LIGHTNOVELONLINE Chapter 937
<937 – Rolling of Oknodie (5)>
The news of a monster entity’s assault on the Chimera Research Facility sent Alex into a frenzy of terror.
“Please! I don’t want to become a part of the monster entity, lose my identity, and get eaten! Please, Oknodie. Please save me! Please!”
“Come on now, what can I do? If the professor sent the monster entity, shouldn’t you at least be polite and suffer through it?”
“I admit it. I’m a bad guy. I’ve been screwing over the other researchers and trying to gather those desirable monster cells. But still, this is too much! This is just too miserable!”
Oknodie had little interest in Alex’s past.
All she knew was that Alex was so vile that he was worth a severe punishment from Titosso, and he deserved what was coming.
The monster entity was one way to dish out a reasonable punishment.
Watching a powerful person’s everything collapse in real time, realizing that others might take what’s theirs—it would be the perfect choice.
But a researcher fully dedicated to monster cells, who had no future outside this path, wasn’t someone remarkable.
“Animals that live for only today tend to feel the imminent crisis and fear more. For seniors, this might actually be a better opportunity, but if you don’t like it, there’s nothing I can do.”
“Are you going to save me?!”
“I felt heartbroken hearing about the research facility I was diligently raising monsters in getting wrecked, so yes!”
The reason Oknodie helped the teaching assistant was not out of altruism or some basic human decency but simply because she was upset that her things were getting hurt.
Some might call it arrogance and criticize them as being the same old same old, but Alex was still grateful for it.
Regardless, Oknodie was the only one who could save him now.
“Senpai, do you like hide-and-seek?”
“Hehehe—I love finding the best hiding spots! I could die from excitement!”
“Then you can go hide now!”
The Dark Princess’s hideout reminded him of the secret lairs or strongholds of the Wahyhiemhai Foundation.
Actually, such facilities did exist.
However, Alex didn’t know that the hidden location Oknodie was about to introduce wasn’t one of those!
With the magnitude of his accumulated sins, Alex was far too large to be safely kept like some revered artifact in such a secret and safe house.
“So where are we hiding?”
“For now, let’s start with the Research Dimension of the famous Professor Diogenes!”
“Okay, other professors’ research dimensions should be… What? Did you just say Research Dimension?”
Oknodie hid a charming, innocent smile while concealing one hand behind her back.
Not even realizing that something resembling a paper airplane was slipping into her backpack, a gut feeling struck fear into Alex as if he had made a wrong choice.
*
Alex was ready to tolerate just about any hideout.
He could bear the dwelling in a slummy area where even a piece of furniture couldn’t be fitted due to rampant burglaries.
He could endure a decrepit inn room that hadn’t been cleaned in so long it would be cleaner than a coffin.
[Are you planning to kill me here?!]
[Senpai has so many complaints! I found you a hiding place! You should be grateful!]
The world was vast, and there were plenty of worse hiding spots out there.
Unlike Professor Buzhaar’s cozy research lab where skill ensured comfort, Professor Diogenes’s research dimension was closer to a raw, untamed wilderness.
[Professor Diogenes’s mana studies on primordial beings focus on strength training by simply living! You’ll get stronger just by hiding! Isn’t that great?]
[I don’t need this kind of strength! What kind of crazy creature risks exposure to foreign dark mana and lives in such conditions?! This is just a primitive realm before the middle realm and dimensional fusion!]
While the Dark Empress Masugaki and the empire’s folk might drool over the notion of dark mana as a elixir, Alex was not one of them.
He had no desire to accumulate dark mana, especially without the ability to extract high-purity energy or filter out impurities.
[A balanced diet is key! By stacking various mana attributes, you reduce the spell’s casting time, enhance its potency, and significantly lower mana costs. It’s a game changer in magical battles!]
[I’m not a magician; I’m a monster! Even if I concede to being on the production side, I’m from the Knight Department! I’d rather train in melee than learn magic!]
Alex’s reaction was fundamentally rational.
The desperate cries of the graduates, losing their dimensional barriers and desperately trying to protect themselves from exposure, echoed the same sentiments.
“Professor! Naturalness means a non-artificial, pure environment, and the strength gained from living in the raw, natural world is true happiness. But must we really affirm such a hostile environment to humanity?”
“Professor Diogenes! We’ve found the happiness you desired. But we want the happiness we couldn’t achieve in the middle realm, so please give us permission to descend to the lower realms!”
“Honestly, the lab of Professor Weird next door would be better! Is this how people should live?! I just want to live like a person!”
As the teaching assistants poured out their desperate cries, Alex clenched his fists and silently cheered for them.
Yeah, that’s it.
If you all leave this insane place, the professor would be gone, and we could convince Oknodie to follow me out.
Please convince the professor!
