Dimensional Hotel

Thirty minutes later, Yu Sheng looked nervously at the small doll lying on the "alchemy table."

Erin propped herself up slowly with her hand, her gaze a bit vacant as she pondered life.

The doll, 66.6 centimeters tall, exuding the fragrance of lotus root.

Experiment successful.jpg.

After a long look, Yu Sheng felt like there was no issue with Erin, so he gradually became more confident: "See, I told you it would work. If flour can be used, why not lotus root..."

"Don't talk just yet, let me think this through," Erin interrupted Yu Sheng with a raise of her hand, then looked at her hands with a bizarre expression, "I just really don't get it. How did it even work? It's illogical, you know? How could it have managed to work..."

Yu Sheng tugged at the corner of his mouth: "You let me try, so why are you doubting it after the fact?"

"I shouldn't have let you! How was I supposed to know you would actually pull it off! Now my arms are really made of lotus root!" Erin glared at Yu Sheng, anger puffing in her cheeks, "I just wanted to have a laugh at your expense. Your messed-up 'alchemy' couldn't possibly succeed! I wanted to see you back down... No, but how did you do it, huh?! How?!"

"I don't know either," Yu Sheng was also a bit stunned, "You agreed to let me try so I did it. You never said you wanted to laugh at me, I thought you were really supporting my science research..."

Erin instantly felt like jumping up and biting him, but because her legs hadn't been repaired yet, she couldn't make the jump, so she was left sitting on the table cursing: "Science research my ass! What kind of science research is this?! My arms have been turned into lotus roots, what am I to do! They've actually grown together now! How did you even do it? With the power of thought or what!? Huh?!"

Yu Sheng pondered a bit, figuring that it probably was the power of thought that got it done.

But the intensity of Erin's reaction was indeed beyond his expectations—he didn't have any foundations in alchemy and all of his actions were just following whatever the doll said, injecting blood into two segments of lotus root and performing Spirit Injection without thinking much, and not knowing that it was all just random nonsense movements that were bound to fail. When the two segments of lotus root, which had undergone the Spirit Injection ritual, began squirming near Erin's elbows and transformed into limbs, he thought that was all normal.

He didn't expect to frighten this little homunculus so much.

"Sorry about that..." Yu Sheng thought it over, starting to feel a bit uneasy, "How about we switch it back? I'll go downstairs and get an axe..."

He hadn't finished his sentence when Erin glared back at him.

"Okay, forget I said anything."

"What's done is done." The little doll begrudgingly lifted her arm, a picture of resigned exhaustion, and then carefully clenched and unclenched her fist, moving each of the ten fingers one by one, as though she had Dr. Octopus's tentacles attached to her own body and was afraid to move lest the two arms that Yu Sheng had randomly operated on would suddenly lose control.

But she quickly realized that the two hands Yu Sheng had haphazardly made were actually pretty usable.

Even if they were made of lotus roots.

"So... is the test over?" Yu Sheng asked carefully, watching from the side. After confirming that the homunculus would not suddenly bite him, he broke the silence, "It should be usable now, right? It doesn't hurt, does it?"

Erin sighed: "Yeah, it's usable. There's no discomfort."

"If it's usable, it's usable. Why the sigh? You gave me a scare," Yu Sheng finally relaxed. His gaze then shifted towards Erin's two legs that couldn't stand, "Now we should repair the legs. Let me have a look at the damage."

Erin made an acknowledgment sound, but suddenly looked up into Yu Sheng's eyes: "Wait a minute, what do you plan to use for the repair— If you pull out a bag of lotus root powder now, you'd be hit by a cement truck in your dreams tonight..."

Yu Sheng was quite puzzled: "I just don't understand. Your body is made of clay, and you're even okay using flour as a substitute, so why are you so opposed to similar materials?"

Erin raised a small hand towards Yu Sheng's nose, but because the hand was too small, this gesture had no intimidation or provocation effect: "You humans still keep pets, why not cockroaches? You eat organic matter, why not eat sh—"

"Okay, I get it, you don't have to continue," Yu Sheng quickly interrupted the homunculus's words, and instantly understood how huge the gap in cognitive concepts could be between different species, "Don't worry, I have proper repair material."

While saying this, he opened the drawer on the other side of the table and took out a small jar of epoxy putty.

"Theoretically, the best way to repair a clay homunculus is with the same kind of clay, but we're out of clay now. Using this is the same, the important thing is to process it with alchemy, right?" He asked Erin for confirmation, "I just need to use a scraper to smooth it out, right?"

