Wizard: I Have a Nightmare World

By the time we returned to the incubation room, it was completely dark.

Amber was squatting on the windowsill, cleaning the dust off the roof of the Lily of the Valley Cottage with a small brush. When she saw Lynn return, she immediately put down the brush and flew over.

"How did it go? What did your teacher say?"

Lynn took the parchment out of his spatial ring, placed it on the workbench, and flipped it open. As he looked at it, he briefly repeated what the Bloodvine Wizard had said.

When Amber heard that "the burrowing lizard rat was a failed creation of an ancient wizard," her eyes widened and her little face was filled with shock.

"Thirteen hundred years ago? Isn't that even older than the migration history of us garden fairies?"

"Yes, so this thing is more complex than I imagined."

As Lynn spoke, his gaze fell on the few lines of text on the parchment concerning the formula for harmonizing bioenergy circuits.

The information the Bloodvine Wizard gave him wasn't too profound; it was more like an introductory guide. It contained three basic bio-energy circuit reconciliation formulas, as well as a method for guiding and connecting external energy circuits using mental power.

According to the manual, this technology was originally developed to repair the energy circuits of contracted creatures, and was later used by some wizards to conduct experiments on grafting their own characteristics onto those of the creatures.

"The first step in grafting is to completely analyze the energy circuit structure of the target organism."

Lynn placed the bottle of nutrient solution containing the dark gray tissue in front of him and carefully observed the grain-sized tissue through the glass.

"Then, using a blended potion as a medium, a temporary energy channel is established between one's mental power and that part of the tissue structure."

"Finally, through mental guidance, the operating pattern of that energy loop is copied into one's own mental energy system."

He put down the bottle and rubbed his temples.

It sounds simple, but it's probably ten times more difficult to do than building a model of witchcraft.

But Lynn was not afraid of difficulties; he himself had a nightmare world.

midnight.

That familiar pulling sensation washed over him, and when Lynn opened his eyes, he found himself in the nightmare world.

Instead of rushing to study the burrowing lizard rat's shielding ability, he first sat cross-legged, closed his eyes, and sank his consciousness into his mental space.

The spiritual liquid pool has been purified by 90% in the real world, and his mental state in the nightmare world also reflects this change.

The liquid pool was crystal clear, with only a thin layer of gray sediment remaining at the bottom.

He had already estimated the progress, which would take about two to three days, so he focused his attention on researching grafting methods to improve the shielding ability of burrowing lizard rats.

He reached out his hand, recalling the structure of the dark gray tissue and the details of the transparent keratin membrane in his mind.

A moment later, a dark gray tissue exactly like the one in reality, along with a small piece of transparent keratin, appeared in his palm.

The ability to materialize in the Nightmare World remains as reliable as ever.

Lynn placed the tissue on the materialized slide, condensed his mental energy into a probe as thin as a hair, and carefully probed into the tissue, beginning to scan its energy circuit structure one by one.

This process is more mentally taxing than I imagined.

Although the micro-energy circuits within the organization are simple, they are extremely precise. The direction, thickness, and node position of each circuit must be recorded accurately. Even the slightest deviation will cause subsequent grafting to fail.

Lynn's mental probes moved slowly through the organization, like a meticulous draftsman, sketching the path of each line onto a blueprint in his mind.

Time passed in silence.

After an unknown amount of time, when Lynn finally finished scanning the last node and completely copied the entire energy circuit structure into his mind, he had already exhausted most of his mental energy.

"call!"

Lynn let out a long breath and rubbed his throbbing temples.

But instead of stopping to rest, he immediately began to try using the mental energy docking method given to him by the Bloodvine Wizard to establish a connection between his mental energy and the energy circuit structure diagram.

The first attempt failed.

The energy channel broke down as soon as it was established.

The second attempt failed.

The guiding mental energy frequency does not match the resonance point of the circuit structure.

The third attempt failed.

The resonance was barely established, but it lacked stability and collapsed in less than three seconds.

The fourth time, the fifth time, the sixth time...

Lynn failed time and time again, and adjusted again and again, but he was never able to establish a stable energy channel.

After his thirteenth failure, he stopped, stopped trying, closed his eyes, and quietly pondered where the problem lay.

"There is indeed a deviation between my mental energy frequency and the resonance point of that circuit structure, but the magnitude of this deviation is very small, and in theory it should not cause the channel to collapse immediately after it is established."

"Unless... that loop structure itself is not complete."

Lynn suddenly opened his eyes, his gaze falling on the dark gray tissue.

An idea flashed through his mind.

