(Nov 3)

“Dragon blood is extremely poisonous and even a single drop could kill even strong knights.”

The soldiers were getting sick was from my lingering blood in the air and dragon essence from the Grinch fight.

I looked over and saw a couple soldiers coughing as they picked up some scrap metal.

I was fairly certain that this was the cause of the soldiers growing sick.

Well, crud.

This isn’t the first time that my powers had accidentally hurt other people, so I wasn’t shocked nor was I even worried, I was just… tired.

Of course, I felt bad that my own blood caused other people’s suffering… but I was just mostly tired.

Tired because it’s my fault and I had to clean up the mess I made.

I told one of the soldiers who seemed to be in charge that something in the air was causing people to get sick and that we should leave for now.

“Something here’s causing the soldiers to get sick…? Hm. There’s no evidence to back that up… but you’re right. There was an intense battle here, there’s a good chance that there might be some stuff in the air. Alright. EVERYBODY! PACK UP! WE’RE LEAVING!”

I didn’t tell them all the details that I knew, just vaguely enough to convince them to retreat for now.

Once I confirmed everyone had left, I walked on over to William’s lab to get his help since this stuff was his forte.

By now, William was used to me suddenly barging in, so he just attentively listened to me as I told him about my lingering blood causing soldiers to become sick.

“Ah, fuck. I knew this was possible, but I didn’t think it would ever happen…” William cursed out loud.

“Wait, you knew this could’ve happened?”

“Yeah. It seems I was careless.”

William let out one of his signature sighs and then proceeded to explain his science mumbo jumbo stuff.

“I’ve been researching your blood, Anthony, for a while now, and I’ve realized that since the amount of dragon blood you absorbed was so minuscule, the toxicity in it was able to be neutralized and became non-toxic once it mixed with your compatible human blood.

Of course, if it wasn’t compatible, you’d have been dead a long time ago the moment you absorbed dragon blood. But since it is, this is also how your family was able to be safe this whole time despite being near you and your blood for months. Otherwise, they’d probably also have at least gotten sick by now.”

“Well, ain’t that awfully convenient! Dragon blood is harmless when mixed with my human blood, so my family is perfectly fine, but suddenly now its not? What’s the chances of this happening? This is bullshit. Who the fuck came up with this logic?”

Needless to say, I was mildly irritated.

William however, being the composed dude, simply replied to me calmly.

“I’m not God, I don’t create the rules, I simply research them. But honestly, I’m not sure if it’s some absurd luck or if it’s something that Gin planned… all I know is that the toxicity was dispersed once it gets mixed with you blood. However… there is an exception. If somehow, your dragon blood and your human blood were to separate, then the toxicity of the dragon blood would come back.”

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“Hmmm.”

William must’ve thought that I didn’t understand what he said and made an analogy that confused me even more.

“Think of it this way Anthony. Carbon dioxide is everywhere, right? It’s nearly harmless unless there’s a huge concentration of it, but carbon monoxide on the other hand is very dangerous. They’re both made of pretty much the same composition of carbon and oxygen, so why is monoxide so dangerous while dioxide isn’t? A single atom difference can completely change the deadliness. Your dragon blood seems to follow a similar logic. Your blood is compatible with the dragon blood and when they mix, they end up cancelling out the toxicity. Of course, it’s a bit more complicated than that, but that goes deep into the chemical side of things.”

William must’ve felt proud at his fancy explanation, but I just sat there even more confused since I didn’t know what half of these words meant.

“William… I have no clue what you just said. What the fuck is a carbon?”

“…”

“…”

“Right. I forgot you were stupid.”

“Hey! I’m not stupid! I’ve heard of some of those words before! I went to school ya know! But… I just never paid attention to class. Ever wonder why I’m a soldier and not a scholar?”

“Rigggghttttt… okay…. I’ll have to come up with another example that an idiot like you can understand. Salt. If you lick a couple grains of salt, it’ll be salty. However, if you mix a few grains of salt with a cup of water, you won’t be able to taste it even if you drunk the whole cup since the salt dissolved. The salt is the dragon blood, the cup of water is your body. Understood?”

I nodded.

It’s normal for friends insult each other playfully and to call each other stupid, but when William calls me stupid, I know it’s actually true.

“As I was saying earlier, if your dragon blood and your human blood were to somehow separate, then the toxicity of the dragon blood would come back. But it would be very difficult to separate something that’s already been mixed. Even if we tried, it would still take a lot of energy to separate the blood types so I didn’t think it would happen by accident.

One of the few cases of that possibly happening is if your blood were to be evaporate; it’ll turn into a gas and cause your dragon and human blood to slightly separate, drawing out a small portion of its toxicity back. This would require an intense amount of heat that would likely kill you, so I assumed what’s the chances of that happening? How often do you see people’s blood being so heated up that it turns into a gas?”

“But it did happen. When I ate the spice pills, it heated me up so much my blood boiled… and then the dragon blood became toxic again.”

William nodded approvingly that I understand his explanation.

“This doesn’t completely separate your dragon and human blood by the way. They’re still somewhat mixed together, albeit a lot less than in its liquid state. If they were to fully separate, then the full toxicity of the dragon blood would recover and then all the soldiers who accidentally inhaled your blood would’ve died instead of merely getting sick. In the end though, it’s only because your human and dragon blood were specifically compatible, if not, then everyone would’ve died.”

Sometimes I wonder if William is trying to give an explanation or if he’s giving a science lecture.

Luckily for me though, William had finished his explanation and wrapped it all up with one sentence.

“Because of that, it should be possible to cure those who got ill from your dragon blood.”

That’s good.

At the very least, no one’s dying.

And that wrapped up everything I wanted to tell William.

But William had something he wanted to talk to me about as well.

“A few days ago, Briggs came by and told me I needed to write up a report on what happened to The Grinch. The king gave me permission to utilize the troops and fight The Grinch, but no one knows what happened and now the higher ups want a full report.”

“I see… so you have no choice but to tell them about my wife?”

“Well, there is something I can do. Briggs is the king’s son. If I tell Briggs what happens, then that will count as a report.”

Ah, I forgot about Briggs.

“Can I get your permission to tell Briggs?” William asked me.

Well, it wasn’t like I could refuse since William had to write up a report.

Plus, Briggs is a friend whom I’ve hung out with a lot before, so I think we can trust him. It’s much better than William writing a report to random higher ups.

Thus, I agreed.

“Alright. Sounds good, I’ll report to him then.”

Then William got to work to do his usual research stuff that I don’t understand.

And I left.

(Nov 5)

The soldiers who had fallen sick were recovering thanks to an antidote that William had handed out.

William did a great job as usual.

He’s super busy and yet he’s still able to somehow create a cure in a mere 2 days.

Doesn’t research usually take a long amount of time? Like, months or even years of study?

It’s darn impressive how he was able to come up with an antidote in such a short amount of time.

Since the soldiers were getting better, they returned to their jobs and cleaned up all the stuff so I didn’t need to help them anymore.

That’s pretty good.

At least now things are truly back to normal.