Warlock Apprentice

Chapter 3039: Chapter 3040: Benson

”My name is Benson, and I am... a zombie.”

Following Dox’s lead, Angel and the others walked in the cave for about half a minute before finally seeing the man leaning against the wall, gasping for breath.

He wore a white mask, and the exposed skin was wrapped in white gauze.

This person was the wizard apprentice Dox had mentioned, who had fused with the earth-fire salamander bloodline.

He called himself Benson and was a member of the Birlos Family.

”Zombie?” Kaier looked at Benson with perplexity. Was this a nickname? A strange nickname... A stiff corpse? A frozen corpse?

Benson nodded: ”Yes, a zombie.”

As he spoke, Benson removed the white mask from his face, revealing his true appearance.

His appearance was quite ordinary. At first glance, it seemed similar to an ordinary person, but upon closer inspection, one would notice that his skin carried a stone-like dullness, and lacked the oily sheen of normal skin, resembling the hardened skin of a dead body.

Kaier didn’t know what was wrong with Benson’s skin, but he secretly guessed that perhaps it was some sort of magical creature’s skin grafted onto him, or maybe it was a unique talent resulting from Benson’s fusion with the earth-fire salamander bloodline?

While Kaier was lost in his thoughts, Dox suddenly spoke: ”This should be some kind of syndrome, right?”

Benson looked at Dox in surprise, not expecting him to recognize his situation at a glance. However, on second thought, it seemed normal. He had seen Dox’s image in the family’s collection and knew Dox was a bloodline wizard active in the Laksum Principality.

Most importantly, Dox was a wandering wizard.

Although wandering wizards don’t have organizations or family backgrounds, they often interact with the lower-level people the most, understanding their real situation the best, while the wizards from organizations tend to be more abstract.

Benson did not deny it, nodding: ”Yes, I have hard skin syndrome.”

Hard skin syndrome is a rare disease, even among the lower levels of people. Its pathogenesis is still unclear, and its most noticeable external symptom is the loss of elasticity and the hardening and thickening of the skin.

From a transcendent’s perspective, the skin hardening caused by hard skin syndrome seems like a benign symptom that enhances resistance to impact. But for ordinary people, hard skin syndrome is an almost incurable fatal disease, leading to narrowed blood vessels and organ damage due to its compressive nature. Over time, this results in organ failure and death.

Benson was unfortunate; he was an ordinary person when afflicted with hard skin syndrome. He struggled through it for five years using various methods, but his life was full of setbacks, devoid of hope.

Benson was also lucky; as he was facing the agony of impending death, he met a wizard. This wizard, called Moon Elder, told Benson that he possessed the bloodline of his kinsfolk, making him a member of the Birlos family from a certain perspective.

Usually, these lost descendants are mostly mortal offspring with a low likelihood of becoming talented ones, hence the Birlos Family seldom bothers finding them.

Benson’s encounter with Moon Elder was a stroke of luck. His mental power value reaching 11 points, exhibiting the potential to become a talented one, further evidenced his luck.

After being brought back to the Birlos Family, Benson began his relentless cultivation.

Upon becoming a wizard apprentice, the strength of his internal organs was enhanced, allowing him to finally break free from the adverse effects of hard skin syndrome.

Moreover, the tenacious hard skin remained as a foundation, granting him enhanced defensive capabilities and resistance.

Guided by Moon Elder, Benson fused with the earth-fire salamander bloodline, further strengthening the skin’s toughness. From a standpoint of resilience, Benson could now compare with bloodline apprentices of the same level.

However, the cost... was having a skin harder than when he was ordinary, causing him to appear frozen; aside from speaking and moving his eyes, he completely resembled a puppet or dead body.

For this reason, Benson donned a mask and wrapped himself in white gauze, avoiding strange glances from others. Though not looking like a zombie, he resembled another species akin to a zombie... a mummy.

