Chapter 125: Fortuitously Alchemical (1/2)
Clutching his acquisition from the library, Mike rushed back over to the Summoning pavilion, making it there shortly before the clock tower started chiming. Catching his breath, he caught sight of a notice posted on one of the support pillars.
It was clearly written by Madeline, since it had her lackadaisical approach to wording and structure. As far as he could tell, she'd cancelled classes because the department had called some kind of big meeting that was taking place all day today. However, she encouraged her students to practice what they've learned so far.
[You barely taught us anything, yet. How can we practice?]
It looked like there was something big going on at the moment, which involved the majority of the teachers. Thinking back to the 'mobilization exercise' mentioned earlier, he guessed the two were related. The whole thing gave him the feeling that he was going to be dragged into another major event in the near future.
[Hopefully, this isn't a precursor to being attacked by another horde of demons or something. I could use a break from apocalyptic scenarios.]
Sighing, he made his way back to the Magic Department's main campus, stopping by one of the cafeterias to get lunch, and moved into the large courtyard underneath the Tower of Will. Finding an open bench, he pulled out the book he'd picked out earlier.
”Basic Elemental Chants: Foundational Spells for the Four Primary Elements,” was a thick leather bound volume that went into excruciating detail about the specific pronunciation and wording for each of the roughly one hundred commonly used Tier 1 elemental chants. Apparently, even this level of knowledge warranted special considerations, since he received a rather stern lecture from the librarian about properly taking care of the book, and ensuring that he didn't inadvertently share the information it contained to anyone outside of the University.
Mike settled down to start learning chants seriously, since he'd been slacking in this aspect lately. While he had the excuse of not wanting to call attention to himself for his ability to modify existing chants on the fly, he knew that this was the next category he really needed to improve on.
Cracking the book open, he started on Earth Magic chants, and was able to make it up to Water Magic spells before he needed to head to his next class. The chants themselves were fairly simple, and it took no real effort to learn them, especially with his Communication Magic assisting. He did run into one problem, however. Memorizing the exact wording proved difficult for Mike.
[I need to start putting together a notebook for these things. Something I can reference on the fly in the event I forget.]
Deciding that further reading could wait until he had something to record them in, Mike walked to his Chanting class, half expecting it to be canceled as well. Unfortunately, the lesson took place as usual, and he was forced to sit through the students moving from pronouncing individual sounds to stringing them together. Apparently High Elven was one of those obnoxious languages where a symbol had different sounds attached to it depending on its placement in relation to other symbols.
It gave him time to skim through the rest of his book, and get a clear idea of what sort of chants it had to offer for each element. Finally, after a painfully long hour, the instructor ended the lesson early and gave the same announcement as the Magic Theory teacher. He also made sure to reiterate about the event that was scheduled for tomorrow, and encouraged everyone to attend. Finally, he released the class after emphasizing the need to speak to their advisors in the near future.
Mike walked to Alchemy, expecting it to be canceled for sure. Once again, he was surprised, pleasantly this time, to see the class continuing, only with a senior male student leading instead of the usual instructor. Something had come up suddenly, and he was asked to fill in at the last minute.
Without anything in particular planned for his juniors, the student simply gave them access to the basic supply closet and had them perform their own experiments.
Thankfully, Lily wasn't there today. Mike could only imagine the number of casualties that would have occurred if she had free reign on the supply closet.
Most of the other students took this opportunity to slack off, throwing a few random ingredients into a pot, and using the time spent waiting to chat with their friends. Mike thought it was a bit silly to waste this opportunity, but supposed that this was a common problem among the young of any world.
Mike dug through the haphazardly arranged closet, looking for some promising materials. Picking out three, he returned to his table and laid them out. He'd located an unusual black fluid, a desiccated liver from some kind of animal, and a red mana core the size of a golf ball. Before launching into his experiment, he took some time to use Appraise on each of them.
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{Evernight Swamp Water}
Magic Material (Tier 1, Rank 4)
An alchemical material. Water drawn from the Blighted Swamp without filtration, this fluid has been aged in a mana infused cask for 100 days, enhancing its potency. As a Dark attuned material, it is commonly used in recipes that involve darkness or deception. When mixed with a mana source, this water is also known to release airborne toxins.
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{Dried Basilisk Liver}
Magic Material (Tier 2, Rank 1)
An alchemical material. Due to the Basilisk's highly toxic diet, their livers retain vast amounts of harmful chemicals in comparison to its size. Dried, this organ is most commonly used as a poison, but also sees frequent use as medicine.
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[Red Mana Core}
Magic Material (Tier 1, Rank 3)
The condensed mana left over when a dungeon monster is slain. Mana cores are categorized by color and size. Red cores are the weakest of all mana cores.
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[…..Why are there so many toxics ingredients in a beginner's class? Anyway, it looks like whatever I try to make with this stuff is going to be dangerous.]
After considering the problem, Mike decided that he would just use a basic method and hope for the best. Since he could use Healing Magic in the event he poisoned himself or others, he wasn't too worried about any accidents.
Taking the liver and the mana core, he ground them up with the mortar and pestle, creating a dark red powder that gave off a slightly acrid smell. He poured the swamp water into his pot and added the powder, replacing the lid quickly.