Chapter 20

Ten people are waiting for me when I walk past this barrier. When I get closer, they give me a salute.

"Young master."

"At ease, men. Tell me what this place is."

They nod their head, and one of them walks forward.

"We have yet to explore deeper but there is not a sign of a monster so far. We did not get deeper but I think there is not a single monster that makes this place their nest."

"I see. What about traps?"

"There are some traps but most of them are already too old to be of any use."

"Too old?"

"Yes. A lot of the mechanism of the traps is too rusty to activate. We even tested it ourselves and came out clean."

I nod my head and say.

"Very well. Let's get inside."

The twelve of us get inside the ruin. I quickly spread my mana around to search for something when I stepped inside. I can feel mana coming from all the buildings. It was weak, but it was still there.

We continue to get deeper into the building, and I must say there is nothing on this floor. Only a destroyed building is ready to collapse at any moment. As we get deeper, my mana sense feels something.

I get closer to the thing and see a small pebble releasing mana. I frown a little and pick it up. To my surprise, it is not a normal pebble and instead a hidden door.

"Oh?!"

I can see a stair behind the door and step inside. However, before I could step inside, Jullian stopped me.

"Young master! Let us get in first! We don't know what kind of trap or monster is inside!"

I release a sigh and let Jullian and the others explore the underground floor for a minute before getting inside. I can see a corridor being lit up by a torch.

"How? Have you guys lit the torch?"

"No, young master. When we step inside, the torch is lit on its own. We did not touch anything."

"I see. That means it is magic."

I can feel mana coming out of the torch. We follow the corridor and arrive in front of a massive metal door. When we get closer, the door opens on its own, making all of us take out our weapons just in case something comes out.

Seeing there is none after waiting for a minute, Jullian opens the door to get the view behind the massive door.

As the door opens up, I can see a massive crystal in the middle of the room. However, what catches my attention is a young woman trapped inside the crystal. We slowly get closer to the crystal, and I can see a lot of paper scattered on the ground.

"Can you guys take all the paper on the ground? I will try and free the poor girl from its cage."

"But young master! We don't know if she is evil or something!"

"I will handle it if it comes to that."

Jullian nods his head and starts to gather the paper on the ground. I walk toward the crystal and touch it. When my hand touches the crystal, I can feel my mana get sucked in by the crystal. I hold myself back from frowning as I don't want my men to worry and let the crystal suck on my mana.

The amount of mana it sucks is not much by my standard. While my character in Second Life is not considered a Mana Monster, I still have a lot of mana to compensate for all the spells I need to cast every second.

The crystal finished sucking not even a quarter of my mana reserve before the crystal shone and started to crack. A few seconds later, the crystal crumbled into dust, and I quickly caught the woman inside the crystal.

"Jullian, what about the paper?"

"We are done, young master. What should we do with her?"

"We will take care of her, of course."

=||=

I put the stack of paper inside my inventory and sighed a little. The young woman I rescued is not a normal woman. I know she will not be a normal woman, but I never thought she was human-made.

She is what the paper called a Homunculus. I know them. Second Life has a race called Homunculus, a man-made humanoid race. They are known for their mana control and regeneration, at least in the Second Life.

I don't know how they work in this world. The paper inside my inventory did not say anything about her kind.

I learned from the paper that she was created by someone called Jameson Terrilynn Version. He has a talent called [Alchemy: Life]. It looks like it was a talent that let him make a life using alchemy. Usually, alchemy is a talent that lets you make potions and other concoctions that grant a lot of effects.

It looks like he has a unique Alchemy rather than a general alchemy talent.

Anyway, the homunculus he created has one purpose: to kill as many monsters as she can. She is a Battle Homunculus. The creator says that she is his greatest creation and can take on a thousand monsters in a single battle before falling down.

The other thing I learned about her is that she is in a state of blankness. She will learn and continue to learn as long as her 'master' lets her be. Speaking of her master, she will register the person who feeds her from her cage as her master.

It's me. I'm her new master. How the hell can I explain this to mom and dad? Argh. Fuck it. I will think about it later.

I get up from the chair and get ready to do evening training with the boys. However, I could hear the homunculus get up before I could get out of my tent. I turn back and see she has already got up from her sleeping bag and looks at me with an intense expression.

"Good evening. How are you?"

Instead of answering me, she quickly jumped at me and hugged me.

"What?"