Ruthless ~ 9!

~ 9 ~

Joe was in the horse stance, grunting as flaming coals were dropped on top of the metal shield he was holding above his head. He found that strength and endurance training allowed him to free his mind to think of other issues in the background. In this case, he was going over what had happened with the Alchemist last night.

The ‘instant’ in the reward line meant that he gained that portion of his reward right away, which meant that they needed to train. Jake had brought Joe to the back of the shop and had him start reading through various primers. He had used the book Joe brought, found a section detailing recipes for ritual-only usage, and worked with Joe to help create one of the brews. The entire process had taken until well past sundown, even with Joe’s enhanced learning speed. It was frustrating for him to find an area like this that he just wasn’t good at.

Joe looked at his brand-new second profession and grunted; partly from a coal that slipped and singed his skin.

Ritualistic Alchemist (Level 0): An Alchemist creates potions and elixirs that can amaze and astound the world. A Ritualistic Alchemist takes that in a different direction, focusing on creating components that enhance and alter rituals. By sacrificing the ability to make most things that an Alchemist can easily produce, the Ritualistic Alchemist is able to become a master at his craft in a fraction of the time. +25% chance to create ritual-specific alchemical items. +25% speed of production to ritual-specific alchemical items. -50% to all attempts to make non ritual-specific alchemical items.

On a very positive note, the practice and hours of lecturing had also allowed Joe to gain the ‘Alchemical Lore’ skill. That was going to be really helpful when testing new combinations or troubleshooting his failed projects.

Ritualistic Alchemy (Novice VIII). You have gained an understanding of how to create alchemical items! 10+n% chance to create ‘Common’ ranked alchemic items such as potions where n = skill level! Each rank higher than ‘Common’ lowers chances of creation by a factor of ten! Example: chance to create uncommon alchemical items: ((10+n)/10)%. Rare: ((10+n)/100)%

Alchemical Lore (Novice VI). Many are satisfied with the end result of their potions, and simply follow the recipes to the letter time and again. You have started to dive deeply into the why of alchemy. +1n% to creation of alchemical items, where n = skill level.

It was extremely telling that even with what Joe suspected was someone at or above the Master rank in alchemy, Joe was only able to reach novice eight in the skill. He pushed upward, frustrated at the slow progression. If any alchemist would have known his thoughts on that matter, they would have happily tossed a ‘Flask of Bottled Explosions’ at him. There was a reason alchemy was rare, it required high intelligence, dexterity, and extreme perception to get anything correct. Beyond Enchanter, it had one of the highest reclass rates of all Eternium base classes.

“I have no idea why you’re coming back here and doing this almost every day.” The trainer shoveling coal on him stated. “You do realize that without staying the entire time, you are only torturing yourself, right?”

“What if I’m just trying to get used to uncomfortable situations? Or am planning to dive into a volcano?” Joe shot back. Everyone seemed to want to tell him how he should be progressing, and it was getting tedious. “This is helping me do what I want to do, that's all. Okay?”

“Chill, man. Just trying to help.” the next coal that was tossed on was a lot hotter than the ones before it. “Oops.”

Joe knew without looking that hammerwords had activated again and he had lost reputation with this guy. Great. At least his training was just ending, and he gained a strength and constitution point. “Not cool, man. Not cool.”

Joe tossed the shield to the side and walked away. “Knowledge. Alchemical Lore.”

Alchemical Lore (Novice VII).

Knowledge (Novice II).

He basked in the feeling of everything he had learned the previous day becoming just that much clearer. It wasn't a huge amount, but it helped him connect the dots on a few subjects. One thing was still just a touch out of focus, and Joe had a vague feeling that he needed to hold his hands in certain positions to maximize the potential of the ingredients… it was gone. Drat.

Alchemy seemed to be illogical. It was supposed to be a cross between cooking and chemistry, but that was thinking about it from a mundane perspective. Even though the magic of the process was coming from the ingredients that were added, it was still magic. Joe decided that he was going to go work on some simple, logical, geometric rituals to take his mind off the ‘art’ of Alchemy. He rubbed his face and felt some soot, frowning at how much slower his aura ability cleaned him compared to Cleanse.

