Warlock Apprentice

Angor woke up and found himself lying still at the dream wasteland.

It took him a few seconds to get rid of the dizziness in his head before he began to remember everything he just saw.

“This world… Did that monster leave? Will it come back?”

He looked up at the gray sky, but he couldn’t see anything beyond the dim color. He wondered if the blond figure was looking at him right now. If so, it was probably like an almighty god staring down an ant.

“I think I need to gain more strength to be in that spot so that I can command this world fully, but…”

He shook his head. He wasn’t even a wizard now. That ambition was too far from his level.

He decided to focus on what he had right now, such as the unknown power he just extracted from the domain sphere.

The knowledge of the power was already lingering in his head. Soon enough, he read something from it, which was the “Dream Gate”. It appeared that this was a minor ability related to spatial dimension control. But apparently, the laws in the dream wasteland were an inferior version of the real spatial dimension laws. In the Dream Realm, dreamers could freely use their fake power to shape the space around them however they liked. But ultimately, the results were only their imagination.

Similarly, Angor could wield such power in the dream wasteland as he wished.

From a quick look, he noticed that “Dream Gate” allowed him to designate the starting points of foreign objects that were pulled into the dream wasteland. For example, if he cast Dream Enkindle on Freud by normal means, then Freud would randomly get dropped somewhere they couldn’t foretell. With Dream Gate, however, Angor could place Freud to a specific place in the wasteland, such as directly inviting Freud into the apartment house he copied into the dream wasteland before.

He wondered if he could combine this ability with the use of Dream Whelk. If so, he would be able to summon large numbers of different items and materials into the dream wasteland, thus achieving “costless alchemy practice” for real.

And in this case, this otherwise useless ability would immediately become beyond valuable.

He would like to leave the dream wasteland and get to testing immediately. But he still had one more task to do.

He picked up the domain sphere in his hand again, which just lost two of its powers. The sphere did not appear too different from its original size, which meant there were many more powers ready to be harvested.

He could not take the sphere outside, or the dream wasteland would quickly lose its balance and merge into the Dream Realm. For now, he had to find a spot to keep it.

Since he was likely going to let more people inside the dream wasteland, leaving the sphere on the ground probably wasn’t a safe thing to do. He considered and levitated high into the sky and used the “snare sigils” to fix the sphere there.

This was a temporary solution. When he had time later, he would make a secure container for the sphere.

With everything settled, he left the dream wasteland to return to reality.

…

He would like to get to more work right away as soon as he “woke up”. Sadly, he misvalued his condition.

Consuming the power of “Dream Gate” took a large amount of energy from his body. Without timely supplementation, this had left his body in a weakened state.

This wasn’t too much of a problem because he could slowly return to normal by resting and proper meals. Compared to this, however, his right hand was the bigger issue.

Upon waking up and before he could see what was around him, he felt a sharp pain coming from his right hand, which soon began to spread to the other parts of his body.

He couldn’t see into his body using Wizard Eye or similar tricks yet, but he could tell that something was breaking and reforming in there.

He didn’t know how long it took or how many muscles were torn. When he had the strength to look, he saw his right arm was now abnormally longer than his left one.

And just like the last time when he initially grew a bigger right hand, he felt once again that a strange bloodline was being pumped into his body.

Must be the projected bloodline, as mentioned by Sunders.

The agony was unimaginable, yet he didn’t have what it took to sound his pain anymore. He simply lay on the dirt, completely motionless, while black blood seeped out from every pore on his skin and gathered into a pool beneath him.

Toby had been watching this happening and was too terrified to do anything. He knew something was VERY wrong when Angor’s strange condition lasted for a long time without any signs of ending.

Angor had opened his eyes to look at the sky, but his eyes were of an abnormal red color that looked quite creepy.

Toby could not ask for anyone’s help nor carelessly move Angor around, so he thought about the only thing he could do, which was taking out several potions from Snowy Feather. Both Angor and Greya used to give Toby healing potions for future use. For now, Toby had no idea which one was the right choice, so he just picked a weak one that had a little negative effect, then spread it on Angor’s body.

The healing liquid came in time and prevented Angor’s physical form from getting fully exhausted.

The pain was still there, but Angor was glad to find his senses returning, and the total numbness was gone.

With a trembling finger, he pointed to several potion bottles that might help with his case, and Toby quickly read his hint and carried the potions his way.

He spent a moment drawing painful breaths on the ground, while Toby waited beside him warily.

He knew he was recovering, but losing and replenishing energy too rapidly still had its bad consequence.

“I’m fine… Let me rest.”

That was the only thing he managed to tell Toby before he fell asleep again. And this time, there was no dream.

A week had passed before he woke up again.

He felt his mind clear enough and tried sitting up, only to find that he couldn’t move at all.

It was still fine if he needed more time to regain stamina, but it was not when the whole area smelled really bad.

He turned his neck to look aside and saw the dirt around him completely blackened by the blood and filth he let out earlier. This was made worse when it was the summit of summer. Under the temperature, the fermented stench was elevated by several folds, attracting flies and worms to his position.

Toby was busy removing the pests from his body using gravity power, but the bird could do nothing to get rid of the odor.

Angor sighed helplessly. Using what strength he could gather, he summoned a black top hat from his bracelet.

The hat with the mark of a smiley face was a gift he received from Devildare. It had a built-in level-3 cantrip, Purification Field, enchanted on it.

The effect did quick work repelling everything unwanted from him until the air returned being fresh.

Delighted, Toby quickly hopped onto Angor’s shoulder and nudged him.

“No worries, partner.” Angor smiled back. “Those potions worked wonders. Otherwise, I could have died back there.”

He knew his body. Without the healing boost, he could have lost his life for real.

He got into this situation because he was too focused on getting the domain sphere but without minding the new “body part” he just gained, which required his full attention. He already went through a similar case before when Sunders was watching, but it slipped from his mind.

“Damn it. I can’t be so short-sighted again.”