The Guild Hall was still operational in spite of what happened yesterday, though Wyll avoided eye contact with me. The primary reason I was here was because there were a lot of Adventurers with weapons that needed cleaning, and I was currently the only one who could do it with some degree of reliability.

"Hey!" I shouted. "I have something to say!"

Several eyes were on me, and I held up one of Spex's daggers. I channeled Mana and blasted the coagulated blood off. "If you need your weapons cleaned, I can try to clean them for you, no charge. I'll be here all day."

Several Adventurers came up to me wanting me to clean the swords off. My being here wasn't strictly charity. It took all of my power to blast the blood off a weapon, and this was primarily because I was pushing outward from the weapon and breaking the bonds of the blood, this made the process training for my MU cap, which was at 279 MU. Because the blood blocked mana, it made the process relatively easy.

That, and Beatrice was interested in studying solidified Felwight blood, which had similar properties to rubber, which also had some interest from me since, well, if it could be processed and reused for different things, there could be a lot of potential applications for it.

The typical process for removing Felwight blood was either careful application of acids, or raw brute strength, and given its typically resilient nature, I could see it potentially being made into armor since even a magically sharpened weapon couldn't penetrate it.

"What will you be doing with the remains?" The Human from yesterday asked.

"Lady Wyrashe's Alchemist wishes to test new removal techniques on coagulated Felwight blood." I said. "Unbonded blood makes for an excellent test material, as it greatly reduces the risk of damaging valuable magical items." I said as I took his sword from him. "Since I can directly channel mana, and Felwight blood prevents magic from passing through, I can channel Mana through a weapon and force the blood off, which is why I am doing this."

I blasted the blood off his sword, leaving it clean. "I'm still trying to determine if I can do the same with armor, though clothing, it seeps in too deeply and I'll end up tearing it." I looked pointedly at his black-stained cape. "Though, if you were to saturate your cape in it and let it dry without sticking to anything, you could have something that can block magic and piercing effects, effectively granting you a flexible shield." I handed him his sword back and he carefully examined it.

He stepped aside, but didn't leave. He watched me work, then said, "I apologize for yesterday."

"And I know you're not sincere." I said. "You blame me for the recent upheaval. I heard the Guildmaster got arrested."`

"You truly doubt my sincerity?" He asked.

"It's easy to say sorry." I said. "It's another thing to actually mean it. You are tense, as if you're holding something back, whether it's some disparaging comment on the way I am dressed or you holding back your fist." I cleaned a longsword and handed it back. "You think I am a naïve fool, and it makes you angry, because I have access to the good will of a Noble and do not take advantage of her." I looked at him as I received a mace. "Have I presumed correctly?"

He didn't say anything, and I focused. I was able to remove the blood and handed it back. "I do not even know your name, I do not even know if you are worthy of any respect. I am not better than you, nor are you any better than me, we're just a pair of Humans in a city that we are a relative rarity in."

"What, then, would I have to do to apologize?" He asked.

I cleaned off a spear and looked at him. "The greatest apology is to never need to do it again." I replied. "To act so that you never need to say sorry, to know whether or not you are about to do something you may regret. Make sure it never happens again, and you will not need to apologize to me."

I focused on my work, and after about two hours, I'd gone through everyone's weapons. I had figured out that meditation, since it restored spell slots, could help my rapidly regain mana, and that it brought me back to my current cap quickly. I couldn't do walking mediation to do it, so I likely wouldn't be able to do it in the middle of combat, but for times when I could sit and focus, I could do it. By the end, I had raised my MU cap to 310, a little under a third for an average spell.

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I gathered up the coagulated blood as Nash came in.

"I see you've been hard at work." He noted.

"Yes, you're on time to help me out."

Nash helped me carry the stuff back to Lissana's manor, where Beatrice was ecstatic at the plentiful supply.

"This is much more than I anticipated." She said.

"Can you return it to a liquid state?" I asked.

"I do not know." She said. "I've been able to cut thin slices and observe them under the microscope, but it is difficult to truly make anything out."

I took a look in the microscope, it was barely translucent, what little light got through only gave a vague shape to it.

