"AI Core, set to text-reading mode..."
At nightfall, Ryan set the program, lay down, and quickly slipped into deep dream-sleep.
Baron Morin, back on that airship wreck, had only obtained the formula for the Corpse-Stitcher serum — not the accompanying class inheritance itself.
But surely the professional knowledge for the Combat Physician line had to be medical in nature — and Pisces's collection happened to be exactly the introductory medical texts Ryan desperately needed.
Mastering the necessary "support skills" would also give him a better chance of surviving once he eventually escaped the Weasel Bandit Gang and made his way across the Frostspine Wasteland.
And beyond these introductory texts, there was still the more advanced knowledge waiting in Morin's storage ring, tucked away in folding space. For a good while yet, Ryan's real work would be digesting all of this professional knowledge.
...
In the depths of the dream, Ryan sat in a library conjured entirely from his own will.
All around him, on shelf after shelf, sat the very texts the AI Core had recorded.
He pulled down a copy of *Introductory Alchemy* and opened it — the text inside matched the real book exactly, even down to the feel of the pages...
Time in the dream was skewed relative to reality, but the sensory flow of time matched the waking world.
Though he felt no hunger or thirst, reading was tedious work — especially dense professional texts like these.
One night equaled twenty — a real advantage in time — but could an ordinary person really endure twenty straight days of nothing but reading? That took no small amount of willpower to push through.
Which was exactly why, even back on Earth with this kind of technology, the world hadn't been overrun with scientists. People who owned an AI Core generally preferred conjuring up pleasant fantasies to indulge in — because in a dream, you could satisfy every desire reality denied you.
Fortunately, this past year of transmigrated life, trapped in a training camp where someone died practically every day, had long since forced Ryan into the habit of this dull, dream-bound study.
He understood well enough: every scrap of knowledge he crammed in now was one more sliver of a chance at staying alive later.
...
By morning, Ryan woke from his sleep.
"AI Core, activate last night's deep memory..."
He never remembered what happened in the dreams, but by now he'd made a habit of activating the memory every morning regardless.
【Ding! Activating deep memory...】
In the next instant, a dense flood of text and symbols poured into his mind.
The sheer volume the AI Core fed back made Ryan feel, for a moment, like his skull had been plugged into a USB drive and had an entire hard drive dumped into it at once — his head swam, dizzy and disoriented.
*Damn, I think I crammed in a bit too much this time...*
Dizzy for a moment, Ryan muttered the complaint to himself, and it took a good while before the discomfort in his head finally settled.
This was one of the AI Core's few side effects — especially after a "pleasant dream," which left behind a peculiar hollowed-out, drained feeling...
...
Before long, sounds of movement stirred beyond the door — Pisces, up early as ever, beginning another day of experiments.
The sly old bastard's little scheme had, in the end, come to nothing.
He assumed that even if Ryan had flipped through his books, there was no way the boy could have made any real progress in such a short time.
Sure, a single day wasn't much — but what about twenty days?
In just one night, Ryan had absorbed knowledge equivalent to twenty days of another person's study, working his way through an enormous number of books, picking up a wealth of foundational medical and serum knowledge in the process.
He now recognized a great many serum materials, was intimately familiar with detailed anatomical diagrams of the human body...
He also understood how serums were refined, how healing draughts were compounded...
He had zero practical experience, of course, but on the theoretical side, he'd already cleared an apprentice's entry threshold.
A new day began. Pisces ran through a few pointers on dissection technique with Ryan, then had no further time to spare.
Ryan picked up the scalpel and, for the first time, attempted to open up the Sawtooth Rat himself.
Cutting through skin, fat, fascia, organs, nerves, blood vessels...
Then attempting to stitch it all back together — threading, tying knots...
His brain said: *I've got this.*
His hands said: *No. You don't.*
Ryan discovered that applying textbook theory to actual practice was still a long road ahead. "Cutting" wasn't just slicing at random — you had to know the tissue structure well enough to avoid certain vessels and nerves. "Suturing" wasn't like sewing cloth either — the anatomical layers had to align neatly, stitch spacing and intervals kept even. Different tissues called for entirely different techniques and needle-work.
Once he'd mastered basic skin closure, there was still the far harder work of connecting nerves and blood vessels ahead...
Fortunately, Ryan was a Transcendent — his perception and dexterity were far beyond a normal person's, or there was no telling how many rats he'd have had to butcher just to get the basics down.
Practice was the only path to real understanding — an eternal truth.
...
Days passed this way.
Studying theory by night, practicing hands-on by day, occasionally stealing a look at Pisces compounding serums.
Ryan's progress was rapid — leaps and bounds by the day.
He suspected Pisces was keeping a close watch on him, so these past few days he hadn't made a single move toward escape — playing, seemingly, the part of a contented apprentice.
