Chapter 252: Chapter 251 Chapter 252: Chapter 251 Nighttime, the laboratory, the main lab.
On a small square table, there sat a candlestick for lighting, surrounded by a large amount of food. On one side of the square table was a chair, and on the chair sat a person, cutting food with utensils, clearly in the midst of dinner.
The sole participant of the dinner, Gutas, was filled with a great deal of confusion at the time.
First of all, his memory was somewhat disordered.
He distinctly remembered strenuously untying the ropes and obtaining his freedom. But what happened afterward seemed to imply from the sidelines that he had merely fallen asleep—because when Richard returned and woke him up, he found himself still solidly tied to the ground.
Could it be that he was overthinking? Could it be that he never escaped, and the memory of escape was just a dream he had while asleep?
With this thought in mind, Gutas put down his utensils and rubbed his face slightly. For some reason, he felt his entire face was somewhat swollen, his eyes barely open, like he had been hit.
Of course, this was a minor issue; what puzzled him more was the situation before him—he was clearly just a captured prisoner, yet his captor, Richard, had brought him an abundant amount of food to eat.
Was it out of some sort of gratitude from Richard, or as a reward for his previous honesty? But the things he had told Richard earlier were clearly lies.
So what was the real reason?
Could it be for some reason Richard had developed a fear of him, aiming to butter him up first, then let him go?
This was not at all plausible.
Gutas was utterly baffled and extremely puzzled, but that did not prevent him from eating.
At that time, he was tied to a chair, but one hand could move within a certain range.
He used the utensil to cut off a plump and juicy thigh from the pickled chicken, grabbed it, and brought it to his mouth. With a twist of the neck and a fierce pull, he bit off large chunks of meat, chewed them a few times and with a “gulp,” swallowed them down. Soon, he had completely devoured the chicken leg, crunching and breaking the bones and swallowing them into his stomach.
After finishing the chicken leg, he picked up some bread and dipped it into the bowl of meat soup. He let the bread soak until it was somewhat soft, brought it to his mouth, and with a bite, swallowed it quickly—he was truly hungry.
Soon, Gutas was half full, and as he continued to eat, he looked at Richard sitting beside him, blinked his eyes, and buzzed, “Kid, you’d better let me go!”
“Hmm?” Richard looked at Gutas and asked, “Why?”
“Because…” Gutas hesitated, gulped down the fragrant steak, and after a long time finally found the threatening words, coldly saying, “Because… if you don’t let me go, once I escape from here, you are going to pay. I’m telling you, I’ve killed a lot of people, a lot!”
Richard looked at Gutas, said nothing, and responded with silence.
Gutas also fell silent, scratching his oily hand through his hair, feeling that this reason for threatening was even a bit too much for him to bear: What kind of threat was this? It didn’t have any substantial impact or retaliation at all!
With some irritation, Gutas tore off a wing from the smoked duck and slowly ate it. After a long time, he finally thought of something suitable to say and looked at Richard, “If you don’t let me go, once my friends find out I’m here, they will surely rescue me, and then you will be sorry.”
“So…” Richard looked at Gutas, “What you’re implicitly saying is that your friends have no idea you’re here, right? This means that, before coming to me, for some reason, you didn’t divulge your plan to anyone, and now no one knows your whereabouts. If that’s the case, what do I have to fear?”
“I…” Gutas was once again at a loss for words, and he really wanted to slap himself. Was this a case of saying too much?
With immense frustration, he finished the smoked duck wing and picked up a fried egg to eat.
After swallowing an entire fried egg, Gutas realized the situation he was in. He looked at Richard and decided to cave in. His lips parted and he spoke, though still with some coldness, his tone had become much gentler, “Kid, alright, I admit defeat. I shouldn’t have come here to steal. But that’s all I did, just attempted to steal, and I didn’t succeed, nor did I offend you in any way. How about you let me go?”
“You mentioned before that you’ve killed people, many people.”
“The ones I killed weren’t you or anyone related to you. Besides, those people are dead, what does it have to do with you?”
“Yeah, they have nothing to do with me. But not letting you go, what does that have to do with you?”
Gutas gritted his teeth, took a deep breath, and attempted to stay calm, “Even so, not letting me go is of no use to you either. Keeping me tied up here, not only do you have to watch over me nervously, but you also have to provide me with food and drink. I won’t bring any value to you but will continue to waste your money. It’s not worth it, so perhaps… you should let me go.”
“No, no, no.” Richard shook his head, looked at Gutas, and said, “You are underestimating yourself. Your value is actually much greater than you think.”
“Huh?” Gutas was confused, “What value?”
Richard didn’t answer immediately. Instead, he asked Gutas, “Looking at how much you’ve talked, are you full now?”
“Uh…” Gutas felt there might be a trap in that question and didn’t know how to respond.
Richard, however, nodded, “Hmm, seems like you are full, then we can proceed with some experimentation. I didn’t bring this food just for you to eat simply, but to test a series of your data—from eating and digestion to gradually testing your condition, physical values, basal metabolic rate, etc. Next, I need to draw some blood from you, hmm, just a bit of blood, don’t be nervous.”
As he was speaking, Richard walked over to a cabinet, pulled open a drawer, and took out a black wooden box. Opening the box revealed an injector.
Although the theory of the syringe was proposed by the Italian Catinell toward the end of the Medieval period on modern Earth, it was not until 1657 that the first human experiment was conducted by an Englishman. Then, in 1853, the Frenchman Pravoz made a silver syringe with a capacity of only one milliliter, which was considered a true invention success.
Therefore, in the Wizard World, which was similar to the Medieval era, there were no syringes. The injector in the box was made by Richard using modern Earth technology.
Because of a lack of many raw materials, Richard’s syringe was somewhat crude and cumbersome:
The body was not made of plastic but of glass. Although it allowed for easy observation of the liquid inside, it was fragile. Moreover, because of the increased weight, it added some difficulty to the operation. Apart from that, what was very noticeable was the enormous needle. Due to the craftsmanship issues of the current world, the needle was exaggeratedly thick, looking more like a deadly awl than a needle.
Richard was considering the possibility that, with the help of the Space Iron Ring and all other means at his disposal, he could personally craft a set of more refined tools to use. But this would take some time, and he couldn’t afford to wait for now. So, he would have to make do with a relatively rudimentary injector.
Thinking this, Richard, holding the injector, approached Gutas, who was slowly beginning to widen his eyes in alarm.