Chapter Eighteen - Brewing

Bringing her to the wall of ingredients, Craig began, “Well, first you need to know what you’re working with and what kind of effect you want to achieve.” Opening one of the drawers, he pulled out something that was vaguely minty. “For instance, miosor is an excellent stimulant. It’s a favorite of the guards, because when brewed it helps to keep them awake on long or overnight shifts.”

Jade stared at the leaf, and her brain cataloged his description as something between a mint tea and coffee. Which made sense. People were always trying to stay awake longer or in dangerous situations. She could imagine busy paper-pushers were equally enamored of the concoctions.

“How much prep work do you do? Chop it up and brew?” She asked, curious as to where they fell on the scale of making tea to xianxia pill formations that took four days in front of a cauldron with a deviant flame.

Laughing, he explained, “I suppose that’s one way to do it, although if that’s all you did, the effect would be rather weak. To start off, there are different parts of the plant that are more effective than others. For the miosor, it’s best to remove the stem and veins, as most of the essence is concentrated on the leaves once it’s been cut.”

Curiously, she activated her mana sight, which instantly proved his words. She could imagine that while it was alive, the veins carried much of the mana, but once it stopped circulating, it pooled into the reserves of the leaf. Several workstations were set up, and Craig showed them how to cut the leaves for the most effective usage.

Thankfully, the workstation was low enough that she could use her left hand for stabilization without it hurting too much. At least she could try to keep up appearances that she was fine. For now.

She felt a small thought from Willow as she decided to help her by keeping an eye on the others, flying off to find a perch that would allow her to watch them all. She sent a note of thanks to her little queen, knowing she was probably bored alone, but stayed so that one of them kept her in their sight.

Knife in hand, she stared down at the leaves, noting that there were certain parts of even the leaf that held almost no concentrations of mana, so she trimmed those off too, only to hear Apollos’ voice behind her, “Ah, you’re cutting off a bit too much. You want to keep as much of the good material as you can.” Blinking, she glanced at him and he seemed to start a bit as he noticed her eyes were glowing from within while she used her skill. “Your eyes…” His voice trailed off in confusion.

Smiling, she replied, “Oh, sorry. I thought it would be more productive to only keep the parts that were mana saturated.” Poking at the trimmed bits, she said, “These parts should have lost most of their mana when they were dried. I thought it would be better to only keep what retained its efficacy.”

“That’s correct. You can see the mana flow?” Craig replied from beside her, obviously intensely interested in her still slightly glowing eyes. When she nodded, he muttered, “Fascinating. That would explain the varying potency issues we face.” Pulling his leaves over, he asked, “Can you see anywhere that needs trimmed on mine?” She could tell he wasn’t testing her, but that he was genuinely interested to see where he might be able to improve.

Separating them out, she made a few cuts, trimming edges or corners off as she said, “These bits. Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem to be consistent.” She paused, then added, “Although it might be a bit more difficult, I think you could probably achieve the same effect by focusing on sensing the nature magic in the plant.”

Eric had proven that her 3D imaging of the world could be done with every element when he used it naturally in her metal class, and she’d tested it out fairly extensively. She did not, however, know if it was actually normal. Maybe most people worked instinctively? She knew her healer train watched through their magic, but then she met people like Brendon in Mianach who could heal people, but weren’t good at it because they couldn’t use whatever echolocation shenanigans she employed on the daily.

“Oh! I can see it!” Katie had immediately closed her eyes and Jade could feel the tingle of a magical pulse in her domain. It was faint, but she was paying attention, unlike when Lars did it earlier. She made a note about how easy it was to spy on the situation as it were, and to figure out if she could amp up her senses to detect it better. Later, when she wasn’t in a foreign delegation. For now, she focused as Katie almost stabbed herself.

“Uh, maybe you should open your eyes.” She suggested cautiously, not wanting them to hurt themselves on the very sharp implements. Then again, it wasn’t like they’d be able to do more damage than she could heal, so it was more a method of saving the ingredients from being tainted by blood. Although wouldn’t blood be a decent alchemical compound to work with? Maybe not a super ethical one though. She could see a lot of ways that would go wrong, so she wasn’t about to mention it. They already used it for funerals, and these were nature mages who probably raised the trees. Anything she could think of, they probably already had.

Frowning, Katie opened her eyes in frustration. “I can see it when I’m sensing, but I lose it as soon as I’m looking normally.”

Jade paused before she lost the battle to say ‘git gud, fam.’ Taking in a deep breath, she schooled her face to calm as she replied, “Then there are perhaps two options. Either learn to switch back and forth fluidly and memorize what’s happening, or…find a way to run the mana through your eyes. Honestly, I’m still working on that too. We’re not meant to see through solid objects, but sensing the mana in the world around you is possible through all elements.”

Almost collectively, eyes closed and she could feel the awareness of six different people brushing against her domain as they test. Some could only extend a little past their bodies with various elements, and she found it interesting to observe through her sixth, or maybe seventh sense?