"This... is fine," Erin finally conceded with some difficulty and then curiously asked, "When did you prepare this?"

"The clay came as a free gift when I bought it earlier. I pressed it to the bottom and didn't notice," Yu Sheng explained while looking at the instructions on the packaging, "Okay, let me see your wound now."

Erin let down her guard, slowly lifted the skirt with the intricate lace a bit, and took off the long sock on her right leg.

There were big and small black cracks all over her ivory-like calf, some of which even went through the knee and extended to the thigh area.

Yu Sheng was immediately shocked: "…Holy shit!"

"At least it didn't break," Erin remained indifferent, "If it did, you'd have to attach a section of lotus root for me."

"It's not about whether it breaks or not. How can you be so unconcerned about this... Doesn't it hurt at all?" Yu Sheng's voice tightened even though he had become accustomed to the sight of blood these days, even his own battered appearance. But seeing the shattered state of Erin's leg, he felt an inexplicable pounding in his heart, an impact utterly different from the hole a monster punched through him.

Perhaps its appearance was too strange and terrifying, even more frightening than Miss Doll's severed arms.

He touched the cracked areas on Erin's leg, feeling that the cracks felt as hard as wood—Erin's normal limbs were soft and indistinguishable from a human's. This hardened texture indicated that the structures near the cracks had started to gradually lose "Soul Synchronization". With just a bit of delay, the next step would be like her previous arm, directly breaking and shattering off.

But Erin herself laughed: "Haha, don't rub, it tickles… it doesn't hurt, not at all… okay, maybe just a little, very, very slight."

Erin gestured with her hands, bringing the index fingers of both hands close together, apparently emphasizing how minimal the pain was.

Yu Sheng sighed, cut the back of his hand with a small knife, started mixing his blood into the repair material, and muttered as he mixed with the scraper, "That's too scary. I don't know the exact physiological structure of you living dolls, but could you please not be so nonchalant next time you get hurt? If it's serious, you need to tell me sooner since I'm the one who'll have to mend you in the end..."

Erin rolled her eyes: "You looked pretty scary when you died with your eyes open, I didn't call you out on it."

Yu Sheng curled his lips, continued with the subsequent material processing, and carefully applied the repair clay onto Erin's wound with the scraper.

"Hey, tickles…"

"Bear with it, don't move."

"Okay."

Erin kept quiet for a while, then probably felt bored waiting for the repair and couldn't help but ramble: "The two Special Service Bureau Officers we saw today, I actually wanted to chat with them and see if they had a way to contact the sisters from Alice's Cottage—Although I don't clearly remember the specifics of this Special Service Bureau, it should be Boundary City's 'official institution', and they should have communications with Alice's Cottage…"

"Why didn't you say so?" Yu Sheng said without lifting his head, still carefully repairing.

The scraper applied the repair clay, filling the cracks on the doll's leg. As soon as the blood-mixed repair material was applied, it made a slight sizzling sound, then melted into a black mud and mist, gradually merging with the doll's skin, restoring a flesh-like texture and elasticity.

"I don't know, suddenly felt a bit panicked," Erin said, "A spiritual warning, felt uneasy… Maybe it's because those two just met, I'm not quite ready to trust them yet? Or perhaps it's because I've been disconnected from the outside world for too long, and I'm not sure about the current situation between the various forces in Boundary Land…"

Yu Sheng stopped his movements and looked up at the doll: "The next time we see them, should I mention your issue to them? They have already seen you today, they will most likely report it once they return…"

"I'm not afraid of the report. There are no living dolls 66.6 centimeters tall in this world. Their report will probably assume I am some sort of Alchemy Creature similar to a living doll, which is not uncommon in their eyes. As for the next meeting..." Erin paused, looked into Yu Sheng's eyes, "Let's see. If their identity is real, confirmed to be officials, then ask them about Alice's Cottage. If they can help connect and find the other living doll sisters in this city, that would be even better. Seeing my own kind... I should feel much more at ease."

Yu Sheng rarely saw the doll show such apprehension.

But he felt he could understand the hesitation and indecision.

If he had been sealed for half a century or even longer, then suddenly released to face a completely unfamiliar world, not knowing what the once familiar things had become, nor understanding the current world order and power structure, then seeking help from other forces... indeed would become a matter requiring caution.

Yu Sheng took a light breath, put down the scraper, and gently realigned Erin's knee joint.

"Try standing up."