Chapter 59

With a startled cry, Takuson immediately broke free from Alice's embrace and instantly ran to within ten meters of the girl.

This brought Alice back to reality.

At this moment, Xiu Er finished recording the Magic in the Magic Guidebook in his hand. This Magic was very practical, so he immediately began to cast Magic.

"— [Codex Opening]— [True Codex]— [Storage Space]—"

A massive Magic Circle appeared on the floor of the warehouse, covering all the items inside.

Alice and Takuson were also drawn to this sudden change.

They both looked at Xiu Er at the same time.

Under their gaze, a hole, only the size of a basketball in diameter, appeared directly above the magic circle, attached to the ceiling.

Then, all the items on the ground except for Xiu Er and the other two were pulled by something and flew into the [hole] above.

In a flash, within seconds, all the items in the warehouse were swept away by Xiu Er.

Having witnessed the "miracle" today, Alice is no longer surprised by anything else.

Her current view of Xiu Er is that no matter what he brings out, she won't be surprised.

Takuson, on the other hand, was delighted that his teacher could add another Magic to his repertoire.

After doing all this, Xiu Er turned around and looked at Takuson.

"[Question] Why did it fail?"

Meanwhile, at Takuson's original location...

Boom!!!

The entire cave experienced an even larger tremor than before.

The walls began to crack, and there were faint signs of collapse.

At this moment, beneath "Xiu Er's" feet was a gigantic Monster, its body cut in two and its head crushed into pieces, now slowly turning to ashes.

All around were the corpses of bandits, cut in half, including the bandit Chief, who had been severed at the waist.

Only the Demon Taming Magic who had been pierced through the chest and whose life was being deliberately kept alive by "Xiu Er" was still alive.

"Dangerous individuals have been eliminated."

It turns out that this was the moment when Takuson triggered [Return to Town] and opened the Space Gate, that Xiu Er's "Doppelganger" emerged from it to replace him.

Responsible for carrying out the actions following Takuson.

"Data parsing successful, proceeding with Commander Unit."

"[Report] Target individual threat level: Direct combat is insufficient to inflict effective damage on the individual 'Takuson'."

"..."

"[Received] Initiating cleaning task."

The blazing flames engulfed the entire cave, turning everything inside—corpses, fortifications, and artifacts—into ashes.

"Xiu Er" grabbed the Magic by the neck and dragged him out of the Space Gate, bringing him to Xiu Er and his group who were already waiting on the ground.

Episode 37: Going Home

Xiu Er coldly stared at the man on the ground, who was sweating profusely. Everything the Doppelganger saw and heard would be directly transmitted to Xiu Er, the "terminal".

Therefore, he understood why the Magic User in front of him was so afraid of him.

It's just that he took care of everyone in an instant. What's so surprising? Can't any powerful warrior in this world do that?

But Xiu Er didn't bother with the prisoner on the ground who was already incapacitated; that matter could be decided later.

The priority now is to educate Takuson.

"[Question] Is this what 'killed' you as an individual?"

"No, it's the Monster he controls."

Realizing that he had made a mistake due to carelessness, Takuson was filled with shame when faced with Xiu Er's questioning.

"[Question] The target has been analyzed. Based on the intelligence obtained, you have a 94.5% chance of winning in a head-on confrontation."

"Ahaha, well..."

"Teacher, why are you keeping this Magic User?"

The topic was changed very abruptly.

It seems that Takuson really doesn't want to discuss this matter, probably because he's ashamed that he was successfully ambushed by Monster due to his carelessness.

It's clear he really wanted to hide it, and he could even do it without blushing or skipping a beat.

Xiu Er naturally sensed the atmosphere and understood what the other party meant.

But he already knew the details of the matter.

It turns out that the device placed on Takuson had already been updated by Xiu Er to function like a "dashcam," meaning that all the footage Takuson experienced was simultaneously seen by Xiu Er.

Of course, this function is not activated all the time. Only when Takuson needs to act alone, like today, will Xiu Er activate the function to record and ensure the safety of his apprentice.

Poor Takuson was unaware of this; he did not understand that he would have no secrets from Xiu Er.

"[Answer] His 'Magic' is an unrecorded type."

Yes, when Xiu Er's Doppelganger finished dealing with everything, he didn't give the opponent a chance to use Magic; it ended instantly. This is also why he brought the Magic User to Xiu Er.

