by K R Dimmick
There were at least thirty small barrels in front of Mikael, and he had one up to his nose and was sniffing away.
“Beer,” he smiled, “And the good stuff too, if I’m not mistaken.”
“The faster we finish up here, the faster we’ll all be home drinking it,” added Kira, glaring at him.
“Hmm. The best way to toast your enemies is with their own beer,” Damir chipped in. “It’s going to be a good night.”
Once we’d managed to pry Mikael away from the beer and send him to go and dismantle his unneeded traps, Kira and the other elves took down the tents.
I looked around to see what else needed doing and found Damir was busy standing between two trees at the back of the camp, chanting. I walked over to find out what he was doing. It looked like he was doing some kind of consecration ritual. I didn’t want to interrupt him in case that caused it to go wrong, so I simply stood there and watched.
After about ten minutes, nothing much had changed. I was about to walk away and ask Mikael or Kira what was going on, when all of a sudden, the chanting stopped. I swung my head back just in time to see a blue, mist-like substance coming out of his outstretched hands and moving toward the space between the two trees. Another couple of minutes later, the mist finally coalesced into something that looked distinctly like a portal. Damir sat down heavily on the floor.
“Pair up!” shouted Kira. “Get through in twos, now.”
The elves quickly organized themselves and ran through the portal in pairs.
“You and Soter are next,” she turned to me, pointing at the portal.
As soon as the last elf had disappeared, Soter and I stepped up to the blue mist. I felt the horribly familiar sensation of being compressed into a single atom as I got sucked into the portal. A few nauseating seconds later, it spat us back out.
I found myself back on all fours, right next to the marker stone in El Sanctum. Several pairs of hands grabbed me, and half pulled, half lifted me out of the way. Not a moment too soon, either, because Kira gracefully stepped out of the portal a second later, right into the space I’d been lying on.
She moved to the side and Mikael, carrying a very pale Damir, followed behind. With a sigh, Damir uttered a single word and passed out just as the portal vanished.
I cast Wound Seal on Damir, hoping to bring him around, but there was nothing wrong with him that I could see.
“He’s just out of mana and stamina,” said Kira. “He’ll be fine in a few minutes. It takes a lot of raw energy to build a portal, even a temporary one like that, and even more to keep it open for people to use.”
Well that explained why we’d rushed through in pairs. He started to mumble something. I leaned forward to hear what he was trying to say.
“Give me one of those beers,” he muttered.
Okay, he was going to be fine. I pulled out the barrels that were in my inventory and handed one to Damir.
Leaving everyone arguing over the beer and when the party was going to start, I went off in search of Aliz and the Herbalist.
50
Let’s Get This Party Started
I handed over all the ingredients, including the extras, to the Herbalist.
Congratulations! You have completed the quest: Gather Ingredients
You have received 3,000 XP.
“I’ll be done processing these by tomorrow. Some of them need to rest overnight as part of the preparation,” he said. “Aliz wants to see you in the Alchemy hut right away.”
He turned and walked off almost before I could thank him. I’d been hoping to make a start on the potion today, but I guess that was now tomorrow’s job. I wandered over to the Alchemy hut, thinking about the impromptu party we were going to have tonight.
A large boom split the air and bright blue smoke started pouring out of the Alchemy hut. As I started running toward it, I saw a lone, soot-covered figure stumble out of the hut, coughing hard.
The second I was within range, I cast Healing Mist, and a pair of green eyes looked gratefully back at me out of the soot.
“Didn’t *cough* work *cough*,” said Aliz, bent over, coughing loudly.
Her health was only back up to 70%, so I cast another Healing Mist as soon as the first one wore off. I quickly sent her a party request as well and cast Minimizer when she accepted, in the hopes that it might help get rid of her cough faster.
“Well at least that’s not what it was meant to do, then,” I laughed.
She slumped down onto a nearby tree stump.
“So, what were you trying to make?” I asked once she’d recovered enough to talk.
“Something my mother called a Karma Reset potion,” she replied. “I didn’t want to start on the Phoenix potion as my first new potion since we have such a limited supply of the ingredients. I thought I’d try out a few of the others first, and hopefully start to understand the nuances of being a Master ranked Alchemist, as well as my mother’s rather cryptic notes.”
Well, at least this meant she hadn’t ruined one of the three Solomon’s Seal roots we had.
“My mother’s notes say it only gives you a temporary reset back to zero Karma, because otherwise, that would be cheating. She does say, however, that if someone’s Karma value is too far into the negative, they’ll be completely unable to start reversing it. Since that always struck her as unfair, she developed this potion. It’s supposed to help people who want to turn their Karma around but aren’t even able to access any quests. This resets it long enough for them to accept a quest and gain some Karma back by completing it.”
I guess that was something. I wasn’t opposed to breaking rules that made no sense, but it did seem stupid to have a Karma stat if you could simply drink a single potion to reverse everything you’d ever done wrong.
“It seemed like a good potion to start with because you told me you needed positive Karma to get through the Dragon Gate. Given what the Dragon Hunters have been up to, I didn’t want you to risk getting a negative value and being unable to reset it.”
