Book 4: Chapter 3: Useful Invention
âGosh, Iâm dead tired. Finally managed to shake that damned chief disciplinarian off.â
Lilith was panting while leaning against a tree. It had been a long while since she last had to flee for her life. That really took a toll on her petite body.
âSeriously, that b̲a̲s̲t̲a̲r̲d̲ actually tried to entrap me. Is this what an elder should be doing? If he had that kind of time, shouldnât he be checking on the deanâs private life? Who knows, he might actually discover that he has a few illegitimate children.â
âAnd maybe one of them could be his son.â
Lilith plopped down on the ground to rest. The explosion scroll left her clothes in tatters. She looked no different than a beggar.
To be honest, Lilithâs heart was really aching right now.
It wasnât because she finally decided to be thrifty, but because there were really not many scrolls left in her hand.
There were still many saint-level ranked scrolls, but she couldnât use them indiscriminately lest they cause a huge commotion if she wasnât careful enough.
As for those ranked below saint level, she had used up 90% of them back in the underground auction house.
âAhhhhh, there goes another one,â Lilith wailed while clutching the storage ring on her finger.
Lilith gritted her teeth again at the thought of that. She had really made it too easy for the auction house by blowing it up. She should have demolished all the toilets instead!
Looking up at the tiny patches of sky through the gaps between the dense leaves, Lilith felt poor for the very first time after being reincarnated into this life.
Well, it wasnât too bad. At least it was a very familiar feeling.
She looked up at the sky in a dazeâ¦
And suddenly recalled that there seemed to be something very important waiting for her to do.
But what was it?
âHelpâ¦â
A faint cry for help suddenly came from the depths of the forest.
Lilith frowned slightly. There was no way she would mishear that. Someone really was calling for help.
Did that person lose her way like her?
The voice sounded weak. That person had probably been lost for a long time and was dying of exhaustion at this point.
But whatever reason it was, Lilith couldnât possibly ignore the plea for help, since they were on the academyâs grounds.
She stood up, dusted her butt and went toward the voice.
â¦â¦â¦
âHelpâ¦â
A middle-aged man in white robes appeared before Lilith.
He was lying face down on the ground while crying weakly for help.
The middle-aged man struggled to lift his head up, perhaps because he sensed someone approaching.
He showed his thin and withered face. The dark circles under his eyes made him look like a panda.
âHey uncle⦠are you alright?â
Lilith approached the middle-aged man cautiously, for fear that she would kill him with the vibrations of her footsteps if she wasnât careful enough.
It was at this moment, that the middle-aged man suddenly snapped open his eyes and opened his mouth. He grabbed Lilithâs calves with his withering hands. His grip had incredible strength, it was as though his weakness from earlier was just an illusion.
Lilith was startled and almost reflexively fought back. But the middle-aged man latched himself onto Lilithâs calves. After staring at her for a while, he squeezed out two words through his teeth.
âIâm hungry.â
Lilith was speechless.
Why couldnât this man just tell her that he was hungry in the first place? Lilith was so scared that she thought he was some zombie that transcended from another world and nearly kicked him in his freaking head.
A few moments later, the middle-aged man was wolfing down on a piece of jerky that Lilith offered to him. He looked no different than a starving ghost.
âEat slowly. Iâm not gonna take any responsibility if you choke yourself to death.â
âUNFFFFâ¦!â
As soon as Lilithâs voice fell, the middle-aged manâs face turned purple and he started pounding on his chest.
Lilith didnât know what to say.
She gave the man a hard slap on his back and successfully helped him to dislodge the food that was choking him.
The middle-aged manâs body trembled violently before he turned around and looked at Lilith with a conflicted expression on his face. âThank you, missy.â
âNo worries, just doing what I should be doing.â
âCan you be more gentle with others next time? No ordinary person would be able to survive that slap of yours.â
âOh please, how can you accuse a lady of not being gentle enough? Do you want me to punch you in the chest with my small fist?â
The middle-aged manâs face instantly stiffened before he silently turned his head around and resumed his attack on the jerky.
âAre you a teacher?â
âYep.â The middle-aged man nodded. âThe nameâs Kumar. Iâm a professor in this academy.â
Lilith raised her eyebrows in surprise.
The academy only had a handful of personnels that were qualified to receive the title of a professor. In fact, there were less than twenty of them in the entire academy. This itself called for a certain level of authority and hence, the title came with great privileges.