”Hard skin syndrome? Truly rare.” Dox muttered under his breath while examining Benson carefully: ”Eh, you fused with the earth-fire salamander bloodline to complement the hard skin? That’s quite a genius idea.”

Benson’s hard skin syndrome isn’t entirely cured; using the hard skin for taking hits, although it enhances resistance, it also causes increased hardening.

While no immediate negative effects are visible, over time, if the skin’s hardness exceeds Benson’s internal organs’ bearing capacity, the aftermath of hard skin syndrome would unfold overwhelmingly.

Benson’s choice to fuse with the earth-fire salamander bloodline was a dual-purpose strategy to enhance the hard skin and solve the underlying issues of hard skin syndrome.

The earth-fire salamander strengthened the hard skin, and its development tolerance for internal organs is comparable to some high-level magical creature bloodlines.

Enhancing the earth-fire salamander bloodline equates to strengthening both hard skin and internal organs, deemed Benson’s best solution to hard skin syndrome.

Given the choice, Dox estimated he would also opt for Benson to fuse with the earth-fire salamander bloodline.

Feeling slightly bashful, Benson said: ”This was actually a suggestion from Moon Elder.”

Dox, who had been focusing on Benson, paused at hearing ”Moon Elder”: ”Moon Elder? As in one of the Birlos family’s tree, sun, and moon elders, Moon Elder?”

Benson nodded: ”Yes, my ancestor was Moon Elder’s brother, so Moon Elder has taken care of me. I’ve been able to cultivate in Paradise Land thanks to Moon Elder’s favor.”

Benson deliberately included a lot of information in this statement.

Although he knew Dox and Dox hadn’t had dealings with the Birlos Family in the past, who could say there was no recent animosity?

For his own safety, Benson’s current strategy is to reveal his connection with Moon Elder and subtly imply Moon Elder’s proximity to bolster his courage.

While clearly comprehending Benson’s hidden intentions, Dox remained unconcerned, discreetly noting this ”shifting conflict, exploiting power” tactic for future application.

When facing an unbeatable foe, he could claim strong ties with Angel and close connections with Sanders, with the three great ancestral spirits of Barbarian Cave as his backing... This method should work in the Southern Domain.

Ultimately, as he planned to follow Angel in the short term, a bit of verbal leverage should cause no harm?

Setting aside fanciful thoughts, Dox refocused on Benson: ”You mean Moon Elder is in Paradise Land? And someone still dared to take action here after proposing to play a game?”

Benson: ”Are you referring to... the masked person?”

Dox: ”Masked person? Who is the masked person?”

Benson looked confused: ”You don’t know the masked person? How did you end up in the ’Mud Puppet Maze’ then?”

”I came in from outside.” Dox replied candidly.

Benson’s eyes lit up: ”Outside? Did the space sealing outside Paradise Land get breached?”

Dox shook his head: ”It hasn’t been destroyed, I used other means to come in.”

Dox didn’t say why he came, instead he said: ”Would you mind telling me about your encounter tonight? The masked figure, the mud puppet maze, what are those?”

Knowing that the space sealing of Paradise Land hadn’t been breached, disappointment flashed in Benson’s eyes. Yet in face of Dox’s inquiry, he still did not hesitate and nodded in agreement.

These weren’t secrets, many people are inside Paradise Land, even without him, Dox could find others to ask. So, Benson didn’t plan to hide anything, and recounted the events in detail.

Just less than an hour ago, Benson was still following Elder Moon, quietly meditating on the mountaintop bathed in moonlight.

But just then, a cloaked masked figure suddenly let out a weird laugh, flashing over from above Paradise Land.

Every zone inside Paradise Land has protection set up, especially areas with people, outsiders won’t choose to step in.

And this masked figure not only came in, but also laughed loudly, asserting his presence, appearing very strange.

Elder Moon noticed something was wrong and chased after him.

As for the events thereafter, Benson didn’t know, since he stayed on the mountaintop and didn’t go after them.

