Huris Potion and the Admission Letter

In May 1991, a mottled owl flew over London with a letter clutched in its beak.

At the same time, in a shabby attic in London's old district, an eleven-year-old Chinese boy was taking notes with a serious expression.

The boy's left hand, covered by a black glove, pressed lightly against an old, yellowed piece of parchment, while his other hand rapidly drew complex geometric patterns on another blank sheet of parchment.

About thirty minutes later, the Chinese boy finished the final stroke, leaned back lightly in his chair, picked up a bottle of pale blue liquid from the edge of the table, and drained it in one gulp.

"Ugh..." The Chinese boy—or rather, Tierra—was nearly driven to vomit by the choking taste of the pale blue liquid. Fortunately, he covered his mouth in time and forced himself to swallow it.

The instant the blue liquid entered his stomach, Tierra felt as if he had returned to the night of the laboratory explosion. The heavy ultra-low-temperature freezer descended from above, its enormous shadow crushing down on him. Those mere four seconds before death seemed stretched into eternity. The dull pain of the freezer striking him, the agonizing pain of his skull being crushed inch by inch, tortured him frame by frame.

After an unknown amount of time, Tierra woke from that hellish torment, drenched in cold sweat. Yet his mind was incomparably invigorated, as though he had awakened after a long and comfortable sleep.

"Just thinking about having to keep drinking this in the future makes me despair." Tierra sighed, righted the chair he had kicked over while drinking the potion, and went downstairs to take a hot shower.

The potion Tierra had just drunk was called Huris Potion. It was one of the research results recorded in Merlin's diary. It could strengthen mental power, and its residual medicinal effects could create a temporary spiritual barrier for the drinker, lasting around a month. It could effectively reduce the odds of accidents and mental confrontations with Great Old Ones while studying forbidden spells.

Of course, the side effects were equally obvious. For ten to thirty minutes after taking it, the drinker would relive the most painful experience of their life over and over again.

For Tierra, that was naturally the experience of being crushed to death by a freezer after the explosion.

Although he had not felt much at the time, that pain had still been recorded by his subconscious and erupted within the illusion created by the Huris Potion.

After his shower, Tierra lay limply on the bed. He planned to rest for a while before learning his next spell.

He only had one short day each week when he could study magic without being affected at all, so he had to make the most of his time.

Five years had passed since he left the orphanage. Though he possessed a fortune in ancient coins, Tierra had cautiously taken out only a few to pawn, exchanging them for enough money to support himself for one or two months. For future expenses, he planned to find a job.

But it was not easy for a six-year-old child to find work. He was either rejected outright, or people with ill intentions tried to sell him into certain underground establishments.

Unable to find work for a long time, Tierra had no choice but to learn from the other homeless children on London's streets and resort to petty theft.

However, that soon changed. During one theft attempt, he was stopped by a Chinese Auntie who could not speak English. After discovering that Tierra spoke English far better than her husband's gesturing English, the plump, kind-hearted, beautiful Chinese Auntie offered Tierra a job—working as a cashier at her restaurant.

Meals and lodging included, six days of work and one day off, with a monthly salary of twenty pounds. His usual job was to sit at the cashier's counter and translate what dishes customers wanted to order. When things got busy, he might help out in the kitchen.

This attic in the old district had originally belonged to one of her friends. The friend had returned to China and temporarily entrusted it to her care. Since it was sitting empty anyway, she arranged for Tierra to live there.

Tierra saved most of the wages he earned.

Even brewing Huris Potion had cost him very little. After all, this library was not merely a library—it was also located on a planet with an ecological environment similar to Earth's. Centered around the library entrance, Merlin had opened up more than ten mu of herb fields.

Although Merlin had been gone for nearly five or six hundred years, most of the herbs had grown wildly like weeds due to the suitable climate. Holding the "Complete Guide to Magical Herbs" he had found on the third bookshelf, Tierra easily gathered most of the ingredients needed to brew Huris Potion. He found the remaining few at a Traditional Chinese Medicine shop in Chinatown.

"Knock, knock, knock."

Just as Tierra was about to get up and learn another spell, he seemed to hear a tapping sound against the glass.

A few seconds later, he saw a mottled owl land in front of his skylight with a paper letter in its beak, then tap the glass three times with its short beak.

"Knock, knock, knock."

"Could it be..." Thinking of