Chapter 119: Putreflorifera!
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[Achievement]:Scolding Stupid Subordinates
[Description]:Although the Malfoy family is not your subordinate yet—but they will be sooner or later, and you fully demonstrated the majesty of a Dark Lord, scolding them without any regard for their dignity.
[Lighting Requirement]:Scold Lucius.
[Achievement Reward]:Max Level Random Dark Magic +1 ——————
"More dark magic again?"
Compared to the initial panic of directly mastering the three Unforgivable Curses when he first obtained the system.
Dylan could now extract the max-level dark magic rewarded by the system without batting an eyelid.
He even felt a bit excited.
"I wonder what magic I'll draw this time. Maybe I can use it next time I rob other dark wizards."
He extracted the reward.
In an instant, he felt everything around him blur, his consciousness seemingly drawn into a deep and boundless cosmic void.
A pitch-black star hung high above his head. Dylan only needed to glance at it to feel a strong aura of evil continuously emanating from it.
"Come on, hit me with your best shot."
Dylan crooked a finger at the black star in the sky.
The next moment—
Whoosh!
The black star suddenly plummeted.
It slammed headfirst into Dylan.
Immediately afterward, Dylan felt himself standing in a desolate land.
Around him were layers upon layers of corpses in various states.
Some had狰狞 faces, mouths wide open, as if they had let out desperate roars before dying.
Some had limbs bent at bizarre angles, stiffly jutting into the air.
Still others had incomplete bodies, severed arms and legs scattered haphazardly, internal organs exposed, the dark red blood on the ground dried into blackish-brown hard clots.
Dylan ignored the strong, pungent, and fishy stench around him and slowly raised his wand.
"Foul Earth Blooms Soul, Rotten Corpse Transforms Flower, With the Decay of Death, Parasitize the Spirit's Method!"
As he uttered a low voice—
"Swish swish swish!"
The tip of Dylan's wand shot out streaks of blood-red light, snaking towards the corpses like venomous snakes.
Where the light touched, the dead bodies began to tremble violently.
Then, from the corpses' eye sockets, nostrils, mouths, and various wounds, twisted black flower buds suddenly sprouted.
As soon as these flower buds emerged, they grew and expanded at an almost frantic speed.
The edges of the petals still had wisps of white veins, slowly unfurling to reveal the scarlet-glowing stamen within.
At the same time as the flowers bloomed, the rate of decay of the corpses suddenly accelerated.
The skin quickly cracked and peeled off, revealing the bluish-black muscles underneath, which in turn instantly turned into pus, slowly flowing down the bones.
Finally, even the bones rapidly turned into dust under the erosion of this force, falling down with a "rustling" sound.
In the blink of an eye, all the corpses had completely rotted, turning into puddles of black soil with even the smell dissipated.
Only the fragmented clothing mixed within and scattered bone fragments symbolized the former appearance of this soil.
And at this moment, they were deeply rooted by a blooming field of black flowers.
The flowers swayed, carrying the eerie feeling of death and new life.
Dylan stood in the middle of this blooming flower sea, his black robes fluttering in the breeze, looking from afar, it actually had a unique sense of beauty.
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[Message]:Congratulations on mastering the max-level magic—Putreflorifera (Foul Earth Blooms Soul)!
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Dylan completely withdrew his consciousness from the system panel.
After experiencing the effects that the newly mastered spell could produce, his eyes lit up.
"This kind of spell, just like the Fiendfyre Curse, can deal with corpses?"
Of course, if one wanted to dispose of a corpse cleanly, the Fiendfyre Curse was naturally the first choice.
However, Putreflorifera naturally had its own special features.
"The black flowers that grow can also be used as medicinal materials?"
Dylan stroked his chin with one hand, somewhat curious about the medicinal effects of these black flowers.
Thinking of this, he glanced at the enclosed pile of cockroaches.
These cockroaches crowded and crawled over each other, making a rustling sound, their oily shells reflecting a cold light in the dim light.
"Crucio!"
A white light shot out.
—Dylan had recently added random colored attack effects to his wand, which had cost him a full thousand Galleons.
