A new symptom has manifested. Their Blood is now black. Strange, but not ailing. Noticing it as someone had injured himself rather severely. The skin had a rather large laceration, so I needed to use some Potion to help the Farmer. Laceration has abated, but I asked everyone to come and let some blood to see if everyone had strangely colored blood.
The result was the latecomers have blackish red blood, but the longer time visitors had all black blood. After the blood is fully black, the glowing scars should start. Many were unnerved hearing those things, but slowly calmed down as I asked what ailments they also have.
Surprisingly everyone felt fine. Not only that they were energetically and have no other direct problem for now. Warts, rashes, even pimples or toothache are more or less gone. It should be the spirit form holding the physical body in an ideal state, where it can. Their fear abate with that but the farmers still feel a bit shaken. To hear they suddenly have black blood, has an ominous ring to it, so they need time.
With the notion of having still nothing to fear, everyone goes to sleep, albeit a bit uneasy.
…
Finally a breakthrough has been found in creating synthetic Monster cores. The ingredient is blood! As the happening with the Farmers reminded me, Monsters have slightly purplish blood. Using this blood with Miasma did nothing, but with my chickens not being a Monster right now I found the solution. It has to be clean blood. Miasma reacts with blood and infuses it with their intent, but only if no other intent is already inside. When the blood first gets polluted, it creates extremely small crystals which coagulate into a core. This core is now infused with my taken over Miasma.
As I can not put my taken over Miasma directly into the body as it loses my Presence, it has to be put in after the creation of the crystal. Slaughtering a Chicken and giving its blood Miasma, which align at most with them I create a core from it in a jar. The next thing is putting it in the chicken sedated right now.
Cutting carefully where the feathers have been plucked I see the internal organs. A bit Potion is put on side to close the incision later on. The heart is visible and next to it deeper inside the spine. With careful precision I put the core inside.
…
What a disaster and success at the same time. The fusion of the chicken and the core was more successful as I would have imagined. Right after putting it in, it literally fused with the chicken and even closed the wound. Then it woke up and went on a rampage. The sedation was gone and it started to scream and attack anything and everything. I needed to put it in my Realm right away, as the shouts were so loud it sounded like I slaughter thousands of chickens at once.
Inside the Realm the next problem showed itself. It needed Biomass. The body changed in a rather extreme way and needed so much mass to become a true Monster. When Mana and Biomass was given it started to go comatose for the time it did not need more, when it was used up it started to rampage again. Putting more and more mass on, I really thought it would never stop growing. Now I have a two and a half meter chicken with scales on the bottom of its body inside my Realm. The talons are very sharp and it even has teeth in its beak. Some old Genes must have been activated. This thing seems aggressive but hears my commands and does follow them.
I can now create Monster. With enough of them I should be able to automate the miasmic cleansing. The only problem is, a two and a half Meter giant Chicken is very noticeable. I need a better place for my creations.
…
Two weeks had passed. Right now I start two projects. One is a fort or castle in the middle of the Crater. The other is bringing the hundred Kilo of radishes and rice to Rendlar. I also need more Potions, Animals and different kind of Materials. With the synthetic cores I will be able to create large pastures full of them for a way faster Mana production.
Taken with me I have Robert, Belk and two of the Youths with me. I can not really trust all the new Members of my Farmers right now, as they might try to flee, therefore I keep the more trusting people with me on this trip. A hundred Kilo between us is not that much, especially as they are more fit the more Mana burn they have.
The scars got bigger, but they start to ignore the whole thing now. Some use them at night as light, hopefully we have enough lamp oil for all of the households after this travel.
…
“Name and reason?”
As lazy as ever…
“Ava, Mercenary, selling stuff. Those are my haulers.”
“Five copper and go.”
Yeah, it is easy to get inside without even being asked what we are hauling. Well for the better, as when the whole World starts to know, what we have, it will be more problematic.
…
“Potions is it? Well we have some in storage. How many would you like?”
Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
“If possible a dozen. If something happens, it will be better to safe a life than dig a grave.”
