The Wizard: Starting with Infinite Part-Time Jobs

It was late at night.

Sera left Aiden's cabin, her steps a little unsteady, but with Aiden's comfort, she felt much better.

She planned to use the fragment of the meditation stone, along with the five magic stones Aiden had given her, to become a full-fledged wizarding apprentice and show Quillins the wizarding world.

Quillins' body was left to Aiden's disposal.

Aiden had composed himself. He took a deep breath, wrapped Quillins' body tightly in his hands, hoisted it onto his shoulder, and walked outside.

"The Forbidden Forest has a special place to cover corpses, called the Tombstone Forest. Corpses there are forbidden to be dug up, which can be considered as a final act of respect for wizard apprentices," Aiden muttered to himself.

If a wizard apprentice's body is buried indiscriminately, it will most likely be dug up by someone with ulterior motives and eventually sold.

With that thought in mind, Aiden quickened his pace.

……

This is a small cemetery in the Forbidden Forest Basin, surrounded by tall, dense weeds that rustle in the wind.

Here stand many tombstones engraved with the names of wizard apprentices, their crooked shapes and desolate appearance adding to the solitude.

In the distance, the occasional roar of a beast sent chills down one's spine.

A brown-haired wizard apprentice, dressed in a gray robe, was carrying a sack of cloth and slowly walking towards them.

Aiden took out a knife and forcefully carved Quillins' name on a blank tombstone.

After he finished carving, he started digging the pit.

In no time, they dug out a large pit.

He was not only busy, but also pondering why Quillins had suddenly died.

"Quellins, I will find a way to uncover the truth. As your only friend, I will find a way to avenge you," Aiden said, his lips trembling.

They then pushed Quillins' body into the small pit they had dug.

The body slid slowly down the pit wall, making a slight scraping sound.

It took Aiden about 20 minutes, his forehead covered in sweat, to straighten the body in the pit. He planned to push the excavated soil back in, and that would be the end of it.

But just then, a "ring ring" sound came from my ear.

The sound was crisp yet eerie, as if it came from a distant place, yet it seemed to be getting closer and closer.

Immediately afterwards, a odorless wind swept over him, making Aiden's hair all messy.

A white blur flashed by, moving so fast that it was almost impossible to catch.

Quillins' body vanished from the pit in a very strange way, as if it had been snatched away by an invisible hand in an instant.

Aiden's eyes widened, his hands still in the bulldozing position, frozen in place.

"Holy crap! What's going on?" Aiden rubbed his eyes hard to make sure he wasn't seeing things.

The body, which was there just seconds ago, simply vanished.

Based on the previous scene, Aiden looked around.

But just like before, this cemetery was deserted except for him; it was eerily quiet.

That "ringing" sound just now seemed to be a sound from some kind of creature.

Based on his experience dealing with living things, Aiden quickly deduced the answer.

"No, Quillins' body can't just disappear like this, without any explanation," Aiden said through gritted teeth. "I'm responsible."

It would be a lie to say that it wasn't terrifying to be faced with such a bizarre situation.

Aiden sat cross-legged in the forest of tombstones, closed his eyes, and began browsing his encyclopedia of the continent.

"What kind of creature makes a 'ding-a-ling' sound and is white?" he muttered.

He began searching for this information in the Encyclopedia of the Pan-Pacific.

After a long while, Aiden slowly woke up from the search state, opened his eyes, and his eyes were full of fatigue.

"If my guess is correct, this is a butterfly called the Space Void Butterfly. Every time it appears, it's accompanied by a 'ding-a-ling' sound as it flaps. But the encyclopedia of the Ring Continent clearly states that this butterfly hasn't appeared for hundreds of years, and it's suspected to be extinct," Aiden muttered to himself.

"Right now, I have no way to deal with this mysterious creature that is suspected to be a spatial butterfly, so I can only go back first." Aiden paused, took a deep breath, and continued, "Tomorrow morning, I will ask Ms. Ollie for some tools to capture creatures. Maybe we can catch the thief who stole the corpse."

……

A day passed, and it was still the same midnight.

Aiden carried a small bag containing a small bottle of biological bait he had bought from Ms. Ollie.

Two makeshift trap cages, which they had picked up from the street vendors, were quickly brought back to the cemetery.

Aiden took out a biological attractant from his bag and smelled it.

It has a faint floral fragrance and a sweet taste.

"According to Ms. Ollie, this is a carefully concocted formula that can attract the vast majority of creatures. After a creature takes it, it will be temporarily paralyzed, making it easier to capture."

Aiden nodded, his face showing anticipation.

He partially covered the two simple trap cages at the original location where the pit had been dug.

The hay completely concealed the cage. Without close inspection, it was impossible to tell that there were two traps.

Aiden divided the biological bait in two and poured both into the makeshift trap cage, keeping a small portion on his body.

Soon, a sweet, cloying aroma wafted out on the wind.

Aiden lay prone in the grass not far away, his body pressed tightly against the ground, carefully watching the movement markers on the makeshift cage.

"These are the only methods we have. I have no other ideas for dealing with unknown creatures." Aiden shook his head helplessly.

The scent of the biological traps traveled farther than Aiden had imagined.

In a small valley about a mile from the cemetery, a black tiger about 5 meters long woke up from its sleep.

Its nose twitched slightly, its ears perked up, and its eyes snapped open.

It crouched down, sniffed a few times, and showed an excited expression on its face, its mouth slightly open, revealing sharp teeth.

They then followed the wind direction and headed towards where Aiden was lying.

This was a tiger king, one of the most ferocious beasts in the entire Forbidden Forest, who rarely left its territory. But now, drawn by the scent of the bait, it disregarded all else, quickening its pace and rampaging through the trees, snapping branches in its wake.

After the Black Tiger King left, a figure holding a short sword, whose bronze skin shone in the moonlight, quietly followed.

Her steps were light and agile, each step landing in a place that was not easily noticed, and her body flexibly adjusted to follow the Black Tiger's movements.

……

"This one isn't right, and this one isn't right either." Aiden looked at the small animals in the makeshift trap and shook his head in disappointment.

He pulled out a gray rabbit and a squirrel that had crawled into a makeshift trap, and gently lifted them with both hands before releasing them back into the wild.

As soon as the gray rabbit and squirrel landed, they ran away quickly and disappeared into the grass.

"This biological attractant can attract nearby creatures, but they all seem to be ordinary herbivores, which doesn't match the appearance of the creatures that were accompanied by a 'ringing' sound the other day, which we suspected were spatial butterfly creatures," Aiden said, frowning with a troubled expression.