Academic gathering with a lich-Chapter 483 - 445 Kevin’s Help

"What’s that, ’Mutating Skeleton Grafting Technique’?"

"A higher discipline of White Bone Spirit Summoning Studies. Are you sure you want to hear about it, Kevin? It will waste some of your time."

"Wasting time? I’m not short on time. Look, I’ve run to the graveyard in the middle of the night. Oh, I’m not targeting you guys because you’re doing legitimate things. I mean, I’m free right now."

At Kevin’s reply, the bird-beaked Lyle chuckled helplessly under his mask, always so during his student years, filled with curiosity.

"Higher White Bone Spirit Summoning Studies, to put it simply, is the study of skeletal mutations. The skeleton of the Eternal Hound capable of traversing space-time can also be considered an abnormal mutated bone. Mutated bones can be artificially created. The ability to transport is one kind of mutating factor."

"Because the Eternal Hound is a rare magical beast, especially now, this kind of magical beast should be on the brink of extinction. Or has already gone extinct in corners unknown to us. Our source of mutated bones comes from our professor—the Dragon sir, who has raised a whole bunch of Skeleton Hounds."

Lyle took out a palm-sized Crystal Bone Fragment from that cluster of floating green light and placed it in Kevin’s hand.

"Cartilage? Colloid?"

Lyle shrugged, "Don’t let human anatomy restrain your thoughts, Doctor Kevin. Although this bone is soft and elastic, the entire skeleton of the Eternal Hound is of this material. We suspect that the reason this colloid-like skeleton appears is related to being in a space-time rift for a long time, as a chaotic space-time rift requires your body to have a certain ’elasticity’."

"This piece in your hand, Kevin, is all the Mutated Bone we got from Professor Dragon."

"All of it? But..." Kevin looked behind Lyle at the circle of skeletons emitting a faint green glow. The skeleton in his hand was as insignificant as a drop in the ocean.

The plague doctor nodded slightly, his bird-beak mask floating lightly with his movements. Lyle spread his hands as if to relish Kevin’s look of amazement.

"This is the class assignment given to us by Professor Dragon, regarding the replication and induction of mutated skeletons. We’ve allowed this tiny bone fragment ’to grow’."

"To grow? You talk as if it’s a living thing..."

"Spirit Summoning Studies, literally the subject that imbues inanimate objects with ’liveliness,’" said Lyle, taking the bone fragment and leaning on the floating skeletons, signaling Kevin to come closer for a look. The original skeleton and the induced skeleton had subtle differences on their surfaces. On the original skeleton, there was a fine layer of tree-ring-like regular patterns. The induced skeleton, however, had a layer of tiny spines."

"Grafting regular skeletons to induce mutations by making them contact the original bone is the ’Mutating Skeleton Grafting Technique’."

"Natural mutations possess powerful capabilities, but artificial bones are more suitable for us. They exist specifically for the situations we adapt them for."

The Skeleton Gate is a ring radiating green light, made up of numerous bone fragments, mostly flat crescent shapes. The huge curved bones that form the arch of the gate have completely defied biology; there are no creatures in nature with spines bent at two hundred seventy degrees."

These bones were mutated by Lyle and his group specifically for the construction of the Skeleton Gate.

Kevin confirmed the difficulty of building his own Skeleton Gate and, after a moment of regret,

"So, can we try out the transport effect of the Skeleton Gate? It seems you’ve already formed a gate."

Lyle turned his head back, briefly locking eyes with the three members of the Necromancer Figure Club amid the ghastly green glow of the Skeleton Gate.

"As a matter of fact, Kevin, we have indeed completed the construction of the Skeleton Gate. But we’ve hit a new bottleneck. We’ve made the gate but are struggling with where to place it. Professor Dragon’s assignment was to construct the Skeleton Gate. I have completed this task through the ’Heretical Growth’ capability that comes with my White Bone Control."

"But casting the Skeleton Gate Spell involves two parts— the construction of the gate and its positioning."

"Sensing Space rifts and positioning the bone fragments of the Skeleton Gate in the corresponding locations can open the respective transport gate."

"However, our course progress hasn’t reached that stage yet. Spirit Summoning Studies have tools for Sensing Space, but we haven’t mastered them because that is knowledge for the next lesson. Without external help, sensing space requires considerable talent, and unfortunately, none of us have a spatial sensing talent like William does."

"So we’re stuck."

It’s indeed frustrating to suddenly hit a roadblock when research has been going smoothly, especially when adaptation and manipulation are involved. They were mages before switching to Spirit Summoners, but it seems spending too much time with the Literary Club has made their solid mage foundations obsolete.

Realizing he may have accidentally poked a sore spot, Kevin was at a loss for how to change the subject.

The atmosphere fell into silence.

The sound of chewing emerged from the side, as Nia used her tentacles to hang from a branch, nibbling on cookies she had brought back from Naslan Castle. Due to the direction of the wind, the cookie crumbs fell onto everyone’s heads.

Although Andrey the lich didn’t mind the crumbs falling on him, Lyle still intended to warn Nia, as it was a very impolite behavior. Kevin was human, and his tolerance was one thing, but Nia couldn’t keep being mischievous by taking advantage of her friend’s indulgence.

Then, Lyle saw it.

Because of the wind, those crumbs that were supposed to fall on Kevin turned midair and scattered on the members of the Necromancer Figure Club, including himself.

It was that damn luck acting up again.

Wait, luck?

Lyle had a good idea, and with a snap of his fingers, the Crystal Bone Fragments that were suspended in the air by magic power fell to the ground, and the ghastly green glow disappeared. Lyle picked up a Bone Fragment and placed it in Kevin’s palm.

"Kevin, feel like playing a jigsaw puzzle?"

The mutual understanding built up over years of playing immediately made Kevin grasp his intentions.

"Using my luck to find a dimensional rift, good idea, Lyle."

"Just habitually relying on your luck, believing it won’t let me down."

With Lyle’s assistance, Kevin started to position the Bone Fragments in the air, one by one, reconnecting them into a ring.

Shiny and the others expressed their confusion, but Lyle didn’t elaborate to his companions.

Because at the next moment, a miserable green light filled the vision of the four of them, and as the green slowly diluted, a profound wormhole that seemed bottomless had already opened at the center of the Skeleton Gate.

"Click," "click," "click."

Lyle was certain, that was the sound of Shiny and the others’ jaws dropping.

An utterly ordinary human, holding a Bone Fragment and casually placing it, had just casually assembled the Bone Fragments, and fused the Skeleton Gate with the space-time rift.

The Skeleton Gate Spell was successfully released by a human.

Kevin laughed heartily.

"Since I’ve opened this gate, why not test the teleportation effect first..."

Shiny rushed out.

"Lord Kevin! How could we let you risk yourself! Please allow me to scout ahead!"

Whether out of respect for Kevin’s luck or simply the desire to be the first to experience the Skeleton Gate, Shiny dove into the Skeleton Gate.

Kevin’s words were not yet finished.

"... Maybe we should test it with a stick or a branch first."

Thirty minutes later, Lyle received a message from Shiny.

"Boss, I’m now at Andrey’s lost and found, my skull and the fingers with the rings are here."

"There’s something wrong with that Skeleton Gate; it teleported ’me’ to every corner of Andrey."