Day came and Siderius' pair of Nocturnal Eyes begged him to sleep. But he couldn't.
Time was of the essence. He did not have many to spare. Arvenox needed to be birthed for Carsten's sake.
He carved out a few big bowls of wood and used it as the mixer.
Siderius started with mixing different quantities of the plants and the poorly-made alcohol. Its elements needed to be fused together. The process needed not to be perfect, but it had to be stable.
The Phosphorus was the binding agent so Siderius needed to drop it in the bowl for every batch.
He used Salt to draw an Alchemy Seal. This Seal would act as a guidance to combine the Body of the ingredients. It was named Supplementary Agent for its purpose.
It was not necessary to use Supplementary Agent. But the seal could greatly speed up the experiment process. Siderius also had a lot of salt so he wasn't afraid of wasting it.
The first mixture exploded into Siderius' face and destroyed the wooden bowl with it. Firevein had too high concentration of Fire element. Its quantity needed to be much lower than when using the Embercoal Root.
Siderius switched to a second bowl.
The second mixture turned into a thick dark brown liquid. It was too dense for any human to consume and would completely wreck their bowel.
The Fire element was also neutralized completely because of the high amount of Earth element.
Grayground was not suitable to exist beside Firevein. Siderius took it out of the formula and used exclusively the Rockslit Clover.
The third mixture was somewhat successful. The mixture did not blow up nor hardened into an indigestible solution. But the alcohol did not absorb the Fire element too well. It looked completely like a normal bowl of liquor that smelled funny.
The alcohol was too soft and wasn't able to absorb the Fire element.
Fourth time, Siderius boiled the alcohol to condense it and mix with the same quantity as before. The alcohol completely nullified the elements inside the Rockslit Leaves and dissolved it to nothingness.
Leaves were not potent enough. Siderius switched to using the body of the Rockslit Clover.
Fifth time, Siderius let the alcohol and Firevein fused first then slowly added on the Rockslit Clover.
The fragile nature of the clover did not survive the combination power of the alcohol and Firevein. Another failure.
Rockslit Body needed to be added at the same time as the alcohol and Firevein. But it also needed to survive the fusion. So Siderius added more Yellowstone in the process of mixing, hoping it would be enough to keep the Rockslit afloat.
He crushed Yellowstone into powder, making sure it could be absorbed the quickest and not cause any unwanted reaction.
It didn't blow up and all elements were fusing together nicely.
After half an hour, a bright orange alcohol-based concoction was now shivering inside the wooden bowl.
Siderius made a makeshift filtration system by combining some pieces of cloth and fine sand he had found in the river bank. Then he filtered the new concoction to another bowl.
What was left in the first bowl was a thick black liquid. And only pure Blightburn Tonic was in the second bowl.
It had a much brighter color than the Blightburn made from Embercoal Root and its pungent smell was evidence for its Fire element.
Siderius held the bowl of orange-colored Blightburn in his hands. Naturally, the next step would be to find livestock and let them drink the new Tonic for testing.
But he did not have that privilege at the moment.
Siderius drank the entire bowl of Blightburn.
[TOXICITY +42]
[TOXICITY LEVEL HAS BEEN ADDED TO THE STATUS WINDOW]
[TOXICITY LEVEL: 42/100]
The first thing he felt was… BURN.
A scorching burn on his throat that went straight down to his stomach. He could feel its every movement inside his organs.
The fever came immediately and sweat poured out of his pores.
Siderius took a deep breath then kneeled down before the campfire. He closed his eyes and started his meditation.
He had to be conscious to take notes of the reaction. The burn made it hard to think and the pain almost shut down his mind.
He couldn't faint.
Siderius initiated the sign sequence for the Ring of Sense again. His mouth was mumbling the verse.
He didn't need to do the signs but the movement helped him concentrate and calmed down.
"By touch and taste…"
"By sense and sound…"
"By touch and taste…"
"By sense and sound…"
Siderius repeated the verse like a machine, over and over again.