"What if this circuit structure needs to work in conjunction with the bodily fluids of the stratum corneum to achieve a complete shielding effect?"

"Then, relying solely on the internal circuitry of this organization, it is certainly impossible for it to operate independently."

Lynn picked up the small, transparent piece of keratin and examined it closely under a magnifying glass.

Sure enough, he also found some faint traces of energy circuits in the microstructure of the stratum corneum. Although the structure was not as complete as that in the tissue, there was clearly some connection between the two.

"I see, one is the energy core, and the other is the release port."

A sudden realization flashed through Lynn's mind.

He put the tissue and the stratum corneum together and began to try to combine their energy circuit structures in his mind to build a complete shielding capability model.

This task was far more complex than simply scanning tissue, but with the foundation laid earlier, Lynn gradually filled in the missing piece of the puzzle through repeated attempts.

When he attempted to merge for the ninth time, a complete miniature energy circuit model composed of the two parts finally slowly took shape in his consciousness space.

He tried to mobilize his mental energy to get the model running.

At first, the model operated very sluggishly, like a rusty gear being forced to turn, making a creaking and grinding sound.

But Lynn did not give up, and continued to adjust the frequency and intensity of his mental energy input.

Gradually, the model began to operate more and more smoothly and stably.

The moment it finally started running smoothly, Lynn felt a strange power envelop her entire body.

The feeling was hard to describe; it was as if his whole being suddenly became blurred, like a wisp of mist, or as if he had never existed at all.

He discovered that his sense of existence was being stripped away from his surroundings by some force.

"It's a success!!"

Lynn was overjoyed, but this joy caused his mental energy to fluctuate slightly, and the newly established model instantly collapsed, along with the shielding cover.

He felt a little regretful, but more excited than anything else.

The direction for grafting has been found; all that remains is to continuously refine and master it until the model can be fully realized in the real world.

Lynn stood up, stretched her stiff shoulders and neck, and prepared to continue practicing.

But the moment he turned around, his peripheral vision caught a glimpse of the other side of the barrier, and he froze.

The gray fog, which originally had a visibility of twenty meters, completely dissipated after he discovered the existence of the barrier, leaving only the gray fog outside the barrier.

And now, in the gray fog outside the barrier, stands a figure.

The figure was not tall, about 1.7 meters, and had the build of an adult human, but was wrapped in black bandages all over his body, so no skin was visible.

The bandages looked old and worn, with some parts torn, revealing grayish-black tissue underneath that looked like dried-up muscle.

What caught Lynn's attention most was its left hand.

Its left hand, from the wrist down, was completely replaced by a cross-shaped knight's sword. The sword's blade was a dark, iron-gray color, with several nicks, covered in dark red rust and dried blood.

At this moment, the figure was standing about five meters outside the barrier, motionless, like a statue.

From the gaps in the black bandages around its head, two dark red lights could be vaguely seen, like two burning embers, shining straight through the barrier and locking onto Lynn.

When Lynn saw this, his pupils contracted sharply.

His body reacted instinctively in an instant.

The spell model of Wind Blade Technique was activated instantly, and a cyan wind blade condensed in his palm.

The figure outside the barrier tilted his head slightly when he saw the wind blade gathering in Lynn's palm, as if he were examining something interesting.

Then, it raised its cross-shaped sword, which was fused with its left hand, and tapped the transparent surface of the barrier twice with the tip of the sword.

Boom, boom.

The voice wasn't loud, but it clearly pierced through the barrier and reached Lynn's ears, sounding like a greeting or a probe.

Immediately afterwards, a strong stench of decay seeped in from the other side of the barrier and entered Lynn's nostrils.

The smell was extremely strong, like the smell of a long-rotten corpse mixed with rust and blood, and it also carried an indescribable chill that made Lynn's stomach churn.

He suppressed the nausea and stared intently at the figure outside the barrier, the wind blade in his palm poised to strike.

But after knocking on the barrier twice, the figure made no further moves.

It stood quietly outside the barrier, staring at Lynn with its dark red lights for about ten seconds.

Then, it slowly turned around, dragging the cross-shaped knight's sword that had merged with its arm, and walked step by step into the depths of the gray fog, disappearing from Lynn's sight.

All that remained was the lingering stench of decay and Lynn's violently pounding heart.

Lynn stood still, the wind blade in his palm still in place, but a layer of cold sweat had seeped out from his back.

The sense of oppression emanating from that figure was far stronger than that from any formal wizard he had ever seen.

Moreover, it's obvious that this guy came for him.