A Serious Student Who Only Takes Nine Potions a Day

The two of them lowered their heads in unison to look at their skinny, stick-like arms, their eyes filled with hatred for the past few months of pill-taking.

What a wonderful opportunity.

What a dreamlike invitation.

Then they heard Evan speak at an unhurried pace.

"Sorry, I have to carry sacks at the docks this weekend. I don't have time."

He turned to leave.

Eldin's eye twitched.

This was already the second time in a week that she had lost to the words "carry sacks."

"You!"

Lane and John lunged from either side and grabbed Evan's wrists.

Their faces were full of disappointment at his failure to live up to expectations.

Their fingers clamped around him like crab claws, as if they wanted nothing more than to force him before Eldin and make him kowtow.

Eldin took a deep breath and quickly adjusted her mindset.

"Are you short on money?"

Evan nodded seriously.

"Very. I've been eating a lot lately, and I can barely afford food anymore."

Eldin's eyes shifted.

"How about this? Saturday, Sunday, and Monday. Three days. I'll give you three dollars a day in commission."

When Lane and John heard that number, their eyes nearly popped out of their heads.

Following such a top-tier noble beauty to a football match was already an enormous honor to them.

And they would actually get paid.

Three dollars a day.

Nine dollars for three days.

Nine dollars was equivalent to a week's income from testing pills, or more than ten days of work for a dockworker who neither ate nor drank.

The envy and jealousy in their hearts were about to burst through the tops of their heads.

They turned at the same time and glared at Evan. Their eyes said only one thing: if this guy dared say "I have to carry sacks" again, they would pin him to the ground and beat him up on the spot.

The moment Evan heard the word "commission," his attitude made a complete one-eighty.

The casual air of "I'm busy, I don't have time" vanished completely, replaced by an ingratiating smile.

"Miss Hurst, you're an excellent judge of character."

He raised a hand and thumped his solid chest.

"Please rest assured, miss. I'll defend your safety with my life."

Eldin was briefly speechless as she watched Evan switch faces so instantly.

She muttered to herself.

"I can clearly smell the overwhelming male hormones on this guy. No matter how I look at him, he doesn't seem impotent..."

"Why doesn't he react to my appearance at all?"

She suppressed that trace of confusion and regained her usual composure.

"Be at Bolton City South Station before nine tomorrow morning."

"You don't need to prepare any clothes. I'll arrange a special uniform for you."

With that, she turned and left.

The hem of her deep purple coat traced an elegant arc across the wooden corridor floor.

Once Eldin disappeared around the corner, the people around Evan erupted.

"Arkham, you're fucking lucky!"

"Damn it, I'm going to die of jealousy!"

Evan smiled and patted Lane and John on the shoulders.

"Try to take fewer pills from now on. A healthy body is better than anything."

Under everyone's envious and jealous gazes, he quickened his pace, ran down the teaching building's steps, and rushed out of the school gates, only to see a tram close its doors and leave.

Evan could only stand by the roadside in frustration and wait for the next one.

Only Lane, John, and several poor students remained in the open space before the athletic field. They had not followed him.

Lane sighed.

"Stop staring. Arkham isn't one of us anymore."

He paused.

"Remember to go volunteer at the church tomorrow."

John rubbed the toe of his shoe against the ground twice before muttering.

"Why? We're both poor boys from the bottom rung. Why does he get to become healthy after taking pills and go watch football with Miss Hurst?"

"While we have to go volunteer at the church?"

The others instinctively clenched their fists.

People do not fear scarcity; they fear unfairness.

Malice quietly grew in the cracks between jealousy and dissatisfaction.

Evan hurried home.

By the time he got off the tram, it was already completely dark.

The night wind in mid-November had grown a little chilly, and the temperature had dropped to around three degrees.

The familiar alley on Gooding Street was, as usual, piled with garbage. Moldy vegetable leaves and damp, rotting newspapers littered the cobblestones.

The moment he entered the alley, he slowed down.

The stray cat was gone.

That skinny gray tabby appeared beside the garbage pile every morning and evening without fail, squatting there and searching for fish bones with its paws.

It had never missed a day for an entire week.

But today, the alley was unnaturally quiet.

There were no meows. No rustling of rats.

Even the wind's wail through the clotheslines seemed to have been swallowed by something.

"Something's wrong."

At that very second.

A fierce pain exploded from deep within his abdomen.

As though someone had calculated the timing perfectly.

The pain was no longer the dull, bearable burning sensation from before.

It was agony that pierced his marrow, as if countless red-hot wires were simultaneously boring through his nerves.

Evan's legs gave out, and his knees slammed straight into the cold, wet cobblestones. His whole body began convulsing uncontrollably.

With trembling fingers, he pulled the bottle of Copper Pills from his jacket pocket, poured one out, and stuffed it into his mouth.

It was useless.

The Copper Pill's painkilling effect was crushed by an invisible hand in the face of pain at this level.

He could clearly feel countless invisible hands inside his body manipulating his blood vessels, internal organs, brain, and eyeballs.

Every fiber was being torn apart and rewoven.

"The potion is about to be fully digested!"

"That damned woman! If she hadn't delayed me and made me miss that tram, I'd already be home!"

Evan gritted his teeth.

One hundred and sixty-eight hours—the digestion time for the demon hunter characteristic.

Now, only the final thirty minutes remained.

That was why he had been in such a hurry to get home today.

He knew this moment would come, and he did not want it to happen in front of any stranger.

Pulis Attacks, Senior Brother Richard (Please Follow)

Evan braced himself against the icy wall and struggled forward.

With every step, the blazing fire in his abdomen burned more fiercely.

Just then.

A light, drifting figure appeared ahead in the alley.

Faint and indistinct, like a silhouette seeping out from the darkness itself.

A tall, slender figure.

A tailored black cape draped down to his ankles.

He was utterly out of place in this filthy alley piled with garbage and reeking of damp mold.

It was as if a finely retouched portrait had been mistakenly cut out and pasted onto the crime page of a newspaper.

Pulis.

"When the demon hunter characteristic reaches the final stage of digestion, your blood vessels, bones, and internal organs will all be reconstructed."

Pulis's voice remained calm and elegant, as if he were teaching an ordinary anatomy lesson in class.

"Your liver will expand further and begin producing black blood."

"Your ribs will expand outward, and your bones will thicken to provide space for a larger chest cavity capable of holding more internal organs."

"Your blood vessel walls will thicken. Your heart will beat faster. Your body temperature will rise. Your blood will boil from the excessive influx of supernatural matter."

The corner of his mouth lifted in an almost imperceptible curve.

"These will be a rather difficult thirty minutes."

With every sentence he spoke, his body slid forward a meter in a way that defied common sense.

He did not walk or swing his arms. His figure simply flickered in place, and the next second, he appeared closer.

Like a ghost, like a projection, like the shadows of the alley themselves were moving toward Evan.

Evan knelt on the ground, drenched in cold sweat, the hair at his temples wetly plastered to his cheeks.

He raised his head and forced out a low, hoarse sentence.

"I thought there was... some affection between teacher and student."

Pulis lowered his head slightly and looked at him.

"Do you remember how many pieces of bread you've eaten?"

His voice was as calm as if he were asking about something completely insignificant.

"Would you develop feelings for the bread you've eaten?"

After hearing that, Evan let out a rattling laugh from his throat.

The laughter was mixed with pain, so twisted that it did not sound like it could have come from an eighteen-year-old.