Chapter Sixty-Six

In the brightly lit room, a middle-aged man knelt on the floor, panting heavily.

It wasn't because someone was using violence against it. Judging from its expression, it was very excited. If a girl hadn't been holding it back, it probably would have already pounced.

The reason was that the thing sitting there, a suit of armor about two meters long, was slowly turning its head.

This simple action made the middle-aged man jump up from the ground, and then he quickly scribbled something in the notebook next to him.

"Lelly, give me the magic flow diagram inside." It shouted to the girl next to it, and she nodded and began to write something down in her notebook as well.

And then, that was it. The machine suddenly stopped and remained motionless.

"Damn it." The middle-aged man cursed and threw the pen in his hand far away.

The diagram clearly shows why he turned his head: it was a linkage effect caused by a leak of magic that caused a piece of metal to twist and deform.

The girl named Leili sighed as she looked at him. Then she went over and started tidying up the thing; after adding a few parts, it could be used as a normal puppet.

The girl is probably young, as she is clearly a child. There's no need to judge, as her age is clearly stated on the sign: fourteen years old.

“At least the internal core wasn’t burned out, and there was no explosion.” The girl said as she recorded the data: “Relatively speaking, this was a very successful experiment; only one part was destroyed.”

"Am I conducting an experiment to prevent it from exploding? It's another failure, still no results!" He shouted loudly as he threw the book next to him, scattering extra pages everywhere.

The girl next to him didn't say much, but slowly bent down to pick up the documents scattered on the ground.

The man took off his work clothes, removed the name tag from them, and placed it on the table. After the experiment failed again, he had no intention of continuing to work and needed to find a way to relax a little.

"How did that bastard manage to do that?" he muttered to himself, sipping his canned coffee and lost in thought.

As a scientist specializing in alchemical dolls, he enjoyed status and reputation in the city. He was well-treated because of his excellence. His name was Kendiri, and his fame in the city was polarized. Ordinary people knew nothing about him, but any mechanic involved in research knew him. After all, his works were ubiquitous in any field related to alchemical dolls.

His laboratory had long since become a mess, and what was once a peaceful place of residence had now been completely turned into a small ruin.

It all started with his apprentice, a guy who used the alias Krypton.

Although that guy is now disgraced, I still have a copy of his wanted poster. The charges are murder, child abuse, and research into forbidden arts.

This crime is enough to warrant him being heated in a cauldron of oil in hell until his skin peels off, and it's all proven; there's not a single falsehood. He fled months ago to escape punishment and hasn't been caught yet.

He's probably gone, considering he dared to cross a forbidden zone just to escape.

Even in death, that guy still caused us a lot of trouble.

After organizing his research materials, Kennedy suddenly felt that he had a new research direction.

The original alchemical dolls had already been researched to their limits; he was merely designing more realistic appearances and weapons for them. Frankly, these things didn't offer much creativity; they were just refining the existing technology and couldn't fundamentally change the status quo.

But this guy's research paid off. Judging from his experimental notes, he had created a puppet capable of thinking on its own, and, with a rather wicked sense of humor, named it after Kennedy's eldest daughter, Lady. According to the notes, it was already a finished product, a thinking machine.

Just days before that, his eldest daughter, Lady, had been murdered. Her body was found in a garbage dump; the man, having no better means of disposal, had hastily strangled her and thrown her in.

The reason is probably easy to guess. That night, she went to deliver dinner to the apprentice as her father had instructed. However, she saw something that Krypton didn't want others to see. So she hastily killed him.

Thinking about it now still makes Kendry furious; he wishes he could tear that guy to pieces himself.

After calming down, he suddenly realized what he needed to do next because of this research. Although he hadn't seen the finished product, if this theory could come true, it would fundamentally change the nature of alchemical dolls.

So he spent all his time thinking and organizing his research, but to no avail.

It is simply unimaginable that his theory could be proven to be successful when a machine can move on its own without any external force.

This is a paradoxical statement, because traditional alchemical puppets relied on the core magic array of alchemy. However, recent alchemical puppets have incorporated mechanical elements. In other words, mechanical puppets are cheaper than purely alchemical creations, and their performance is superior and more stable.

A puppet acting entirely against the user's will is theoretically impossible. Yet, to his disbelief, the guy's research notes actually recorded successful cases, and more than one.

He didn't take everything, only the most complete piece. One of his successful examples was nearby. It was a mechanical bird, curiously observing him from its cage. As a mechanical creation, its body was made of metal, not alchemical materials. This allowed him to better observe how the magic array operated—completely chaotic and without any rhyme or reason. The only rule was that this thing acted entirely irrationally, just like a living bird.

"It's okay if we don't do it, right?"

As Kendry stared blankly at the bird, the little girl next to him suddenly spoke.

Kendry turned to look at the girl, who was curled up in the corner. It was a simple bed with a fairly soft blanket and a plush toy—a rather ugly bear, after all, Kendry didn't know much about sewing toys.

He didn't marry young, and his wife passed away five years ago from a cold. He practically raised his two children alone, so they've been exposed to mechanics and alchemy since they were little. Leili grew up in this room, originally with her older sister, but since her sister died six months ago, she's become increasingly withdrawn.

