Chapter 40 Teacher

Because the Viersman Teaching Building itself carried an oppressive, gloomy, and unsettling aura,

coupled with the winding corridors and the layout resembling that of a mental hospital, everyone had been maintaining a high level of concentration since they entered the building,

almost at the instant the tungsten filament lamp went out,

everyone quickly lit their portable kerosene lamps,

and when the radiating firelight re-illuminated the classroom, an extremely terrifying scene was revealed before their eyes.

At the classroom's main entrance,

a tremendously horrifying "zombie" was crawling in, sticking to the wall.

Its eyes were bound with black bandages,

its mouth was pierced and sewn shut with steel wire,

its body was marked with black, thick lines denoting human anatomical structures,

and its spine was evenly impaled with long, coarse steel nails.

As the first zombie crawled into the classroom, many more similar creatures swarmed in, their numbers even exceeding the total count of gentlemen in the class.

At that moment,

the gentlemen in the class touched the straps of their backpacks,

[Suit]→[Overcoat]

instantly switching to battle stance.

Only Yi Chen hesitated,

his fingers about to touch the strap, paused in mid-air... because he harbored certain doubts about the 'dangerous situation' unfolding before him.

Tick!

Suddenly, a droplet of saliva landed right on Yi Chen's collar.

A menacing zombie was lying on the ceiling, its mouth wide open, eagerly anticipating the taste of fresh blood and flesh.

Locking onto Yi Chen,

it shifted to a crawling stance and fell vertically from the ceiling.

Yi Chen also drew out his Hand Axe at the same time, his gaze locking on... confident in executing a precise mid-air beheading.

Clang! A loud noise.

Before the axe could come swinging down,

a heavy, iron school desk flew sideways, smashing the zombie away... its head caved in completely, oozing a foul-smelling liquid.

Not far off,

Dagbert from the Northern Realm of Quechua exchanged a look with Yi Chen,

due to the relatively small space of the classroom, he couldn't wield his greatsword, having no choice but to fight barehanded against the horde of zombies... yet he wasn't losing ground at all.

『Dagbert's physique probably started at a [4], maybe even [5], right?

He should be able to easily reach the Limit Barrier in a short time... This brute strength is just too exaggerated.』

Yi Chen took a few steps to get closer to the three-person squad,

leveraging their strong cooperation and cover to reduce his own presence so as not to attract the attention of the zombies.

[Visual Enhancement]

His gaze swept across every zombie that barged into the classroom, observing various details on them.

"Hmm? This is..."

He quickly noticed a 'problematic' detail,

took a deep breath,

and straightened his clothing, stepping with a formal, dignified gait towards a certain direction in the classroom, where a zombie was gnawing on a student's arm.

The zombie, too, sensed someone approaching,

Swish!

After tearing off a large chunk of flesh from the student's arm, its head turned 90° in an instant, facing Yi Chen, who was walking straight toward it.

With tensed knees,

the zombie was about to pounce like a wild beast when,

Yi Chen, approaching head-on, did something that left everyone present bewildered.

He tapped the tip of his right foot toward the side of his left foot,

rotated his right upper arm gracefully, pressing it against his chest,

leaned his body forward by about 30°,

and gave the zombie tearing at the flesh a "gentleman's bow,"

while adjusting his voice and softly saying,

"Good morning!"

For a moment,

all the zombies battling with the students inside the classroom stopped their movements and froze.

Even though some students did not cease their attacks, chopping weapons into the bodies and shattering their bones, the group of undead remained unfazed.

The 'undead' that Yi Chen treated with a gentleman's courtesy,

transformed from a primitive and frantic crawl to a normal stance... spine straightened, clink, clink, clink! The steel nails stuck in the spine successively fell off.

Reaching out to remove the steel wire wedged between its teeth,

eerie as it was,

the wound did not bleed at all but healed and repaired itself at a visible speed, leaving no scars behind.

A chilling, hoarse voice emanated from deep within the mouth from which the steel wire had just been removed:

"What is your name?"

"William Behrens."

"You are among the students of the past ten sessions who noticed something was amiss and discovered 'me' at first instance... Good observation skills and sufficiently meticulous thought.

How did you find out?"

Of course, Yi Chen would not say that he had already known the teacher had certain quirks the day before and was therefore prepared in advance.

"Breathing…and subtle behavioral differences.

I guess this might have been a loophole you intentionally left open, teacher, hoping we would remain calm in the face of crisis and notice these hidden details.

Otherwise, with your skills, perfectly imitating an undead would surely not pose any problem."

Upon hearing these words, the 'undead' did not respond immediately,

but walked past the cluttered desks, undead, and students to ascend the comparatively clean podium.

He took out a black coat akin to a white lab coat from beneath the podium and slipped it over his bare upper body.

"This batch of students is not bad... better than the previous few sessions.

These 'corpses' that you have killed are precisely today's teaching materials; they were individuals in the early stages of infection when alive. After death, they were completely disinfected and no longer capable of spreading the disease.

Subsequently, I reused them with some corpse making techniques.

Now,

arrange your desks properly, choose a corpse each to place on your table, and prepare for the lesson."

Such a bizarre pre-class procedure, as it was the first time for everyone, instinctively engendered a sense of fear toward this teacher,

While they were adjusting desks and moving corpses, the teacher casually wrote his own name on the blackboard—Hogni Zede.

He then continued with a series of strange actions.

He took off the black coat, lying bare-chested on the metal podium,

then commanded an undead that appeared not too bright, even with a hole broken in its head, to step onto the podium.

"I'll begin the [First Lesson] by simply talking to you about human anatomy; don't get distracted, record every detail.

Only by understanding the human body, which is the most susceptible to infection and holds the greatest potential, can you comprehend deeper layers of pathological knowledge in subsequent lessons."

With that,

he pulled out a sharp surgical knife from his mouth and handed it to the not-so-bright undead.

Under everyone's gaze,

he instructed the undead to begin with a cut to the skin of his hand, explaining the basic structure of the skin layers.

Next, he used tweezers to pick out muscle fibers and nerves from beneath the skin for a detailed explanation.

As Zede teacher dissected himself, he turned to the students saying, "Don't worry too much about classroom discipline; if you wish to see more clearly and in greater detail, feel free to come closer for a careful observation."

A morning of [Pathology]

concluded in an uncanny and bizarre teaching atmosphere,

and it must be said that such a hands-on teaching method benefited every student greatly, advancing their understanding of the human structure even further.

After class,

Zede teacher, who still lay on the podium, was performing self-suturing, stuffing some of the organs he had taken out back inside his body.

Yi Chen deliberately turned down post-class invitations from Edmund and others, choosing to stay in the classroom alone.

When everyone else had left,

Zede teacher also finished self-suturing and sat up straight.

"What is it, William?"

As requested, Yi Chen handed over Professor Qian Bosen's handwritten letter and business card.

Unbeknownst to him, Zede seemed to be a blind man, reading through touch by feeling the subtle embossing on the paper,

After completing his tactile reading, his mouth slowly curved into a twisted smile,

"Knowing full well the academy does not allow me to take students individually, Professor Qian Bosen still sent you my way... seeing as you are quite interesting, I suppose I will reluctantly take on this task.

Remember,

my expectations for the living are much higher than for the dead.

And I cannot guarantee your safety; you might well die during special training."

"Alright."

"Follow me then~ We have [half an hour] left before my time to leave is up, need to hurry back to my 'office'."