Steele Alchemist

by Deck Davis

  “Holy hell,” said Faei. “It’s a duotai.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Some animals have two stages before they die. This is its second form.”

  Not again. If the fog beast summoned those damn insects again, they were done.

  “Fuck this,” he said.

  He reached into his bag and grabbed a vial. He held it up. Then, certain he’d gotten the right one, he uncorked it just a little. Taking aim, he threw it at the fog beast as hard as he could.

  The vial sailed through the air. It looked like he’d overshot it. The vial was just going to sail tight over the damn thing.

  And then it arced and fell, before smashing against the beast’s chest and covering it with the liquid.

  “Don’t tell me you just threw a healing potion at it?”

  “Just watch,” said Jake.

  And they both did. They watched the beast as it stretched out its arms, roared. Then, it ducked its head like a football player and started to charge toward them. With its new height and bone-covered exterior, it would have been too powerful for them. Hell, it could have taken the four warriors out on its own without much effort.

  But the warriors didn’t have brittle bone potion.

  The fog beast took just two more strides before screaming in agony. Jake heard a crunching sound. The beast fell face forward and smashed into the ground, and he heard several more crunches.

  The monster groaned. It lifted an arm and planted it on the ground. Then, as soon as it tried to push itself up, the bones in its arms shattered. It slammed back into the ground again, and more bone fragments splintered off from its skull.

  This time, it didn’t move. The beast died in a fit of pitiful groans, with the yellow glow of the rune cast on its shattered head.

  Chapter Fifteen

  With the battle over, it was almost time for a stat update, but he held it off. Instead, he and Faei gathered as many herbs until both their leather bags were full. Jake even picked up the dead bodies of a few of the pincer insects in case they could be used in potions. He was starting to learn that alchemists were scavengers, and that everything that grew or lived had a use.

  With that done, he allowed his stat updates to display. There were reams of information telling him how many insects he’d killed, how much damage he’d taken in the fight and what type of damage it was. A couple of things stuck out as the most pertinent.

  Level up to level 4!

  -HP increased to 195

  -Stamina increased to 218

  -Bite damage resistance increased by 4.75%

  - Poison damage resistance increased by 5%

  After feeling the pain on his skin from the insects’ pincers and the burning in his nose and throat when he’d breathed poison fog, any damage resistance was welcome. It seemed that whatever kind of battle made him level up influenced the type of damage resistance he gained. That meant at some point, he was going to have to work out what damage resistance he really needed and then go start some fights.

  The level up was great, but the best thing came after he’d identified and gathered the herbs that Cason needed.

  Gauge skill upgraded to level 4

  - Property Identify inc to 4/50 [Improved spotting distance, increased range of smell to track herbs]

  - Herb Lore inc to 4/50 [Herb property database increased]

  After his gauge skill improved, a whoosh of energy flowed through him. Somehow, he knew that it wasn’t the normal fuzzy feeling he got after levelling up a skill. This sensation started at his fingertips and toes, and then rippled through his body and into his belly like the flush of a hot coffee on a freezing day.

  “Okay Jake?” said Faei.

  “Yeah, I just-”

  When the fuzzy feeling reached his head and made his skull feel light, he found out what it meant.

  Alchemist Rank Increased to Novice [Level 2]!

  As your knowledge in alchemy increases, so do your powers. Sure, you might still unwittingly explode your master’s alchemy lab when making health potions, or you might accidentally make a poisonous mana potion, but you’re improving.

  With this next step up in your alchemy rank comes a prize; you can now create alchemy bombs! Combine potions with bombs to create projectile spheres of exploding death that shower all manner of nasty effects upon your opponents. Have an alchemist master instruct you in bomb making to increase your production speed and quality.

  Jake couldn’t help but do a fist pump. He even did a second one, despite catching Faei looking at him with an arched eyebrow. If any moment deserved a fist pump, it was this. Sure, he was still a novice alchemist, but he’d made a major step up. All his practice behind Cason’s back had paid off!

  This meant that he was just one rank away from becoming an apprentice alchemist. According to the reference screen that was accessible through his character screen, there were six ranks of alchemist, starting at novice and ranging through to grandmaster.

  Each rank became harder to get. To go from novice to apprentice you needed to increase your alchemist rank twice, and then to go from apprentice to journeyman you needed to increase it three times, and so on. It left him with hell of a lot of work to do, but it spurred him on. If bombs were the prize for becoming a second rank novice, then he could only image what skills a grandmaster would have.

  Faei was across the crater. The fog was still there, though it had lessened considerably after the beast had died, and seemed like it would fade away given enough time. Faei was crouched by the corpses of the warriors.

  “Is Cason a grandmaster?” he called to her.

  She put her hand to her ear. “Is he a grandmother?”

  “No. Is he…Never mind, I’ll come over.”