“There has to be progress,” Kendrick said after a pause. “There has to be someone who makes our lives better.”

"I don't understand. Shouldn't we just focus on living our lives properly now?"

You'll understand when you grow up.

“You always say that. But will I be able to grow up smoothly? My sister didn’t grow up either, and she didn’t understand either. But now she’s dead.”

You will grow up smoothly.

How can I trust you, Father?

“I don’t know. I’m not good at persuading others. I prefer to take action first.” Kendrick paused and said, “What time is it now?”

“It’s noon, and you haven’t had lunch or breakfast yet. Plus, you’ve been up all night.”

"Then let me take a nap. After I wake up, I'll take you outside for a walk and also help me eat, since I haven't had anything all day. Please don't wander around while I'm sleeping."

"I'm not going anywhere."

......

Yak slowly opened his eyes, but did not move.

Because he felt something pressing on his shoulder.

"Benny?" Ark called out a name softly. But he smiled helplessly as soon as he spoke.

He must have mistaken someone else for someone else; it wouldn't be easy to see that guy again, the one who used to sleep on his shoulder. And he probably doesn't use that name anymore either.

So who could it be? Ark looked at the reflection in the metal pipe in front of him and confirmed the identity.

Denos said he would wake up in three hours, but he didn't actually open his eyes until the morning of the next day, which is now.

Lady was also still asleep. She had been waiting for Ark to wake up for so long last night that she had fallen asleep herself. However, there wasn't a better place to lie down on the chair, so she leaned on Ark's shoulder while still feeling drowsy.

Yak hesitated whether to wake her, but decided to wait a little longer.

She must have come looking for me; the fact that she'd fallen asleep waiting means she'd been waiting here for quite some time. I shouldn't have rushed to wake her.

However, this girl should at least have some awareness of her surroundings. At least right now, she seems completely unguarded, making it easy for Ark to do many things without her noticing. For example, stabbing her in the neck with a dagger, or...

Ark turned to look at her face, which still seemed somewhat eerie. There wasn't a single flaw; if it were a real person's face, it would be far too unsettling.

He thought, "He's just a child."

Because he wasn't young, even an old man could be called a child by seniority. Ark often referred to people with somewhat childish behavior as children, like Lady. In his eyes, Lady was simply an immature child, acting without thinking and easily letting things affect him excessively. And she was always causing trouble.

But it's good that all of these qualities are present, indicating that this person is alive.

However, this guy really knows how to get himself into trouble. For example, the only reason he's here right now is to fulfill a promise he made. He said he would take this child home, and he's determined to bring her back no matter what.

This is a very strange logic, because even though he said it, he didn't actually fulfill all of his promises. He also did many, many things that went against his own commitments.

But he always had to find some value in his existence, even if it was just the least valuable thing. He hoped that he would give others the impression of someone who would keep his promises, nothing more.

As Ark listened to Lady's breathing, he suddenly had a strange feeling, and at the same time, a headache made his body tremble uncontrollably.

How many times has it been? How many people have leaned on his shoulder to rest? It's a surprising thing, because Yak suddenly realized that no matter who it was, their breathing sounded so similar. At first, he could still identify the source of the sound.

But now, he suddenly felt he couldn't tell the difference; it was just breathing. Everyone's breathing sounded the same. Perhaps it was all just his imagination, perhaps he was just a woodcutter suffering from amnesia and delusions, and everything he was experiencing was a delusion. The person leaning against him might be his wife, simply making different sounds because she had a cold one day.

But suddenly he calmed down because his hand suddenly touched something in his pocket.

The sense of emptiness he had felt earlier, due to uncertainty about his own existence, vanished in an instant. In the blink of an eye, he felt himself firmly planted on the ground again.

Honestly, I shouldn't be thinking about these things right now, Ark sighed helplessly. A smile suddenly appeared on his expressionless face, a smile that was so helpless, but also from the bottom of his heart.

"That's good." He thought to himself, realizing he was being a little too pessimistic. He felt that the death of the abandoned child had had too much of an impact on Lady, causing her excessive grief. But he was also becoming overly pessimistic because of the chain reaction he was experiencing.

In that case, aren't I still just a child who hasn't grown up? It's like the pot calling the kettle black; I really am quite useless.

He snapped his fingers, and the cup on the table suddenly jumped up and then fell back down with a clattering sound.

The sound was neither too loud nor too soft, but just enough to wake Lady up.

"What am I doing?" she mumbled, rubbing her eyes. When she realized she was leaning on Ark's shoulder, she sprang up at lightning speed.

"I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry. I... I don't know why I..." Lady stopped herself from speaking, a blush suddenly spreading across her face. In her memory, there was indeed a definition and meaning of sleeping with one's head resting on a shoulder. That's why she felt she should perhaps say something to explain.

Yak shrugged, indicating that he didn't care at all.

“There’s a problem, isn’t there?” Yak asked, looking at Lady’s confused eyes. “If that’s the case, I suggest we go downstairs to talk. It’s already morning, and we need some bread and drinks to make ourselves feel better.”