Chapter 12

“Wake up! Wake up!”

Half-dreaming, half-awake, Lynn felt someone patting his face a few times.

He slowly opened his sleepy eyes.

Once he cleared his vision, Lynn immediately fell into a state of confusion.

Who am I? Where am I? And why am I completely naked?! As soon as Lynn realized he was tied up naked on a chair, he fell silent.

He found himself in some kind of underground facility.

Surrounding him were numerous old instruments, multicolored gems, and various magical matrices illustrated on parchment, their content intricate and obscure.

Not only that, but not far away on a stone pedestal, an open book of dark magic lay waiting.

One of its pages bore a pattern that looked like a vertical pupil, appearing lifelike and eerie.

It felt as if it could penetrate his soul and impose some sort of suggestion on him.

Lynn vaguely remembered that this insignia belonged to the Church of the Mind, active during the Second and Third Eras.

Later, for some unknown reason, it was branded as a cult by an empire and completely wiped out.

“You’re finally awake, Experiment 126.”

The earlier voice came again.

Lynn looked around but saw no one; the entire laboratory was empty.

Am I seeing ghosts? “Hey, I’m here!”

Finally, Lynn looked down and saw a little girl named Milani standing at the bottom of the steps.

She was about twelve or thirteen, dressed in an ill-fitting white lab coat, with messy short brown hair and a few freckles on her nose, intently observing him.

“Who are you?”

Lynn watched her warily, trying to clamp his legs together.

Meanwhile, he had developed the good habit of casually opening the system.

[Character Name: Milani Valenella]

[Story Level: D]

[Story Deviation: 0.00%]

Sure enough, he then heard her self-introduction.

“My name is Milani, you can call me Miss Milani.” The little girl scratched her messy head, putting her hands in her pockets, “No need for extra words; you should know why Princess Ivyst sent you here, right?”

Hearing this, memories from not long ago rushed into Lynn’s mind.

He gasped.

Did he just do something huge? It seemed the villainous princess was furious about him exposing her mask.

Recalling the bone-chilling fear he felt at that moment, Lynn couldn’t help but shiver.

Honestly, some things can only be appreciated after experiencing them firsthand, realizing the beauty of being alive.

Right now, he would rather run naked down the street screaming “I’m gay” than face that enraged woman again.

But for some reason, she spared his life.

However, it seemed he couldn’t escape whatever experiment was mentioned earlier in the underground prison.

“Are you going to perform mind control on me?”

Lynn frowned.

At this, Milani shook her head: “It’s not some low-end trick of mind control; it’s hypnosis, understand?”

“Abilities and magic related to mental interference are quite rare; currently, humans mainly possess charms, forgetfulness, and psychological suggestions, but they are rejected by the three mainstream churches of the Saint Roland Empire.”

“Moreover, these abilities all come with their own drawbacks.”

“For example, charms can easily stir human desires, leading to a loss of reason; as for psychological suggestions, their effects are average and don’t work on those with strong wills.”

“So, studies involving the mind are quite an interesting subject; I have been trying in this area for a long time.”

“In summary, my expected effect of hypnosis is to completely control a person’s body and mind without them even realizing it.”

“During ordinary times, the hypnotized person will be just like anyone else, unaware of their state, but once the switch is flipped, they will enter a subconscious state, becoming a slave to the hypnotist.”

“Any command from the hypnotist will imprint on the hypnotized person’s mind like a mental brand, even potentially altering their perception of the world and their common sense.”

“So, Experiment 126, you need to understand that you are participating in a grand experiment like no other.”

Milani suddenly stood on her toes, looking into Lynn’s eyes earnestly.

Lynn twitched the corner of his mouth: “Can I refuse?”

“Of course not.” Milani affectionately patted his head, then placed a helmet-like crude device on his head. “Alright, let’s save the whining for later; since you’re awake, we can start the experiment now.”

As she spoke, Milani walked over to a stone slab covered in dirt.

Carved into it was the Eye of the Mind from that dark magic book, surrounded by various magical matrices and a dozen slots for embedding magical stones.

The slab was connected to several old instruments, ultimately linking to the helmet on Lynn’s head.

What the heck, why does this feel like sitting in an electric chair?

Lynn thought uncomfortably. His fate was now in someone else’s hands, and he had no way to resist.

“Can I ask what happened to the previous 125 subjects?”

Lynn asked with a forced smile.

Milani turned back and smiled, “Hehe.”

Everything was left unsaid.

Seeing this, Lynn completely gave up the idea of talking back.

This girl seemed like a mad scientist, too immersed in her work to be swayed by mere words.

Besides, this was an order from that princess.

No, he had to save himself.

As he thought, Lynn looked at his body.

His hands and legs were restrained by iron hoops on the armrests, and even his waist was tightly bound by several belts.

It seemed Ivyst and the others were quite wary of him.

And right now, he was just an ordinary person without any extraordinary ability, so there was no way he could break free with sheer strength.

With this realization, Lynn abandoned the thought of struggle and turned his gaze to his last hope.

“System!”

In the next second, a light screen appeared in front of Lynn.

However, unlike the simple interface he remembered, this time, the system seemed to be completely open to him.

[Name: Lynn]

[Race: Human]

[Age: 17]

[Belief: None]

[Rank: None]

[Extraordinary Ability: None]

[Divine Factor: 0]

[Remaining System Points: 1]

The empty interface made Lynn feel a bit embarrassed.

In his memories, his former self used to believe in one of the three main churches of the empire— the Church of Heavenly Justice, and at his peak, he had 136 divine factors, making him one of the best among his peers.

But right now, he had no time to reminisce about glorious past times and focused on another piece of information.

“Why do I have 1 system point?”

He silently inquired the system.

[The host successfully raised the story deviation degree of the S-level character “Ivyst Roland Alexini” to 0.01%, receiving 1 system point as a reward.]

[Additionally, the host can spend points to draw various extraordinary abilities and enhance them, or ignite new divine factors to strengthen his power.]

Lynn was stunned.

The reward for an S-level character was only this? Then what awful fate awaited E and F-level characters? But on second thought, most people were in the E and F ranks, even if they were numerous, it was still a significant scale.

This system is truly outrageous in every sense.

At least it wasn’t all in vain after being tormented for half a month.

After a few moments of reflection, Lynn shifted his gaze to the right side of the system interface.

There hovered a disk-like relief, divided into thirty-six sectors, each bearing an ancient and abstract symbol.

Among them was a symbol he recognized, almost resembling several twinkling stars connected together.

It was the exclusive mark of the Church of Heavenly Justice.

Could it be that each mark points to a deity? The original work never mentioned this; there were so many? With a nervous heart, Lynn touched the needle at the center of the relief disk, and a prompt jumped up before his eyes.

[Would you like to spend 1 system point to draw an ability?]

“Yes.”

In the next second, the relief disk started spinning rapidly as if going haywire.

At the same time, Milani began embedding various colored magical stones into the Eye of the Mind slab, about to start the final step.

So Lynn mentally murmured,

Please, system bro, I’ve never asked anything of you in this life.

Just give me a decent ability!