“By the heavens, what happened to you?” Katie’s voice was horrified as her eyes opened to stare at Jade, and she remembered that teaching them to see through their spiritual senses was exactly what she probably shouldn’t have been teaching the girl.

“Don’t.” Jade’s voice held a note of command as she made eye contact, staring the girl down.

“But you…” She started before her voice choked.

“I said don’t.” Her head tilted as she warned the girl. Apollos looked completely confused, while Lochlann and Craig were exchanging concerned glances. She felt more than saw Tao fading into the shadows, hands on the hilts of his blades as he prepared for the worst. Camille just looked exasperated.

Taking a deep breath, she turned to the shadows and stared directly at the quiet man as she said, “There’s no need for that. Attacking me would only result in losing your magic, if you’ve forgotten.”

“Save in self-defense.” Tao seemed to sigh the words as he stepped back, letting go of the swords. He was a bit more trigger happy than the others, and she couldn’t help but wonder what he’d been through to make him that way. She could feel Willow’s anger through her bond that he would even think of hurting her, and took a moment to soothe the queen, letting her stay hidden up above them for now, though she felt Willow was keeping a closer eye on him in particular now.

Sighing, she reached up, rubbing her temples as she tried to figure out how to defuse the situation. She really didn’t want Katie blabbing about her injury, but she still needed these people to teach her. Looking back at the girl, she informed her, “I’m afraid that what you saw falls under the contract you signed. You’re not to tell anyone, even those in this room.”

“Your spirit is injured.” Apollos blurted out of the blue. When everyone turned to look at him, he shrugged as he asked, “What? It’s not that hard to draw conclusions. Katie was looking through the elements, she’s got spirit magic, she asked what happened to you. Ergo, you’re dying and don’t want anyone to know.” Lochlann very much looked like he wanted to jump on his young compatriot and gag him, and Tao took an instinctive step back again as deathly silence fell over them.

Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.

Closing her eyes, she counted down from ten once, then twice, then a third time. Just trying to get her emotions under control as the tension deepened. Once she felt she had calmed down, she opened her eyes and accepted the reality that she needed to explain.

“All right. I guess we’re doing this.” She felt Cami’s hand on her good shoulder, and glanced back at her to find the princess had an encouraging look on her face. Nodding, she turned back to the others and said, “Apollos is partially right. Yes, my spirit was injured. No, I am not dying anymore.”

“Anymore?” Lochlann’s voice was strained as he interrupted her.

Rolling her eyes, she confirmed. “Anymore. It still hurts, but it’s not killing me. And honestly, trying to find a way to fix it is why we’re here. I would, however, really emphasize that I do not want that information leaving those in this room. I will tell you right now that trying to take advantage of it falls under ‘scheming against a traveler’ and will require you to leave the kingdom immediately without your magic if you should attempt that route.” She paused, then asked. “So. I think that’s fairly clear. Any questions or shall we move on with the lessons?”

Apollos wasn’t subtle as all as his head swung to look at Katie, who seemed relieved and nodded at his unspoken query. She could feel a lot of the tension fade as they realized she was, in fact, not dying. She supposed trying to cozy up to a dying traveler was far less appealing than one that would be around for a while.

“I assure you, no one here will speak of it.” Lochlann finally agreed for all of them, and she gave him a drawn smile.

Craig had nodded, then turned to consider their work. “If that’s your purpose, I suppose learning to process the miosor isn’t exactly what you want to learn.”

“Actually, I’d still like to continue.” She said softly, and he seemed confused. Giving him a more genuine smile, she said, “I find that learning the basics first is better than diving straight into the deep end. So let’s finish this, and then we can explore the properties of other things that might be helpful.”

“Yes, building a firm foundation is important.” He immediately agreed, then went on. “In that case, let’s move onto the second step. Grinding. In order to facilitate the blending process, the finer you can mash the ingredients, the easier it will be.” He demonstrated by taking the mortar and pestle on his station and putting the leaves in. “Now, it’s best if you can wrap a layer of nature mana around the space to contain it as you crush.”

He made a small bubble that kept the ingredients separate from the stone instead of spreading the paste over it as he rhythmically smashed the leaves. “I find a smooth, circular motion works best.”

Frowning slightly, she asked, “Do you always do it by hand, or are you able to use any of the other elements to speed it along?” He had to keep a firm hold of the bowl, and she didn’t really want to do that. Metal, earth, water, wind, all of them had options she could use to blend up the brew almost instantaneously, but she didn’t know if introducing other elements would ruin the integrity of the ingredients.

While she knew Craig was capable of doing something similar, maybe he just taught it manually because his students didn’t have that same functionality.

Considering her question, he finally explained, “Introducing other elements does taint it slightly. As we boil and reduce it in the next step, we frequently use conjured water as it blends more easily and maintains the magical density. However, infusing is another way to increase the ultimate aspects and performance of the potion. For example, Apollos frequently includes healing mana during the compressing process, which results in a potion that is far more rejuvenating. Katie includes life mana, which often extends the duration of effects.”

