21-Processing materials instead of trauma

5/1/5/4353 M.A.C - Niwut - Evening

"MOM! Can you open the door, please? I bought some things and my hands are full. I can't quite get it open."

Doro shouted from behind the door that connected their kitchen to the side street. He heard the noise of a chair moving inside followed by approaching footsteps.

"I was busy makin' dinner, couldn't you just have put the stuff on the floor, and then opened the door?"

Suyum complained as she approached, making Doro even more pleased about his upcoming prank. Suyum opened the door, only to freeze as she found herself face to helm with the enormous armor-clad man. Suyum frantically looked around for her son, but could not spot him anywhere.

"Uh Mom? Are you gonna keep standing there all day? I can't come in if you don't move. What's wrong?"

Doro's voice spoke again. What was worse was that his voice seemed to come from inside the helm and even resonated a bit.

"D....Do...Dor...Son is that you? What kind of cursed Ability did this to you!? I need to go get your dad, he'll know how to help you!"

Suyum was panicking and the color drained from her face. The failing light from the setting sun gave the street an eerie atmosphere as Doro spoke again, trying to push the creepiness to its maximum.

"Help me? No, I don't think so. I feel better than ever. Why don't I help you...Help you become one of us. Muha, muhaha, muhahahaha!"

Suyum was mid-turn, about to bolt as fast as she could, but Doro broke character and started giggling as he dropped down from his position. Dhruvah also began to laugh as he stepped aside to reveal Doro. Doro had been clinging to Dhruvah's broad back, using gaps where some of the armored plates connected as handholds, and had been speaking directly into one of the small ventilation holes on the backside of his helm.

Suyum seemed to realize she had just been had, as the color of her face didn't simply return to normal but continued turning redder and redder.

"Why you little...you nearly made my heart stop!"

Suyum took a deep breath and her demeanor seemed to shift again as a smile cropped on her face.

"I'm going to have to get you back for that one, just you wait my dear son. I know where you live."

Doro gulped audibly as Dhruvah's laugh increased in volume at the situation, but then Suyum turned abruptly toward him.

"And you sir? I don't know you! What makes you believe it is acceptable to do such a thing? If it didn't have a chance of blowin' back on my son, I would be warranted in callin' the guards on you."

Suyum advanced on Dhruvah and started poking his armored chest forcefully.

"Just consider yourself lucky it wasn't my husband here instead. He is a nine-foot-tall Thermal, a master of the Warhammer. He might have driven its spike right through your armor before you let up on your little joke. You know what, I'll call him, he still might. Honey, get over here!"

Doro had given Dhruvah too much information for this joke to work.

"Do you mean your five-foot-tall human husband with the scholarly Choice? Or do you happen to have a second husband? I wouldn't blame you though, you seem to be quite a woman, and I could understand how more than one man might be interested. If you are looking for a third though...Wink."

"Uhhhh , maybe you don't hit on my happily married mother in front of me, you elderly perv. And did you just say the word "wink"!?"

"Well, it's not like she could see me winking with my visor down and all. My apologies Doro. Ma'am, I will refrain from flirting with you...in front of your son at least."

"You do realize that the last bit counts as flirting right? Don't make me go get my dad. Sure he doesn't have a combat-related Choice, but he is a [Refiner] and can hit you where it would hurt you the most. If you piss him off, your armor might just rust off your body in seconds if he throws one of his vials at you."

"Noooo! Not in the armor!"

Suyum gave a short sigh before interrupting the comic duo.

"Alright, alright. Let's stop with the jokes for now, I need to finish cookin'. Why don't you introduce me to your new friend while I do?"

Doro answered his mother with a quiet voice, not exactly sure how he would bring up the subject.

"It's better if we get Dad first. Stuff happened and it's quite...well...I'll explain over dinner. For now, Mom, meet Dhruvah. He is a 411-year-old, level 64 [Heavy Steelclad Juggernaut] and a Decanus of the Free Legion, off duty. I'll go get Dad while you wrap your head around that."

***

"How did Aonghus think it was a good idea to give a gold mark to a kid...I'm happy that he favors us enough to give you such a present, but couldn't he have given you silver marks instead?"

As they were having dinner, Doro gave his parents the background information behind the incident, but let Dhruvah cover the matter of the attack. The two had left out some of the more gruesome details, to avoid alarming Suyum and Khetep.

"Dad, I know he is a Thermal, and kind of huge, but with the amounts of money he deals with, silver marks would be impractically heavy. He probably didn't even think of it as strange, you know?"

"Yeah but still..."

"Dad, just wait until you see what his gold mark got us before you get too mad."

