125 A Savage Failure

I would have to break through in my alchemy here and now or I would die! The Codex was unreachable; I had tried multiple times to call for Sybil since walking in the cave. It seemed the only one I could truly depend on was myself.

I hated the fat turtle to death for his cowardice making me end up in such a condition, but didn't even have the attention to spare him at the moment.

I began preparing my ingredients for a life or death refinement, as I tried to calm my mind.

I pulled out 'Little Mac', the cauldron I had borrowed from the alchemy lab. Little Mac was nothing like my glorious 'The Champ' to use Little Mac I had to carefully supply my own essence and everything. Normally I wouldn't have even brought a cauldron, but I had no idea what kind of place The Savage Land would be. I was prudent enough to err on the side of caution.

Luckily, I stowed away 'Little Mac' before leaving Satyr Castle. Right now Little Mac was the only thing standing between me and certain doom. I had to forge a Baron level healing pill core at all costs. I focused my mind, recalling everything I knew about alchemy.

Right now I needed to create a Dark Violet pill-core, it was much more difficult than any previous refinement I had ever done. With Dark Violet pill cores, there was a higher level of flame control needed to perfect the pill-core. I was running out of time.

With my current essence, I estimated I could craft two to three pill cores before I would pass out from my injuries. This was not enough time at all! But I would fight through it, this young lord's life was on the line.

The ingredients I had on were top quality freshly picked herbs, perfect for this type of crafting.

I lit up my Fire Essence and began forming a pill embryo. Slowly but sturdily making a nice round pill embryo within the cauldron. I added a dab of my Electric Essence to the pill embryo, giving it a hint of life. Now that I formed the pill embryo, it was time to mix the ingredients.

For this crafting, I had decided to base the Dark Violet pill core on the Green Ganja herb I found. Green Ganja was normally used to form cultivation recovery pill cores, but when mixed with the right supplemental herbs it could make an exceptional healing agent. I sighed when I crushed up the Green Ganja for refinement. I had planned to take this back entire herb back to Kyle.

Green Ganja was very similar to fel weed, I'm sure if Kyle had this one on hand he could make an even more potent strain of fel weed. Kyle would love that opportunity. No use crying over spilled milk, I'll look for some more herbs similar to fel weed if I survive this tragedy.

For this transformation, I would use Yellow Carrot Hairs, Purple Pumpa Melon, and Blue Turnip Leaf. The Yellow Carrot Hairs would help in making the concoction much more soothing. While the Purple Pampa Melon would add more healing efficiency to the mix. The Blue Turnip Leaf was the catalyst I chose to stabilize the mix, it didn't clash with any of the herbs so it was the perfect stabilization agent.

I was dealing with 4 ingredients with this crafting, much more than I had ever dealt with before. Any misstep when adding or mixing them would lead to certain failure. The Embryo was currently stable, ready to take on the new herbs. I controlled my flame, bringing in Yellow Carrot Hairs.

The embryo became erratic as I tried to refine the additional ingredient it with my fire essence. I tried to gain back control of the unstable embryo core, but it was all for nothing. Soon the embryo exploded in the cauldron. My first refinement was a complete failure.

The problem lied in the amount of Yellow Carrot Hair I had added in the mix; I added it way too fast to have a stable refinement. I would need to add it much slower if I wanted to keep the mix stable, or I would need to add the balancing agent even sooner in my crafting.

For my second crafting, I will attempt to add Yellow Carrot Hair with the balancing agent and the other supplementary herb at the same time. I slowly measured out an amount I felt comfortable with after preparing a new pill embryo. As I added the ingredients to the cauldron, I looked upon what was happening. Initially, it was much more stable than my previous refinement attempt.

But soon I realized my flame control wasn't good enough to handle the efficiency of three separate ingredients. When separate ingredients were added to a pill embryo at the same time, each of them needs to be kept and a separate temperature while being mixed. It was a fine art of precision control.

Sadly, my precision was a little off, leaving me with another failed product. I cleaned up the mess from my second failure, but wasn't upset. On both of these refinement attempts I had made a mistake, though they were slight errors they lead to the unstableness of the pill core.

Now I only had one more refinement left until I would pass out. I brought out a little bit of extra Green Ganja I had leftover and lit it up to clear my mind. I relaxed, inhaling the Green Ganja as I tried to glean some insights into the Alchemy Dao. With new insights, I could make the greatest last attempt.

The soothing Green Ganja really eased my fears about the whole inch away from death thing. With a clearer mind, I could make much better decisions.

I thought about why I had failed both times as I came to a startling conclusion!