"Carol?"
Carol's father called out in a trembling voice. Before his eyes, his daughter had transformed from a human into a monster.
Her body was covered in protrusions that looked like muscles, each one resembling a pebble in color.
Since she was facing away, he couldn't see Carol's face at that moment.
But the wizard noticed him.
"Heh, look. A person with spiritual perception, just a day and night, and she's gone from being a mere mortal to a cultivator. She succeeded."
In the wizard's twisted words, Carol's father's face grew more and more contorted with rage. He wanted nothing more than to tear the wizard hiding under the cloak into pieces.
Unfortunately, he didn't have the strength to do so. The fury of a mortal was no match for the wizard, who found it all amusing. With a flick of his hand, he used his magical essence to tighten his grip on the father's throat.
"Carol." The wizard squeezed Carol's father's throat, silencing him. Then, with a smug look, he turned to Carol. "You've survived the potion, and now you have the strength of a true cultivator. Go, show them… Kill the man, torment the woman."
The wizard whispered these words into the ear of the monstrous Carol, as though casting a spell on her.
The grotesque, twisted flesh of Carol trembled, and within the fading remnants of her sanity, the images of Ashu and Anna appeared.
"Rooaarrr—"
From her now shortened and thickened throat came a low growl, like that of a tiger.
Then, with a powerful leap, she charged toward the riverbank.
The immense strength caused the cornfield beneath her to flatten instantly. Her enraged roar echoed, spreading throughout the entire Gorn Village.
At this moment...
The wizard released Carol's father's neck and smirked. "I've completed your commission beyond your expectations. How's that? Satisfied?"
Carol's father gasped for air, his eyes bloodshot with rage as he glared at the wizard. Through gritted teeth, he spat, "Ula-Ula! You filthy beast, you monster! Now I understand why the Cultivator Guild will never recognize you!"
Despair was beginning to grip Carol's father by the ankle.
He was both furious and regretful.
He regretted, in a moment of anger, running to the neighboring village to ask Ula-Ula to become his daughter's mentor.
He regretted being blinded by his trust in the Cultivator Guild and choosing this inferior wizard instead.
But no matter how much he regretted, there was no such thing as a remedy for regret in this world.
And so, his anger burned. The wizard had turned his only daughter into a monster, a strong and ugly monster.
As a father, he wanted to crush Ula-Ula's skull with his fists, but he was just a mortal.
A vast chasm lay between a mortal and a cultivator.
With all the murderous intent he could muster, he raised his fist with the determination to die alongside Ula-Ula and swung it at the wizard. However, to his shock, his fist didn't even touch the wizard's cloak. Instead, it was frozen in midair, held in place by the wizard's magical essence.
"Shh, shh, shh. Cursing and insulting me won't turn your daughter back to normal. Kneel and beg me, and maybe I'll pull out the antidote for you."
Facing the intense hatred of a mere mortal, Ula-Ula treated it like a game, as if toying with a dog.
He manipulated Carol's father's mind, his cruelty knowing no bounds. Honestly, even the wizard himself wouldn't dare to try the effects of the red potion. That Carol had survived it was nothing short of a miracle.
As for the antidote? The wizard didn't even have an accurate record of the potion's formula, let alone an antidote.
Upon hearing this.
Carol's father, broken and defeated, sank to his knees. His rage, compared to his daughter's transformation, seemed insignificant."Ula-Ula, please, please, I'll give you all the money in my house, my land, everything. Please, turn my daughter back to normal. We don't want anything else, just my Carol!"
Carol's father dropped to the ground, repeatedly banging his head against the earth.
Watching a mortal in such a pitiful state, the wizard, Ula-Ula, couldn't help but tremble with laughter. "Haha, fine, fine. Now go, go after your daughter."
The wizard pointed to a path—one that led to the demise of Carol's family.
As long as Carol's father followed it, no matter what happened, Carol's family would be the ones to bear the consequences.
The wizard only had to wait in place for the outcome of Carol's actions.
...
The River
Ashu and Anna were still practicing. He was testing the power of the Water Ball technique and calculating the strength of the Water Bullet.
The Water Bullet required a significant amount of Magical Essence, which in turn drained a lot of physical and mental energy.