[PSYCHOSIS -1]
[PSYCHOSIS -1]
[PSYCHOSIS LEVEL: 53/125]
The further in the meditation, the slower the psychosis would drop.
In the beginning, two hours had decreased one point of Psychosis.
Then it stretched out to four hours for one point.
Siderius meditated for six hours straight. His fever subsided and the heat within him was gone.
However, Siderius didn't stop the meditation. He could feel the first Ring was coming to a conclusion.
Another four hours passed by.
Inside the dark mind space of Siderius, the blue sphere had almost disappeared, only a very faint glow was left.
The ring outside of the owl had solidified itself, now actually looked like a real gold ring.
And then it happened. The blue sphere completely disappeared and the ring was the only thing left.
Siderius clasped his two hands together.
"No chaos placed, on hallowed ground!"
The ring attached itself onto the owl's waist, placing a shackle onto its essence.
[PSYCHOSIS -3]
[PSYCHOSIS LEVEl: 50/125]
[YOU HAVE ABSORBED THE ESSENCE OF YOUR MUTATION]
[PERCEPTION +1]
[S.Y.S.T.E.M.]
[USER: Siderius 'Snow' Satterblade]
[ ATTRIBUTES ]
|Strength: 3|
|Agility: 4|
|Perception: 3 (+1)|
|Stamina: 5|
|Endurance: 6|
[WITCH HUNTER RANK: OCULUS EXTIMA I]
[ALCHEMIST RANK: SILVER I]
[SIGILS SLOT: 2/2]
[SIGIL:
[MERCURY EXTRACT: 23/150]
[PSYCHOSIS LEVEL: 50/125]
[TOXICITY LEVEL: 2/100]
Siderius opened his eyes and the window of the system was already there.
His psychosis had gone down significantly. But now he got one more thing to worry about. Toxicity.
Alchemical spirits were not miracles. They too had drawbacks.
However, compared to Psychosis, Toxicity was something much more manageable. The toxicity level would also drop very quickly by itself over time.
Over the span of eight hours, the Toxicity had decreased by 40 points. The remaining amount was less than noticeable.
As long as Siderius didn't exceed his maximum toxicity, he would be fine.
He was a bit disappointed with the Toxicity of Blightburn. 42 points were too much for a mere beginner tonic. There was more space to improve.
Siderius had also successfully placed a ring onto the psyche of the owl. In exchange, he absorbed its essence, increasing his own perception.
Siderius' eyes were a bit better. The shortsightedness of this body decreased greatly. He couldn't clearly see the tree from afar but he could observe most of it now.
Originally his vision may be around five or six on a grade of ten points. But it was eight out of ten now. It was only a bit blurry when focused at things in the very far distance.
His nose was also a little bit sharper. He could smell the remnants of his previous experiments.
His ears heard the wind howling and branches shaking.
The hair on his skin stood up due to the cold wind.
The bitter taste of Blightburn lingered in his mouth.
One simple point made a huge difference.
Siderius grinned. He slowly got up. The fever was gone. The strength of youthfulness reigned inside him.
"It is good to be young," Siderius thought to himself.
He let out a long huge breath. A small cloud of golden dust left his mouth.
Blightburn Tonic version two was a success. And that counted as a new piece of knowledge. It had helped Siderius acquire a little bit of True Aether.
The amount was abysmal compared to Siderius' original cloud but an alchemist could never complain about having more True Aether.
There was a byproduct of gas let out in the mixing process.
The residue was a thick black liquid with unknown characteristics.
[BLIGHTBURN TONIC V2]
Boiled Low-Grade Alcohol (Base) + Firevein Leaves (Main) + Rockslit Clover Body (Sub) + Yellowstone Powder (Sub) + Phosphorus (Binding Agent) = Blightburn Tonic (Product) + Unknown Gas (Byproduct) + Unknown Black Liquid (Residue)