But after he'd finally reduced seven or eight small beasts captured off the wasteland — along with a handful of human corpses from who knew where — to bloody, unrecognizable ruin on the dissection table...
He knew: the opportunity he'd been waiting for had finally arrived.
...
Ever since becoming Pisces's disciple, Ryan had stopped showing up at the mess hall entirely. That alone had stirred a measure of suspicion in Quinn, the gang's leader.
After all, Ryan was the surviving witness closest to Morin's corpse.
Much as Quinn couldn't afford to offend a serum master of Pisces's standing, the pressure had gotten to him enough that he'd come to question Ryan again, in detail, about that day's operation at Steelburn Fort.
On this particular day, Pisces returned to the lab. That Quinn had come to question Ryan while he was away — that was not a good sign at all.
If Ryan hadn't already become his disciple, Quinn probably would have had the boy transferred out by now.
Pisces asked, "What did the chief want, coming here today?"
Ryan kept writing and sketching on the table as he answered. "Oh, still asking about that day's mission at Steelburn Fort..."
Pisces: "What did you tell him?"
Ryan: "Same thing I told him last time."
"Mm. Well done."
After a moment's pause, Pisces spoke again. "I've already sent men to check out that place — 88 Maple Street..."
He left the second half unspoken: they'd found nothing worth calling "treasure" there.
As he spoke, the old man kept his eyes on Ryan, hoping to catch some slip in his expression.
Ryan feigned ignorance, looking up in mock surprise. "Oh? Then, Teacher — did you find Baron Morin's treasure?"
"That was indeed one of Morin's secret properties, but there was nothing of value there..."
Pisces found no telltale sign, his eyes flickering, unreadable.
He genuinely couldn't decide whether he'd been played, or whether something of seemingly little worth actually concealed some hidden secret.
Ryan pressed, deliberately steering him. "Really? But Baron Morin seemed to care so much about that address... could the treasure be hidden somewhere inside it?"
He'd predicted this outcome from the start — this whole exchange had been planned in advance.
Didn't find the treasure? Well, did you knock open every single brick? Cross-check every word in every book for a hidden treasure map? I told you everything I know — if you didn't find it, that's clearly your own fault for looking wrong...
"Mm. Perhaps."
Pisces looked faintly displeased.
Seeing the old man's sour expression, Ryan didn't push further, returning instead to scribbling away busily on his notes.
That kind of motion easily draws the eye. Sure enough, Pisces glanced over at it idly.
He assumed his "disciple" was just taking some basic notes.
But when he actually made out what Ryan had written on the page, his face went white with shock. "You — what are you writing?!"
"I don't even know what this is myself," Ryan said, shrugging, an expression of genuine confusion on his own face. "It looks like some kind of formula."
He knew exactly what he was writing.
This was the "Golden Serum Formula" — the very one Baron Morin had handed over to the Ormar royal family in exchange for his title.
In this world, gene serum formulas didn't just record materials — they recorded the entire refining process in detail. Something like a chemical equation from his past life, full of specialized symbols: heating, distillation, filtering, purification, fusion — all rendered as symbols.
Strings of arcane marks, one after another...
Then came the reaction stages — time, temperature, concentration — page after page of dense notation, like dozens of complex chemical equations chained together, dizzying to look at.
To anyone but a trained serum master, it would read like utter gibberish.
And this, of course, was a Golden-grade formula. An ordinary Black Iron formula wasn't nearly so complex — the higher the grade, the more materials required, and the more intricate the formula.
...
Ryan claimed he didn't understand it — but a two-star serum master like Pisces? How could he not?
The instant he saw the half-finished equation Ryan had written, he understood immediately: this was a high-grade gene serum formula!
Pisces couldn't hide the excitement in his eyes, his breathing growing faintly ragged. "This is indeed a serum formula. You're only just starting out — it's no wonder you don't understand it..."
As he spoke, real anticipation began to gleam in his eyes.
He himself held two Silver-grade formulas — but judging by the sheer complexity of the equation before him, this one far exceeded anything in his own collection.
Could it be... a Golden-grade formula?!
A rarity he himself had never so much as laid eyes on!
Given that Morin had traded a Golden formula for his very title, Pisces's eyes grew brighter and brighter. A thing like this — the Ormar royal family and top-tier nobility alike would treasure it as a priceless strategic asset!
But...
Only half-written, and already it was agony. Like a gorgeous woman undressing before you — nothing to worry about while she's clothed, but once she's half-undone and the good part's about to come into view... nothing more happens.
Pisces looked at Ryan and pressed, "What about the rest?"
A flicker of something sharp and calculating passed, unnoticed, behind Ryan's eyes. "That part... I think I've forgotten it..."
Watching the hunger burning in the old man's eyes, he knew — his plan had worked.