CHAPTER 263: 263

As Alexander’s shadow essence entered Michelle’s body, she felt her senses dull. But it wasn’t for long.

After a while, they got back to normal—maybe even a bit sharper.

And along with that, she felt something new. A barely noticeable, dull thudding in the upper right part of her chest, right below her collarbone. It felt a bit like a second heart had formed there.

A frown formed on Michelle’s brows. It wasn’t exactly comfortable, but she could get used to it.

Lifting her gaze, Michelle turned to look at Alexander. "What is that?" she asked.

In reality, she knew, but since she had decided to make Alexander think she couldn’t find out anything about the Shadow Pact, she would make him explain things to her.

"Shadow Pact," Alexander started explaining.

At first, what he said was exactly what Michelle had found out in the book, but as he continued, Michelle couldn’t help but lift a brow.

The Shadow Pact could not only let the two know when one of them was in danger or pain, but it could even let them communicate with each other just like Michelle could with her contracted beasts.

But for that, it wasn’t enough for Alexander to put his shadow essence into Michelle’s neck. She would need to do the same back to him.

That made Michelle narrow her eyes. She didn’t really want something like that. Especially since she was planning to sometimes break the pact to fool Alexander into thinking she died.

If, by then, Alexander could communicate with her and started asking her questions, she would need to put up a perfect act for him to think she really died.

That would be a hassle. And if she didn’t do it perfectly, with how sharp Alexander was, he would quickly guess that she didn’t die—that she just found a way to break the pact.

And that would be no fun.

Seeing the frown on Michelle’s face, Alexander knew she didn’t want to be able to communicate with him through the pact.

It wasn’t that surprising. To him, it looked like Michelle had only reluctantly accepted the pact because she lost a bet. So it was natural she wouldn’t want to deepen it in any way.

Knowing that, Alexander wasn’t surprised when Michelle whipped out a bottle of poison. "Since my end of the deal is done, you should do yours too," she said with a smile.

She could finally test her poison on someone who didn’t have inhuman healing abilities. It made her fairly happy.

Alexander rolled up his sleeve and extended his hand to Michelle.

She picked up a knife and made a cut on his forearm. She made sure it wasn’t pointlessly deep. If she wanted Alexander to let her test her poison on him a few more times, she had to make the wound shallow so it would heal quicker. Her plan wasn’t to hurt him in the long term.

After making the cut, Michelle opened the bottle of poison. There, she already had the poison pills ground, so she just sprinkled some over Alexander’s wound.

"Tell me when your sight starts returning!" she finally said as she stood up and went over to her cauldron.

While Alexander was poisoned, she could try making another, even better batch of poison.

Alexander’s sight turned into a hazy mess, and he could barely make Michelle out as she went a few steps away from him. He could barely make out the tips of his fingers when he stretched his hands out. It was quite a nasty feeling.

Michelle didn’t pay any attention to Alexander. She just focused on making the poison. She got better at controlling the fire, and her soul and spirit energy.

After a few hours, Michelle had a new batch on hand.

To check its quality, Michelle cut one pill open. Her eyes gleamed when she noticed that the color gradient was nearly unnoticeable. The pills were nearing perfection.

Without giving it any thought, Michelle once again cut the inner side of her lip and sprinkled the ground poison there. She wanted to see how much it would deform her gaze.

When the poison kicked in, Michelle nearly laughed. She could barely see anything. Just a small dot in the middle—and it, too, was extremely blurry. People with sight like that would basically be considered blind.

But Michelle wasn’t satisfied yet.

She quickly used her soul and spirit energy to push her blood back into the vein so her sight returned. Then, her attention went back to the cauldron.

But before she started making another batch, she turned her attention to Alexander. "How is your sight?" she asked.

"Still the same," he answered truthfully.

That made Michelle happy. If it lasted for at least another hour or two, she could be sure the poison made people with normal healing abilities permanently blind.

So, while waiting, Michelle turned her attention back to the cauldron. The poison was extremely close to perfection. She wanted to finish it already.

Silence once again overtook the room. The only sound that could be heard was the bubbling of all the liquids in Michelle’s cauldron as they boiled and evaporated.

Michelle put her full focus into it, completely ignoring Alexander’s existence.

After another few hours, Michelle was triumphantly holding a new pill. She had sliced through it, and it had no color gradient. At least in color and consistency, it was perfect.

The only question was whether it could really make one go completely blind.

So Michelle took the poison.

When she lost her sight, she nearly squealed in happiness.

But she held back and quickly cured herself.

Then, she turned her attention to Alexander. "Still no changes?" she asked.

"No changes..." he nodded.

Hearing that, Michelle smiled.

She came over to Alexander and placed her hands on each side of his head. Then, she started pouring her soul and spirit energy into his head.

Once they got under his skull, she found the spot where the broken vein was and wrapped them around it. Then, she had them solidify and push the blood back to its place. Next, she had the spirit and soul energy create a temporary vein in the place it was missing.

Alexander’s gaze quickly returned.

But he still wasn’t cured. His sight was working only because Michelle’s soul and spirit energy were working as a vein. But they couldn’t be kept there forever.

"Do you have something that speeds up recovery?" she asked. She never really carried pills like that for herself.

Alexander reached into his spatial ring and took out a pill bottle. He took out one pill and put it into his mouth.

"Good!" Michelle nodded. Then, she quickly gathered the poison she made. "You can stay here to recover, I’m going to see Master!"

The next moment, she had left the room, going toward Mavreth’s office.

When she entered, Mavreth’s gaze fell on the jade bottle in her hand. "I see you’ve succeeded." He was satisfied with what his disciple could do. "Take this, then!" he threw another pill bottle to Michelle. "It works after being inhaled."

"Thanks, Master!" Michelle nodded and left with the new poison. She was curious as to what it would do.

Once back in her room, Michelle saw Alexander staring at her. "What?" she tilted her head a bit.

Alexander frowned a bit. "After I took the poison, you didn’t feel anything?" He was clearly asking about the Shadow Pact. Since Alexander was poisoned, Michelle should have felt it.

"I did feel it. But since I knew what was going on with you, I just ignored it." She shrugged.

"Wasn’t it uncomfortable?" Alexander asked.

Michelle clearly didn’t care. "Maybe a bit, but not enough to distract me."

Alexander’s frown deepened. When Michelle had tested the new batches of her poisons on herself, he could feel the beating under his collarbone get stronger. It was extremely uncomfortable.

Michelle should have felt around the same intensity of the beating when he had taken the poison, so how was she able to bear it so easily?

It made Alexander curious about her past. He didn’t feel pity for what she had gone through to be used to something as uncomfortable as that was. He was just curious about what had shaped her into who she was today.

But there was no way for him to know. Michelle was mostly shaped by the experiences she had in her past life. That was in a different world, one which Alexander had no clue about. And he had no way of investigating it.

Michelle ignored Alexander’s stare and opened the poison bottle Mavreth had given her. She wanted to see what state the poison was in—whether she would have to alter it somehow to be able to take it.

Seeing Michelle with another poison, Alexander frowned a bit. He realized that by entering the Shadow Pact with Michelle, he had signed himself up for daily suffering.