  He was done with the herbs anyway, and the corpse of the fog beast, with its splintered bones, had yielded nothing valuable. He crossed over the crater, avoiding the holes of the pincer creatures.

  When he joined Faei and looked at her, he stepped back in shock. With the fog weakening, this was the first time he’d seen her face properly since the battle. Man, was it a sight. Starting from her forehead and going down her face and to her shoulders, she was covered in nasty-looking red welts. It looked like an army of the insects had taken major issue with her face.

  “Jesus, Faei. You okay? That looks like it hurts like hell.”

  “I’ve had worse. Think Cason got my demogoth antidote right first time? You don’t even want to know some of the side effects I got while he worked on it. This is nothing.”

  It didn’t look like nothing. To Jake, it looked like she’d dived face-first into a tangle of poison ivy and then had rubbed her face all over it for good measure.

  “Check this guy,” said Faei, gesturing at the warrior with the stringy black hair. “I’ll loot the others.”

  Jake nodded. Back home it was considered impolite to search a dead body for valuables straight after someone died. Here, it was expected. He kneeled by the body of the warrior. His chest plate was scorched black, and his neck and chin were badly burned. Added to that were the swollen gouges of the insects’ pincer bites. This man hadn’t met a happy end.

  His armor and sword aside, he didn’t seem to have anything of value. Still, Jake supposed that Cason would like the armor. If not, Jake would barter it the next time Cason summoned the trader to his home.

  He found the metal clasps on either side and opened the man’s chest plate. Underneath, the warrior was wearing a pale-yellow tunic that bore the stains of road life. His stench, kept at bay until now, was ripe. Jake was hoping to call it a day, when he saw a weird bulge on the warrior’s right side, under his tunic.

  When he patted it, he heard the jingle of something metal. This must have been the man’s money pouch. He found the string where it wrapped around his shoulder under his tunic, and he wrenched out the pouch. When he opened it, he found a dirty ring with a yellow opal gem, a dozen gonil coins, and then something else. Something strange. The last thing he’d expected t
o see.

  It was a driving license with the warrior’s name and face on it.

  In the photograph, the man had shorter hair. It was still greasy-looking, but he looked like he’d at least had it cut. The picture was too small to show much, but near the cut-off Jake could see that he wore a shirt and tie. His name was Richard Lasbecker.

  Hang on. Where do I know that name from? Lasbecker, Lasbecker…Nope, it wouldn’t come to him.

  He’d definitely heard it somewhere, and Lasbecker wasn’t the kind of name you’d forget.

  He shrugged and turned the license over. On the back, it showed, with little black symbols, each kind of vehicle the licensee was allowed to drive. Apparently, Richard had a license to drive HGV trucks and motorbikes, as well as cars.

  When Faei joined him, he couldn’t help starting at the welts on her face. Man, they looked nasty. As well as that, it looked like some of her knee-length hair had gotten too close to her flame arrows. Some of the strands were curled at the ends.

  “Can I ask you something?” he said. “Why do you wear your hair so long? I mean, don’t get me wrong, it looks great. But it seems like it gets in the way.”

  “It’s a pain in the behind sometimes,” she said. “Back on Steel Pike, when I lived with my real parents, me and my older brother Mort were closer than two peas sharing the same pod. He was two years older than me and he was a boy, but I was bigger and stronger than him. He had a gentle nature, you know. The kind that isn’t looked on too well in a hunting village.”

  “I can imagine,” said Jake.

  “We were unbelievably close. Back then, I used to cut my hair short. I even shaved it sometimes, but Mort always said he liked it long. We spent every second together, so you can’t believe how much it hurt me when my parents cast me off. Not because of myself, but for Mort. I knew as soon as I was gone, the village bullies would start looking at him.”

  “I don’t get this place,” said Jake. “Sending your kids off to die just because they don’t look like they’ll be good at hunting. I don’t understand though; why was Mort allowed to stay?”

  Faei shrugged. “He was their first born. Anyway, it is what it is. A few years after my new parents took me in, I found out that Mort died. After that, I decided I’d grow my hair in honor of him. I haven’t had it cut since. I’m not too worried right now, but when it reaches my feet, I’ll have a problem.”

  Jake didn’t know what to say. He was never good at this kind of thing. You know, emotion. Real human interaction.

  Luckily, Faei filled the gap. “So what did you find on our deceased friend’s person?” she asked, gesturing at the dead warrior.

  Jake handed her the license. She turned it over in her fingers, with an increasing look of confusion.

  “I don’t get it.”

  “Where I’m from, we drive cars.”

  She looked at him strangely.

  “They help you get places quicker. They’re made of metal, and they burn fuel to move.”

  “Right…”

  “Anyway, this license shows that that guy there, Richard Lasbecker, can drive cars.”

