Chapter 554 - An Incurable Poison! (2/2)

His footsteps finally stopped beside Link. Arda’s voice came next. “Hey, I hear you’re quite good with the sword.”

“Just a bit.” Link nodded. His eyes were still shut.

Arda asked patiently, “Did you also see the Beastman just now?”

Link nodded again.

Arda explained, “There were actually two of them just now. One of them was killed by us. However, the other managed to escape us. We suspect that they were scouts, and it’s possible they may attack us tonight. As it turns out, their blood is quite poisonous. Our leader, Milo and some of our best men were poisoned by the Beastmen’s blood. We need all the help we can get to guard the place tonight.”

Arda probably assumed that Link had a lot of experience surviving the wilderness, considering the fact that he had just traversed the plains on his own before joining the caravans. As the mercenaries were now short on manpower, Arda naturally sought Link out for his help. Of course, Link was not the only one Arda had asked. Those who looked physically competent had also been recruited by him to keep watch tonight.

Incidentally, Link was also curious about the two mysterious Beastmen himself. He nodded at Arda and said, “Alright then, what do you have in mind for me?”

Arda did not expect Link to agree to his request so easily, since he had noticed that Link had been extremely quiet throughout their journey. Relieved by Link’s answer, “It’s like this. We’re kinda short on people on the eastern side. If you don’t mind, could you take the first shift there?”

“No problem.” Link rolled up his woolen blanket and headed towards where Arda had indicated.

Along the way, he observed his surroundings. He noticed the solemn expressions on the mercenaries’ faces. Through the crowd, he could see their brethren who had been poisoned.

Three of them had been poisoned. The mercenary who had been blinded in one eye already had the blood on his face cleaned up, but there was the same greenish hue on the man’s face that Link had also seen on the Beastmen. His body was trembling uncontrollably while his mouth muttered unintelligible gibberish. Beside him lay the mercenaries who had slain the Beastmen. One of them was the leader of the mercenaries, Milo.

Milo’s condition seemed a lot better than the other two. His face was not as green as the other two. He could even move, but from the way he moved, Link could see that his condition was still severe. Milo might only be able to use half of his strength at the moment, but his condition would only worsen if left untreated.

If those two Beastmen were really scouts, there’s a high chance we’ll be ambushed tonight. I can’t really do anything about that now. I’ll just have to wait and see what happens, Link thought.

Right now, he needed to do some research on the poison that had flowed through the Beastmen’s veins.

Link noticed that the place he was assigned was an empty space cleared out among the merchants’ cargo, which shielded him from the night breeze. He was the only one standing guard there tonight. No one would be able to see what Link was up to there. It was an ideal location for him.

Link spread out his blanket on the empty space and sat on it. With one ear strained at the noises from the campsite, Link took out the bottle of blood he had collected back then and began experimenting on the poison contained within.

According to the principles of alchemy, each type of poison had a certain attribute which in turn had a corresponding neutralizing agent. Some poisons had multiple attributes, but with the proper alchemical procedure, Link should be able to identify the type of toxicity in the Beastmen’s blood.

Of course, understanding the nature of the poison itself did not equate to actually finding a cure for it.

The reason why some forms of poison proved difficult to cure is due to the fact that they contained multiple attributes which intersected with one another in a sophisticated manner. As a result, antidotes for these types of poison were usually hard to find. There were even some that had remained incurable for a long time.

One might liken this to a mathematical formula. It might look like an innocuous arrangement of numbers and alphabets to the naked eye. Eventually, to your frustration, you realized that there was absolutely no way to solve it, despite knowing what each of the numbers and alphabets meant.

At that moment, no one was paying any attention to him. Link began his experiments. Ten minutes later, he finally stopped.

There was no sophistication to the poison’s toxicity. Its attributes were clearly laid out. All five elements, which comprised gold, wood, water, fire, and earth, intersected with each other according to a specific order. But the way it was concocted was of some interest to Link. He had gone through 20 different methods of detoxification, none of which had any effect on this particular poison.

This was the first time he had come across such a poison ever since he mastered alchemy. Link was up against a highly skilled poisoner devoid of all sympathy for his victims.

Link frowned slightly. Can it really be incurable? What kind of person would concoct such an insidious poison?

With no cure in sight, those poisoned would surely meet a slow and painful death. Link raised his head up from his hiding spot and looked at the three poisoned mercenaries pitifully.

Before, the leader of the mercenaries was still be able to move. But the poison had spread deep into his body. He now looked even weaker than before.

He seemed to have sensed that his time was up. The mercenaries tending to him now leaned down over his body as he muttered something to them. Link listened to what he said. The man was already making arrangements for his death.

There was no fear or sorrow in the mercenary leader’s voice. It sounded level and impassive, as one would expect from someone who had constant brushes with death in his job.

Link grew even more sympathetic for the man’s plight. What a shame to lose such an excellent mercenary. If only he was infused with Sunlight Power… With his talent, he may even make it beyond Level-8, he thought.

As he lamented on Milo’s condition, there was sudden heavy breathing coming from the campsite, followed by strange groaning sounds. Link quickly located where the sounds were coming from. They had come from the mercenary who had been grievously poisoned the most.

He was taking in huge gulps of air. There was a hissing sound from the depths of his throat. The whites of his eyes were gone, and in their place was complete darkness. White patches of the filament-like fungi began sprouting on his face.

Those were the same symptoms Link had seen on the Beastmen that had been poisoned!