Celina smirked as she thought that her challenge would give him a headache.
However, her smile froze as soon as she saw him smiling.
"I can accept that condition…" Vale suddenly said, which made the young girl feel a chill behind her back.
"Y-you…" Celina squinted her eyes as she looked at Vale. She had a bad feeling about this.
'No way.'
She was momentarily speechless as she considered whether Vale was just bluffing and messing with her.
She wasn't even serious about that ridiculous challenge. However, now that Vale accepted it, it would seem that she was too indecisive if she just backed out.
Furthermore, doubling her Spirit Strands means that Vale should have 42 Spirit Strands!
Which 14 or 15-year-old would have such a ridiculous number of Spirit Strands?!
Was he conceived by a human and a spirit?!
Celina's eyes widened as soon as she reached this thought.
'R-right… I think I heard of this before…' Celina felt that she had discovered the young man's huge secret. According to what she heard from the conversation between her great grandfather and her father, there were instances when humans, mostly women, would conceive a child from Spiritual Beings, Demonic Beings, or even Mystical Entities that came from a different realm.
The child born from the forbidden affair would normally have an appearance close to the humans, but some parts of them differ. They could still be identified with their unique traits, so they would typically become a subject of scorn and would be killed before they could even mature.
Nevertheless, others were born that looks entirely like any other child born from both humans.
'Vale was probably one of them… A child born from a mysterious entity and a human… The Chambers Family must be investigated! I have to tell this to Father!'
"Fine! I'll accept that! However, we don't have a Spirit Converging Crystal that exceeds 40! There was no way to test your limit. How about this? I'll request my father to get a Spirit Converging Crystal with a 50-Strand limit. That should arrive in a few days. We'll go ahead and assess your Spirit Strand on that day."
"Mhmm… That's fine. However, you should join our club."
"Deal!"
Celina said as she offered her hand to Vale.
Vale accepted it as they shook their hands.
'Oh? You're being sneaky?' Vale thought as he used his Spell Dispersion to stop Celina from probing him.
"It's not polite to use that Spell." Vale warned.
Celina seemed unperturbed as she explained. "Ahem… It was a habit taught to me by my butler. I'm trying to change that already. It won't happen again."
"Fine… Then fill up this form so you can officially join the club… Senior Nadine will explain all the other matters in the club. I'll be leaving now." Vale said as he canceled his Darkness Manipulation spell that was isolating them before using his telepathy to inform Nadine that Celina already decided to join, and she needed to brief her about the club.
Nadine seemed surprised by his sudden contact through telepathy as he forgot that she wasn't aware that he had such an ability. In any case, Vale decided not to explain too much as he left the Assembly Hall after he saw Nadine and Celina chatting with each other.
He just let Nadine handle the rest of the recruitment process.
***
On the next day, Vale woke up early as he had to practice the precision of his Extractions… He couldn't do it without a sample, so he had to be early and visit the dockyard for the supplies of the corpses. Although there wasn't any success in his training, he felt that he already had a better grasp of what he should do to have a precise extraction.
Luckily, the class was still suspended, so he had a lot of free time.
"Vale! You're here again. Aren't you being a bit too serious about this? I thought the rumors were fake." Ashe said with a chuckle while holding a cup of hot tea. She saw Vale entering the dockyard even though the sun hadn't fully risen yet and she couldn't help but tease him.
"Good morning, Vice Captain Ashe. I guess the Sixth Squad would stay here for a long time, huh…"
"Yes. So expect me here having a cup of tea every morning. The other members didn't like meeting with other people, so they're mostly hidden in their posts."
"No wonder I don't see the others… I guess that's also a good thing for the members of the squad. It's better not to expose their identities, especially if they have missions outside." Vale commented.
It was already normal to have a short chat with this Vice Captain since she basically runs the whole dockyard. She was the one who could decide who could be allowed to enter or exit the dockyard. This also includes the airships that were using the dock, so he had to be respectful.
"Heh… You're thinking too much. They're just being lazy… In any case, look at the gray Airship. That's the one with a supply of corpses. They're all sealed using a Paper Talisman so you'll have an easier time touching them."
"Cough… Cough. That doesn't sound appropriate, Vice Captain. Anyway, what's the difference with the paper talisman?" Vale asked as he swiftly changed the topic.
The methods taught in class were only the freezing and ritual sealing methods to preserve corpses. He hadn't heard about the Talisman method.
Vice Captain smiled at Vale's reaction and replied. "These corpses came from Lushfort… That's where our Necromancy Branch is located. They're using Paper Talisman to preserve corpses there. You'll understand what I'm saying once you visit the corpses."
"I understand." Vale didn't waste any more time as he decided to enter the Airship.
After entering, he easily found the morgue since this wasn't his first time here.
Soon, Vale saw the corpses as he finally understood what Ashe was telling him.
'They're similar to the Jiangshi that I've seen before…' Vale commented in his mind as he recalled some information from his past life.
Nevertheless, this didn't stop him from his experiment. After he realized that there were a total of 20 corpses he could extract, he couldn't help but smile.
This is the largest number of corpses delivered over the past week…
'It seems that Lushfort was a decent place to farm attributes.'
He then approached the first corpse and gently touched its shoulder.
'Concentrate… I just want to extract Intelligence… Just Intelligence, nothing more…' Vale repeated in his mind like a mantra as he triggered his system.
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