Chapter 54: No Place I'd Lather Be

Chapter 54: No Place I'd Lather Be

Inion kept to her side of the Bargain quite nicely and didnt bother Edwin as he started following the instructions in the Grimoire. It was a nice surprise, that there were no crazy twists that meant hed screwed himself over well, not yet anyway. But that meant he was able to work without distractions, so it was a win.

First, he needed ash from the tree in question. That was easy enough, he had loads of extra wood that werent the right size for his cabin that he could burn. They were smaller, too, which meant they were much easier to carry around.

Inion only took a bit of convincing to use her Skill to process these as well, which meant Edwin didnt have to spend the time needed to peel the bark off. He didnt know if leaving the bark on would interfere with the process, but he didnt know that it wouldnt either, and he had enough variables to account for in this formula without adding an additional one. Maybe hed be able to try it in the future, once he had enough ingredients, though not today.

In any case, Edwins first attempt at getting ashes failed in a really stupid mistake. He hadnt failed to account for holding the ashes- no, hed made sure to build the fire inside the metal bowl he was still dragging around from the dwarves- instead, hed flexed his Firestarting to make the wood burn fast and hot. It worked, even getting a Firestarting level out of it, but had the unfortunate side effect of burning so fast and hot that it didnt leave any ashes.

That had set Inion off laughing for a good ten minutes- what was just so funny about that? and by the time she had recovered, Edwin had his next attempt already well underway. This time, he just let the whole thing slowly burn while he prepared the next ingredient.

Curiously, despite its inclusion in the preservation of flesh variant of the recipe, Edwin, fortunately, did not need drying seagrass. After all, he didnt have any left at this point, what with his use of the stuff back when fighting Niall and his minions. Instead, he needed oil. What kind of oil wasnt specified, but given Edwin only had something which looked and smelled vaguely like olive oil, he didnt have very many options and just had to hope it would work.

Stupid vague instructions, not telling anything useful.

According to the book, once he had the ash, he needed to mix it with water to form a paste, then add oil, stirring until the mixture achieved a frothy texture

Hang on, isnt this just how you make soap?

It used oil instead of tallow and didnt involve concentration of lye, but ashes and oil were the main ingredients used for soap creation. Was that principle involved somehow? Curious, he reassessed the pages outlining the process.

The mixture was combined with some ground dried firevine leaves, which was a kind of ivy whose leaves looked like tongues of fire. Edwin had a decent supply of them, but he had no clue what they might provide to the creation.

They were ever so faintly magical, though. If he focused really hard, he could tell that much. It was also one of the primary constants in all variations of the formula, so whatever it provided, it was clearly important. Maybe it had some kind of fire mana imbued in it, that helped burn off the water, or canceled out the moisture in some way? The Grimoire claimed that it would leech and burn the lifeblood from the tree, in death as it did in life. Hed need to test it out.

The formula then wanted salt to replace the removed hydration, which Edwin supposed he did have, though hed forgotten about it when making food- not that he had enough to really use it on his meals. He could deal with the lessened flavor, it had better uses- Now, he was going to use it to make salted logs. Did it even do anything?

Something Edwin felt even more strongly was probably a vestigial ingredient in the process was fine sand, taken from a riverbed and dried over a fire. It was supposed to be able to flow as smoothly as water from his hand. If it were pure white, that was a bonus but not required, as it would be adequate though left uncleansed of the aquatic essence. Then again, he was dealing with magic, so how could he really know?

By then, Inion had returned with armloads of the rhoreed and his ashes were finished cooking into a bit of a paste. The oil was easy enough to mix in, though given the tiny quantities he was working with, mixing anything in would be relatively easy.

The firevine addition went essentially as it was supposed to, though nothing in the Grimoire made any comments about how the new mixture was supposed to give off heat. His pinch of salt made no discernible impact, though he did his best to scale all proportions correctly. If anything, he might have added a bit too much, though he had his doubts that it would actually have any impact.

Sand may have been in the same category of does this even do anything, but that didnt stop him from still trying to do everything correctly. This was his more or less control batch, after all. No sense in messing it up just because Edwin wanted to be stingy with the ingredients he had plenty of, after all.

The sunstalk blades were broken and ground as appropriate and tossed in. As Edwin continued, he got the distinct impression that doing so seemed to give the sand already in the mixture a bit of a glimmer. Wait, did the sand actually do something to aid the overall formula? That would be a surprise. There were still some hints of magic throughout the formula, though his sense wasnt even close to being precise enough for Edwin to figure out what parts actually had some magic lurking within it.

In comparison, adding sawdust went exactly as Edwin had anticipated. The thick mixture (he added a bit more water to maintain the paste-like consistency described in the book) took in the small amount of sawdust and began to dry out. To counter that, Edwin added the crushed rhoreed, where the juice from the plant stalks hydrated his creation just enough to make it stir-able.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, his first batch did not turn out well in the slightest. While he only made about a cup, maybe two, of the mixture, nothing happened as it was supposed to once he had everything added together. It never reached any sort of partially liquid-like consistency, just drying out and cracking along the inside of the bowl he was using.

Edwin sighed. Ah well, thats why he didnt try to do everything at once. It wasnt a complete waste, at least.

Level Up!

Alchemy Level 5253

Mana Sense Level 3233

He must have been doing something right, even if it wasnt what he wanted.

The second mixture turned out better. He was a bit more generous with adding water this time around, and that resulted in a superior consistency for his final mixture. It was even vaguely syrupy!

Unlike his first attempt, which was an obvious failure, Edwin actually had to test this batch, which meant pulling out a spare log, too small for his log cabin uses but still large enough to work as firewood. Inion wasnt being petty and actually helped him prepare it for application.

After spreading the unusually liquid-like paste down the length of the entire log and setting it up in as direct of sunlight as he could manage, that meant there was nothing to do but wait.