Chapter 745
Mentor Alistair
As Alistair looked at “Christina’s” gaze, which was both unfamiliar and familiar, the arrogant and confident smile on Alistair’s face softened considerably.
“Don’t call me Master anymore. You are free. I have fulfilled my promise from the past, granting you a wider world.”
She reached out and stroked “Christina’s” hair, cupped her face in her hands, and gently admonished, “If you can, remember to take care of fellow student Weber. Don’t let her get bullied—it would be too ridiculous to have obtained my power and still be as pathetic as before.
“…But remember, don’t let yourself be wronged. If you encounter danger, or trouble you can’t solve, remember to come find me—we are still friends.
“If you need me, then ask 【me】 for help.”
“Then…”
Alice hesitated for a moment: “What should I call you… ‘Brother’?”
When Alice was buried in the foundation, she was still a little girl not yet ten years old.
To her, Alistair’s age was indeed comparable to that of an elder brother.
“Mmm…”
Alistair’s expression became complicated for a moment, but she still smiled gently: “Let’s not. I already have many sisters.”
—She knew that Eivass was the “correct self,” and Alistair was merely a fleeting afterimage with little time left.
Alice directly calling herself “Brother” was undoubtedly correct. Even if Alice called herself “Sister,” she would proactively correct the other person’s address.
After all, it was Eivass who saved her, not Alistair.
…But in that instant, she couldn’t help but feel a nameless sense of melancholy.
“You can call me…”
Alistair pondered for a moment, her expression becoming a little more serious: “You can call me… Mentor.”
“Mentor!”
Alice responded without hesitation.
Then, her expression changed dramatically, clearly showing a hint of timidity.
Christina murmured in response: “Mentor…?”
“Christina.”
Alistair suddenly called her name.
“…I’m here, I’m here, sir!”
Christina said flusteredly, afraid of angering the important figure before her.
“You too, just call me Mentor,” Alistair said softly. “Go back to school and continue studying well—of course, if you can, I suggest you stop studying Alchemy. Necromancy would be more suitable for you.”
This was Alistair’s heartfelt advice.
Christina didn’t seem like the extremely rational or exceptionally serious type, and was clearly not suited for the Path of Balance. Star Antinomy Alchemy, in particular, required affinity with the Path of Transcendence, which would be quite difficult for her.
Since she was prone to soul leakage without mastering the power of the Twilight Path, strengthening her mastery of Necromancy would be a good choice, to reduce Alice’s workload.
“Necromancy…”
Christina murmured.
She quickly made up her mind: “I understand, Mentor. I will do it.”
Undoubtedly, she saw this “suggestion” as the first mission her mentor had given her: she needed to find a way to join the Spirit Tower.
“…But, Mentor.”
Christina looked somewhat conflicted: “I have a question…”
“Speak,” Alistair nodded.
“The dress I was wearing before… was lent to me by a senior student. She was very good to me, but the dress is ruined. If I have to leave Hellsing University, I hope to at least return the money for the dress to her…”
After a night that felt like hell, Christina seemed to have gained some enlightenment. Her past vanity, her yearning for wealth and luxury items, her worries about a house and a job, all seemed so vulgar in the face of true High-Tier Extraordinarys and the Path of the Extraordinary… they seemed meaningless.
She vowed not to fall again… if possible, she would change herself starting from this day.
【Really?】
A cold, childlike voice echoed from the depths of her heart.
This startled Christina, but she quickly gritted her teeth and replied in her heart, “Yes, it’s true! If you don’t believe me, then… I mean, if you don’t believe me, you can supervise me anytime.”
【I will always watch you】
The cold voice echoed as if in her skull.
Alistair, however, didn’t react much to this: “Yes, that’s only right.”
Seeing that this mysterious young lady seemed uninterested, Christina timidly whispered: “So…”
“…So?”
“I, I don’t have money… I mean, I don’t have money for now! I’ll find a way to earn money working later… if possible, I’d like to borrow some money from Mentor—if not, I can borrow from other friends!”