However, Dylan was now considered wealthy, so although he was saving up for the main upgrades to his suitcase, he was still happy to spend these small amounts when researching aesthetic functions.
When the Cruciatus Curse landed in the pile of cockroaches, the little creatures that were originally crawling around freely instantly fell into frenzied struggles.
Their antennae flailed wildly, and their spiky legs kicked back and forth.
—Because a cockroach's heart is composed of multiple chambers, the pain they endured was actually even more intense.
In just a moment, a small half of the cockroaches had their life force drained and fell down stiffly.
"Putreflorifera!"
Dylan waved his wand again.
A strange purplish-black light flashed.
In the blink of an eye, rather petite but vividly colored black flowers slowly emerged from the pile of cockroach corpses.
Dylan took a light sniff and smelled a peculiar sweet and greasy scent.
It was very faint, but it was indeed there.
The surviving cockroaches around seemed to be attracted by this fragrance. Originally fleeing in panic, they now all turned around and crawled towards the newly grown flowers.
"Oh?"
This discovery surprised Dylan somewhat.
He didn't stop the cockroaches from tearing at the flowers but wanted to observe what changes would occur in the cockroaches after they ate these black flowers.
"Rustle rustle"
Due to the large number, the sound made by the cockroaches was even more dense.
Their antennae flailed wildly, their mouthparts opened and closed, and some even began to bite each other in order to compete for a position closer to the flowers.
Dylan watched with interest as a slightly larger cockroach was the first to crawl in front of a black flower, first touching the petals repeatedly with its antennae, and then opening its mouthparts to devour it in large bites.
As it continued to swallow, strange changes began to occur.
The cockroach's body actually swelled up visibly!
Its body, originally only the size of a thumb, was gradually approaching the size of a middle finger, and even its exoskeleton seemed to become increasingly hard, looking much thicker.
This fellow's movements and reaction speed were greatly improved, and the smaller ones around were all knocked away by its reckless charge.
"This..."
Dylan raised an eyebrow.
"So, these flowers also contain some kind of special factor that can stimulate biological growth?"
Dylan developed a great interest in these black flowers.
He moved closer, carefully observing the small insects that were still constantly trying to approach the flowers, his eyes filled with exploration and doubt.
"If these flowers really contain factors that can make organisms grow, then perhaps I can use this to develop a new potion!"
However, Dylan was still unclear whether the effects produced by these black flowers were immediate or long-lasting.
"In addition to that, I can't be sure if the type of flower is consistent, whether the black flowers obtained anywhere have completely the same effect."
"Or is it that the flower grown from the corpse of one creature can only be used by that one creature, and other creatures cannot be effective?"
Dylan couldn't help but ponder.
"If the potion can really be developed, it might directly sell like crazy..."
Dylan didn't even bother with grinding the spell mastery task. He straightened up, waved his wand, and shattered all the little creatures that were trying to approach the black flowers.
The surrounding cockroaches were so frightened that they sprang up in place and retreated far away.
"Huh? Wait, it seems I used the wrong spell."
He shouldn't have directly shattered these little cuties.
"But can the shattered corpses still grow flowers?"
With the thought of giving it a try, Dylan turned his wand again.
To his surprise, flower buds actually emerged from the pile of powder that had gathered.
"Not bad!"
Dylan was very satisfied with this result. With a flick of his wand, all the black flowers floated up and drifted to his side.
Dylan also picked out the cockroaches that had eaten the black flowers from the enclosure and placed them in another area, putting them into petri dishes and storing them separately.
"It seems I'll be busy next."
Spell mastery, magic cultivation, potion research...
He also had to maintain his reading progress every day and couldn't skip a day of reading. "Sigh, this is the happy trouble."
Dylan felt the knowledge he had mastered continuously accumulating, and his magic also becoming stronger bit by bit. That sense of satisfaction was extremely difficult to describe.
Days passed one after another.
Until it was almost time for school to start.
Only then did Dylan crawl out of his suitcase.
"I didn't expect that the Reanimation Charm could actually be used on this group of small insects."
Reanimation allowed Dylan to control corpses.