She nodded, considering that. It validated her thoughts on being able to inject the different types of mana for added results. “So if I used pure mana…” She muttered softly to herself, and a white string of mana reached down, picking up her leaves and encompassing them in a pearly white globe that absolutely shredded them into dust as it floated mid-air. She further compressed the residue until it was about the size of a marble, nodding as she looked at Craig, “Then what’s the next step?”

“Is that pure mana? Like what Ryan uses?” Tao asked in interest as he stared at the small glowing orb. The second question had been in an undertone, and she was sure it was more for his benefit than hers. Then again, he might’ve pieced together that her ability to see magic extended to the weird breathing technique of his friend.

“The technical term is special magic, but yes. It’s basically unaspected mana.” He’d come even closer to take another look at it, nodding in thought.

Lochlann finally seemed to come to terms with the fact that, yet again, he had hopped onto her crazy train, because he gave his teacher a long-suffering glance to move on.

Nodding a little absently as he, too, studied the pearly orb containing her leaf dust, he gestured to the burners, taking his own leaves over. Camille had long abandoned her station to watch Jade with Tao and Katie, but she noted that Apollos had quietly finished grinding and brought his leaves over too. She actually kinda admired the seriousness with which he treated his alchemy, even if he had blabbed her secret.

Although truthfully, he was right. The deductions were obvious enough if you were paying any sort of attention and knew Katie’s affinities, which the group clearly did. She’d been kidding herself by trying to stop the girl from talking. It made it seem more serious than it was, though it had at least stopped the girl from mentioning the extent of the burns covering her spirit shoulder. Hopefully her little reminder stopped the rest of the group from asking further questions. It was a fine line to tread, and she was banking that they wouldn’t be willing to risk their safety and magic to find out.

She supposed that if a delegation was going to discover her secret, at least it was the one she already had under contract not to hurt or scheme against her.

Craig was already explaining the next process as he conjured water from the air while he turned three burners on after glancing at Apollos in pride. She could tell why he was the favored student. He diverted the water into two of them to boil as he gestured for Jade to do the same. “If you can call your own water, having your mana in it will vastly increase how easily it combines with the other ingredients similarly processed.”

Ah, so that’s why he hadn’t done hers. She easily called forth an orb of similar size, but hesitated when she was about to put it in the burner before flicking it off. When he looked at her in confusion, she shrugged slightly and said, “If I’m experimenting anyway, I might as well use my own fire to heat it.” Combining the water with dust, she encased the whole thing in special mana, then added a coating of flame as she asked, “So, are we just heating it up, or is there something else I should be doing?”

“Right. Yes. You should obviously maintain the protective barrier so that the essence doesn’t escape. This step is about combining it into liquid form and distilling it down to the essence. This is also where you can add other mana types as desired. The steps get more complicated if you’re using more than one ingredient to make sure they merge properly.”

Jade nodded, doing a mental inventory as she considered what she wanted to do with the slowly boiling substance. She’d started it low to give herself some time to think. Craig already mentioned that healing and life magic were known resonances to the stimulating potion. None of the basic elements seemed like they would add much. Death was out completely. Illusion, summoning, spatial, gravity, and contractual seemed completely unrelated.

That left compulsion, blood, and spiritual of the basic twenty. She didn’t want to make it sentient, so animation was out. But time and creation? Those were definite possibilities. Deciding to err on the side of caution, she chose compulsion and spiritual. Her thought process tried to code it so that it would basically be a ‘wake up!’ call to body, mind, and spirit.

She watched as her mana sent the ingredients spiraling through the ball like a tiny hurricane until it finally all blended together into a shining blob. Reaching that point, she felt her instincts telling her it was done, she she let the fire drop and stopped trying to inject more, letting it hover there as she glanced at Lochlann. “Got a glass or something I can put this in?”

“It shouldn’t be done yet.” Apollos interjected thoughtfully, carefully stirring his own concoction.

“But it is.” She refuted instantly.

Frowning, he asked, “Why are you so sure?”

She paused. This group had no idea what her special ability was. They were clueless that she was getting feedback from not only her domain, but the natural corrective abilities of her combined crafter skill being at advanced five. So lamely she sighed, “Reasons. Traveler reasons.”

Lochlann had been waiting to see if Apollos would get answers, and she realized the youngest might not be quite as brash as he was presenting himself to be. Sure, that was at least partially his personality, but whether they had talked about it previous and were playing into it or just taking advantage, she didn’t know. It didn’t feel malicious, but they did want as much information as possible, and seemed perfectly fine with using a somewhat innocent teenager to get it.

Given that no further answers were forthcoming, the prince grabbed a stoppered glass bottle, holding it out for her. She smiled her thanks and took it, examining the bottle that had been lightly warded to maintain its contents. Satisfied that she could more or less easily replicate the effects, she stuck her potion into it and stoppered it before dismissing the last of her mana sphere.

“Well, that was fun. Once you’re done, shall we test how effective they are?” She asked Craig, a smile creeping onto her face as he stirred vigorously, wanting to examine her creation, but unwilling to sacrifice his own. She could see Apollos injecting his healing mana and grinned.

She was honestly excited to see how her intuitive alterations compared.