From a theoretical standpoint, in his current state, he could only cast Water Bullet once a day at most.
Once he cast that spell, it would immediately deplete his physical stamina, and his brain would experience dizziness, just like the first time he tried to control the leaves.
"For now, I'll consider it my trump card," Ashu thought to himself.
Suddenly.
A powerful low growl echoed through the air.
He looked toward Anna. Based on his years of experience in Gorn Village, it was rare for any dangerous beasts to come into the village.
"Anna, be careful. The sound is coming toward us. This is no ordinary creature," he warned.
Anna nodded. As a level twelve spiritual perception practitioner, her sensing abilities were far superior to Ashu's. She knew instantly that the approaching creature wasn't a wild beast but a alchemical monster.
"Did that wizard do this? Damn him," Anna thought, feeling a chill run down her spine. She had returned to the village to peacefully live and train with Ashu.
She didn't want to get involved in the village's troubles, but there were always those who didn't know when to stop and came to provoke.
Boom—
The monstrous Carol, moving on all fours, was incredibly fast. In an instant, she crossed the fields and leaped high into the air above the two of them.
The creature looked down from its elevated position.
Ashu also looked up, observing the full form of the monster.
Its appearance had become so far removed from Carol that Ashu didn't recognize it as her.
However, Anna furrowed her brow.
With her level twelve spiritual perception, she could sense the soul fluctuations of familiar individuals. Although Carol wasn't a particularly common person, she had seen her enough times to recognize her presence.
She could distinctly feel that this monstrous creature was, in fact, the same entity as the Carol they knew.
As for why she had become such a monster, it was undoubtedly due to the potion.
And not just any potion—but a low-quality one.
The Witch's Guild library contained extensive research on potions, including those that caused transformations.
In those potions, the drinker could maintain their human rationality, but Carol, now, had clearly lost most of her mind and was left only with her remaining beastly instincts.
"This is... a magical beast?" Ashu asked, confused, while at the same time, he quickly formed a waterball spell in his hands.
Having lived in this world for over a decade, Ashu had never seen such an ugly magical beast. So, for a moment, he couldn't identify its species.
Anna kept her eyes fixed on the creature as it landed across the river, her gaze briefly flicking over to Ashu. She hesitated, wondering if she should tell him the truth.
There was no time to think further. The monstrous Carol seemed to fix her gaze on Ashu. With a burst of power from her limbs, she pounced like a hunting lion, swiftly charging toward Ashu in the river.
Ashu was ready. He immediately released the waterball spell from his hand and, using the recoil, jumped backward.
The waterball struck the monster's head precisely, but the impact only slightly diverted its trajectory, stunning it momentarily, though it didn't cause any real harm.
Without hesitation, Ashu grabbed Anna's delicate arm and, with all his strength, hurled her toward the shore.
Having worked as a farmer for over ten years, his well-developed muscles came into play. With a surge of adrenaline, Ashu pulled Anna five or six meters along the riverbank.
"Run, Anna!" he shouted.
Without stopping to put on his beloved shoes, Ashu ran barefoot, pulling Anna with him, heading toward the village.
But the monstrous Carol wasn't going to give up so easily. Having witnessed the closeness between Ashu and Anna, its temperament became even more volatile.
"Rooar—!!"
With a thunderous roar, the creature lunged forward, leaping out of the river with powerful strides, catching up to Ashu within just a few steps.
Although Ashu had embarked on the path of a cultivator, he was still outpaced by Carol, who had consumed the potion and become a monster.
"Ashu, fight back, you can't outrun it," Anna said, her voice calm. A creature of this caliber, when she was at her peak, would have been nothing more than a thought away from being obliterated.
Her cultivation level had dropped, and she lacked both mana and health, with most of her skills sealed, but her battle experience and mental fortitude remained intact.
Quickly, she searched her mind for an appropriate countermeasure.
"Wildness, spread! Vines of the earth!"
With minimal chanting, Anna invoked her wood element magic. The trees along the riverbank immediately extended numerous vines, which rushed toward the rapidly advancing monster Carol.
Seeing the monster momentarily entangled by the vines, Ashu wasted no time. He stopped hiding his strength and unleashed his most powerful spell—the Water Bullet.
"Clear waters, come forth! The flowing stream appears!"