Putreflorifera could turn corpses into magical materials.
Both were extremely evil dark magic spells, but Dylan had recently devoted all his energy to these two.
After eating and chatting with his family for a while, Dylan returned to his bedroom once again and climbed into his suitcase.
At this time, the suitcase's hundred thousand cubic space had undergone a great transformation.
A large part of the area was filled with many bookshelves.
A small part of the space had been partitioned by Dylan to serve as his research lab.
Now, this area was further divided into several sections.
In the first section, densely packed cockroaches crowded together.
In the second section, there was a group of spiders, either hanging upside down on their webs or scurrying quickly between the strands.
The third section was a set of shelves, Dylan's workbench, with several petri dishes on it. Some contained individually stored, large cockroaches and spiders, and there were also many black flowers.
The fourth section was the most eye-catching, a huge transparent tank filled with murky Yin water, with wisps of cold air rising from the surface.
The tank was conjured by Dylan using a Transfiguration Charm. He had also recently been researching how to inscribe spells onto an object.
Similar to how to make a flying broomstick.
This tank was the result of his research.
It was inscribed with a stable Transfiguration Charm, allowing the tank to maintain its current form at all times.
As for the water in the tank, it was created by Dylan using the Reanimation Charm.
—Reanimation couldn't simply bring corpses back to life.
On the contrary, he had to use Yin water to allow the corpses to be imbued with new life after soaking in it—becoming Inferi.
Therefore, there were many insect bodies moving in the tank.
But due to prolonged soaking, they had become swollen, their exoskeletons losing their luster, turning gray and mottled.
In addition, although they were swimming in the water, their movements were very stiff.
Dylan gradually approached, observed them for a while, and then casually threw a few surviving cockroaches into it.
After being thrown in, the few live cockroaches caused the spider Inferi that had been soaking for several days to collectively open their compound eyes, their pupils pulsating with the same scarlet light as the black flower stamens.
At the same time, their former kin also swarmed over, clinging to the live cockroaches and pressing them firmly to the bottom of the tank.
Eventually, they all died together.
But soon, they, who had already died, began to move again under the soaking of the Yin water.
—They were resurrected.
And became members of the Inferi cockroach and Inferi spider army.
"Yin water must have live creatures continuously thrown into it to be maintained, otherwise, it will gradually evaporate and dissipate."
Dylan glanced at the large tank.
He had recently spent a lot of effort to create so much Yin water, but it had already reached its peak. Currently, he had no way to further increase the Yin water production.
Because to make more Yin water, he would need more corpses, but the number of insects he had here was limited.
Although Dylan could directly throw them into the tank after using them to grind the spell mastery task, he also needed to keep some to grow black flowers.
—Dylan discovered that the life of black flowers was also time-limited.
Although not as fleeting as the Ephemeral Flower, they only survived for a day.
After a day, they would quickly wither.
When he first discovered this, it caused Dylan to lose a lot of research materials.
Therefore, to maintain his research progress recently, he had to set aside some corpses every day to cast Putreflorifera.
Fortunately, for the time being, he didn't need too much Yin water.
Although to create Inferi, the corpse had to be completely immersed in Yin water.
Just like the large lake Harry had fallen into back then.
If he had really been dragged to the bottom of the lake by the Inferi and completely drowned, then Harry would have become a living corpse controlled by others.
But Dylan wasn't in a hurry to create Inferi. After all, it didn't provide him with any substantial help.
Compared to creating Inferi, Dylan was more interested in researching whether Yin water had the potential to be refined into potions or other functions.
"Although the research time hasn't been long, I'm almost certain that these flowers contain an extremely powerful energy!"
Dylan took out a black flower, looking at the clearly visible patterns on it, turning it over and over.
The patterns on the petals were like ancient runes, just too blurry for Dylan to determine the specific appearance of the runes.
And through his testing and research during this period, although he had confirmed that there was an energy within these flowers, after a day, when the flowers died, the energy within would also dissipate immediately.
Even the bodies of the cockroaches that had eaten the flowers would shrink back. Although they wouldn't completely shrink back to their original appearance, it clearly showed that the energy that had been digested by the cockroaches dissipated directly at the same time as the flowers.