Hearing my words, the Farmers are moved. Well it is partially true, as I need them for more experiments. I have some ideas I need to test, so it is a necessity to be fully stocked.
“The twelve Potions should be strong?”
“Yes, they can have high Mana, I don’t care.”
“As if high Mana Potions for healing are that common… We have quality potions, which can be used for even reattachment, they are rather expensive however. One gold for each.”
“No worries. We have Money.”
With the slip in the hand I go with the Farmers through the streets eating an evening meal. Tomorrow we get our Items and trod through the snow back home. Oh, the snow is getting rather deep right now, but nothing the farmers care about. They are fit as an ox it seems.
...
“Lord, the food tastes somehow bland.”
Huh? Something wrong with the food?
“Now, that you mention it, my food is bland too brother.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Ah, sorry my Lord. The Youth just talk before thinking. Do not worry.”
“I am not angry, I just want to know what they mean.”
“Lord… The food in the Crater has more flavor than this one. Even raw it tastes better than this apparently spicy soup.”
Huh, this might be another side effect. Things without Mana tastes now bland? Interesting. Is it just taste or does it work like a drug? We will see.
“Relax, we are back the day after tomorrow. Then we have a few chickens to eat. Maybe a Monster too.”
“Lord, Monster are not really edible. Their poison will be making us cramp up.”
“It is my thinking, that the Miasma inside would do that, but you have so much Mana inside, it might be possible for you to eat some of it without cramps. Mages do eat Monsters, too. There should be a correlation.”
“Well, I would like to try.”
“...Youths.”
With that sigh from Robert, everyone on the Table starts laughing. Nothing wrong with a bit fun at work. We have spare time and now we need to sleep as I need to go to the Orphanage early in the morning.
…
“We are very thankful for this generous donation, but what do you want from our children?”
“Well I need them for a job… No, nothing suspicious or dangerous. They shall search something for me, and no I do not mean stealing. I want Insects and Rodents.”
“Insects? Rodents? What for?”
“To be honest, I do not know much about what that old coot makes, but he writes everything over Animals. So I just need them to search for the bugs and small animals around who capture the warmth of this House to bring them for his documentation.”
“Oh… You have a kind of Mage as friend?”
“Not really Mage, he is a writer and looks for all common animals found in different regions. Now he wants to write of all things about things living with us in the Towns.”
“...your Friend is rather strange, is he not?”
“Yeah, he is really strange, but it is his passion. What do I have to say about his things he wants to study?”
My plan is to capture as many Insects here as I can find. With them I should be able to breed them hopefully. With them as materials I can start small with Monster creation.
The Kids were extremely motivated, when they heard, they would get one copper for each uninjured small animal they brought. And I was overwhelmed with what they brought. Who would have thought there were even some shivering kittens and a mangy puppy with them. Those will come in handy. Even two Birds were brought, sadly different species and I have the notion those were stolen from someones cage.
My many jars were not enough for all of them, so I had to chose the most valuable ones. Spiders, Roaches, kittens, puppy, Birds, mice, rats and even some earthworms of different kinds. All got put into my backpack and stored. This will be a great way to experiment on so many things.
Going back the Farmers did their job and got all the necessities ordered earlier with the slip including the Potions. While feeding the different animals I now possess we go to sleep early as we want to rise before sunrise.
…
The travel back was uneventful but slow, as we were all overburdened. Although the Farmers were enthusiastic, as nearly all Items were bought for them and will be shared between them, their Mana powered strength was not enough.
We rest right now for a bit and start our tour right after a small lunch. With filled stomachs they were back on track and we reached our destiny even before the sun has vanished behind the horizon.
“Welcome back Lord.”
“Welcome back! I missed you.”
Snow has started to use ‘I’ in her sentences. She seems to start getting smarter by the day. It is great to see her grow up so fast.
“I missed you too. Sorry for not playing with you, but I was busy with some overenthusiastic children on the other side.”
Scratching her head makes her relax and I start ordering the unpacking of the new tools. We have now lamps and lamp oil. The oil itself should be able to be made with animal fat, right? I should take some of it apart, maybe I can give a steady stream of oil for use.