The desperate will of the teaching assistants and Alex finally nudged Professor Diogenes to speak.
“You seek to transcend humanity’s limits, wanting the eternal being’s strength despite being unsatisfied even after graduating from the academy and coming to me.”
“If you want to live like a person, seek an environment where humans live, and if you aspire to be superhuman, seek an environment inhabited by superhumans; if you wish to embody the eternal being, find a realm where they dwell. To become a transcendent being of the lower realm, you need to live in such special dimensions, don’t you think?”
Teaching the peculiarities of mana accumulation by putting mud on the ground and having primordial beings pile it up leads to challenges of surviving in an extreme environment.
Though the term ‘higher realm’ sounds endearing as an ideal, it is academically based on a ‘higher mana distribution’ that is greater than that of the middle realm and does not signify an actual habitable world.
Unfortunately for humans, such worlds are rife with a natural flow that is exceedingly vast and harsh, making them terribly unsuitable for life.
Much like how a journey reaches one profound truth across myriad paths, the professors’ teachings inevitably converge into another dimension beyond the middle realm.
“We’ll settle for mediocrity. We’ll understand the limits of commoners, short-lived beings, and graduates, valuing the humble life and embracing the nature of the middle realm!”
“No. How could I ignore such desires knocking at my door? If you can’t trust yourself, then trust me who believes in you!”
“No way! We can’t do this!! We’ll all die like this!!”
As the students instinctively tried to filter out the impurities of dark mana to survive, their exposure levels gradually rose, and as the purity of mana increased, a shroud of the professor’s secrets enveloped the teaching assistants.
[Rabid Domain]
[Effect: All beings within this range enter a state of ‘compelled impulse’ where they cannot resist their desires.]
The professor’s energy stimulated the deepest desires of the instructors trapped in a dire situation.
Desires to grow stronger.
Desires to survive.
Desires to flaunt and boast in a way that makes others envy you.
Most of the teaching assistants poured all their mana into forcibly opening a dimensional gate and fled to the middle realm in order to survive.
However, a rare few exceptions, having successfully sorted the wheat from the chaff, found their growth desires overpowering their survival instincts and concentrated all their efforts on controlling the dark mana without being swept away by the atmosphere.
They restricted the contaminated parts to one area and formed a filtration mechanism in that region.
By channeling it into their fingernails, where dead cells of the bodily extremities gathered, they achieved the survival energy that could withstand cosmic environments and the primordial realm’s dark mana.
“Congratulations. Your true nature has transcended the middle realm and reached the higher realm. While they cannot escape the confines of the middle realm, your world will traverse dimensions.”
“Thank you, professor. Because of your faith in me, I managed to stabilize my wavering heart and adapt to the nature of the higher realm.”
If there’s anyone quaking at this moment of enlightenment, it was Alex, hiding and watching the scene unfold.
[See? This place isn’t so bad!]
[Ugh. That crazy person is going to rot away in the higher realm!]
The one who missed out on a chance to escape trembled, but in a way, it could be said luck was on his side.
The monster entity that picked up the scent of Alex’s bio-mana began to tear through the surrounding space and invade dimensions.
Grrrrr…
The monster entity that breached dimensions was rattled by the unfamiliar environment filled with pure dark mana.
Untamed energies that weren’t filtered could be harmful to a human body.
Just like uncontrolled fire could burn skin or damage organs, unregulated dark mana could alter and distort physical forms.
Especially for large life forms, they’re more sensitive to their natural environments.
The amount of mana they need to sustain life is substantially greater.
Which means that the monster entity, having entered this dimension, quickly absorbed dark mana faster and more than any other lifeform, causing rapid exposure.
[Degraded Monster Entity]
[Distorted Summoning]
A giant mass that overshadowed the sky swelled uncontrollably, with tumors protruding and its ‘eyes’ unable to fully open, contorting its face.
Under a thin red column, which descended in a crooked fashion like a child’s crayon drawing, monsters were born.
Lifeforms that clumsily shoved the ‘impurities’ of uncontrollable dark mana into themselves had their combat capabilities and lifespans thrown into chaos, making them into ‘abnormalities.’
“Professor, is this also a trial prepared for your students adapting to the higher realm?”
“No, what the hell is this? This is just horrifying.”
“…Profesor?”
Assaulted by the unexpectedly grotesque monsters, Professor Diogenes and his students, trapped by intense dimensional pressure, could only brace themselves for a fight.
[What should we do now?]
[We took all the attention, so let’s run, right?]
Alex was stunned by Oknodie’s absurd suggestion to pit professors against each other and flee.
[Unless you want to join us for a round?]
[No, I’ll pass on that.]
Excited, Alex darted off behind Oknodie.
Little did he know she’d leave a sign saying “Alex went on an errand” behind!