  Faei’s eyes widened. “He’s from your world?”

  “Without a doubt.”

  “Do you know him? Does he live near you, or something?”

  “My world is kinda big. The likelihood of me knowing someone else who came through a portal must be six billion to one…but I do recognize his name. I’ve never seen his face in my life, but his surname sticks out. I just can’t figure out how.”

  Faei nodded. “Have Cason brew you a Tip o’ the Tongue potion.”

  “What’s that?”

  “You know when there are lines from a bard’s song that you just can’t remember? Or when you see a street theatre actor and you can’t remember what other plays he’s been in? Tip O’ the Tongue will sort that for you.”

  “Gotcha. Now let’s leave this fog-filled hellhole.”

  ~

  They got back to the shack just as the morning sun was rising. It cast an orange glow over the dead grass, reminding Jake of autumn days back home. From somewhere he couldn’t see, birds chirped songs to signal the start of their day.

  Their original plan had been to time it so that they got back just after twilight, but the hours spent in the fog crater had thrown that out of whack. When they were back on the road, they made the decision to power through on their journey home, rather than sleep.

  Jake spent much of the next day in bed. It was late afternoon when he finally rose. His skin itched where the insects had bitten him. The bites looked swollen, and he hoped that they weren’t getting infected.

  After dressing, he walked through the shack. Faei and Cason were nowhere to be seen. He went outside to find Cason at the side of the shack. He had a bulbous glass bottle in his hand, and he was sprinkling green liquid around the outskirts of the shack. He wore his mauve alchemist apron, which made him look a little like a pastry chef.

  “The maiden awakes!” said Cason, flashing him a smile.

  “Where’s Faei?”

  “Funny that the first thing you say when you see me isn’t ‘hello Cason, how nice it is to see you,’ but instead you’re flapping about the girl. Any one would think she got your pecker hard.”

  “Funny the first thing you say isn’t ‘thanks for risking your own safety to get the herbs.’”

  “Thanks? Thanks for what? According to Faei, you got valuable experience out there.”

  It was too early for this, Jake decided. Well, technically it was midafternoon, but he felt like he’d only had an hour of sleep. He wasn’t in the mood for his daily argument with Cason.

  “So, where is she?”

  “Went out hunting a few hours ago. You know what she’s like.”

  The girl was a machine. If she’d gone out hunting a few hours ago, that meant she’d slept for two or three hours, tops. It put Jake to shame.

  “What’s with the vial?” asked Jake.

  Cason held it up. “Seen lots of spiders around here lately. And I hate spiders with a burning passion. This stuff keeps them away.”

  “Weird. I’ve notice a lot of them around here too. Maybe they like the warmth.”

  Cason looked around warily. “Aye. Maybe that, or maybe the buggers are up to something else. Never trust a spider, Jake.”

  To their right, the long, red mane and sturdy figure of Faei emerged at the top of the hill. She held up a piece of string with fish dangling from it. Some of them were longer than Jake’s arm.

  “Eurgh,” said Cason. “Fish. I hate fish with a burning passion.”

  “Is there anything you don’t hate with a burning passion?”

  “Ale and whores. At least they don’t glue me to the latrine. Come on girl, you know fish give me a bad belly.”

  Faei shrugged. She walked toward them. “Slim pickings out on the plains today. Had to go to the river. Food’s food, isn’t it?”

  Cason gave a dismissive hand wave. “I’ve got work to do. Come on, boy, time to further your education.”

  “You’re going to show me another recipe?”

  Cason shook his head. “No. You’ve got vials to wash. Let’s head inside.”

  Jake and Cason went inside the shack, while Faei set herself up at Cason’s butchery station outside so that she could gut the fish. The inside of the shack had a pleasant warmth to it that was a welcome break from the biting winds outside. Jake looked at Cason’s alchemy counter and saw piles and piles of dirty vials. This really wasn’t what he had in mind when he found out he was an alchemist, but he guessed Cason was right. In any chosen profession, you had to earn your bread.

  Just as he contemplated the next few hours he would spend cleaning glass, he saw something out of the corner of his eye. It was the griefer creature, the strange, jet-black rat-hare hybrid. He knew that it wouldn’t go away, and decided instead to ignore it.

  “So, while we were getting the herbs, I levelled up. I’m a level two novice,” he said.

&
nbsp; “Hold on,” said Cason. “Let me go inform the emperor. He’ll want to organize feast!”

  “Apparently, I can make bombs now, but I’ll learn quicker if you show me how to make one.”

  “Aye, and I will. But I don’t have time right now.”

  Cason went into his bed room, and then came out dressed in a thick fur coat. It had two oversized pockets on with side near his hips, and Jake heard vials clink in them when Cason walked. There were dozens of little leather loops along the front which looked the right size to slip vials into.