eureka stretched her arms. “I need a good rest after that fight.”
Leon considered and asked one final question, “What’s your stance regarding Jon, ma’am?”
“You’re asking because you want to tell Angor about it later?”
Leon admitted by staying silent.
“No matter. I can tell you. But Angor probably won’t believe my answer. While it’s true that I want to try out many experiments on Jon, I currently have too many important matters to handle. Besides, Jon isn’t very valuable to me because he’s going to die soon. However... I can’t say the same about Red.”
She was referring to Red-Haired Thewis, Leon’s teacher, or at least Leon saw Thewis as his teacher.
“But... my professor doesn’t check out Jon that often like you.”
“That doesn’t mean he’s not curious. And trust me, Thewis won’t mind whether he’s working on someone alive or dead.”
Leon then left the stilt house in a grim mood. He just realized that Angor’s biggest rival wasn’t Eureka. It was his teacher.
...
One week later, Angor stepped out of the ice room and went to Jon’s old house in which he spent most of his teenage years.
Only the memories remained. Nothing was the same anymore.
He arrived and saw Eureka being all sleepy for some reason, which further confirmed his previous speculation, that Eureka’s spirit was not in the right state. Wizards usually didn’t need to sleep at all.
Of course, he wasn’t going to say it.
“What do you want?” Eureka rubbed her eyes while gazing at Angor with a lazy look.
“I have all the data we need,” Angor said as he handed a pile of papers to Eureka.
“You... what?” Eureka wondered if she had slept through an entire month instead of a few days.
Telling from how fast apprentices usually do their studies, Eureka expected Angor to give her an initial result in two months or so, or maybe quicker. But a week?
Naturally, she knew nothing about Angor’s superior arithmetic capacity made possible by his “mind overdrive”, then enhanced by the hologram tablet.
The formulas and digits were extremely complicated. However, Eureka only needed a bit of mental tryout to know that everything was sound.
“Who are you, really?” She gave Angor an inquiring stare. “Are you Leon’s brother for real?”
“He’s one and only.”
“Then why is Leon so dumb compared to you? Did everything he ate grow on his muscles?”
Angor tried to keep his poker face.
“Let’s go.” Eureka returned the papers to Angor. “I know you want to hurry. I’ll help you keep the balance during the procedure. I prefer that Jon stays alive as well.”
Angor simply turned away and headed to the ice room first without saying another word.
As Eureka mentioned, he had to treat Jon as fast as possible. Every second wasted away would potentially weaken the outcome of their attempt, until even “granting Jon two more years” would become questionable.
Inside the ice room, Angor fully calmed his mind as he prepared to take the utmost caution when handling Jon’s body. He had to change the quantity of Vitalizer, heal Jon’s body, and apply the Inscription card at the same time, while Eureka was in charge of repairing the “balance” if Angor’s moves briefly disrupted it while changing the elements.
“I’m starting.” Angor took another deep breath.
He summoned two Hands of Spell to deal with the Vitalizer flask and the card, which didn’t require too much management. Meanwhile, he took out several bottles from his bracelet that contained special potions for nurturing Jon.
Even though Eureka knew about these potions because she just read about them in Angor’s papers, she was still amazed to see Angor actually bringing them out.
These things added together were not any cheaper than a full flask of Vitalizer. Once again, she wondered how Angor earned his income.