The Bizarre Wizarding World

Having put away the pocket watch, he stood to one side and waited quietly.

However, this time, not even an hour had passed - just half an hour - when the mutation suddenly occurred.

"Arghhh—"

From the right side of the hall, Abner, who was initially practicing slowly, began to sweat profusely from his forehead. Soon after, his movements halted, and he suddenly let out a beastly roar.

He lunged towards Colin, the nearest to him, in a seemingly suicidal manner, his eyes blood-red with thread-like veins covering them, and his entire face was flushed with the same alarming hue!

Colin's expression changed slightly, and he immediately released the Temple Ring Binding!

Bang!

Abner's lunge toward the front came to a frozen stop, his body slamming into the silver floor with such force that he slid a considerable distance before coming to a halt at Colin's feet.

"He seems to have... fallen into a bloodlust state?" Onions said uncertainly from aside.

In the past six months, he hadn't touched any cave factors, but every month and a half or so, he would still descend into madness.

He was no stranger to Abner's current behavior.

Colin looked down at Abner at his feet, furrowing his brows, sharing Onions' familiarity with Abner's condition.

It was clearly a state of contamination by the cavern factor.

This startling change caused Orkot next to him to cease his practice and look over in astonishment, his expression slightly bewildered.

The effects of the Magic Potion Colin had given him were more intense than he had imagined.

"You continue," Colin said with a glance and a commanding tone.

"Huff—huff—"

At that moment, a slight noise came from underfoot.

Colin looked down to see that the redness on Abner's face had faded unnoticed, the bloodshot veins in his eyes had disappeared, and his face had returned to its normal appearance.

Swish.

With a slight arch of his brow, Colin waved his hand, releasing Abner from his restraint.

"Cough—cough cough—"

The latter coughed violently for a moment before propping himself up and getting to his feet.

"Describe to me what you just felt," Colin asked calmly.

Under the influence of the Knight Aura, Abner did not hesitate and, recalling his sensations carefully, said:

"After taking your remarkable Magic Potion, I started practicing as normal. At first, it was the same as before, I could distinctly feel my physical strength continuously improving.

"But then, at a certain moment, everything suddenly changed, as if a spring had been compressed to its limit and then rebounded, or as if a certain threshold had been punctured."

"A scorching heat rushed from my heart to my brain, obliterating all rational thought, and a savage emotion instantly overtook me; then I lunged forward, and the next moment, you had me under control."

"I must say, your power is indeed..."

Colin raised his hand to interrupt Abner's irrelevant narrative.

'After advancing to Great Knight, taking the cavern factor seems to have a negative effect...'

He pondered for a moment and began to examine Abner's body.

The situation was worse than what Abner had felt: on the skin over his heart, purple-red spots had begun to appear.

However, Abner's strength had indeed improved noticeably than before.

But such an improvement was negligible compared to the detrimental effects.

To date, Colin had still not found any effective treatment or way to mitigate the side effects caused by taking the cavern factor.

Whenever Onions had an episode, he could only be restrained like Abner had been, waiting for a natural recovery.

After a while, Orkot completed his practice, his eyes filled with surprise.

Without waiting for Colin to ask, he volunteered:

"Great Knight, I feel as though I have become smaller," while saying this, he swung his fist, "but there doesn't seem to be any decrease in strength, on the contrary, there's quite a significant improvement."

"What about your mind? Did you feel any hot or violent impulses?" Colin continued to inquire.

"None," Orkot shook his head decisively. "I feel very clear-headed, with my will remaining firm."

Colin raised an eyebrow and instructed, "Come here, let me check."

Orkot's body had indeed shrunk, as he had described.

Before this round of practice, Orkot stood at about two and a half meters tall, but now he had shrunk to around two meters forty.

It's worth mentioning that despite such a significant change in stature, Orkot's weight had almost not changed.

"Great Knight, in addition to this, I feel like I can see inside my body and seem to have acquired some strange new ability."

Orkot continued, demonstrating his newfound ability to Colin.

He extended his index finger and then swiped it over the uplifted forearm of his right hand.

Swish!

His long-uncut fingernails, like a sharp little knife with the force of a Great Knight, swept quickly over the forearm, yet left no mark at all.

This was a usual occurrence—if Orkot had activated his Blood Energy Armor.

However, he had not.

Colin, with his keen observation, noticed that as Orkot's fingernails passed over the forearm, they did not actually make contact with the skin—there seemed to be an invisible substance preventing the nail from cutting.

Orkot withdrew his right hand and then poked his left forearm with his index finger.

This time, the phenomenon that Colin could see was even more straightforward.

Orkot's now semi-transparent nail bent under the immense force, yet the skin of the left forearm had no reaction, not even a slight dent!