Gray Owl had expected to see some slumbering behemoth through the window—but there was no living creature in sight inside the compartment.
Instead, it looked more like an unused laboratory.
It was clean and orderly, with long tables lined in metal sheeting and shelves filled with glassware—flasks, test tubes, retorts, mortars, and all sorts of small instruments. Just looking at them, one could almost smell the overwhelming scents of alcohol, ether, and formalin.
But what truly drew Gray Owl's attention was a steel chair bound with leather restraints. The design was peculiar—clearly intended to secure a person tightly in place for some specific purpose.
As an experienced interrogator, Gray Owl instantly recognized the signs: that chair had been used many times. The entire room reeked of discomfort and menace.
"Don't look at that," Vilgefortz redirected his attention, pointing toward the compartments from which growls and roars were emanating. "Those are the true keys to our victory."
The fruits of victory… This bastard actually wants the young lioness's placenta...
Recalling Vilgefortz's plans for the Princess of Cintra, Gray Owl shivered despite himself.
Compared to these flashy and bizarre experiments of the mages, even the Empire's methods of interrogating traitors and spies suddenly seemed merciful.
Gray Owl swallowed hard. "You plan to use these caged monsters as part of your operation? I think the moment you open those doors, they'll tear us to shreds!"
The implication was clear—he wanted nothing to do with these uncontrollable beasts.
"Isn't that better?" Vilgefortz chuckled softly. "The more ferocious they are, the more havoc they'll wreak in Cintra."
He gestured as he walked past the iron doors, naming them one by one like prized collectibles: "The Chimera—a fusion of leshen, griffin, pterosaur, and insectoid traits.
The Mantis Dreadling—originally created by Alzur and later modified by the alchemists stationed at Kaer Morhen.
And the Koschey Fiend—a variant crafted through the merging of local and otherworldly creatures.
Each one of them is a beast capable of razing an ordinary town."
Pride gleamed in Vilgefortz's eyes, though he sighed a moment later. "It's a shame I haven't found a way to summon or recreate a Slime Demon. Otherwise, I might've been able to replicate the Alzur's Double Cross Summoning."
"With that… forget an ordinary garrison—not even the entire Cintran army could stop us from taking Cirilla."
Every name he mentioned carried a chilling weight. Even those unfamiliar with monster lore or biology could find them in history books.
Gray Owl was both thrilled and unnerved. "You're going to deploy them straight into Brokilon through a portal?"
"No," Vilgefortz replied, shaking his head. "You're misunderstanding the nature of portals. I can't transport that many creatures of such size—not even enough to get my mercenaries and your team into Cintra."
The mage admitted his limitations without hesitation—causing Gray Owl's face to twist in barely contained rage.
"What the hell do you mean by that?" the imperial coroner growled. "Are you playing me? After all this time, we're still going to walk to Cintra? The fighting has already started—we've wasted too much time! By the time we get there, everything will be over!"
"Calm yourself, Gray Owl," Vilgefortz replied evenly. "I value the young lioness far more than you do… perhaps even more than your Emperor."
"I may not be able to—but it can."
The mage led Gray Owl to the end of the corridor, where a heavily inscribed door stood.
Gray Owl expected some horrific beast to be locked away behind it. But when the door opened, it revealed yet another empty chamber.
Inside was a single metal table—its surface and surroundings etched with dense arrays of runes.
At the center of the table sat a small vial.
"This is your other laboratory?" Gray Owl asked.
"No," Vilgefortz replied, pointing at the vial. "This is the prison holding the most terrifying beast of them all."
Gray Owl stepped forward, suspicion clouding his gaze. What lay before him wasn't just a bottle—it was an exceptionally old one.
It seemed to be made of earthenware, sealed with wood and wax. A layer of dried mud clung to its surface, and Gray Owl had no doubt that the dirt would flake off onto anyone who touched it.
If there was anything special about it, it was the six-pointed star etched into the stopper.
A familiar sense of mockery welled up inside him again.
Yet before he could turn around to question it, the sorcerer behind him suddenly began to chant an incantation in a loud, commanding voice—its language unfamiliar.
All at once, the inscriptions and runes on the floor sprang to life like fish swimming through water. They glowed with a cold, ghostly light and began swirling around the earthen bottle.
They clung to its surface like sharks scenting blood, greedily crawling across its shell.
The eerie spectacle made Gray Owl instinctively take a few steps back, fearful that these animated runes might harm him.
As the runes gradually seeped into the bottle's interior, the plain, timeworn vessel began to glow as well. Then, with a sharp crack—a sound that echoed not in the ears but in the mind—a translucent face suddenly burst out of the bottle, riding a violent wind.
The storm had arrived.
The face emerging from the bottle radiated light as blinding as the sun. An immense, devastating force swirled around it—so much power that it could rip a city to shreds—compressed within the confines of this small room, desperately seeking an outlet.
Frantically, Gray Owl reached out to grab hold of something to keep himself steady. But aside from himself and Vilgefortz, everything else in the room had already been shredded to pieces.
A thin, shimmering barrier stood firm around him, shielding him from harm entirely.
Vilgefortz, by contrast, stood unprotected in the eye of the storm—yet the gales and energies bent away from him, avoiding him as if held back by fear.
The sight of Gray Owl's flustered struggle amused the sorcerer, who broke into a satisfied, malicious grin. And before Gray Owl could explode in rage, Vilgefortz raised both hands and shouted: "Djinn—obey my command: Return!"
The runes absorbed by the bottle flared all at once, and a gravitational pull like that of a black hole erupted from within. It forcefully dragged the struggling, unwilling face back into the bottle's dark and narrow confines.
Silence returned to the chamber.
Still shaken, Gray Owl gasped for breath, eyes wide as he looked about the room in disbelief.
"That was… that was…"
A name surfaced in his mind—one spoken of only in fairy tales and ballads.
Vilgefortz nodded with certainty. "That was a Djinn."
...
It had once been said that between the world's atmosphere and the Astral Realm lay another layer: the Elemental Sphere.
Back when Lann had absorbed energy from the Elemental Circle at Kaer Morhen, he had accidentally stumbled into the Elemental Sphere—and in doing so, attracted the attention of beings beyond comprehension. If not for the timely intervention of a certain unnamed benefactor, the consequences could have been catastrophic.
The Elemental Sphere consisted of four layers: Earth, Water, Fire, and Air. Within each realm, a corresponding elemental spirit had been born.
Among them, the air spirits were given a special name by scholars: Djinn.
Sorcerers had a particular fondness for Djinn, for their bodies teemed with raw magical power and elemental essence. Exceptionally powerful mages could capture and seal a Djinn, siphoning its energy to cast spells in place of conventional mana.
Of course, fighting a Djinn was no easy feat. With a mere flick of its fingers, it could unleash spells that elite human mages might spend years preparing but still fail to cast. It could command the wind as if it were an extension of its own will—summoning hurricanes of apocalyptic scale.
But sorcerers prized Djinn not just for being walking reservoirs of energy. More importantly, Djinn possessed knowledge of magical arts beyond human understanding—techniques that mortals could neither learn nor even comprehend.
A sorcerer, or anyone who inherited a sealed Djinn after a sorcerer's death, could use that Djinn to accomplish feats they would otherwise never be capable of.
And so, tales and poems gradually began to include a peculiar motif:
If you happen to find a bottle sealed by magic while traveling in the wild…
Then congratulations, lucky traveler—
Open it.
A wondrous spirit will appear before you, ready to grant you three wishes...
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