Dylan stared at the cockroach in the petri dish, which had swollen to the size of a palm, and suddenly used tweezers to pick up the molted exoskeleton that was shedding.
Those originally fragile, translucent shells now refracted a mithril-like metallic luster under the light.
When he immersed the molted exoskeleton in Yin water, ice-crystal-like magical runes suddenly condensed on the water surface.
"Truly wonderful existences."
After this period of experimentation, Dylan discovered that the energy in the black flowers had a bit of corrosive properties. When the cockroaches shrank back, they would become quite listless.
And when they had just eaten the petals, they would appear somewhat frantic, as if the basic desires of the creatures had been stimulated.
These were all problems—problems that Dylan had to eliminate if he wanted to research a potion that could sell well on the market.
Ideally, only the positive effects produced when eating the flowers should be retained for it to truly sell well.
Otherwise, as a potion with negative effects, perhaps some people would buy it, but it would never become widespread.
"But none of this is the most important thing. The most important thing is that I really felt a power of life in this flower!"
After reading the Book of Abraham the Jew, although Dylan couldn't directly create the Philosopher's Stone, he gained many insights into how to create it.
And the Philosopher's Stone represented immortality, so when Dylan researched the black flowers, the knowledge he had previously learned would all emerge in his mind.
This had led to continuous progress in his research recently, with new breakthroughs and discoveries from time to time.
"Maybe this energy, after continuous extraction, will be like unicorn blood, possessing the value of researching immortality!"
After Dylan researched for a while longer, he tidied up his research table, relaxed his mind, raised his head, looked at the dim environment around him, and his gaze shifted.
"Hmm... it's got that vibe."
—An evil wizard, day and night in his laboratory, conducting bizarre, sinister, insane, disgusting, and inhumane experiments.
"But if I can research new substances, and in the process of research, apply, master, and even generate new knowledge—that's really exciting!"
Dylan smacked his lips.
However, despite researching so many corpses and dark magic, his mind had never been distorted.
Corpses were just corpses.
Dark magic was just magic.
Apart from research, he had no other dark thoughts.
—This allowed his overall temperament to remain unaffected by these experiments.
"Tomorrow is the start of school. I need to ask Mum and Dad for another sum of money, and after school starts, they have to send me a regular monthly allowance."
Dylan left the suitcase, tidied up a bit, and lay down on the bed.
He planned to spend money after school started to create a real natural area in the pet space suitcase.
—Or two areas.
One to serve as a Necromantic research lab.
One for pets and magical creatures to live in.
"In that case, the pet space would also have to be expanded a bit. After all, I still need to catch many magical creatures, and Coal and Beta's activity area also needs to be larger."
Dylan lay on the bed and sighed.
Counting it all up, it was all about money!
Poor, still too poor!
"Clang clang—"
The crescent moon outside the window sprinkled silver frost on the bed.
As the grandfather clock in the attic struck ten, Dylan's potion-stained fingers drew silver-green runes in the air.
The air suddenly rippled, and Coal lightly leaped out of the distorted light screen, its jet-black fur smooth and shiny. Its tail stood upright, and its amber pupils flickered like Gubraithian fire in the room's light.
"Have you been doing well with Beta recently?" Dylan hadn't paid much attention to the two pets during this period, focusing all his attention on research.
Tomorrow was the start of school, and he planned to spend some quality time with Coal today.
"Moo!"
Coal glanced sideways at Dylan, acting aloof for a moment, but then noticed that Dylan was just looking at it with a smile, without saying a word. Then it gracefully padded over to Dylan's lap and curled up into a fluffy ball.
Dylan chuckled softly, stroked Coal's head, and prepared to fall asleep.
The scent of pine from the night breeze drifted through the window cracks. Before the last trace of consciousness sank into darkness, Dylan vaguely felt Coal rest its furry head on the "Draught of Living Death" chapter of his copy of Advanced Potion-Making.
And the moonpetal in the illustration on that page, facing the moonlight, was quietly blooming.
(End of chapter)
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