Chapter 156 - 031: Twisted Space

Chapter 156: 031: Twisted Space

“Huff! Huff!”

The sound of heavy breathing echoed, as Lynch lay face down on the ground, gasping for air.

“I… I’m still alive…”

After panting for a while, he tried to flip himself over. He expected it to be strenuous, but surprisingly, he managed it with ease. His aged, sluggish body seemed to regain its former agility.

Lynch hurriedly raised his hands before his eyes. His arms were pale and smooth, his skin firm and full of vitality—they looked just as they used to.

’Is this reverting back…?’

Lynch continued to examine his body. His limbs were strong and full of energy, his previously shriveled skin now moist and healthy. Even his hunched back could straighten again. Everything about his body had returned to its original state, as if the aging had only been an illusion.

’No…’

’Impossible for it to be an illusion…’

The suffocating feeling, the weakening from the loss of life force—Lynch had vividly felt himself approach death with each passing moment. The memory still left him terrified.

After resting for a while, Lynch finally calmed down.

Only then did he begin to take stock of his surroundings.

“Where is this?”

Lynch looked around and found himself in an unusual space.

The space was distorted—in every direction, up, down, left, and right, the area bent and curved in peculiar ways.

In the sky, countless bizarre clocks floated above. Smaller ones resembled ordinary clocks, but the larger ones were as massive as houses, layered and floating in mid-air.

Each clock displayed a different time, but now, all of them had stopped, just like in the laboratory earlier.

“The laboratory—is it gone?”

Lynch recalled entering this place from the laboratory. However, when he turned to look behind him, all he saw was an expanse of void and warped space. The laboratory, including the door that led him here, had completely vanished.

“A barrier?”

Upon closer inspection, Lynch discovered an invisible barrier surrounding him. It existed to his left, right, above, below, and at his back, sealing the area off completely. It created a narrow tunnel-like space with a depth of about two meters.

Despite carefully searching for an exit, Lynch couldn’t find any way out and had no choice but to venture forward.

“What is going on?”

He had been in this laboratory for ten years, and in all that time, nothing unexpected had ever occurred—let alone something as bizarre as today’s events. Just moments ago, he truly thought his life was coming to an end here.

“Tap. Tap. Tap.” The sound of footsteps echoed in his ears as Lynch walked cautiously forward, curiously observing the surroundings.

At this moment, he was deeply intrigued by where he had ended up.

He had used this laboratory countless times over the past decade, navigating every nook and cranny of it until it was as familiar to him as the back of his hand. Yet today, this place was entirely new to him. He couldn’t believe that such a peculiar space could exist within the lab.

Lynch kept walking forward. He didn’t know how long he had been moving—the scenery didn’t change, there was no weather, no sun rising or setting, and absolutely no way to track time.

Eventually, the slight tingling in his legs signaled how long he had been walking. And then, for the first time, the scenery ahead began to change.

Up ahead lay a circular plaza.

The plaza had a diameter of several hundred meters and was a perfect circle. Floating clocks of varying sizes surrounded the plaza, just like the corridor earlier.

At the plaza’s center stood a gigantic mechanical clock, roughly as large as a house. It appeared to be undergoing repairs, its opened casing revealing countless tightly packed metal gears, machinery, and an assortment of strange alchemy parts—truly a magnificent sight.

However, Lynch’s gaze didn’t linger on the towering structure but instead shifted immediately to the open space in front of the clock.

There he saw, lying on the ground, a human figure.

“Wizard Somda?!”

The person lying on the ground was none other than Wizard Somda—Lynch’s mentor whom he met briefly ten years ago.

Lynch rushed over immediately.

Wizard Somda was lying on his side, his eyes closed and motionless, as though he were dead.

Frantically checking him over, Lynch breathed a sigh of relief to find that Somda’s breathing and heartbeat were still present—he seemed merely unconscious for unknown reasons.

Lynch quickly picked Somda up and called out to him.

“Wizard Somda!”

“Wake up, Wizard Somda!”

Finally, after several attempts, a faint “mm” escaped Somda’s mouth and nostrils, followed by his eyes slowly opening.

“You finally woke up…” Lynch let out a deep breath in relief.

At the same time, Somda looked at Lynch with confusion and sat upright, asking, “Who are you?”

Lynch froze before replying hesitantly, “I’m your apprentice, Lynch! Lynch Valen! Don’t you remember?”

Ten years might not mean much to a wizard—even Lynch, just an apprentice, could easily recall the people and events from that time. For Somda, whose spiritual power far exceeded his own, forgetting something like this should have been impossible.

Yet Somda inexplicably failed to recognize Lynch. Even after hearing his name, his face remained a portrait of puzzlement and uncertainty.

“An apprentice…”

“I remember.” After a long moment, Somda finally recalled, “You were the apprentice assigned to me by the Tower, weren’t you? I do vaguely recall speaking with you briefly.”

Lynch nodded. “Yes, Mentor.”

Somda asked curiously, “But why are you here? I believe my usual instructions emphasize that you must never open the door in the laboratory. Didn’t I give you that warning?”

Lynch nodded again, “Yes, Mentor, you did warn me. But you also mentioned an exception.”

“An exception?”

Somda paused, reflecting for a moment, before suddenly realizing something. His expression shifted as he quickly asked, “I remember now—I told you not to approach this laboratory unless…”

Lynch answered, “Unless time stops.”

“You told me to only come here if time stopped moving. That’s exactly the situation now. And… the laboratory has become incredibly strange. I only entered because I had no other choice, and I nearly died once inside…”

Somda didn’t wait for Lynch to continue speaking and instead turned sharply, heading quickly toward the massive clock ahead.

“It stopped…”

“How could they let it stop…”

His face was grim, muttering ceaselessly as a palpable sense of worry and anxiety radiated from him—a tension that Lynch could clearly feel.

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