However, this sloppy middle-aged man who was lying on the ground calling for help with a withering face and dark circles under his eyes that made him seem like he had never slept before turned out to be a professor in this academy?
âWell then⦠Professor Kumar, what are you doing in a place like this? How did you end up in this state?â
âMaking an invention.â
âWhat kind of invention?â Lilithâs curiosity was piqued. âCan you show me?â
Professor Kumar threw a glance at Lilith. âYou want to see?â
âYeah!â
âOkay then⦠Iâll show you since you saved my life.â
Professor Kumar stood up and staggered toward a specific direction.
Lilith quickly followed behind him.
The place wasnât actually that far. They just went through a few bushes before they arrived at his lab.
There were still traces of friction left on the ground. It would seem like Professor Kumar had crawled all the way from here.
Lilith looked up at the sky. âAn open-air lab?â
Kumar nodded. âBetter ventilation and easier for people to hear your desperate cries for help when youâre dying.â
Lilith didnât know how to respond to that.
She ignored the manâs abnormal logic and turned her attention to the surroundings.
Aside from a workbench and an unidentified object covered by a black cloth, everything else was natural resources. Lilith didnât even see any essentials needed for survival. Not only that, there were all sorts of vines covering the workbench.
Of course, there were also various mechanical parts among the weeds under her feet. Lilith didnât know how thick they were piled up to, but she could hear the crunch they made with every footstep she took.
Was Professor Kumar living in this kind of environment? In a certain sense, he was really an amazing person.
âThis is the invention that I have just completed.â Professor Kumar walked to an unidentified object covered by a black cloth, then suddenly pulled the black cloth off.
The object was shaped like a huge drum. Its main part was made of metal but the drumhead was made of some unknown black ore. Beneath it was a cube console with a row of colorful buttons.
âWhat is this?â
âI call it a mentally-challenged attractor. Its function is to suck up creatures with the lowest IQ within a radius of one kilometer, then trap them on the device so that they cannot move.â
Lilith didnât know what to comment on the name and application of this toy, so she shot a direct question, âSo, what is its practical use?â
âIt can be very useful on the battlefield. Think about it, isnât there a saying: all brawn and no brain? If we suck up the brawniest enemy and trap him, wonât we be able to win easily?â
That did make a lot of sense.
âBut.. how do you make sure that this brawniest guy is on the enemyâs side?â
Professor Kumar was stunned by the question before he fell into deep thought. âTrue⦠Why didnât I think of that⦠Why didnât Iâ¦?â
âIn other words, this is actually a useless toy?â
âDo not insult my invention as useless!â Professor Kumar said angrily. âI will prove to you that my invention is very useful.â
After saying that, he pressed down on what seemed to be a power switch.
The drumhead of the mentally-challenged attractor began to glow and heat up, thenâ¦
Thenâ¦
Thenâ¦
Then nothing happened.
âIsnât it uselessâ¦?â
âImpossible! I actually painstakingly created this within half a month! How could it be useless? Increase the power!!â Professor Kumar roared and his eyes turned red.
While Professor Kumar turned the power to the maximum in a fit of anger, something unusual suddenly happened.
A figure was drawn in by a certain force. It broke through countless obstacles and arrived here after traveling through a long distance.
It collided against the drumhead of the mentally-challenged attractor with a loud bang.
âLook, it really sucked in a mentally r̲e̲t̲a̲r̲d̲e̲d̲ one! Iâm right after all, my invention is very useful!â Professor Kumar exclaimed in his excitement.
Lilithâs face stiffened as her limbs turned cold.
It was a figure that was at least three meters tall, had a square and tough-looking face. His small sexy eyes looked like they could shoot laser beams at any time. His tight-fitting red and blue dojo uniform seemed like it could be ripped apart by the muscles underneath it any time. The little curl on his forehead looked like it had just been scorched as green smoke was still coming out of it.
Without a doubt, he was none other than Lord Mord, the chief disciplinarian who swore earlier that he wouldnât let Lilith get away with things.
Mord had a dumbfounded look on his face. He was holding a tattered little notebook in his hand. There were scratches from branches left all over his body and he looked as though he couldnât figure out the current situation.n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om
âWho am I? Where am I?â
He looked at Lilith and Kumar with dull eyes. âWhat are you two doing here?â