Warlock Apprentice

He had to find other solutions.

For example, could he try blocking someone’s senses or tricking their minds?

He already possessed peculiar illusion talent. When creating Journey in Heaven, he didn’t add any particularly special elements into the music box. However, the final product amazed everyone, including Lady Mirror, who set their eyes upon the wonderful illusion that seemed to freeze time.

Since that experience, Angor believed he gained a brand new level of knowledge about illusions. Swiftly, he learned how to mislead people’s senses of directions or space.

But when he got his hands on The Mystery of Nightmare Domain, he began to ignore his own talent after learning about nightmare illusions.

He didn’t know whether he should focus on one thing at a time, but he would admit that nightmare illusions were quite handy. Today, however, he realized that nightmare illusions couldn’t be used together with alchemy, or at least not unless he learned how to.

For now, he had to revert to using pure illusion to finish his task.

Another three days had passed. Angor looked at the feather ear stud in his hand and frowned.

He finally made this thing without using nightmare aura, which tricked someone’s “sense of touch”. But it only worked for someone of the same level as him, namely, level-2 apprentices or below.

The illusion was based on Toby. Yet it would not work on Greya, not unless Greya chose to open up her mind to the illusion.

Generally speaking, he failed. An alchemy product that required its user to “cooperate” wasn’t a convincing product at all.

But he didn’t have another choice. According to a servant, Shadow had already obtained Naga and left before him.

He had to go back. And this “failed item” was the only thing he could provide Greya for now.

With the hope to earn some scores back, he did his best to perfect the other details of the ear stud.

Next, he returned to the first floor, and with a sad expression, he found Greya.

His looks immediately told Greya about his incompetent job.

And since Greya didn’t know much about alchemy, Angor had to spend some time explaining the problems about the item.

“… But the other day, I can connect with the existence in your illusion with my hand,” Greya commented.

Angor certainly couldn’t tell Greya about his Nightmare Domain. “It’s a special way of using illusion I learned from professor Sunders. But I just found it’s impossible to do that with alchemy, so I can only make this thing that works by tricking your mind. But I can’t make something powerful at my level. This one can only ‘trick’ someone like me, or people weaker than me.”

“That is to say, your ear stud is pointless to me?”

Angor nodded, but he quickly shook his head after that. “It will work if you open up your spirit to feel the illusion, Lady Greya.”

Then he looked down in shame again.

It was a joke, asking wizards to lower their spirit defense and accept the effect of an illusion.

“It’s a failure. I… tried my best,” Angor muttered in a small voice.

Greya didn’t answer. In her point of view, Angor had satisfied her requirement. The item wasn’t a failure. It was just that the boy held himself to really high standards.

She knew that Angor meant to make something that worked for both apprentices and wizards, but to most people, this was almost impossible.

Every time an apprentice managed to create something convenient for wizards, it would arouse celebrations and heated discussions. And 99% of the time, apprentice alchemists should NOT be able to achieve such things.

Yet it seemed that Angor had a completely different idea.

Greya silently sighed in her mind. She could see that Angor was truly feeling sorry for his “failure”.

She also knew that this wasn’t because the boy had strict discipline. Angor underestimated himself too much because he never met many alchemists in his life.

Any other alchemists who just presented this ear stud would already boast about their achievement at this moment.

Angor carefully looked up, and when he noticed that Greya didn’t show him any expressions, he quickly became uneasy again. “Lady Greya, I’m… I’m still too inexperienced. I promise that one day, I’ll become better, and I’ll make something better and deliver it to your door.”

He didn’t mention returning Toby to Greya because he knew Greya would absolutely hate anyone who regarded Toby as a trade item.

Greya grinned after a while. “Okay, I accept your offer. But! I have another condition to ask.”

“What is it, Lady Greya?”

“You don’t have to keep it in your plan. I’ll tell you when to start making the item.”

Angor nodded.

Greya already found Angor’s descriptions to be satisfactory, but she wouldn’t decline an extra offer from the boy since he said so.

Angor had a bright future as an alchemist. Greya got a feeling that she just earned a promise from a potential Master Alchemist.

“Now, show me your item.”

Angor had been telling her the drawbacks of the product without taking it out. With a start, he carefully took the feather ear stud in his hand and handed it to Greya politely.

The feather had a silver theme and delicate engravings. Every single pattern followed how Toby’s feathers looked. Soft, detailed, and exceptionally pretty.

From the first look, Greya was content with the item’s appearance.

“It looks good! As for the illusion… it doesn’t really matter. I’ll wait for your little surprise in the coming days.”

Angor scratched his head and chuckled.

“Can you show me Toby?” Greya put the item in her pocket casually.

Angor then fumbled to open up his chest pocket and reveal the bird.

Greya ran her hand gently along Toby’s back.

“Toby’s in your hands now. I… cannot take good care of him in my current condition,” Greya said and sighed. “I lost my body in Nightmare Realm, and I believe my enemies already found out that I’m still alive. It’s too dangerous for Toby to stay with me.”

“Rest assured, Lady Greya. I will protect Toby,” Angor said with a solemn look.

“Oh, I trust you.” Greya grinned again and returned Toby in Angor’s hands, albeit still a little hesitantly. “So are you going to leave Dark Castle soon?”

Angor nodded.

Greya took out a space capsule as well as a shining golden card. “Take these. The capsule has Soul Orbs in there. Toby may need them if he runs into another emotion-related conflict. The card is a golden VIP card for Butterfly Tavern. Felicia’s compensation for you. She hopes you don’t mind what she did during that dinner.”

Neither of them wanted to talk about the matter since Isabelle already warned them not to question it. Angor would also like to avoid mentioning the incident that involved the secrets of his soul. He accepted the items without saying anything.

“Now, off with you,” Greya said as she gave Toby one last, affectionate look, “and I hope you two can present me with more surprises next time.”

Angor bowed deeply to Greya and turned away.

He didn’t need time to pack up his things since everything he needed was inside the bracelet. Following the zigzagging path, he slowly left the grounds of Dark Castle.

Greya stayed near the window and saw the boy off.

She sat back on a sofa after she finally sensed that Angor had left Otherworld.

“… If you really can’t leave Toby, at least you can let me keep him. I can always ensure his safety.” Felicia emerged from the shadows.

“Oh pshh. He’ll probably run away from you even if you don’t chase him away first. I believe Angor cares for Toby with all his heart. And Toby’s happier that way.”

“Are you certain you will entrust Toby to an apprentice?”

“It doesn’t matter. I’m putting my belief in Toby’s future. Angor’s future. And…”

My own future.

Felicia nodded and didn’t question further. She simply sat down beside Greya and sipped her wine.

Greya took out Angor’s ear stud and injected some mana inside while wondering what kind of illusion awaited her.