With the change of topic, their curiosity started replacing the unease caused by the previous topic. Doro first opened one of the bags containing some of the three hundred Librae of dotted sandstone he had bought and handed it to his father.

"Son? I think you've been scammed. This material produces something we call dot iron, and it isn't great. Furthermore, it seems someone has already harvested the iron-rich sections. You'd be lucky to get even 5% of its total weight in iron with the state it is in."

Doro chuckled and assuaged his dad's fears with a smile.

"You got it wrong, Dad. Iron isn't what I got this for. I need to experiment a little but I should be able to extract a metal you've never seen thanks to my Abilities."

Suyum looked skeptical, but Khetep knew that Doro had memories from a previous life in a more advanced world and thus, he was more easily convinced.

"So, what else did you get?"

Doro retrieved the sixty librae of chromite and plopped it onto the table.

"Ooh, that's some good quality Umayer Iron ore. I sometimes process some into powder form for black pigments. It is too expensive to use on its own for most orders, but mixing some in helps give more depth. So that is the one you got for iron?"

"Wrong again. Sure I'll get the iron out of it and use it too. Otherwise, it would be a waste. Again though, there is another metal I should be able to extract from it. The metal itself won't be very useful on its own, but it should let me make great alloys. The same holds true of the third thing I bought. Another source for metal that'll let me make some other nice alloys."

As he uncovered the crystals, his mother's hand immediately shot forward and grabbed one of the smaller clusters.

"Yoink! I'm stealing some of this to carve small decorations for my pottery. We'll call it punishment for scaring the life out of me earlier."

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

"Sure Mom, have it but don't act as if it buys me safety. You've never needed an excuse to prank me, or Dad, whether we had it coming or not."

"Here, here!"

Khetep joined in and showed support for Doro's statement, before pouring a couple of glasses of the distilled fruit liquor he made as a hobby to the adults around the table. Khetep's alcohol tolerance was too low to enjoy most readily available drinks, so he had resorted to making his own, about half as strong as beer, but a lot tastier. It was weak enough that he sometimes allowed Doro a sip on special occasions.

"It just kind of sucks that we weren't able to find sifter sand considering it should have been the easiest thing to source."

"Yeah, after trekking in the stuff for days, I'm surprised it was so tough to find anyone selling it."

Suyum and Khetep shared a look and a smile before clearing up the situation.

"Well yeah, of course. The stuff is basically free. When people need some they either go get it themselves, or pay some person with a cart to go get some for them. If there is any in a shop, it's because it got tracked in on people's shoes, and they haven't swept the floor in a while. We probably have a few bags left in the cellar since I use it in the white base coat your mother applies to her pottery before the glazes."

"Wait, those bags aren't filled with chalk? I always assumed."

"Now, why would we waste money on good chalk when this works as well and is basically free."

Well, damn. I wonder what else I've wrongly assumed. At least, if it works well as a white pigment, it is even more likely that it contains titanium oxide of some sort.

"Would it be fine if I took one of those bags to run some tests?"

"Sure, take all you want. I've already processed a bunch in advance, so I won't be needing any of it for a while."

"Thanks Dad!"

Dhruvah downed his third bottle of fruit liquor, earning Suyum's respect and Khetep's worry. Dhruvah had tried to be reserved at first, but every time his drink was empty, Suyum would refill it before he could protest. Even though it was weak, the quantity seemed to have been enough to affect the man's mood. Dhruvah quietly stared at the liquid he was swirling in his cup, a complicated look on his face.

"Well Doro, at least you seem to have a loving family. Makes me feel nostalgic for the old days. That's the problem with living longer than the people around you, you can't really force them to keep up with you. Even some of the friends I went adventuring with eventually retired and stopped trying to get past their next threshold. Not to count those who die from accidents or diseases. I'm actually here in Niwut to visit one of my old friends whose lifespan is running out. We are not sure exactly when, but he has given up on passing his next threshold, and only has a handful of years left. He could try to spend the money he's accumulated to find ways to increase his lifespan if he hasn't reached the limit, but he decided that he was happy with the life that he's led and would rather spend the end of his life with his descendants, passing on some of his teachings to the younger generation, and leaving them his wealth. He left us twenty years ago. Now that Tom and I are back on the continent, we decided that we should visit him, in case it is the last time we could."

The mood around the table grew more somber as Dhruvah told his story.

"Ah, is that where Tom went? If I'm the reason you are not visiting your friend yet, I'm sorry."

