Claire After picking up the corpses, he walked around inside and outside the ruins and confirmed that the three people had escaped, and then gave up the plan of chasing them.
Finally, he took out the spirit body of Horna, and with some tricks, he learned from him where some treasures in the ruins were stored.
Except for a few of the treasures discovered by the previous wizards, all the other treasures went into Claire's pocket.
However, those treasures did not bring much to Claire. For Claire, the biggest gain was the stone carved with strange runes obtained from Kelly, and the soul of Horna...
Both of these can help him advance to Archmage faster and then return to the original world.
In Martin's castle, Claire brought the spirit body of Horna into the laboratory.
After entering the castle, Claire also released the restraint on Horna's spirit body, allowing him to change from a spherical shape back to a human form. However, he still cast a spell to restrain it to avoid any further trouble.
"Boy, let me go. I admit that you are very smart. You did guess what I was thinking..." Horna's soul kept chattering along the way.
"I don't plan to take your body now. As long as you let me go and find a wizard for me to possess you, I will give you the perfect Cultivation Method."
Horna has been tempting Claire, but Claire is not moved at all, just as if his chattering has fallen on deaf ears.
"I didn't lie to you! I can swear! That perfect Cultivation Method is what all wizards pursue. Are you sure you don't want it?"
After arriving in the laboratory, Claire finally turned around and talked to him, "No, I have it myself."
"You have?" Horna was surprised, but quickly added, "Your Cultivation Method must not be as perfect as mine! Really! I spent thousands of years perfecting my Cultivation Method, and your Cultivation Method is not as good as mine at all!" When Horna said this, his tone was full of confidence. That was the summary of his life. He didn't believe that Cultivation Method could not compare to Claire.
"Are you sure?" Claire chuckled.
From Claire's laugh, Horna felt a little uneasy, but he still stiffened his neck and said, "What's there to compare with? Mine is definitely better!"
"Then look at this." Claire threw out the Cultivation Method that Martin had modified before. In his opinion, the Cultivation Method still had many flaws, but for wizards in this world, it was already a product of the times.
Horna turned over the pages of the book hesitantly, his expression became particularly good-looking, and he turned the pages faster and faster, until finally there was only a look of shock and surprise on his face.
"This... how is this possible!"
"This is actually more perfect than what I have researched! Many aspects and routes are things I have never imagined..." Horna's hand holding the book trembled. Finally, he raised his head and stared directly into Claire's eyes and asked, "Where did you get this from?"
Claire took the book back from the other party's hand, "I have no obligation to tell you the answer." After saying that, he threw the Cultivation Method casually to the test bench aside.
Horna's eyes followed the throwing trajectory of the book from top to bottom. When the book fell on the test bench, his heart couldn't help but feel uncomfortable, as if something he cherished was being treated casually by others.
"Since you already have a more perfect Cultivation Method, why did you catch me..." Horna asked faintly. He thought that his value was to have a more perfect Cultivation Method, but Claire obviously didn't need that kind of thing.
Claire smiled slightly, "Didn't I say it at the beginning? I'm not interested in that Cultivation Method, but I am quite interested in you."
Horna's pupils shrank and he wanted to take a step back, but found that he was restrained and couldn't move at all.
"What do you mean?"
Claire looked at Horna with a faint smile and said softly, "Then Water Mirror Space should be specially designed by you to nourish your spirit body so that it will not be consumed for a long time and even your spiritual intelligence will not exist. And you have been nourished for thousands of years, plus you are the spirit body of a legendary wizard. How much soul material do you think you should have?"
Soul matter is also a type of energy. It can be said to be a higher level of energy. If used for breakthroughs, the effect will be twice the result with half the effort.
Being stared at by Claire and saying such words, Horna felt his goosebumps stand up again, like a prey being targeted by a hunter.
He said tremblingly, "You want to absorb my soul material? Then be promoted to an epic level wizard!"
Claire snapped his fingers, "Correct answer, but there is no reward."
After getting the definite answer from Claire, Horna panicked and wanted to open his mouth to seek some hope of survival for himself, but when the words came to his lips, he felt how powerless those words were, and there was no way he could gain the possibility of survival for himself.
His biggest trump card, "perfect Cultivation Method", the other party already had, and it was even better than his own. Horna didn't know what to do now. The other party was eyeing his life, and he couldn't think of any reason to persuade the other party to give up.
"Are you going to do it yourself or let me do it?" Claire suddenly asked.
Horna then came back to his senses, "What do you mean?"
"It means, do you want to survive?"
Horna nodded quickly, he didn't care about face at all in the face of life and death.
"Strip off your own soul matter yourself. If you can survive after stripping it off, I will spare your life." Claire said softly. If he were to forcibly strip it away, the quality and quantity of the soul matter would decrease to a certain extent under the resistance of the other party. In order to maintain quality and quantity, Claire gave Horna a choice to survive.
Horna's eyes changed several times in just one second after hearing Claire's words. Is this really a person? How could such cruel words come out of a person's mouth.
Claire's proposal is equivalent to asking a person to Ling Chi himself with a knife and peel off the flesh and blood from his body piece by piece. The pain of stripping away the soul material is even more painful than Ling Chi.
Seeing the hesitant look in Horna's eyes, Claire smiled slightly, "Is it so difficult to make a choice? Then I'll do it."
Horna quickly stretched out his hand, stopped Claire and said, "No, no, no! I've thought about it, I'll peel it off myself."
"But can you keep your promise? If I survive, you will spare my life."
"Do you think you can still bargain in this situation? Believe it or not, the decision is in your hands."
While Claire was talking, Horna kept staring closely at Claire's eyes, trying to get some clues, but Claire's eyes were always calm without any fluctuation.
"Okay! I believe you!" Horna gritted his teeth. If Claire had just vowed to let him go, Horna would not believe it in his heart.
"You made the right choice."
Then Claire quickly stirred the transparent liquid in the beaker with a glass rod. When the liquid inside became thick enough, Claire stopped what he was doing, and then poured the transparent, viscous liquid with a hint of light into the air.
After the viscous liquid was spilled, it quickly changed. The liquid quickly expanded into a substance similar to marshmallows, filling the entire laboratory. Those substances similar to marshmallows are in the illusion, and Claire is not affected at all when walking inside. On the contrary, it is a bit of a hindrance to Horna, the spirit body.
This is a container specially prepared by Claire to retain the soul material. Otherwise, if a substance like a beaker is used to come into contact with the soul material, the soul material cannot be preserved at all.
"Okay, we can start." Claire lay lazily on the chair and said.
Then, an irregular and terrifying scream that made people feel scalp numb came from the laboratory. Upton assured that this was the scariest sound he had ever heard, bar none.