This wizard only wishes to be a teacher

Lucien didn’t immediately return to Lurah’s bedroom but instead snuck into the Shadow Space and began to quietly wander about, also using this opportunity to check if there were other players tracking him.

"Hm? Is the player whose identity is a maid still around?" Soon after, as Lucien passed through the servants’ quarters within the estate, he noticed the maid he had marked earlier.

However, the latter was sound asleep at this time, seemingly having left her physical body with the help of the night’s rules.

"It seems, at least in this vicinity, it’s still safe. Otherwise, this somewhat rash player couldn’t have survived until now." Lucien paused for a moment and, after some hesitation, decided to forego the idea of harvesting the player who was at the level of a third-tier Wizard Apprentice.

However, while the player was away from this identity, Lucien’s spiritual power quietly seeped into the maid’s body, using spiritual power as a tag to leave a subtle mark inside her.

Should this maid die, Lucien would quickly sense it through this mark. In a way, she had now become a "living" one-time warning device set by Lucien.

"I hope the warning device I’ve set up works." After dealing with all this, Lucien quickly left and returned to Lurah’s bedroom.

"Awakening Stone." After merging his own body with Lurah’s identity, Lucien took out a gray, dusty stone from his Space Ring.

He gazed at the Awakening Stone, but his eyes showed a hint of hesitation.

"From what I gathered at the gathering, the requirement for ’impersonation’ isn’t completely to match the character, but to avoid being noticed by non-player characters. From this angle, even if I turn Lurah into an ’Awakener,’ there wouldn’t be any problem as long as I don’t expose myself. It could even provide me with an ace in the hole."

Lucien looked at the Awakening Stone and no longer hesitated; he pricked Lurah’s finger and dropped a drop of her blood into the gray Awakening Stone.

Drip—

The blood fell on the Awakening Stone, visibly softening it at a visible rate. The stone even began to slowly wiggle, as if it had taken on some characteristics of life.

Lucien didn’t hesitate and stretched out Lurah’s hand to make contact with the now animate Awakening Stone while also releasing his spiritual power to observe the entire awakening process of Lurah.

"The body seems to be undergoing some kind of transformation? Hmm, it’s more like it’s looking for an entry point to merge with this body... This must also be related to the extraordinary abilities after awakening..."

Lucien could feel that some extraordinary powers hidden inside Lurah’s body became active after merging with the Awakening Stone.

These included powers to manipulate flames, ice, and even an extremely rare talent for manipulating space that seemed capable of teleportation...

"Unfortunately, these talents are not good choices for me. After all, revealing such talents would carry too high a risk of exposure," Lucien murmured to himself while also using his spiritual power to prevent the forces within the Awakening Stone from merging with the extraordinary powers displayed by Lurah’s body.

But as Lucien’s spiritual power entangled with the force of the Awakening Stone, they suddenly fused.

"Hm?" Lucien was alarmed. He had just started to strip away the force entangled with his spiritual power, but he quickly stopped his movement because after it was imbued with his spiritual essence, the nature of the force within the Awakening Stone seemed to have changed.

Soon it separated from Lucien’s spiritual power and began to rapidly reshape Lurah’s body, consuming and transforming other extraordinary powers within her body as fuel.

"It seems... the Awakening Stone has taken my spiritual power as some kind of special awakening source, thus gaining a talent related to spiritual power?" Lucien speculated in his heart. However, the awakening hadn’t ended at this point, so he wasn’t clear on what extraordinary talent Lurah would ultimately awaken.

But soon, a severe headache from Lurah’s mind transferred over to Lucien’s own body, preventing him from maintaining the fused-yet-detached state with Lurah. His consciousness fully entered Lurah’s identity, experiencing the painful process of the Awakening Stone’s brain alteration.

"Ah..."

"Oh..."

Lucien seemed to hear many people’s voices in his mind, unclear and muffled, but those voices brought him annoyance and even pain.

These voices echoed in his mind as if they were about to burst his brain open. Even with his spiritual power as a Formal Wizard, he felt somewhat helpless against it.

