Although it took some time since Alec needed to read the feedback from his spell, rest, and recover mana between each cast, he confirmed that the aspects of monsterifiaction for the human monster and the two animals were the same.

Their bodies were made of superior physical matter, and their brains were mushy, non-functional messes. There were slight variations between the lizard and the cat, but those could be attributed to their species.

But there was one difference that Alec was certain had nothing to do with species or origin.

It was the difference in the quality of their physiques. The third-stage cat's body and cells had a clear edge compared to the lizard's. It was like it was one step above in terms of design and raw material.

In the same vein, the lizard was one step above the human monster.

But the difference in species made it so that the human monster had the strength to break out, while the lizard didn't. There was also the fact that human monsters were outliers and not reliable test subjects.

Alec noted down his results and then decided to call it a day. He still had a way to go before he could complete his quest and attain monsterification immunity, but he had made good progress. He could feel how close he was.

But he hadn't rested properly in a while. Although it still felt like he could think clearly and remain sharp and focused, there was no harm in sleeping like a baby every now and then.

However, there was no way he could do that with three hungry monsters staring at him. He glared back while reciting the Poem and then left to look for an unoccupied room.

Fortunately, most of the rooms were unoccupied.

Unfortunately, most of the rooms were similar to the one he used. All of them were covered in stains of dried blood. There were cells and shackles.

Everywhere he looked, he saw the traces of Shim's horrible experiments. Unless he tired himself out until he passed out, he wouldn't be able to sleep peacefully.

Finally, he had one room left, the room furthest into the underground facility.

Alec hadn't even noticed it until he got right up to the wall while considering whether to sleep in the hallway or not. If it hadn't been for his extremely honed mana sense, he would never have found the engraved spell formation in the wall that opened the door to a proper room.

As he looked around the room, slightly surprised, he soon realized that it was a room Shim had made for when he stayed in the lab overnight. It was where he slept.

That immediately made Alec want to turn around and find somewhere else.

But he could just erase the traces of the old bastard and mark the place as his own.

He also hoped that the doorway inside the room would lead to a bathroom. At least a toilet, but if he were lucky, maybe even a shower.

Unfortunately, he found neither.

Instead, he found a sleeping beauty. Literally.

It was an empty stone room, much like the others he had seen. The one thing that separated it was the woman sleeping in a box of glass held up by branches and flowers.

'I guess that's the lover Moira mentioned.' Apparently, Shim had lost a person close to him in his youth, which had made him stray from the righteous path.

The woman in the glass coffin looked a lot younger than Shim, but if she had turned into a monster and been sealed by whatever spell that was, she probably didn't age as quickly as Shim had.

Alec's guess was confirmed as he got a closer look. She had long, straight brown hair trapped under her shoulders, fair skin, and gentle hands clasped over her belly. But she also had a pair of white wings growing from her back.

They looked uncomfortably squeezed into the coffin with her, but her face was peaceful.

She looked like an angel trapped by the desire of man, yet gracious enough to accept it.

Alec had a feeling that would change as soon as she woke up, though, so he stopped getting closer to her and watched her from a distance. He didn't know what kind of spells Shim had set up, and he did not want to disturb her.

The woman had most likely been a mage or warrior at the second or third stages by the time she monsterified, given how old she appeared to be and the status she should have had as Shim's betrothed.

Alec didn't know how that translated into monster strength, but she could imagine it was one powerful monster Shim had enshrined.

Still, he couldn't help but look at her a little more before returning to the bedroom.

'She said a few weeks to a few months, right? I guess that means I can use the Poem about…once a day, maybe?' Alec closed his eyes and tried to sleep, but his restless mind kept spinning.

He kept thinking about everything that had happened lately and about monsters, human and not. But he also thought about what was happening outside the underground lab.

Despite being an old man inside, he had found himself adapting to his current life as a teenager again. He had gotten caught up in unnecessary teenage drama, albeit the medieval fantasy variant.

But he had also made friends, something he hadn't been very good at on Earth.

He couldn't help but wonder if they missed him. He also wondered what they thought had happened to him.

Had Shim just said that he ran away or got eaten by a monster or something? Maybe they were out there looking for him while he was trapped in an underground lab trying to solve one of the world's greatest mysteries.

Alec's hopes weren't completely off the mark.

If his friends had been free enough to worry about him, they probably would have.

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