Chapter 26: Mother in the Dream

In Ierantis, the study and research of magic is a profoundly serious matter. It is much like the clinical medical training and residency Zohan underwent back in the day. Every textbook is critical; there is no such thing as a "key chapter." Everything must be mastered, accompanied by endless notes, lectures, videos, and a vast amount of practical application. It is a grueling test of both physical strength and mental stamina.

How could it ever be as relaxed and pleasant as developing new magic with Lady Ordoss? Even though the "Partial Cleansing Spell" was not yet officially perfected, wasn't the process of developing it far more captivating?

Zohan had been busy all morning. When he left Lady Ordoss’s bedroom at noon, he checked his own status.

[Mana Surge]
[Attack Speed Doubled]

Both states were still active; no wonder his physical exertion had accelerated so significantly.

[Muscle Vitality]
[Stamina Boost]

These two states had declined sharply.

[Due to the continuous loss of bodily fluids and decrease in body weight, although mana levels remain abundant, a portion of mana is being diverted to generate new fluids to produce and maintain a specific state of excitation. This is a danger signal.]

In short, he needed moderation. Zohan reminded himself to be disciplined. Yet, psychologically, he felt refreshed and clear-headed; Lady Ordoss was truly delightful.

Zohan finished his own lunch. Lady Ordoss, feeling languid and weak, had no desire to move a muscle and was being served by her personal maid. He carried a portion of lunch to Ceriad’s room.

Ceriad remained in her Sleeping Beauty state. Zohan glanced at her vibrant lips and, reminded of Lady Ordoss’s earlier behavior, felt no untoward impulses. Even though he had fully adapted to the role of an "adulterer," he still had his bottom line—just as Mahait might be a villain, yet his gratitude toward Butler Linde could still be sincere. Zohan would not be the kind of man who, after usurping a mother, would harbor wicked thoughts toward a beautiful young girl—though, the real question was, since this beautiful girl had become an anomalous creature, could she even be considered human?

That was an intractable ethical dilemma, not a clinical medical one, so Zohan stopped thinking about it.

"Yeye," Zohan tapped on the cabinet door.

Yeye pushed the door open and crawled out. She had changed into the new dress Zohan had found for her. It was clean, and as the hem swayed, the girl's legs looked as dazzling as sunlight streaming through a window.

"Wait, wash your hands first." Seeing her reach for the meat on the plate the moment she crawled out, Zohan stopped her, using a towel to wipe her hands thoroughly.

Yeye tilted her head, watching him. She had seen humans do this for their offspring. If her mother could do this for her, surely she would have the same expression and movements, right? She longed to take him to find her mother and have her mother sleep in the big box with them. Yeye would sleep just a little way off and run around them when she woke up.

"Eat," Zohan ruffled her hair. Seeing her crawl out of the cabinet, she seemed like a little pet, making his heart melt. Even though this little pet could instinctively master high-level magic and create "Blood Slaves"—monsters that were Tier 5 at their initial level.

The pack of demon wolves Mahait had led earlier, which Zohan had seen through "His Majesty Edmond’s Spacetime Fracture," were merely Tier 3 monsters. Yet there were so many of them that an ordinary mage would be helpless against them.

"This is for you." Yeye pulled another drawing from the cabinet and handed it to Zohan before starting on her meal.

It was the other half of the tomb structure. Last time, Yeye had drawn the part surrounding the core of the tomb. The whole layout had an unfinished quality, as if it extended outward, and Zohan had realized then that the paper was only large enough for a portion. Now, Yeye had completed it.

Watching her eat earnestly, Zohan walked to the side and took out the previous drawing to piece them together.

"Does the Roland Continent also believe in serving the dead as if they were living?" Zohan gasped. The scale of this mausoleum was grand and magnificent.

The entire tomb centered on the location of the central sarcophagus, consisting of several inner and outer layers of an underground palace. Yeye had said those passages allowed her to run around. Based on the width and height of underground tomb passages he had seen before, Zohan made a rough estimate: the underground palace alone was likely over 200,000 square meters.

The palace was filled with all sorts of structures—altars, towers, palaces, dwellings, secret chambers, storehouses, and city walls—forming an entire subterranean city. If Yeye’s mother was not a sacrificial victim or a funerary accompaniment, what kind of great figure must she have been to deserve such a tomb?

"Yeye, are there others there who, like your mother, lie still without moving?" Zohan asked, tilting his head as he wiped the corner of her mouth. Honestly, no one was competing with her; hadn't her table manners been quite elegant before? Could it be that today’s food was particularly to her liking? Zohan couldn't help but laugh.

"No more!" Yeye shook her head vigorously.

"By the way, I never asked: how does your mother talk to you?" Zohan knew that in such an enclosed environment, Yeye’s language and logic would be different from the average person's, giving an impression of chaos. But if one understood the environment in which her language and logic were formed, it became understandable. For instance, Yeye always spoke of resurrecting her mother. To an ordinary person, that meant she was dead... so how did Yeye acquire language skills? And so on. But Zohan knew it wasn't because Yeye was lying, or because of hallucinations.

"Sometimes when I run until I'm tired and fall asleep, Mother comes to talk to me..." Yeye wiped her mouth and looked up at Zohan.

Zohan gently hugged Yeye. In her eyes, which glowed with the same deep blue as his own, there was a reservoir of longing and sorrow.

"Mother says this is my dream. In the dream, I cannot see or remember her face, so I have never seen what Mother looks like when she is watching me."

"And when you wake up, Mother is just lying there, not moving. She has no expression; she doesn't look at you tenderly, and she doesn't smile, right?" Zohan understood her heart.

It was so painful. As a doctor, Zohan had long since become indifferent to life and death, especially the eternal farewells played out in hospitals every day. His heart had gradually grown calm and detached. Yet, he could never tolerate a child suffering or being abused. Seeing those fragile, innocent children who relied entirely on their parents to survive in this world, feeling the desolation and bitterness of existence, his heart ached deeply.

Yeye looked to be in her teens, but had she ever felt normal parental love or the warmth of a family? *Sigh.* Zohan sighed. If he had chosen a different profession in his past life and married early, his own daughter might have been as old as Yeye by the time he died.

"Eat a little more." Zohan’s tone became incredibly gentle as he coaxed her to continue. In that massive tomb, she must have had nothing to eat. He wondered if her survival had something to do with her constitution, but he didn't let his curiosity drive him to examine her body without cause.

Yeye sniffled and continued to eat.

Zohan calmed his empathetic heart and began to analyze the information Yeye provided. He was certain that her mother’s death was definitely not the end of life as ordinary people understood it. It must be another state of existence—neither dead nor alive. The more learned a person is, the stronger their capacity for acceptance. Zohan was not shocked to the point of disbelief; in fact, he knew quite a bit about such states.

For instance, his teacher, Jormungandr, had once spent a period of time in a state similar to that of Yeye's mother.