episode_0019
by fnovelpia“Where should we look?”
Mia had descended to the underground warehouse connected to her laboratory. She peered into the open-topped oak barrels. A sparkling purple liquid shimmered inside, like sprinkled glitter.
“The quality isn’t bad.”
Mia smiled satisfactorily and checked the other oak barrel placed beside her.
“This should be fine for experimentation.”
Mia lightly waved the staff in her hand, causing the two oak barrels to float in mid-air. They glided up the stairs as if sliding.
Creak, thud.
After closing the underground warehouse door and exiting, the bustling scene of the laboratory was more apparent than usual. On one side, a root, as thick as an arm, hung upside down.
The root bore a resemblance to a human face, with sunken cheeks emitting sounds akin to “huff, puff,” while brown liquid dripped from what seemed to be its eye area.
Due to hanging upside down, the liquid fell into a beaker placed below.
Various herbs and byproducts were being extracted for toxins. The matured toxins were filled in the oak barrels.
Sizzle-.
Mia poured the liquid from the oak barrel into a black bathtub placed in one corner of the laboratory.
Bubbling.
The purple liquid bubbled as if carbonated, then soon calmed down.
After magically levitating the empty oak barrel back to the warehouse, Mia sat on the cold workbench and looked at Rian, who was sitting in the middle of the laboratory, and said,
“Now that all preparations are complete, let’s begin the experiment.”
A harder-than-usual experiment had commenced.
***
I was often captured and experimented on by mad scientists. It wasn’t because I was particularly unlucky. It was because mad scientists conducted experiments by the thousands, even tens of thousands, due to the nature of the comedic world where returning to the original state took several days. Therefore, their experiments never succeeded.
Anyway, I became accustomed to all sorts of experiments, and before I knew it, I started to regard experiments as something that came around like a midterm or a pop quiz.
Profit.
Of course, at first, I felt fear about my skin melting or blood pouring out.
Puff!
It didn’t particularly hurt, and over time, my body returned to normal. Besides, the people who had undergone the experiments didn’t seem to care much.
Thud.
Because of that, I wasn’t particularly afraid even when faced with my organs and blood spewing out more than at a murder scene.
“…Rian, are you perhaps descended from dragons?”
“Oh, come on, that’s not possible.”
“Or maybe your parents were orcs?”
“Isn’t that too harsh an insult?”
I cried thinking I might be that ugly. Mia blinked and looked at my face, nodding as if understanding something.
“Definitely not an orc’s child.”
“…?”
“Hmm, then how exactly is your body recovering so quickly…”
Mia’s eyes sparkled with curiosity. She examined my body, broke it, sprayed poison, and then brought a large needle and stuck it into my forearm.
Through the hose connected to the needle, blood began to be sucked into a large container placed on the floor.
“Wow, the blood is flowing out without any separate device?”
“Even though it looks like this, the needle has intricate runes carved on it.”
I tried to look closely at the needle, but it was halfway stuck in my arm, making it hard to see. Giving up on finding the runes carved on the needle, I admired the laboratory that seemed like something out of a fantasy world.
“I didn’t have these things before. When did she bring them?”
I marveled at the round, long-necked flask below. Its size was almost half that of a person.
“…How can a body look like this? I’ve definitely dissected the whole body, but I still can’t figure it out. Should I open the head after all?”
When I turned my gaze away from her harsh words, I suddenly saw a brimming container filled with blood.
“Wow, why is the blood filling up so quickly?”
I’m not particularly surprised that so much blood came out of my body. I’ve lived in a world where lost blood naturally recovers like breathing.
Empty.
Mia brought a larger container for receiving blood and started to collect it there.
“If you start feeling anemic, let me know.”
“Yes.”
The words were no different from saying, “Let me know if you’re tired of breathing,” but I nodded quietly, finding it more fun to sit still and look around.
Mia brought several more containers and filled them with blood, but I didn’t change color at all. Eventually, Mia removed the needle from her arm.
“Ah… I didn’t expect this.”
Seeing the embarrassed expression on Mia’s face made me feel like I had done something wrong. I glanced at Mia as if I were a dog who had messed up the house.
“Well, then let’s try the next experiment.”
“Yes.”
Mia brought a root plant that made a faint sound of “hieek…”
“Lie down.”
