# Chapter 9: Dorm Life & Mosquito Coils
The wooden door to dorm room 402 creaked softly as Aster pushed it open. His shoulders sagged, as if the gravity of the entire world had just been doubled directly over his spine. In the corner of his eye, blood-red digital numbers continued blinking mercilessly.
[COUNTDOWN: 68 HOURS 14 MINUTES 09 SECONDS.]
Three days. Less than three days before the sky tore open and monsters from the Abyss dimension descended to turn humanity into a buffet. Aster only wanted to collapse onto a soft mattress, close his eyes, and pretend he knew nothing about any of it.
However, the aroma of homemade chicken broth and fried garlic immediately greeted his nose.
"Wow, you're back early!" Toby called from the corner of the room. The stocky young man was sitting cross-legged on the carpet, stirring a tin pot filled with boiled instant noodles.
But the instant noodles weren't what made Aster's heart stop. It was the thing Toby was using to heat the pot. A small, round stove made of clay, molded by Aster himself from leftover river mud behind the academy the previous week. Aster had only made it on a whim, intending to sell it as an "antique flowerpot" at the flea market.
However, the fire burning inside the stove wasn't orange. It was pale blue, giving off no heat while making the air around it distort like asphalt melting under the blazing sun.
A system window exploded directly in front of Aster's face.
[CRITICAL WARNING: ARTIFACT 'CLAY STOVE' DETECTED!] [GLITCH ANALYSIS: CLAY STRUCTURE IS FORCEFULLY ABSORBING AMBIENT MANA.] [ACTIVE CONCEPT: KARMA BURNING.] [STATUS: FUEL IS NOT WOOD. THIS STOVE IS BURNING THE USER'S FATE AND LUCK TO COOK THE NOODLES.] [SIDE EFFECT: USER WILL EXPERIENCE CATASTROPHE-GRADE BAD LUCK FOR 10 YEARS.]
"Toby! Get your hands away from that thing!" Aster shouted, his voice rising in panic.
Without a second thought, Aster leaped forward, kicked the clay stove away from Toby, then snatched it up with his bare hands. The stove felt cold, but Aster could sense a strange vibration that seemed to be trying to suck away the last remnants of his luck. He quickly shoved it into his ragged burlap sack and tied it tightly shut.
"Hey! What the heck, Aster? My noodles aren't done yet!" Toby protested, holding the pot of broth, which was already starting to cool.
"That stove is defective! Manufacturing flaw! If you keep using it, you'll have a lifetime of bad luck, Toby! Trust me!" Aster panted, cold sweat trickling down his temple. Almost. I almost cursed my roommate worse than the Abyss apocalypse.
In the doorway, Kaelen, who had just entered, stared at the scene with sharply narrowed eyes. He saw Aster willingly seize the "dangerous artifact" for himself, taking on the risk of a karmic curse to save the life of his clueless roommate.
How noble, Kaelen thought, his respect soaring. The master is willing to stain his own hands with bad karma to protect his pawns on the chessboard. He didn't even let Toby realize the sacrifice he had made. A ruthless yet compassionate strategy.
"Just eat your noodles with hot water from the thermos," Aster ordered as he tossed his junk sack under the bed. "I'm going to sleep. Don't wake me unless this building collapses."
The night grew late. The clock on the wall showed two in the morning.
Kaelen sat cross-legged by the window, his eyes closed but his senses still alert, keeping watch like a guard dog. Toby was already snoring loudly on his mattress, hugging a bolster pillow. Meanwhile, Aster lay on his back, staring at the mold-spotted ceiling.
[COUNTDOWN: 62 HOURS 05 MINUTES.]
Aster couldn't sleep. His mind spun wildly as he thought of ways to escape. But the biggest problem right now wasn't the Abyss apocalypse. His biggest problem was the ringing sound shredding his eardrums.
Bzzzzzzzt.
A mosquito landed on his nose. Aster slapped at it, but missed.
Bzzzzzzzt.
Two more mosquitoes buzzed around his ears. Dorm room 402 was located right beside the swamp behind the academy, making it paradise for bloodsucking insects. Aster had already tried closing the window, but its wooden frame had rotted and was full of gaps.
"Damn it," Aster muttered, sitting up with a crumpled face. The itch had started spreading across his ankles. As far as he was concerned, the apocalypse could wait, but being bitten by mosquitoes while stressed was psychological torture on a godly level.
