Chapter 121: Down To A Science Pt.2
Lake didn't really understand what was happening, but since Nancom had warned him it probably meant this was an important moment, and he needed to help in some way. Lake didn't see a way to slow down the reaction with it already having everything bonded together, so he went for the other move of increasing the pressure to make sure the reaction stayed stable.
Lake wasn't sure how other alchemists would handle this situation, so he kept his eyes on what Nancom was doing to see how someone would usually keep this kind of reaction stable. The only problem was Nancom wasn't really doing anything other than barely stirring the stick around which wasn't doing anything as far as he could tell.
Lake was sure he wouldn't be doing it at all if there wasn't a point though which probably meant he was just staying ready to intervene if he thought the reaction was getting out of control. This probably meant Lake had seen what normal alchemists did to control this kind of reaction the last few times he had watched Nancom make the poison.
All he had done was a few different stirring techniques and thinking back, Lake remembered Nancom cutting through the dirt and straight lines a lot during this part. Lake thought maybe this had broken up the reaction into smaller and smaller pieces as he broke the dirt up, and this somehow slowed it down.
Lake thought this was probably true and he would try splitting the reaction if it seemed like the pressure technique wasn't going to work. He had confidence that he could just keep doing what he was doing though because it seemed to be working. If the reaction was already at its strongest point he would have no problems keeping it steady till whatever it was doing was over.
After a while the reaction started to fade and Nancom said. "That was about five minutes faster than when I have to break it up during the reaction. Ok I'm about to add some more ingredients. These are regular plant ingredients that give the potion some desired effects, so the reaction shouldn't be very strong."
Lake nodded and watched as Nancom just dumped the powder in to let him take care of it. He did so with no problem. "These are the last three ingredients and I'm sure you remember what happens after I add them, so you can't really help anymore go ahead and back up." Lake did as he was told, and watched as Nancom lightly sprinkled the powders over the dirt before placing the glass dome over the top.
After the dome was in place Lake walked back over to the vat, so he could get a good look of the plants once they started to grow. While he was waiting for it to happen he thought back to the things he had noticed during the brewing process, so he could get the questions he was going to ask ready.
The first he wanted to ask was obvious, he wanted to know more about the secondary reaction that had happened between the seed powder and the troll blood. The only other question he could really think of was actually just confirming what he thought the weird poisonous energy that formed between the seed powder and all the other monster parts they had added was.
He was pretty sure it was the life energy of the Nisysis seeds growing strong enough to sprout after absorbing elemental mana. He was guessing the only reason they didn't right away was because they had been ground down before being added. Now that he thought about it he guessed that was why Nancom had done it at all even though he wanted the Nisysis to grow he was making sure they didn't spring up before he was done mixing everything in.
Lake had originally thought it was just because you needed to grind something into a powder if you wanted it to combine with other ingredients well. It was probably both actually, it didn't have to be one or the other in this situation. Seeing the plants start to sprout, Lake stopped thinking, and just enjoyed the show.
He had already seen it a few times but there was something magical about the way the plants grew. Once the buds started to emerge Lake got to counting. Once he was done he found all the plants had the exact number of buds they did last time which made sense with Nancom not changing anything.
Lake had really only counted to see if it was actually up to how much of curtain ingredients they added or if there was a bit of chance related to them dealing with living things. Lake had wondered if the plants could end up underleveled even though they had given them the exact same amount of food, but it seemed Nisysis used every bit of energy they had given it.
It was good there wasn't any chance involved because if one of the runs he help with ended up worse for whatever reason, especially if this one had, he might have been blamed by Nancom and kicked out of the Master Lab to grind more powder. When the Acid started to fly towards them he thought he might be able to get a question in without Nancom just giving him a basic answer.
"Do those two plant powders you added right before the last three monster ingredients bond with the Nisysis plants after they dissolve themselves?" This was the only thing that made sense to him because they had only reacted together when he had been controlling them during their reaction and to make a stable effect you needed three things bonded in some way.
Everything else they had added had bonded with the seed powder so everything other than the to plant powders were bonded like that, so the two plant powders had stuck out in his mind and now that he saw the Nisysis plants growing he thought they could now have what it took at level forty to bond everything together.
"That's right, but the original recipe has a lot more plant ingredients, and the Nisysis plants grow to a higher level so there isn't much to that step at the moment." Lake nodded and then asked one of his prepared questions. "Is the poisonous energy that forms between the Monster parts and the Seed powder the Plants Life energy?"
"That's not quite right, it isn't forming, just changing slightly and growing in power as it absorbs the elemental mana from the other ingredients." Lake nodded and asked a follow up. "Why is it different with the troll blood?" The troll blood was also a monster part he was sure had elemental mana in it, so why didn't an earth flower show up?
"Nisysis reacts differently with the earth element. I'm sure you have observed how the troll blood starts to turn from a dirt color to a green color. Well that's the Nisysis making the environment more suitable for it by making the earth poisonous just how it likes it." Lake couldn't help but wonder why it took Nancom so much time to make the Nine elements acid when it seemed the Nisysis did everything on its own.
It was almost like the plant was the alchemist not Nancom but he needed to keep in mind this was an incomplete version they were making now and the original was probably much more complicated. This question had also answered his question about the secondary reaction so he stopped talking because the amount of acid being sent towards the glass was starting to die down meaning the plants had started to melt themselves.
A little over a minute later Nancom lifted the glass dome off and said. "We saved 15 minutes total. Let's do it again." Lake was a little caught off guard with how fast Nancom wanted to go again and asked. "Is there a goal, or are you just going to do it as many times as possible before we're attacked?"
"I've been doing ten a day, and I'll stop when I'm told to." Lake wanted to know how many of the ten they had done so far, but decided knowing wouldn't change anything, so it wasn't worth potentially annoying Nancom by asking. It would give Nancom the impression he didn't want to work hard for the guild.
It wasn't a good look if he wanted to stay in the Master Lab for an extended amount of time, so he just got to work to seem diligent. "Would you be alright with me making the Catalyst in the big vat? I won't fail and it will save us a bit of time." Nancom nodded so Lake did just that.
With him knowing exactly what he needed to do he just put himself into autopilot. It wouldn't be long, especially if he was able to make the process even faster this time around.
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