I was touched. I hadn’t even thought of that myself and it did sound like a potion I should take with me, just in case.
“Not only that, but it had also looked like the easiest one to make, as well,” she looked thoroughly dejected.
“Why don’t we both have a go? Between us, we might be able to work it out,” I said, trying my best to sound encouraging. “We’ve got a couple of hours before nightfall to experiment.”
I looked over the recipe for the Karma Reset potion once again.
Karma Reset Potion:
1 bottle of water
10 drops of Vampire Deer tongue clear tincture
Pulp made from 20 Miracle Berries
6 dried, finely crushed Vetiver Grass seeds
Combine the liquid ingredients over Warm heat until bright green.
Add pulp and stir rapidly until the mixture thickens to a soft peak.
Sprinkle on the dry ingredients and capture the gas that is released as the mixture becomes liquid again.
Infuse mana into the gas, then bubble the mana-infused gas through the rest of the potion until the mixture turns black.
That looked complicated. No wonder Aliz had struggled. And if this was the easiest one, we might be in for a very long night.
“How far did you get before the explosion?” I asked.
“I was adding the dry ingredients,” she replied. “I don’t know if I interpreted the thickness incorrectly, or whether I missed collecting some of the escaping gas. At least we have plenty of these ingredients to work with.”
“Okay, let’s give it another go, then,” I said, grabbing the ingredients and putting them in front of us.
We added the liquids together, and a minute later, we had a flask filled with a green liquid that was so bright it almost looked like it was lit up from the inside. Aliz added in the pulp, while I stirred the mixture as fast as I could.
“My mother’s notes say to put it over your head, whatever that means,” she in
structed, looking up from her journal.
I laughed. I remembered being a child, watching the chef do this while he was teaching his kitchen helpers how to make meringues.
“I think I know what she means,” I smiled, whipping the mixture until it looked like it had grown spikes.
I turned the flask upside down over Aliz’s head, laughing as she ducked and started yelling at me. When nothing fell out, I figured we’d gotten the right consistency.
“Did you get it this solid last time?” I asked an extremely annoyed looking Aliz.
She took a deep breath and seemed to deflate a little.
“I don’t know,” she admitted. “I might not have.”
“So how do we go about capturing this gas?”
“We use this,” Aliz said, pulling out something that looked like a little glass umbrella with a bobble on top. “It’s called a gasalator. All you have to do is hold it over the flask and the gas will be trapped in the bulb, unable to come out.”
“Ready?” she asked, grabbing the grass seeds to sprinkle over the mixture.
“Go for it,” I replied.
I held the glass umbrella over the mixture as it started to bubble violently. Every time a little bubble popped, a tiny cloud of bright blue smoke drifted upward. Occasionally, I had to move the gasalator sideways to catch it, but I made certain I caught every single bit of it. Finally, the mixture stopped bubbling and I was left holding the gasalator, the bulb on top filled with bright blue gas. The liquid in the flask now looked slightly metallic, almost like we had a flask filled with liquid gold.
“Okay, now we have to infuse the gas with mana,” Aliz declared, after consulting her journal.
She looked at me with a frown on her face.
“There’s another comment from my mother here that I don’t understand. It says to draw the mana up from your center, down your arms and into the gas. I’ve never even tried to access my mana before, and as for this center she mentioned…” She shook her head. “I’m completely lost.”
“That’s okay, I have to infuse my mana into my bow to use it, so that makes sense to me. If you focus on this point,” I pointed to just below my belly button, “You’ll hopefully be able to feel a slight tingling sensation.”
Aliz nodded as her eyebrows disappeared behind her hair.
“Now you want to imagine grabbing that sensation and pulling it up to your chest. Once it’s there, push it down your right arm, into your hand and then into the gas. I’ll do the first one,” I offered, holding the bulb of blue gas.
Infusing my mana into the gas felt almost exactly like infusing my bow. I watched as the gas turned from a bright blue to an almost midnight blue before I felt like I couldn’t push any more of my mana into it. A quick glance showed me I’d used over 500 MP to do it. There was no way a non-magic user would be able to do this. They simply wouldn’t have enough mana available.
“Okay, that’s all it will take,” I said, looking over at Aliz who was putting together a complicated contraption.
She poured the liquid, gold-colored mixture into one end of a tube and let it flow down toward the far end.
“Turn the gasalator upside down and put it here,” she instructed, pointing at where I needed to place it.
As soon as it was in place, she chanted a few words I didn’t catch and moved her hands over the contraption. The dark gas started to bubble into the golden liquid, slowly but surely making the mixture darker and darker, until finally, it turned jet black.
Aliz chanted something again and the gasalator closed itself off. She poured the black liquid into a flask and handed it to me.
Success! You have created: A Potion
Try it out to see what effect is has.
“This part is all yours,” Aliz said with a smile.
I walked down the path, Soter joining me on the way, and headed back to my little potion testing clearing. A quick check showed me my Karma was still at 100, so I wasn’t quite sure how I was going to know if this worked or not. I suppose, if nothing else, I could make sure that it wouldn’t kill anyone, and then I’d have to find someone with negative Karma to test it out properly. Fingers crossed, I thought as I popped the lid and downed the potion in one gulp.