“Pardon me… Mr. Joe, I believe?” The sweet voice calling his name made Joe frown and look around for the source. An unbelievably beautiful woman was walking toward him. She was wearing a professional outfit, and had her hair pulled back into a ponytail. She reached out and shook his hand, “I’ve been looking for you. I am here representing the Architect’s Union, which is what the previous Guild has become after the new ownership and management. I have a proposition for you.”

“You’re here to proposition me?” Joe spoke without thinking. “That is… I didn’t mean-”

“Please don’t worry about it.” She blinked a few times and got back on track, “My name is Daniella, and I have an offer from you from the Guild. We would like to offer you the chance to study any buildings in the city that we own, or can pull in favors from. That, or we can offer you a few blueprints that you may use at your leisure.”

“I see… and what’s the catch?” Joe narrowed his eyes and tried to gauge how high her charisma must be to impact him like this even through his huge wisdom score. It had to be at least third tier, probably in the early one hundreds.

“I’ll be frank.” Daniella lowered her chin and locked eyes with him. “We’ve been seeing what you are capable of, and management is concerned that you are going to put us out of business if you go out on the open market. By giving you free access, you will need to agree that you will only make buildings for yourself or your Guild.”

Joe really liked her direct attitude, which meant either that her Guild had really been studying him, that her charisma was filling in the gaps for her, or a little of both. “Hmm… I can get behind that. Slight change. Myself, my Guild, and my family. Also, that limitation applies only in this Zone. I plan to leave Midgard, and I don't want to be bound by the rules of an organization that is here when I am fighting to survive somewhere else.”

“Done.” Daniella shook his hand. “I’ll get the contracts ready, is there anything you need from me?”

“I need a fat stack of high-quality blueprint paper at cost.” Joe pulled out a bank note for fifty gold and handed it over. “I’ll need that well before we get started.”

“I can have it delivered today…” Daniella looked at the note and winced as she thought about how much paper that could buy when it was sold at cost. 

“Get it here by noon and we can start tomorrow morning.” Joe cheerfully informed her. 

Daniella nodded and walked away, calling back with, “I’ll add the at cost paper to the contract. If you don’t sign, you’ll need to pay current market value!”

“Then make sure not to put any stupid clauses on the contract!” Joe yelled after her vanishing form. “Hmm. Gonna have to read that contract carefully. Hopefully Tatum will help me find any hidden sections.”

From there, Joe decided to skip breakfast and get straight to work. He rounded up his coven members and assigned them a task, “Taka, Kirby, Rob, Mo, Hannah… sorry about this, but I need us to sit down and just make an unholy huge amount of this ritual diagram.”

The group looked at the diagram for Architect’s Fury, and discussed how they could separate out tasks. It was Big Mo who came up with the real issue, “Joe, I want to do this, but it's a Student ranked ritual. I’m a Beginner with ritual magic. It’ll just explode if I try to make it.”

He had a point. Joe had them all sit at a table, and tried to figure out a plan. “Alright… here’s what we’re going to do. Hannah has the highest rank after me, a solid Beginner that is getting close to Apprentice. Teaching moment here, since this is a Student ranked ritual, there are still two circles that each of you can draw up with a high probability of success. We are all going to make a diagram with the highest circles we can, then divide the work up.”

“Those with the lowest ranks will draw the first circles, then the next group does the beginner. When Hannah hits Apprentice rank, she’ll do that too. Whatever can't get done is something I’ll do. Also, I’ll come around and make sure things are looking correct as we get started. That should help boost your productivity, grant a boost to leveling up your skills, and even help me rank up my teaching skill. Oh… nevermind, I added that skill to a skill combo. Shoot.” 

Joe grinned at the confused faces that were being made. “Are you all waiting for an invitation? Let’s make the magic happen!”