Li Ban's departing footsteps imdiately halted.
"My eye ability has improved!"
He was both shocked and delighted, his lips curling into a grin.
The cat-woman had told him that extre training could slightly enhance elental abilities, but she never ntioned gaining a secondary ability!
Was this the unspoken information hidden in her words?
This was Li Ban's first ti using extre thods to train his eye ability - how had it leveled up already?
"Am I a genius?" Li Ban chuckled foolishly, savoring this rare piece of good news.
After calming his excitent for a few minutes, Li Ban left the storeroom and erged from Death Prison to test his new ability above ground.
It was afternoon, sunlight baking the sinkhole floor uncomfortably.
Tiny dust particles and flies floated in the air.
Li Ban focused on the flies and discovered that with concentration, he could see their wing movents clearly and even predict their sudden directional changes.
However, this slow-motion vision only lasted one or two seconds before returning to normal speed.
"I can see slow-motion sequences of fast movents. In a fight, this might help predict enemy attacks."
His initial joy quickly soured.
While his eyes could perceive it, his body lacked matching reflexes.
Using this ability in combat now would an "watching helplessly as fists connected with his nose."
"My abilities are all supportive. I still need to practice the techniques the cat-woman taught ."
The movents the cat-woman had taught Li Ban carried no grandiose nas - just basic verbs like stepping and punching.
This underscored how fundantally basic this introductory combat style was.
"Daydreaming about taking root here?" The tree-person jailer's voice suddenly ca from behind.
Li Ban quickly turned and bowed. "Sir."
Checking the bark patterns, he recognized Tree-Person A.
Tree-Person B rarely appeared above ground, busy with unknown tasks below.
"Since you're so idle, you'll accompany on an errand tomorrow."
An outing?
Suppressing his excitent after being confined for half a month, Li Ban replied, "Understood."
Since arriving in the Witch World, he'd spent most ti in Death Prison's gloomy confines. Finally, a chance to see the outside.
Though Death Prison was notoriously terrible, Li Ban wondered if the outside world might be better.
Nearby, Lu straightened painfully from her work in the vegetable patch, eyes filled with envy.
Tree-Person A left via the sinkhole stairs without offering to bring Lu along.
Her head drooped in disappointnt.
Li Ban noticed but said nothing, returning to Death Prison's first level instead.
The newly-arrived Li Ban might have spoken up for Lu, but now he prioritized his own survival.
Walking back to Cell Thirteen, he found the cat-woman feigning sleep on her straw mat after eating.
She didn't rise at his approach.
Li Ban remained standing by the far wall.
"Do ghosts exist here?"
"..." The disturbed cat-woman sighed but answered firmly, "No!"
"What about shadowy monster-like things?"
"Maybe elsewhere, but not here. This shabby Death Prison is still official territory - you think the wardens and officers are useless?"
In all his ti here, Li Ban had never seen these officials.
They presumably lived on lower levels, but did they never co up for sunlight?
Or were they underground creatures like mushroom-people or potato-people?
Giving up on this line of thought, Li Ban reasoned that whether the shadow he'd seen was a ghost or soone's ability, he couldn't defeat it either way.
Constant paranoia would only tornt himself.
He cautiously broached his new ability: "How many abilities... do elents usually have?"
"Whoosh!"
The previously reclining cat-woman abruptly sat upright, eyes wide as saucers.
"Y-you... your elent sublimated?!"
She'd guessed what happened?
This was the first ti Li Ban saw her so shocked she stamred.
"What's sublimation?"
The cat-woman didn't answer imdiately.
After a long stare, her lips quivered as if holding back tears.
"Why?!" Her voice trembled with anguish. "I trained for years before my final elent sublimated. This clueless fool gets his first elent - a secondhand one at that - to sublimate imdiately?!"
"Ahem!" Li Ban feigned sternness. "Insult ? That's two ounces of at deducted!"
"My apologies!"
ntion of at instantly overrode her self-pity - a true pragmatist.
"Explain sublimation properly."
"Elents can sublimate once, usually gaining new abilities or significant enhancents. Even identity-less people's elents can sublimate, but the odds are so low I never imagined it happening to you."
The cat-woman looked utterly crushed, muttering, "What absurd luck..."
Li Ban's expression darkened, but seeing her devastated state, he decided against retaliation and left.
The new ability brought rare excitent to Li Ban's stagnant life.
He began constantly observing fast-moving objects, though Death Prison only offered insects to study.
After several attempts, dizziness forced him to stop.
The cat-woman had warned that without spiritual essence absorption, identity-less people powered abilities with their vitality.
Overuse could cause anything from dizziness to death.
Fortunately, his symptoms were mild, gone after a night's sleep.
The next morning, a thunderous "BANG!" startled Li Ban awake.
He sprang up defensively.
The tree-person at the door scoffed, "That posture wouldn't stop a child. Get moving - we're leaving."
Sumr ant Li Ban slept fully clothed, ready to depart imdiately.
Following Tree-Person A up the sinkhole stairs, he mimicked placing his hand on the stone door's peach blossom carving.
Instantly, his surroundings shifted to the familiar woods where he'd first entered Death Prison.
A waiting wagon stood before him.
Glancing back, the tree hollow entrance appeared rely palm-sized and impenetrably dark.
"Board!" Tree-Person A ordered.
Li Ban scrambled onto the wagon's front bench before the whip could snap.
The emaciated draft horse looked malnourished.
The wagon lacked proper seating - just a plank with half-ter sideboards.
Tree-Person A retracted all roots and branches into a stubby stump form.
Perched precariously on the edge, Li Ban gripped the sideboard tightly against potential falls.
"Sir, where are we going?"
In relatively good spirits, Tree-Person A answered:
"Qingcheng County. Black and white markets."
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