But shortly after Elder Moon chased the masked figure away, he heard a weird laugh echoing through Paradise Land—

”Let’s play a game~ If you win, I’ll let you leave~”

Benson was very certain this weird laugh came from that masked figure earlier.

Before he could figure out why the masked figure wanted such clamor, Paradise Land was enveloped by a massive space seal.

Following that, one space membrane after another partitioned Paradise Land into multiple different areas.

When Benson and the other transcendents around realized something was wrong, they were unable to leave.

They could only search nearby, hoping to find some gaps.

Someone then discovered a giant stone with a human face on the mountaintop.

The stone had been there before, but without the human face. Now, the emergence of the human face pattern appeared very abnormal.

The human face on the stone informed them that this was a game named escape in words but survival in truth. As long as they cleared two games, they could leave Paradise Land.

Immediately after, the eyes of the human face pattern flashed with various game names, demanding everyone must enter the game.

At that moment, Benson wasn’t planning to enter this so-called game.

After all, Benson was self-aware, very clear that his strength wasn’t enough to get involved in such bizarre affairs.

Those holding the same thoughts as Benson were numerous, but in the end... they were still forced to participate in the game.

Because someone agreed to join the game, and the human face pattern informed that insufficient numbers would sharply increase the death rate of players. The greater the numbers, the higher the survival rate.

And that person who agreed to play was an Official Wizard.

He directly commanded that everyone on the mountaintop must participate in the game.

Thus Benson, half-coerced, also entered the game.

However, the participants from the mountaintop seemed to be thrown into different games. Benson found himself in a game called ”Mud Puppet Maze,” and the number of people participating alongside him was... zero.

Perhaps there were other players in the Mud Puppet Maze, but at least at Benson’s starting point, there wasn’t anyone else.

At the starting point of Benson’s maze, there was also a human face pattern, only it grew on the wall.

This human face pattern seemed to exist to explain the game’s rules, it told Benson: the Mud Puppet Maze was a maze modified within the mountain, and the way to clear it is to find the maze’s exit.

During the search for the exit, Benson needed to be aware of two things: First, there will be special mud puppet demons inside the Mud Puppet Maze, these demons will launch attacks on players, but their strength won’t exceed that of Third Level apprentices.

It sounds like these mud puppet demons aren’t strong, indeed... they aren’t strong. But the trouble is in their numbers, as soon as you approach the swamp, groups of mud puppet demons appear.

For this reason, every time Benson sees passages with swamps, he instinctively stays away.

But as he kept avoiding the swamps, Benson discovered... he seemed to be turning in circles, unable to find a way out.

Therefore, it’s highly likely that the real exit can only be found by tracing the swamps.

Second, there are many walking poisoned mushroom creatures inside the Mud Puppet Maze, these mushrooms will emit poisonous fog spores, causing large areas of the maze to be shrouded in toxic fog, requiring careful protection.

As for this point, Benson didn’t care much, his tough skin combined with the bloodline of the Fire Salamander prevented large particles of toxic fog from entering his body.

Overall, the human face pattern informed Benson only of the magical creature’s dangers within the Mud Puppet Maze.

But in reality, besides the dangers posed by the magical creatures, the maze harbors many other hazards.

For instance, wall destruction.

Benson attempted to demolish walls, thinking it might expedite finding the exit. But after several tests, Benson found that some walls had hidden space traps within, and destruction would result in backlash.

Benson nearly got severed in half by a space rift, marking the end of his reckless wall demolition attempts.

In addition, there are numerous trigger-type traps.

Benson is hiding here, panting heavily, due to triggering a chain trap earlier, resulting in entire corridors collapsing, compounded by space traps triggered by wall destruction.

To escape, he endured falling debris, withstood energy blasts, pushed his body’s potential to the limit, and barely made his escape.

Benson chose a quiet place to restore his Magical Core and heal his injuries, which is here.

Unexpectedly, however, Dox found his location due to the bloodline aura of the Fire Salamander within him.