"Have you tried putting a drop of blood between two sheets of glass?" I asked.

"I was hoping to avoid it." She said. "Glass is expensive, and ruining two seems like a waste."

"See it less of a waste and more of a necessary sacrifice." I replied.

She nodded and put a drop of blood on a slide, then sandwiched it with another piece of glass. The light was more easily seen now.

"I see..." She said. "Thin strands are formed into a uniform pattern, if I could sever these strands..." She wrote down notes wordlessly before she focused on me. "I would like to see how removal would look on skin."

"What?" I asked.

"Do not worry, I have healing potions set aside for you. I want to see how it sets and its effect on skin. You are the only person who can do this."

"This is stupid." I said, but I knew she would just find someone else to do it, and then have me try to channel Mana through them. Felwight blood could be kept in a liquid state with specific magical items, and Beatrice as an Alchemist knew how to do this. She had a metal tube set up for me to dunk my arm into, first filled with water so she could make certain how much liquid was actually needed.

"I will want you to submerge your arm into the liquid until you touch the bottom, then pull back enough so you are not touching the bottom, then with your fingers not touching, hold for a minute, then pull out and allow the blood to dry."

I sighed and we tested with water first, She took notes of how much liquid was necessary, and then she filled it with Felwight blood.

The first thing I noted was the blood was thick, it slowed movement enough that it took a few seconds to reach the bottom. I felt it tighten around my arm during the minute, and when I pulled it out, Beatrice siphoned it off with magic so none would be lost.

"Move your fingers and wrist around, I want to see if there is any loss of dexterity."

There wasn't really, and oddly enough, it actually felt nice. The friction between fingers was about average for rubber.

"I need more data." She said. "Your other arm."

I was less hesitant this time, though I really should have been. I could understand why there were people who willingly covered themselves with the stuff.

"Alright, now I want you to remove them." She said.

I hesitated, I wasn't a huge fan of pain, but I knew the alternative was her, or someone else, doing it for me.

I had to focus on exactly what I wanted, that being only the absolute minimum of skin loss, I blasted it after having a firm image in my mind, and I blacked out from the agony. I awoke from Beatrice pouring a healing potion in my mouth, and the skin on my arms regrowing. I let out a loud expletive, which I later learned could be heard from the other side of the manor. My assisting Beatrice ended there, and I was allowed to rest in my bed until it was lunch.

While I did not sustain lasting damage, the potions even regrew my fingernails, I made it my current mission to tell Beatrice to never ask me to do that again.

"That sounds horrible." Lissana said.

"Yeah, I had to do both at the same time because I knew otherwise it would have been worse."

"It was a mess." Cier stated. "I refused to clean it."

"You, refusing to clean up?" Nash asked.

"It was to teach Beatrice to choose her requests carefully." Cier stated. "Considering Rex's hands are otherwise unharmed, I would assume he healed properly."

I rubbed my wrists. "It's tender, but I only sloughed off the absolute top layer of my epidermis, which there is a layer of skin at the very top that is comprised of dead skin cells."

"That is mildly disturbing." Nash remarked.

"I remember reading that somewhere up to eighty percent of dust is made up of dead skin cells." I remarked.

"Must this be discussed at the dining table?" Cier asked.

"Sorry." I said.

"It sounds as though you have a fairly strong grasp of magic." Lissana stated. "Being able to, well, do what you did while minimizing damage, it takes nerves of steel to do that."

"Yeah. But recall that I don't feel fear as intensely as I should, and yet there wasn't any indication of why when I had the Appraisal."

"It is odd." Nash noted. "But I would say it has allowed you to face danger head on. You still feel fear, but it does not rule you."

I nodded. "It doesn't make sense though. I should be unable to move from terror, I shouldn't even be able to make some of the choices I have made, yet..." I felt a sudden headache, it wasn't too uncommon for me, though it had been a long time. I held my hand up to my head and rubbed my temples.

"Rex?"

"Just a headache." I said. "Nothing to... nothing."

I couldn't remember what led to me staring up at the ceiling, and I didn't remember seeing Lissana get up. Everything darkened...