High School of Demon Hunting

Chapter 1243: Chapter 305: The Witness (Part 2)

The Yellow Flowered Cat went to school to pick up Jiang Yu, because taking students off the island involved certain procedures that required a walk to the School Works Committee, which gave Zheng Qing some time to consult with Mr. Wu.

But before consulting, he had to adapt to his new body first.

Just like a person putting on a brand new piece of clothing, there would always be places that didn’t fit quite right. Zheng Qing tried stretching his fingers, curling his arms, trying to shakily stand up and take a few steps.

The whole process seemed somewhat comical, and a bit disturbing.

”Your body is no different from before,” Mr. Wu said, somewhat dismissively at the young wizard’s cautious attempts, ”you’ve just lost some ’parts’ due to the explosion... so I provided an appropriate environment for it to return to its original state, that’s all.”

”The discomfort you feel is because your soul has expanded a bit after the explosion—it’s an inevitable occurrence. It’s a side effect of using the forbidden curse. If you change into a cat several more times, your soul will slowly get used to the new body.”

”Why...would changing into a cat...make it easier to adapt?” Zheng Qing still spoke with a bit of unfamiliarity, so he tried to speak more to hasten the familiarization process: ”Mr. Wu...you...could have...given me...a...better-suited body.”

His reasoning was straightforward; like buying larger clothes when growing up as a child, since the soul had expanded slightly and the original body felt cramped, why not just make a slightly larger body?

At this thoughtless suggestion, Mr. Wu gave him a figurative ”brain explosion.”

”Creating a new body out of thin air is easy but it wouldn’t be of any help to you,” Mr. Wu said, holding his teacup, blowing on it, and explained, ”Every time the body and soul adapt to each other, it can enhance your ability to control the soul... Besides, old folks often say ’old clothes fit best,’ ’the original body suits the original soul’—although these sayings don’t have a very solid theoretical foundation now, practice has proven them to have some merit...”

”...change into a cat...” Zheng Qing rubbed the lump on his forehead, pressing on the previous question.

”Do you remember why you learned the Transformation in the first place?” Mr. Wu cut off the young wizard’s halting questions.

Why learn Transformation? Of course, Zheng Qing remembered.

Because he had suffered recurring headaches, and after multiple diagnoses by the big wizards at the school, they confirmed that the ’headache’ was an ’affliction’ belonging to Zheng Qing’s ’Witness’ talent, a side effect brought about by his talent. So, they taught him Transformation as a way to avoid the affliction.

”Just like I told you before, getting you to learn Transformation to avoid your affliction, and it actually working to suppress your headaches, was like a blind cat running into a dead mouse,” Mr. Wu mentioned, always with a certain exuberance, as if Professor Yao’s coincidental success proved something.

”Why?” Zheng Qing had countless questions in his mind, but because his tongue was not cooperating, he couldn’t articulate them clearly and could only muster a single why.

”Why do you possess the ’Witness’ talent, yet have so few clear eyewitness records?” Mr. Wu countered, then without waiting for Zheng Qing to think, he answered, ”Because you’re not a true ’Witness.’”

The boy’s eyes widened in surprise.

Just moments before, he had just recalled the ’eyewitness record’ of the Faceless Demon at Lin Zhong Lake murdering the Little White Cat, and now Mr. Wu was denying it. For a moment, he did not know if what he remembered was a hallucination or if he had just misheard Mr. Wu’s words.

But he soon confirmed he hadn’t misheard.

Mr. Wu tapped his teacup rim with his fingertips, considering his words, and simply explained, ”As you know, you are a forbidden curse. What is a forbidden curse? Theoretically, a forbidden curse contains the information of the entire world, which means everything the world has, you can have.”

”From this premise, you could understand the following statement—the Forbidden Curse will bring you many ’talents’ that you originally did not possess, but truly exist in the world,” like ”the witness.”

”The Forbidden Curse might grant you at some moment a kind of talent that your heart most deeply desires. Perhaps even you are not clear about this desire... but this does not mean you possess this talent.”

”This temporary talent is merely a gift from the Forbidden Curse, a one-time thing.”

”Of course, if you wish... I mean, if you have a strong will to possess a certain ’talent,’ maybe the Forbidden Curse could help you achieve this wish. But it’s like fishing a specific pebble out of the sea... extremely, extremely difficult. And no matter how many times you experience that ’talent,’ you will never possess it.”

”Because it’s not your talent.”

”As for experiencing a specific talent anytime and anywhere... I believe, only when you fully master the Forbidden Curse within your body, can you truly realize this ability.”

Zheng Qing listened numbly to his teacher’s explanation, an absurd thought suddenly popping into his head—Could I possibly have the power to transform seventy-two times?

Then his thoughts inevitably slipped towards a certain hairy-faced, thunder god-mouthed Monk.

It wasn’t until the teacher finished explaining that he came back to his senses, stuttering, and said, ”...While I was being boiled in the teapot, I saw many of my past dreams.”

Mr. Wu lightly ’oh’ed, put down the teacup in his hand, leaned slightly forward, interlaced his fingers, and a hint of interest appeared on his face.

”I saw... I remembered a lot of dreams I had forgotten.” Perhaps because he had grown accustomed to his new tongue, Zheng Qing’s speech became progressively more fluent.

”People always say ’Dreams are a safe harbor,’” the teacher spoke softly: ”On the beaches of this harbor are often buried many brilliant memories, and it’s not surprising if you’re willing to stoop down and pick some pretty pebbles from the sand.”

”Why are many of my dreams set against a background of red?” Zheng Qing steadied his spirit, looked earnestly into his teacher’s eyes, and detailed several of the dreams he had seen.

The teacher listened very carefully.

But his reply was somewhat less serious:

”This shows that First University made a very correct decision to put you in Jiuyou Academy.”

The teacher’s response came off more like a joke.

Zheng Qing tugged at the corner of his mouth, uncertain whether he should give a compliant laugh.

The teacher paused for a moment, then added, ”I am not you, so I can’t experience the dreams you described. But from your description, I can sense a feeling of oppression and fear. Red, in most contexts, signifies sacrifice, slaughter, or even destruction.”

”According to old-school Dream Fortune Tellers’ understanding, this represents the increasing challenges you will face. According to my personal interpretation, those reds are probably the essence of the ’Forbidden Curse’ that resides in the depth of your soul, unconsciously releasing a trace of its presence while you are unaware. You could consider it as the Forbidden Curse’s slow erosion... or assimiliation of your body.”

”It sounds like a very ’neutral’ concept?” Zheng Qing pondered, choosing a suitable word.

”Nobody can judge whether it’s a good or bad thing.” The teacher spread his hands, trying to put the young wizard at ease: ”After all, you are the first wizard to possess a complete Forbidden Curse.”