Monster, Arno No. 1

Ruslan watched as Serim gazed at Arno No. 1 with obsessed, crazed admiration. The hand holding his pen trembled as he let out a heavy sigh.

Serim, though you had not inherited your family's glorious and powerful gem-based magical power, you were still a genius.

Was he a genius?

Without question, yes.

Even with ordinary water-aspected magical power, Serim Zolgen was still among the finest of Lawrence's descendants.

Arno No. 1—a familiar creation of this caliber—was not something an ordinary person could research and produce. Even the magecraft circuit inscription techniques in the smallest details of this experiment were relatively rare technologies.

And all of this had been proposed, studied, and ultimately developed by Serim Zolgen alone.

Perhaps he was not a genius at using magecraft, but he was undoubtedly a genius at magecraft research.

He had inherited his ancestors' pioneering spirit, as well as their talent and pride, but he alone had failed to inherit Lawrence's capacity for self-reflection.

Serim, you would become duckweed without roots, swept by raging waves in another direction; you would become a boulder rolling down a mountain, growing ever more frenzied as you fell; you would become an aged lone wolf, so desperate with hunger that your eyes saw only what you wished to see.

"You will reap what you sow. So will I." Ruslan sank helplessly to the floor.

Meanwhile, Serim had already completed the final procedure.

He formed a contract with Arno No. 1, then removed the magecraft that isolated Arno No. 1 from his nervous system and stimulated Arno No. 1's senses.

Within Arno No. 1—within Norla Broll's consciousness—

He hugged his knees, like a piece of discarded refuse floating there.

That was rationality.

"I'm so scared."

"It hurts."

"It's so painful."

"Why? Why are you doing this to me?"

"I