That evening Azrael was working on the table in his own house, still reeling with the realisation of how terrifyingly talented the three youngest members of his village were. On his desk lay a collection of items. Alena, silently watched from the side.

The items included a writing tablet, a mortar and pestle, a pot, a jug of water, a knife, a chopping board, several magically crafted stone vials, a bundle of ghost mint, six mana stones and a small pile of the pure mana crystals from the clearing.

He made an effort to keep the mana stones and mana crystals separate, as they were quite similar. The mana stones were purple and crystalline, as were the mana crystals. The mana crystals, however, looked clearer. The mana stones were also slightly darker in colour. Alena had used mana crystals, but he wanted to test mana stones as well, as she had mumbled something about the two as he’d left.

Placing the pot on the kitchen stove he poured in some of the water from the jug. Without an accurate measure he eyed it. In the end it was about one cup worth. He could have used more, but since he was experimenting, he was going to try and create several small samples. Covering the pot with a lid he set it to boil.

Next, he gathered around ten fresh leaves of spirit mint. Elena had used roughly that many and so he wanted to use the same amount as a starting point for his experiment. The only difference were that his were fresh. Alchemy was good. Science was better. Magical, alchemical science was best.

Placing the leaves on the chopping board he began cutting them into the smallest pieces possible, before throwing them into the mortar and mashing them into a paste with the pestle. This way he could guarantee to be able to squeeze as much of the mint leaves’ juice… oil?

Carrying the mortar over to the now boiling water Azrael shaped the mortar to be completely smooth, letting the blue-white paste slip into the pot. He used the pestle to give the mixture a stir, breaking up the paste. The water immediately gained a blue tinge.

Next, he dropped in three medium sized mana crystals. It was roughly the same amount as Elena had used for hers. Though, whether her ratios were a matter of experimentation or simply ratios born from limited supply or intuition he didn’t know. Still, for a first test run it served as a good marker (especially because he’d made sure to get as much of the ghost mint’s oil into the mixture as he could, whereas Elena had lost almost half).

Letting the two ingredients boil, Azrael prepared the vials for the first finished batch, as well as preparing the ingredients for his second experimentation – this time with a doubled amount of ghost mint and mana crystals.

For the next hour or two Azrael began experimenting with different ratios and methods of preparation. He tried doubling, tripling and even quadrupling the amount of ingredients compared to the water, or else changing the ratios of ghost mint and mana crystals. He also tried with normal water and conjured water. On a whim he tested the results between cut and whole ghost mint leaves. In one experiment he also substituted mana crystals with the mana stones, curious if there would be a difference. Due to his low quantity though, he followed Elena’s original recipe when using them.

It was a productive night, with Alena curiously and silently watching his experimentation. In the end though, after several repetitions she left him to it, deciding to have an early night. It had been a long day after all.

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Azrael continued on, with all the determination of a stat boosted gamer. His intention was to keep experimenting as long as there were materials. Of course, fate often had other ideas, especially so when people were experimenting with things they didn’t completely understand. Doubly so for when working with alchemy and magical materials.

Placing a mana stone into the mortar Azrael raised the pestle to try and smash it. When previously making a mana potion with mana stones he’d noticed that unlike the mana crystals, which completely dissolved into the potion the mana stones simple lost colour, as if the mana was leeching out. He’d ended up with three slightly opaque purple tinged mana stone, looking a whole lot like cloudy stained-glass shards.

This phenomena, this difference, between the mana stones and mana crystals interested him and it sparked the question of whether crushing a mana stone down into a fine powder would affect the final outcome of the potion. Would the mana seep out better if the mana stone was broken?

The pestle came crashing down onto the mana stone, before suddenly coming to a full stop. Azrael raised the pestle again, this time increasing the force he used. The table rattled and there was a distinct ‘crack’. It wasn’t however the mana stone, but the mortar fracturing from the blow. It had a distinct crack running through it. The pestle also had a chip split off. The mana stone lay there unharmed.

Raising his arm a third time Azrael applied [Reinforcement] to the pestle, completely ignoring the cracked mortar. It would crack again and he would have to fix it later anyways.

The pestle came down, an arbiter of destruction. The mana stone cracked, then shattered in an ear-splitting explosion. Light flashed and the table shattered. Shrapnel exploded outwards.

Alena arrived a moment later in sleepwear, with her dagger drawn and ready. She threw open the door and in the same moment took in the broken table, the shattered mortar and Azrael on the ground. She lowered her dagger, glared at him accusingly for disturbing her sleep and closed the door again, leaving him with the aftermath.

He sighed, picking himself and several larger bits of stone off the floor. Fortunately, the mortar had broken into several large chunks, instead of exploding into smaller shrapnel. With the amount of force that the shattering mana stone had released it could have been deadly. Luckily none of the large chunks had struck him either.

As for the surviving vials – only three had shattered – he placed them on the kitchen bench, before using the broom to sweep up the remnant shards of the mortar. The lonely pestle, the chopping board, knife and note block all found a spot on the kitchen bench, leaving the shattered table.

Azrael glanced at it appraisingly. The explosive force of the mana stone shattering had discharged energy in every direction, with the mortar taking the brunt of it. Still, the table had snapped in half. With many large, jagged pieces being snapped off close to the small explosion. Azrael sighed, infusing the broken parts of the table with mana, before letting some void energy flow out. As wary as he was of both this unpredictable energy and its subsequent risks, nothing had actually happened… so far.

Despite his ‘Human’ level currently sitting at 78% nothing had changed. He hadn’t grown horns, tentacles or a third eye and as far as he was aware the change didn’t affect his emotions or cognitive ability. For all intents and purposes it was just a game design that had implemented itself in his status. For all he knew he was turning into a gnome, or an elf. Hehe. Gnelf.

Using the void he quickly fixed the table, fusing larger splinters that had sprung away back onto the table. The repair destroyed the pattern of the grain, but it was an acceptable trade-off for having a functioning table again.

Setting the table back into place Azrael glanced at his now cool and drinkable potion vials. Three had shattered, but nine had remained intact. These were the potion using Elana’s ratio, one with double, one with triple and one with quadruple the amount of ingredients to water, one with double water, one with the ghost mint leaves uncut, one with an increase in ghost mint, one with an increase in mana crystals and one made with mana stones. Packing them safely into the pot Azrael called it for the night and went to bed. Tomorrow he would test the potions and hopefully get some results.

That night Azrael dreams of himself running through Nova Lux, throwing exploding mortars at holy knights, while a certain kitsune chased him with a pestle.