The Third Step: Chapter Thirty-Two

A few days after we returned to the boat, after it had set sail down the coast, charting a course to loop around the unclaimed lands near Kijani, cut through Tyrannosaurus Archipelligo, and then back up through a long stretch of unclaimed lands on the way to Tianzhu, Orykson arrived. I wasn’t sure if he was here to fulfill his obligation to mentor me, out of complete and utter boredom, because he’d been unable to show up during the time we spent in Obsidian Forest, or something else entirely, but I was glad to have him here. 

In the handful of days, and with the help of Dusk’s ability to partially restructure the materials she absorbed, we’d managed to transform the long planks of wood and nodes of stone into an archway inset into the wall of the tower. It was located, right above where the hidden access to the time dilation magic was, and should hopefully also serve to help hide the magic’s presence from anyone who managed to break into Dusk. 

Kene and Meadow had been occupied with enchanting the vat that currently held my body. It was a massive glass tube, layered with the spells to transform it into a cauldron, and filling it with the eighty gallons of preservation fluid had taken quite a bit of time. It was currently sitting outside, ready to be moved into the demiplane after I created it, and it was inordinately strange to see my own body, burnt and broken, within the vat. 

The vat neatly sat next to the pile of mana sources and other resources I’d be using, alongside a potion that should help me reduce the effects of mana-toxicity, using the spiritbalm and healer’s heart. 

Orykson surveyed our efforts, then gave a half-nod. 

“Not an awful start. Though if you hadn’t been lazy enough to cheat your way through your assignment to do this before by expanding the internals of a cardboard box, you would likely be in a much better position now.” 

I grumbled, but didn’t entirely disagree with the point. I had gotten a bit of experience while making the bracelet with Ed, but having done one entirely on my own before would also have been helpful. 

“Are you ready to begin?” I asked, tucking my hands into my coat pockets. 

“I am if you are. The initial factor you should focus on is planar stability. If you have insufficient stability, then you’ll have little more than a spatial pocket that you can’t enter or exit. Fine for a spatial ring. Less so for isolating the body. If you fail and are forced to purchase the services of a contractor in order to expand the size, that’s far more reasonably priced than upgrading the planar stability after the fact. Begin by placing your anchors and working them together.” 

I nodded and stepped forward, placing an anchor in each of the nodes, as well as in the wood that made up the frame and floor door stop. Then, under Orykson’s instruction, I extended the threads of space in order to weave all five of the anchors into a complete, stabilized pattern. 

With that done, the worst part of the work started: enchanting. I pulled out a stick of charcoal, like the sort that artists used. It would have been better to carve the arrays into the wood, but I wasn’t a woodworker, nor was anyone I knew. I wasn’t much of an artist either, but I could at least remove the charcoal when I messed up.

Molding the spellform for Create Spatial Pocket to fit on the door without overly elongating it and causing mana-loss, while properly keeping it interacting with the spatial anchors, as well as incorporating the ungated enchantments that would allow for anyone to open or close the space with just a touch of mana, was a horrible pain. 

I hated every second of it, and it was made worse every time I was made to redo a section that I was certain would work perfectly fine, just because Orykson mentioned a mana inefficiency. By the time Orykson finally announced my work as ‘acceptable, at least for a neophyte who needs this only for a single purpose’, I was about ready to try and jam the chalk in his eye, and it was well past dinner time. I’d been forced to skip lunch and replace it with a nutritional potion, which might have taken care of my body’s needs, but it didn’t exactly make me full or in a good mood. 

“Well, now for the easy part,” Orykson said, gesturing to the pile of mana sources. “I’d recommend that you brew a soul resistance potion first. It should significantly help you with reducing mana toxin clogging your body and mana channels from the high number of mana sources you’re taking.” 

“A what?” I asked, crinkling my eyebrows together, and Orykson’s smirk was borderline evil looking. 

“Oh, has Meadow not introduced you to the field of soul alchemy yet? Well, I suppose she wouldn’t have, given she’s not capable of using her soul mana as freely as you or I.” 

“I did do some research into the topic,” Meadow called from the porch where she was sitting and discussing things with Kene. “Even the simplest of recipes are in the high fifth gate level of complexity. Most are in the sixth. Malachi is a competent alchemist, but he’s a combat artist, not an alchemist expert. Brewing two stages up would be beyond him. Best to just use the standard potion.” 

“That’s true,” I said, nodding. “Kene might be able to brew fifth gate potions, but I’m pretty tapped out at the fourth gate. I might be able to fight an Arcanist, but I can’t craft like one.” 