With his eyes half-closed, Aster reached under the bed, shifted the sack containing the clay stove, and pulled out a cardboard box filled with his homemade "junk." He took out a dull-brown spiral coil. It was his homemade Mosquito Coil, made from a mixture of teak sawdust, dried neem leaves he'd gathered behind the alchemy laboratory, and a little starch glue. It looked ugly and broke easily, but Aster was confident its smell would be strong enough to drive away the insects.
Without him realizing it, three black shadows were crawling along the outside wall of the dorm beyond his window.
They were the remnants of the elite assassins of the Vespera clan, secretly hired by the Valerius family to behead Aster Vale that very night. They wore leather armor layered with sound-dampening spells, poisoned daggers in hand. Their leader gave a hand signal. One by one, they slipped through the loose window gaps, landing on the wooden floor without making the slightest sound.
They were aiming for Aster's neck as he sat on the edge of his mattress.
Aster, completely unaware of the three deadly assassins behind him, merely yawned widely. He took out a match, struck it, and lit the end of his homemade Mosquito Coil.
"Die, you damn parasites," Aster muttered, blowing on the glowing tip until smoke began to rise.
At that exact moment, the system window in front of Aster's eyes flashed with blinding neon green.
[ITEM 'MOSQUITO COIL' ACTIVATED.] [ANALYZING COMPOSITION: SAWDUST, NEEM LEAVES, STARCH GLUE.] [GLITCH DETECTED: ALCHEMICAL MANA IN NEEM LEAVES IS REACTING WITH THE SPIRAL PATTERN.] [ACTIVE CONCEPT: TOXIC EXISTENCE EXORCISM.] [ORIGINAL TARGET: MOSQUITOES (NONE WITHIN A 10-METER RADIUS).] [SEARCHING FOR ALTERNATE TARGET... TOXIC EXISTENCES DETECTED: 3 ENTITIES.] [EXECUTING PURGE.]
Thin grayish smoke began rising from the Mosquito Coil. However, the smoke didn't spread randomly. It moved as if alive, splitting into three thin trails that shot forward like snakes, heading straight for the three assassins who had just raised their daggers.
The first assassin inhaled the smoke. His eyes flew wide. He didn't choke. He didn't cough. But inside his body, the "poison" referred to by the System was not a physical toxin. It was their murderous intent, resentment, and the darkness in their souls.
[TOXIC EXISTENCE EXORCISM CONCEPT: BURNING EVERY FORM OF HATRED AND SIN DOWN TO THE ROOTS OF THE SOUL.]
The first assassin's skin turned pale, then cracked like dried ceramic. In terrifying silence, his armor, flesh, and bones crumbled into fine dust. He collapsed into a pile of gray ash on the wooden floor, leaving behind only his black clothing and dagger, which clinked softly.
The second and third assassins tried to flee, twisting around to leap through the window. But the smoke was faster. It wrapped around their faces and entered their pores and lungs. Both of them froze. Expressions of horror were etched across their faces for a single second before their bodies also exploded into fine dust, blown away by the night wind through the open window.
In less than three seconds, the three elite Vespera assassins had vanished from the face of the earth. There was no blood. No screaming. Only three piles of ash and empty clothes on the bedroom floor.
Aster inhaled deeply and waved his hand to disperse the smoke. "Wow, this stuff really works. The mosquitoes took off instantly." He placed the Mosquito Coil on a tin plate on the floor, then lay back down on the mattress and pulled the blanket up over his nose.
On the opposite mattress, Toby woke briefly at the sound of falling daggers. He yawned, rubbed his watery eyes, and inhaled the room's air, which now smelled like burning wood and dried leaves.
"Wow... smells nice, Aster," Toby mumbled hoarsely, his eyes closing again. "Did you make relaxing incense? Nice... makes me sleepy..."
"Yeah, yeah. Go back to sleep. Sweep the floor in the morning, okay? There's a lot of dust and dead mosquitoes," Aster replied without opening his eyes, completely unaware that the "dust" he meant was the remains of the high-level assassins' souls.
In the corner of the room, Kaelen, who had witnessed the entire event from beginning to end, swallowed with difficulty. His hand trembled around the hilt of his wooden sword. He had just watched his Master kill three members of the deadliest assassin clan on the continent by burning... a roll of sawdust.
No spell. No mana movement. Just a god-level conceptual law triggered by a piece of junk, Kaelen thought, cold sweat running down his back. Master... he doesn't even consider them a threat. He only considers them... mosquitoes.
Kaelen stared at the piles of ash on the floor, then at Aster's back as he snored peacefully. That night, Kaelen swore in his heart that he would never, ever, not even once, make Aster Vale angry.