At her words, I obediently lay down on the experimental table, and in an instant, my torso split open by magic, revealing a belly full of scars.
“Ggwek-..!”
The weakly trembling plant, screaming, entered my abdomen with a thud.
“I wonder what will happen in this situation…”
Mia skillfully shielded herself from the blood that spurted out and looked at the poisonous plant stuck inside my stomach. I looked at the root plant inside me with a face filled with pity.
“Poor thing.”
I know. I know that my organs are not just beings that help with normal bodily functions. They are, indeed, alive.
“Hieek, hik… ”
“Jeseong.. Jeseoeong…”
“Sob, Mom…”
The poisonous plant lodged in my stomach suddenly started crying. Instead of speaking properly, Mia’s expression turned into one of astonishment as the unassuming poisonous plant began to cry.
Perhaps inside, a conversation like this was taking place.
“What’s this? A new recruit?”
“This guy has no backbone, huh? Why doesn’t he even greet us?”
“Hey, keep it down. Let’s listen to what he’s saying.”
“Huk, huk!! Virus? It’s a virus? Huh? Huh?
Yes. My organs are truly ‘alive.’ They have consciousness and can communicate in certain situations.
I found out about this when I was being experimented on by a gloomy mad scientist.
The gloomy but broad-minded mad scientist, who covered her bangs down to her eyes, boldly cut into my abdomen, only to scold the organs fiercely, cry, and stop the experiment.
Even though I was clearly in a kidnapped situation at that time, I couldn’t help but comfort her as she cried bitterly. The split abdomen even closed up on its own. It was an event shocking enough to surprise someone like me, who was accustomed to the world of comedy.
‘Since then, if a timid or gloomy person opens my abdomen, the organs wake up.’
When another mad scientist cut into the abdomen, the creatures barely reacted, but if a strangely timid or gloomy person did it, they went crazy.
‘A sample of strength and weakness.’
While thinking such thoughts, the poisonous grass started wailing and then began to wither. Before long, it turned brown like wilted grass, trembled, and died.
“Oh… a kind friend is leaving like this.”
Unable to withstand the terrifying society, a life passed away like that. Tears seem to flow for some reason.
“What is this, what is this…”
Mia looked down at my abdomen with a vacant expression, as if she had heard that all common knowledge in the world was a lie.
Whooomp.
The abdomen, unlike usual, closed on its own. Perhaps it closed because it was cold.
“Why…? Why is this happening? It’s not usually healed like this?!”
Mia looked flustered and sliced my side with a puzzled expression. But this time, it didn’t heal immediately. Of course not. Mia was a strong one to the organs.
“Ah…”
Mia looked down at my body with empty eyes. Her expression was like that of a second-year high school student who just found out that everything she had been studying so hard for wasn’t on the test.
“…Let’s do the final experiment.”
Mia gave up on understanding and decided to proceed with the final experiment she had prepared. With an expression as if her soul had left her, she created wounds all over my body and fixed them with magic.
My recovery speed is so remarkable that it takes quite a bit of magic to fix. So, I was told not to exert too much force on my body.
It seemed that whether the magic had been applied or not, my body would recover if I focused and lightly brushed off the energy.
“Go in there.”
“That’s…”
“Atia’s poison, one of the most wicked poisons in this world. It’s so terrible that it can’t even be kept without being magically treated.”
“Oh…”
Would I turn into a skeleton if I went in there? Sometimes, when exposed to a very serious poison, one temporarily becomes boneless.
‘That’s a little embarrassing.’
Those who haven’t experienced it wouldn’t know. The fact that bones deeper than the body’s vital parts, unseen by anyone, are visible to others.
But it was a role that couldn’t be endured just because it was embarrassing. I put my foot in the bathtub, blood dripping from the wound.
Sizzle!
The clothes and skin began to melt!
“Ouch!”
I screamed and pulled my foot out. Mia blinked and said,
“Did you finally feel real pain this time? Or perhaps a threat to your life…!”
“Oh, that. I don’t have many clothes. It’s a bit inconvenient if they melt.”
…”
She looked at me again with eyes that seemed to have lost their soul. As I awkwardly smiled and avoided her intense gaze.
“…!”
Through the slightly open door of the lab, familiar eyes met mine. It was Noah’s pupils.
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