"Don't worry kid. Despite his age and physical state, he is a very busy person, and his schedule is always packed. Since we showed up unexpectedly, he wasn't able to reschedule some obligations and sent us a letter telling us to go see him in two days, at twelfth bell. On this, I think I may retire for the night. I will see all you lovely people in the morning."

"Be sure to come back, I want to make you a little something to help you out. Also, I think your armor could do with a little polish and detailing before you meet your old friend. My dad and I can give it a look tomorrow morning."

"I wouldn't feel ri-"

Druvah tried to politely decline, but Suyum interrupted him.

"Nonsense, You saved our son and even accompanied him all afternoon before makin' sure he got back home safely. That is the least that we can do."

"Yeah, although my mom is showing her bad habit of volunteering for my dad, don't worry about it. Plus, I'll do most of the work myself. You can consider it helping with my training if it helps."

"I give up. You obviously won't drop it until I agree...I really wanna wash up after my trek in the desert, so I'll head off now before I drink any more and my legs stop working"

Dhruvah left his chair and it released a series of creaks, as if it were sighing in relief at being given a respite from the large man's weight. He pulled up his thick canvas hood and mail coiffe before putting his helm back on. Doro accompanied him outside to give him directions to a nearby inn before returning to the kitchen a couple of minutes later. As he entered, he noticed his parents were no longer in the room. On the table, among the remnants of dinner, was a small scrap of paper.

Doro,

You skipped the clean-up after lunch, don't forget this time. Don't come into our room tonight unless you want to see how a baby is made.

Love, your mother.

Doro smacked his palm against his forehead, in reaction to his mother's antics, and started clearing the table. He spent another ten minutes scrubbing the plates in the sink until they were spotless.

Well, whatever bad jokes she makes, she beats out my previous mother. After she left me with Dad, she only sent me a letter a year and visited once for my high school graduation. At least, little Thabisa and Farai were happy to have a big brother, and called me all the time to chat when they could hide it from their father. I think the two of them might be the most affected by my death on that side of the family. I hope it didn't scar them too much. Damn, Dhruvah's story put me in a weird mood. Let's go play with my new toys to change my mind before I go to bed. There is still one Ability I haven't put to the test.

Doro went to retrieve a bag of sifter sand from the cellar before making a few trips to bring all of his materials into his father's workshop.

Ok, energy levels are nearly full, let's have some fun! First, let's give the sifter sand a looksee.

[Matter Analysis]

What the hell!? This stuff is 40% titanium dioxide! The rest appears to be mostly Silica ,but it seems there is nearly 2% of varied trace materials, each in small enough quantities that I can't pick up what they are.

Doro grabbed a small handful of sifter sand and deposited it on the counter. He wasn't sure how the Ability would function, and so decided to skip straight to trying to activate it automatically.

[Matter Isolation Field]

Woah!

Eight golfball-sized orbs of energy exited from Doro and arranged themselves into a cube on the counter. Doro saw straight, fine lines of energy form between the orbs and waited to see if anything else would happen.

Hmm...I can't really feel it draining any energy except for the bit that originally formed the spheres. Ah, it seems that I can store more energy into those nodes for later use. How is this a field though, it's basically just eight balls stacked into a cube...Wait, don't tell me-

Doro had a flash of insight and tried to move the nodes apart. As if he were using a drawing program on a computer, he mentally dragged the nodes as if they were the corners of a selection box. The nodes separated and ended up marking the corners of a cube, the lines connecting them extending proportionately.

Ah, now it's draining a tiny bit of the energy from the nodes, must be passively doing something inside.

Doro tried to follow the energy flow, and instantly realized what it was doing.

Oh! It's passively using [Matter Analysis]. I can tell what is inside the field, I'm even getting information on the makeup of the air. But it's actually expending energy unlike when I use the ability alone, I wonder why...Oh! I get it. if the information about the air composition isn't changing, then there must not be any exchanges between the air inside and outside. I need to test it out, but I reckon the field must somehow act as a container separating the inside from the outside.

Doro performed a few tests to confirm his hypothesis, and found out he wasn't quite right. The field was not acting as a container, per se, but was outright holding all the matter in some sort of suspension while keeping exterior matter from entering. In essence, it was more than a simple container but did not have physical boundaries. Doro performed a few more tests and found that it was also stopping any matter from reacting naturally.

Alright, let's try the sifter sand.

Doro moved the field over to the small pile of sand he had prepared previously and reduced the size of the field to make it slightly taller than the pile of sand and twice as wide. The small energy drain lessened as the field decreased in size. Doro started picturing the components of the sand in his head, using the information coming from the field to help him. He imagined the silicon dioxide and the titanium dioxide dissociating in a single grain of sand and saw it break apart. He then attempted to do the same with a dozen grains at the same time and noticed that aside from the two piles, a minuscule amount of something else remained where the grains had originally been.