Consciousness seemed to become a small sailboat swaying through the stormy seas, at any moment capable of capsizing in waves taller than the boat itself.

Lucien’s consciousness grew increasingly blurry, and everything before his eyes twisted and distorted...

"Ah, ah, ah..." he clutched at his head in desperation, but this instinctive bodily defense did nothing to alleviate his condition, causing him to roll uncontrollably on the bed.

"Hold on... hold on... any more noise, and it will bring others," Lucien’s remaining reason struggled to stabilize his current state. Time seemed to lose meaning in Lucien’s consciousness; it slowed to a near standstill.

How much time had passed, he didn’t know, but finally, the pain in Lucien’s mind began to subside. He hurriedly took out a vial of medicine from his storage ring and gulped it down. Looking at the sky outside the window, which was now slightly illuminated, Lucien let out a sigh of relief.

"Thank goodness, I made it through," Lucien whispered, the tone carrying a hint of fright.

Then, he closed his eyes and quietly felt the supernatural talent awakened by this identity of Lurah, a power he had gained in exchange for immense suffering!

"Truly, it’s a talent of the mind; I can even feel that a natural witchcraft model has formed in Lurah’s mind..." Lucien opened his eyes, his expression a mix of a smile and a sob. "So, the pain I just experienced was because the Awakening Stone forcibly inscribed a witchcraft model inside Lurah’s mind?"

"Judging by its complexity, this witchcraft model must be at least at the level of a second-tier spell. However, if it is stimulated in the crude way those in the Dream World’s Awakeners do, it definitely can’t harness all its power..."

Lucian silently checked the talent of Lurah, quickly understanding its precise effect.

This supernatural talent could be called "Mind Reading." It leaned towards a supportive role and could accurately detect another person’s true emotions and even thoughts. However, depending on the user’s strength, the effectiveness of this ability would vary.

For instance, using the weak spiritual power innate to Lurah’s body for detection, one could at most see others’ "emotions."

If the subject was skilled in acting or hiding their emotions, such observations could even be erroneous or miss hidden feelings altogether. To read another person’s thoughts, one would need to gaze into their eyes up close, using the eyes as a medium to reduce the consumption of spiritual power.

But if Lucien were to enhance this ability with his own spiritual power, then it could be terrifyingly amplified.

As long as the other person was not intentionally concealing their emotions or had similar defensive measures, with the talent of "Mind Reading," Lucien could subtly sense their true emotions and thoughts, preparing to take evasive actions or extract useful information in advance.

"Perhaps for a normal Awakener, this talent is a burden since it has no direct combat capabilities. But for a player, it’s practically a ’bug’-level talent..." Uncontrollably, a smile spread across Lucien’s face.

With this ability, he would have an even deeper grasp of certain key events in upcoming dreams and could even become a "Manipulator" through his own power.

"Miss, good morning! It’s time to get up!" Just as Lucien was pondering the use of his new ability, the maid Mier had already walked into the bedroom, greeting him cheerfully.

"Mm, there’s a slight blue hue around her body; it seems my maid hasn’t completely emerged from the shadows of before. But she’s still trying her best to cover up her true emotions in front of Lurah and trying to heal Lurah’s soul with warmth... She really is a good person!" Lucien reflected inwardly.

But he also knew that these dream world characters were but ephemeral illusions; they might have real-life counterparts, but at least everything that happened in this dream was artificial, personalities made of nothing but mist.

"Good morning, Sister Mier," Though his thoughts were thus, Lucien still showed a sweet smile on his face.

At the same time, Lucien’s spiritual power quietly enhanced the talent he had just awakened, intent on testing its strength on Mier, like a lab rat, after being amplified by his spiritual power.

But as Lucien’s spiritual power focused on the Mind Reading talent, he suddenly felt a black emotion, filled with malice.

This emotion was directed at him and it was close to his own body.

"Who... who is that?" Lucien didn’t even bother to check Mier’s mental state. He quickly got dressed and hurried out the door to face the source of malice.

And in his field of vision, he saw his father, Anos, holding a beverage akin to coffee, and upon noticing Lucien, or rather Lurah’s gaze, Anos displayed a warm and kind smile.