“Of course the recipes are too complex. Most mages don’t have time to access soul mana, and learning to direct a draw of the mana sans an ability to store it is incredibly complex for most mages. But that doesn’t mean a new set of recipes can’t be made.” 

Meadow’s eyebrows rose, and Orykson’s smile grew even wider and more malicious looking. 

“I’ve experimented with creating a variety of new, soul mana potions that run the gamut from first gate to ninth. I assure you, creating a soul resistance potion is possible, and it will be more effective than the potion that you and Kene brewed.” 

“At the cost of only working for Malachi and locking away a portion of said soul mana until it’s used,” Meadow countered. “That’s the flaw in soul mana based crafting. Unless you’ve managed to find a way around that restriction?” 

“I have certain ideas, but no. But given who is going to be creating the demiplane, and that he’s going to be drinking it immediately, that hardly seems like an unmanageable drawback.” 

“Certainly not. I just thought it prescient to make it clear that there were restrictions. And given the fact that we brewed a fifth gate mana toxicity resistance potion, he’d need to make a fourth gate soul resistance potion to exceed it.” 

“I would like to learn,” I said, interjecting for the first time in a while. “Even if I don’t manage to create something better than what a standard alchemist can do, it’s worth learning.” 

“If it’s safe,” Meadow said. “Which is the crux of it.” 

“Perfectly safe,” Orykson said. “Given he does it right.” 

They stared at one another for some time, but this time, Meadow was the one who backed down. Orykson and I gathered up some spirit-balm, my spirit lantern mushrooms, soultoad’s seat, and healer’s heart, then set to work on the potion. 

The beginning phases were pretty much exactly what I expected – I worked the toxic parts of the spirit lanterns and soultoad seat out, reinforcing the portions that I needed, and sending death mana within. I was overcharging my mana to further empower the components, sure, but I’d done that before. We skimmed out any excess energy from the water before saturating it with my death mana to make mana-water, and we added a shard of bone that glowed with fourth gate death mana to infuse it further.

That was where things began to go differently. Orykson had me draw on my soul mana, but rather than sending it into a spell to supercharge it, which I’d somewhat expected, I pushed it out of my body. From there, I had to keep a firm grip on the mana to stop it from slipping away into nothingness, while shaping it into copies of the arrays within spirit-balm, two mushrooms, and healer’s heart that were being used by the potion. 

Splitting my focus into four different points, each one often containing two or more arrays, was difficult, and I was forced to conjure my crown of mushrooms to help focus my soul mana after slipping up a few times. Eventually, I managed to get it done, after which it was time to add the components into the cauldron alongside the soul-mana forged copies of the arrays. 

Within my beastcore, I felt the power grow sluggish and still, then almost vanish entirely. It wasn’t gone in the same way as if I’d spent it on a spell, and it would recover with time. This was more like the crystal spikes in my mana-garden that were created by my runelight lens, locking power away for use in something else. Each component and soul copy that went in, I felt a bit more of my soul mana lock itself away, and by the end, I’d locked up almost three quarters of my mana in this single potion. 

From there, the final steps were a mix of standard and nonstandard. We skimmed off waste material with ungated mana, but then used the cauldron’s enchantment to flare the entire liquid with the last of my soul mana. This, at least, didn’t lock away soul mana, just spent it in the same way that I would with a spell. 

We were finally done with the crafting of the potion around midnight, and I held up the vial to examine it. The entire thing was an opalescent white color that reminded me of Edgar’s shell, streaked with thin lines of other colors, and it radiated power that reminded me of fifth gate magic. 

I personally thought that Orykson’s comment that it would be stronger than the potion Kene and Meadow had brewed was a touch overblown. This one was definitely a bit more potent, but it was more like the difference between two middleweight mundane boxers. It was there, sure, but both were still in the same weight class. 

“I’m going to bed,” I said, setting the potion down on the shelf, and Orykson frowned at me. 

“The demiplane isn’t constructed yet.” 

“Will it take longer than a few minutes to complete?” 

“Well, yes, but–”

“Then I’m going to bed. It’s well past midnight, and I’ve been focusing for the last sixteen hours. I might not be done, but I can’t operate at a decent efficiency while I’m tired. I’m a mere mortal still.”

Orykson huffed out a breath, then nodded.

“Fine, I’ll be back in the morning.”

With that he vanished, leaving a distinct air of annoyed disapproval hanging behind him. Despite everything, I didn’t think he was actually annoyed at me, but more at the fact that his experiment had been interrupted midway through. I shrugged and headed to bed, climbing in next to Kene as quietly as I could before passing out.