Must be the impurities and trace elements, better be careful with how I handle those when I don't know what they are. I don't actually care about getting pure silica right now though, so maybe I can just separate the titanium dioxide and leave the impurities with the silica. Might save a bit on energy expenditure too. If I'm not wrong about the field stopping reactions, I should be able to stop the titanium from reacting to the oxygen and oxidizing before I can clump it back together.

Doro shifted his process and ran a few more tests before deciding that he was ready to start on a bigger scale. He measured out three librae of the sand to allow him to easily convert to metric units. Doro wasn't against the use of pounds and miles, or in this world librae and miles, but when it came to science, he found the metric system easier to work with thanks to it working in 10's.

Doro then proceeded to isolate the titanium dioxide. Once separated, Doro repeated the process to separate the titanium from the oxygen before using [phase transition] to meld the resulting fine particulates of titanium together. After taking note of how much was left in his energy reserves, he proceeded to also meld the silica together to avoid the possibility of something like glass lung occurring. He let his field drop and inspected the results.

Yes! Titanium metal successfully unlocked! Seems the silica turned into fused amorphous quartz glass instead of crystals though. Still, a nice material but since I've already gotten borosilicate glass, crystals would have been cooler. I reckon that it took about a fifth of my energy, so 2, to process this sand, without counting melding the silica. I'm a bit over three-quarters full, so I should be able to repeat this three more times, maybe four if I try to streamline the process and start from full.

Considering the molar mass of silica and titanium, and that they are both bonded with an equal number of oxygen atoms, if they were distributed 50/50 in composition, then I should end up with a bigger portion of the weight on the side of silica. Considering the sifter sand was slightly above 40% titanium dioxide, I should be able to recover a bit over one-third of the original weight in titanium dioxide. Let's call it one libra for the three librae of sand.

Titanium dioxide is made up of two atoms of oxygen for every atom of titanium. The molar mass of oxygen is nearly exactly a third of titanium's, so that becomes a fairly simple formula. If we count the one titanium as three oxygens, then it should account for 3/5th of the weight, or in other words, approximately 60% of the total mass of titanium dioxide should be comprised of pure titanium.

Thank Akasha that this Ability seems to allow for lossless extraction, unlike Bayer's process. If I am correct, one libra, or 333 grams, of titanium dioxide should yield approximately (333/100) x60 grams. Considering I was conservative with my estimates, I should get around 200g of Titanium for every kilogram of sifter sand.

Doro weighed the ingot of titanium, to test out his math, and was pleased to see that he'd been right. He simplified the math now that he knew the result, and it turned out that sifter sand would yield approximately 20% of its weight in titanium. He repeated the process a second time and recovered nearly the same amount of titanium.

Ok. The titanium content can vary from batch to batch, but it seems to be by such a small amount that it doesn't matter much at this scale. It should cost approximately 10 energy to recover 1kg with my current Abilities. Let's see how the chromite turns out.

Doro spent the next thirty minutes repeating the process he had just gone through with the sifter sand and double-checking the math behind the conversion. The chromite, or Umayer Iron as his father had called it, turned out to be quite similar to his previous project. It also ended up requiring a two-step process. He could first separate it into ferrous oxide and chromium oxide, both of which could be used as pigments since ferrous oxide created a deep black color, and chromium oxide was responsible for giving emeralds their green color. He decided not to extract the iron from the ferrous oxide, to conserve energy, and proceeded to remove the oxygen from the chromium oxide. After weighing the resulting ingot and doing the math, Doro concluded that this type of chromite would yield 50% of its weight in pure chromium.

Well, that makes the math easy. These sums were starting to do my head in. Also, it would seem that most of the energy I had saved, thanks to the chromite being less evenly split, was spent removing oxygen from a larger portion of the total material. Both the Umayer iron and the sifter sand seem to take me two energy per kilogram of base material when only extracting the relevant metals, different yields though. I'll do one more Chromium extraction and use whatever energy remains to clean up. I'm getting tired and the math isn't helping.

Doro stored the 400 grams of titanium and the kilogram of chromium he had managed to extract and collected the ferrous oxide for later use. He then threw the fused Silica into the box in which his father kept his broken glassware.

All done here! I'm gonna sleep like a log tonight.

Proud of his accomplishments, Doro returned to his room to change out of his clothes. He was so drained by the day's events that he fell asleep mere moments after settling his head onto his pillow.