“How much?” Alistair asked back.
“Um… the tag I saw before said this dress was 120 gold and 8 silver. However, it’s a popular style, so I think there might be a pre-owned one in the secondary market for under a hundred gold…” Christina said quickly.
“This is indeed my oversight,” Alistair said, suddenly realizing, and added with some distress, “But I don’t have any money on me.”
Christina froze for a moment, her cost-calculating words suddenly halting.
“Mirror Demon, are you still there?” Alistair asked as if nothing had happened.
Black smoke rose from the mirror beside her: “I am still here, watching over my former master’s soul. Until his soul returns to the Dream Realm.”
It was too cautious.
As long as the former master wasn’t completely dead, it wouldn’t leave. It was afraid of the boss suddenly coming back to life and calling it back for overtime.
“—There’s no need for such trouble. I’ll find someone to hold a funeral for him shortly and send his soul away,” Alistair said.
Although she was no longer a Priest…
Her true self was now His Majesty the Pope.
With a single thought, she could immediately command a local Bishop to come here and hold a funeral, directly allowing the Earl’s soul to pass on.
“Similarly, help me with something. First, get me some loose change for Christina—no, that’s too troublesome. Just put it in her house. You know where she lives, right?”
“Of course,” the attentive Mirror Demon secretary inquired, “How much money should I place?”
“Let’s start with three thousand gold coins. That should be enough for a while.”
“Three thousand—” Christina blurted out.
The fear in her heart was instantly dispelled—the Earl had offered her an “almost irresistible price” to spend a month with him, and had only offered her eight hundred gold coins.
As a First Tier Alchemist, eight hundred gold coins worth of alchemical materials was enough for her to advance to Second Tier, or even Third Tier.
Even if she could borrow alchemical tools from the school laboratory, she was desperately short of materials.
A single standard alchemy cost nearly two gold coins. In Star Antinomy, where prices were soaring, this money could buy about seventy to eighty servings of steak.
First Tier Alchemists had no direct offensive abilities at all. According to her mentor’s advice, if she wanted to create the potions needed for the Ascension Ritual, she would need at least a complete set of beginner potion kits worth one hundred and forty gold coins. Only then would she be a valuable teammate in the Ascension Ritual and receive protection from others.
Even if the most expensive and difficult Petrochemical Potion wasn’t refined, the remaining ones would still cost over sixty gold coins.
—Even if all the refinements were successful on the first try, one Ascension Ritual would cost sixty gold coins!
Christina couldn’t afford the materials.
She could only watch others refine, and then imagine in her mind that she was the one refining—she called this “Meditation Alchemy.” As long as she hypnotized herself deeply enough, it was as if she had already practiced.
…But as it turned out, imagination remained just imagination. She finally bought a set of materials, but only managed to synthesize two bottles of Vitality Potion and one jar of Hemostatic Powder in the first round of alchemy.
Naturally, she was looked down upon during the Ascension Ritual.
In Star Antinomy, where Alchemists were in oversupply, people were willing to bring Path of Balance Extraordinarys to ascend just to get potions from them. But she had no Snake Venom Ointment, no Sobering Potion, and most crucially, no Featherfall Potion, all things a First Tier could refine—then why wouldn’t I team up with a Path of Devotion Extraordinary for just these three bottles?
Why should I bring you along?
So Christina became desperate.
—She couldn’t afford to buy them anyway, and even if she successfully synthesized potions, they might be exploited or disdained. She might even be abandoned or betrayed if she formed a team, so she might as well not refine any potions.
I’ll just take the exam empty-handed!
Failing the Ascension Ritual at the First Tier was not dangerous. With a few more attempts, there was a chance she could get in.
Perhaps she would get lucky and randomly get the Great Philosopher’s ceremony, where everyone would compete fairly using their brains instead of Extraordinary Abilities.
(End of Chapter)