“Ewww,” I complained. It tasted like licorice, which I hated.
Success! You have discovered: Karma Reset Potion
Temporarily resets the user’s negative Karma back to 0. If taken while you have positive Karma, the potion has no effect.
Duration: 2 minutes.
Well that was a relief. I’m glad it hadn’t reset my Karma back to zero. I hadn’t even thought of that problem. Paranoia set in and I did a quick check to discover that my Karma was indeed still at 100.
Aliz and I made another ten Karma Reset Potions to maximize our Alchemy progress and we found that we could both contribute to the mana infusion. I suppose that was an option so that non-magic users could still practice Alchemy.
A few hours later, we’d managed to create another four different potions and I was now at level 47 in Alchemy with 50% progress toward the next level.
So far, we’d discovered an Intelligence potion that gave me +10 Intelligence for one hour, as well as a Wisdom potion and Fortitude potion with similar effects. We’d also created a Timer Reset potion that was supposed to have something to do with a player’s timer. Neither of us was very sure about the line in the riddle about there being no time to drain, but Arik had come up with the theory that my timer needed to be on day six for me to cross the gate. Since tomorrow would be day five, I essentially needed to drain a whole day away, so we were hoping that’s what this potion did. Obviously, I couldn’t test it yet, so we were simply crossing our fingers and hoping for the best.
I also only had two slots left in my inventory, one of which would hold the Phoenix potion I would make tomorrow. The Timer Reset potion we’d just created refused to stack in a single slot. I could only assume it was because it was still untested and therefore simply labeled as ‘Potion’. I left the spare ones in the Alchemy hut, so that no one would take one by mistake.
“Let’s get this party started!” Mikael yelled, standing a safe distance away from the Alchemy hut.
“To our enemies, may they be forever weak,” Mikael held up his mug of beer to cheers from the elves.
King Faelyn had insisted on having the full patrol of hunters out just in case Andrew tried something again. So, while there were fewer people at this party, it was still quite lively.
“And may they always leave their best beer behind,” Damir added to another round of cheering.
It looked like he’d completely recovered and was now determined to out drink Mikael.
The beer flowed, the music played and as the sun started to go down, the King and Queen finally entered the clearing. There was someone else walking with them who looked familiar, but I couldn’t quite place them. They stayed back, partly hidden in the shadows, as King Faelyn grabbed a beer and climbed up onto one of the tables. The crowd quieted down to hear his toast.
“Once again, I find myself welcoming a new friend into our lives,” a few people started muttering and looking around to see who it might be. “Today, while some of you were out, handing a sound defeat to our enemy, he was dealt another blow by the loss of one of his most valuable people. She has come asking for sanctuary and claims blood relation to one of our own.”
The King gestured toward the partly hidden figure, while the Queen pushed her forward into the light in the clearing.
“I ask you all to welcome Skye and Savrine’s sister into our midst,” the King declared, holding out his hand to help the woman step up onto the table beside him. “This is Suri, our new Grandmaster Chef.”
51
Morphing Sigils
I rushed over to Suri, feeling a little guilty that I’d forgotten she was going to try and escape from the Dragon Hunters once Aliz and the journal were safe.
Aliz, however, beat me to it with a squeal of delight. This wa
s their time, so I left them to it. I could find out how she’d gotten away later.
“We’re creating quite the crafting community here,” Arik smiled and offered me one of the beers.
“You’ve never told me what kind of crafting you do,” I said, figuring that he must be into crafting, since clearly, at his level, he wasn’t into fighting.
“Well, you’ve seen me craft,” he seemed surprised. A twinkle formed in his eye. “Maybe you just weren’t paying attention?”
“All I’ve ever seen you do is read and research things. While that does sound like my idea of fun, I wouldn’t exactly call it a craft,” I replied.
“I’m a Scribe. Reading, writing, researching and ultimately creating magical sigils, symbols and spell books is what I do,” he laughed. “It’s the perfect craft for me. I can’t imagine putting myself in danger every day like the rest of you. Instead, I read about it. If there’s a puzzle to solve, or a piece of information to find, I’m the one people come to.”
I was good at puzzles and I loved reading. Why wasn’t I a Scribe?
“Could you unlock it for me?” I asked hopefully.
Laughing, he put his hand on my head.
Congratulations! You have learned the craft: Scribe.
Inscribe sigils and research ideas to increase your skill level.
“It’s an unusual craft,” Arik said. “There are no ranks like Novice, or Grandmaster. Instead, it’s almost like a cross between a craft and a type of magic. You learn symbols and runes, and you can inscribe sigils into armor or weapons to make them stronger. The sigils are like spells, once you know them, you can recreate them. However, unlike magic, you can research and learn new symbols and runes for yourself. It’s a perfect complement to magic as well, because you need to infuse your mana into your creations to activate them. All of my stat points are in Intelligence to make sure my mana pool is as large as I can make it.”