Academic gathering with a lich

Lyle actually didn’t want to visit Professor Arnold; after the incident involving Merfolk Vina, he felt his relationship with the professor was far from amicable. Especially after hearing the recent rumors about Arnold’s changes, it felt like a thorn stabbing into his chest. Lyle held an ominous impression of Arnold, even fear. After much contemplation, Lyle still didn’t avoid tonight’s class. Whether it was the fear of the Omen Giant in his heart or the ominous intuition towards Arnold, Lyle had to find out for himself. Only then could the heavy stone weighing on his heart finally fall.

The Necromancer Figure Club had taken in some new members from the Spirit Summoning Studies, who were provided with detailed information on the crafting of the Spine Wheel and enthusiastically supplied with all the necessary materials for its creation. These eager novices spent days and nights in the spacious side room practicing the spellwork to modify and create objects, and the Spine Wheels they produced, once adjusted by Lyle and others, would sell for a tidy sum among the Demon Race. Andrey’s Liches, obsessed with academia, were extremely keen on this practice that could enhance their skills, even though it mostly involved repetitive, mechanical actions. Since no strict production goals were imposed on them, the place Lyle jokingly called the "assembly center" occasionally produced new surprises, but the inherent lack of ability still led most people to choose to manufacture the Spine Wheel.

All the way there, Mr. Variability was touting his theory of capitalism, and while the outcome was positive, Lyle couldn’t commend the viewpoint that treated Lich researchers as mere tools. Incidentally, Variability was also such a Lich, so was this a case of cannibalism amongst their own kind?

According to sparkling feedback, the Spine Wheel had already sparked a craze among the Black Abyssal Demons, and the daily orders kept piling up, making the Necromancer Figure Club’s labor force seem severely understaffed, forcing them to increase the selling price to dampen the Demon Race’s purchasing fervor. Yet, the orders only increased!

"The higher prices make those Demons believe they’re getting something of value," Sparkling complained along the way, scribbling with a pen and calculating funds, "Damn it, how much have I lost."

The manipulator watched his taciturn club president, knocked on his indifferent mask, looked sideways at the red moon outside Andrey’s corridor, and began to mutter to himself.

"In that reservoir, the moon probably can’t be seen, right? Actually, I suspect Professor Arnold is a fake Spirit Summoning master because he never really took any classes seriously. We have attended his class three times, just meeting the minimum standards set by the academy. He just assigned us to clear some mud or other waste from the Chill Reservoir during those underground classes, and besides that, there was no teaching in the two-hour sessions. Either he is an ignorant fraud, or he is a petty person hoarding his trivial secrets. If it hadn’t been for Mr. Crimson’s strong recommendation, and the fact that every instructor has their quirks, I would have dropped the class just like most people."

The manipulator turned his head, pulling his absent-minded friend’s thoughts back to the present.

"I say, what’s your impression of Arnold?"

Sparkling tilted his head, "That smiling man?"

Mr. Variability also offered his opinion. "A Spirit Summoning capitalist, having us work for free without any form or semblance of compensation. In some sense, he indeed is a master of Spirit Summoning Studies, using us Liches as if we were mindless zombies— isn’t that Spirit Summoning?"

Lyle felt his friends’ attempt at consolation, albeit ineffective. His discomfort wasn’t with the new professor or the new course, but with Arnold as a person, though his friends couldn’t empathize with him as deeply.

Continuing to worry was of no help, so Lyle decided to join the conversation.

"Mr. Arnold can smile? I can’t imagine what his smile would look like." Indeed, he couldn’t imagine the smile on that Water Monkey with malice flowing through its sullied gaze.

"Not him smiling, Plague Doctor." Sparkling moved his hands across his face, reflective scales shifting like living things.

"Mr. Arnold wears a bone mask, a smiling bone mask; although it’s hard to describe that eerie smile, I can’t think of the word for it at the moment..."

Behind the mask they couldn’t see, Lyle’s pupils were dilating as he murmured softly,

"Mocking..."

"Yes! That’s the word! A mocking smile."

It seemed to be the familiar Chill Reservoir they were headed to as Lyle and the others descended the spiral staircase leading to the Chill Reservoir. Whether it was psychological or not, the temperature in the vicinity kept dropping, and the staircase seemed to have no end.

When they reached the very bottom, a white frost covered the stone bricks, and Nia formed a thin layer of thermal insulation on the surface of Lyle’s skin.

This place was once a familiar reservoir, but not everything was so familiar anymore.

The original shell-like sealed door was gone, replaced by a black vertical strip of connective tissue that bridged the top and bottom, somewhat resembling the junction between tendons and muscles.

Perhaps because it wasn’t time yet, there weren’t many students waiting outside the reservoir. However, after communicating, it was learned that the dozen or so people standing here were all of Arnold’s students. The unnecessary underwater cleaning operations, repeated time and again, had exhausted the patience of those Liches students, leaving behind mostly those, like Lyle, who had additional channels of information or were genuinely interested idlers.

"The door has opened."

Not long after Lyle and the others stood in line, the curtain-like barrier opened a crack. Lyle guessed that these were like muscle tissues, given that Arnold was fundamentally a professor of the fleshly faction, displaying the content of his teachings to the students as the essence.

But these muscle-like things exhibited a behavior pattern utterly different from actual muscles.

Muscles can only stretch and contract, like a spring, but these black substances bent to both sides, tearing open a shuttle-shaped gap in the center of the barrier. Even at maximum stretch, this gap allowed only two people to pass side by side.

"I guess Professor Arnold designed it this way to show that his power goes beyond ordinary flesh, to exhibit his eeriness. But it’s not efficient. Look, such a large door can only open so little."

Gesticulating flamboyantly, he beckoned his companions forward, walking over the threshold, only to realize that his Plague Doctor club leader hadn’t followed.

"Boss, what are you standing there for?"

As the door opened, Lyle stood in place, transfixed by such a curious spectacle, as if his soul had been hooked away, until the metallic call snapped him back to reality.

Lyle took a breath of cold air and then silently stepped into the reservoir.

It wasn’t as Flamboyant had thought. Those bending flesh weren’t meant to display Arnold’s uniqueness.

The door that unfolded was actually mimicking something commonly seen; it was an eye. The black substances were eyelids, and the shuttle-shaped gap at the center was akin to an open pupil.

As the door slowly opened, in Lyle’s eyes, it was as if a giant beast had opened its vertical pupil.

Lyle knew his thoughts were absurd, but something in his head still twisted his thoughts into an even more terrible conjecture.

Arnold’s message was clear.

I am watching you.