"Teacher, if I may be so bold, there's absolutely no need to acquire such evil Magic, is there?"

In fact, Takuson also understood his teacher's "love" for "Magic".

Every time he makes a move, he intentionally holds back against enemies who use Magic. This is not out of kindness, but to give them the opportunity to use Magic.

This way, teachers can see more Magic they've never seen before.

Once the enemy has used all the Magic they know, they will be deemed "worthless" by the teacher, and only then will their life be ended.

Now, after hearing the reason given by Xiu Er, Takuson immediately recalled the tragedy that had befallen Alice's family because of this Magic.

This also made it impossible for him to feel any goodwill towards the Magic, but he also understood that Magic itself was neither good nor evil.

It all depends on the user.

Unfortunately, this [Demon Taming Magic] is currently being used by a scumbag.

Thinking of this, Takuson looked at the Magic User on the ground again, his gaze causing the latter to tremble uncontrollably.

"[Refutation] Magic is neither good nor bad."

"Ah, I know, teacher, but I..."

"[Question] Is it because of Alice's family?"

"Forehead..."

"Yes, teacher."

As expected of Xiu Er, he hit the nail on the head with just one sentence. After all, he was Takuson's apprentice for many years. How could he not know what kind of person his apprentice was?

Besides, hadn't he "copied" Demon Magic before? Takuson had raised this issue with Xiu Er before, and that's how he came to know his apprentice's personality in this regard.

After briefly resolving the issues with Takuson, Xiu Er approached the Magic User, and to the latter's astonishment, the device above his head began to unfold...

"Alice, are you sure this is the city?"

Takuson pointed to a world map on the ground, placing his finger on the icon of a city in the southern region, and looked at the blonde girl beside him.

The girl was Alice, whom he had rescued from the Monster a day earlier.

Alice looked at the map on the ground, fine beads of sweat dripping from her forehead.

It turns out they were discussing their next steps.

Since Xiu Er and his apprentice are currently in an employer-employee relationship with Alice, their primary task is to safely return her to their destination— Alice's uncle's house.

What we are doing now is to get Alice to tell us the location of her uncle's house based on the map, so that we can determine the direction of our next trip.

Of course, Xiu Er possesses the weaponry to open Space Gate, allowing him to directly reach his destination.

It can be used only if there is an accurate coordinate.

The problem is that Alice doesn't know the exact location of her uncle's house, and she has never been there before, so this visit is actually her first long trip.

Goodness, so this girl is really that unlucky?

This happened on my first long trip.

Xiu Er didn't participate; he simply waited quietly to the side, casually leaning against a tree trunk.

"World resolution... 53.46%"

As Xiu Er checked the progress of the analysis of the [Codex of the Whispers], he was somewhat at a loss.

How many years has it been?

How did it take you to analyze this point?

Moreover, this progress was accelerated after encountering Sariel and Volumen. Before and after that, the daily increase was only a random number within the range of 0.001 to 10%.

He checks the world analysis progress of the [Codex of the Whispers] every day, but the results are puzzling, leaving Xiu Er unsure of what the problem is.

Since we don't know, let's just ask another being.

"System, isn't this wrong?"

"This is normal, please don't worry about it."

"You call this a normal phenomenon?!"

Faced with the "system's" response, Xiu Er's "heart" beneath his calm exterior could no longer maintain its previous stability.

Is it my fault?

"The process of analyzing the Codex of the Whispers is essentially a process of accessing the origin of the world. In this process, being 'rushed' is useless. Also, the analysis speed is not fixed. It may seem slow now, but it will be very fast after a while."

"Alright."

Just as I finished my conversation with the system, Takuson's conversation also ended.

Rustle--

Then someone came to Xiu Er's side.

"[Question] Has a result been reached in the discussion?"

"Well, what we know for now is that Alice's uncle's house is to the south of where we are now."

"..."

"[Question] Is this all the information we have?"

"Um... well, that's all Alice knows."

At this point, Takuson was a little embarrassed, as they had only gotten this little bit of information after discussing for so long.

"[Question] Her parents didn't provide an address?"

Xiu Er found it hard to believe that this person didn't even know the location of his uncle's house, which he was originally going to.

The result was that the other party did ask their parents, but because of the trauma of that incident, they had forgotten that part of their memory.

But Xiu Er noticed something.

"[Question] Is it a memory that you 'remembered' but have 'forgotten' before?"