Chapter 190 – 190 – What We Can Do
His father said there was something amazing hidden in the basement.
Usually, something that a father tells his son is ‘awesome’ is bound to be content that the mother will fight against. There was no exception in our case.
‘A fully equipped alchemy facility in the newlywed home. It’s the dream space of every wizard on maternity leave.’
‘It’s so cool that it makes my heart flutter just by hearing it. But did we have something like that in our house? When I was young, the basement was a pantry.’
‘···Food storage? ‘You hung ham or sausages in the place where my hobby space was torn down…?’
My father looked truly saddened by the shocking prospect of the future.
Of course, it would have been reasonable for the mother to organize things. There is no one to use the alchemy tools, and my brother and I might end up blowing something up while playing with it.
However, I do remember that flasks and green alchemy fusion potions were kept in a drawer.
She found it useful when Thena came to visit and played wizard with her sister. Among us, the only one apt for magic was her brother.
That was my father’s memento.
There was such a secret in our house. Just listening to the words made me feel excited and excited, as if I had gone on an adventure.
Just by hanging out with my father and doing something, it felt like I was making up for my childhood.
But the fun ended there. This is because the goddess closed her eyes and fell down.
My father, who was smiling at the thought of giving me a detailed introduction to the basement, kicked in the basement door without even having time to do so.
And he shouted at me, who was carrying the goddess.
“Lie down on this table! Quick!”
My father first pulled down the mannequin that was lying on the table. The doll with Mana’s veins on it rolled down with a loud noise.
I immediately put her Goddess down. The goddess, struggling in pain, swallowed her moans with several faces at the same time.
“···How much is left?”
“We don’t have time. We could be ejected at any time on our own time! So hurry. If Wintemyr can’t make the medicine… You will have to retreat from Elan and go to the Magic Tower to synthesize the medicine!”
“It will take quite some time. Will Thena be able to hold out until then?”
The goddess hesitated a little, then shook her head slightly.
Despair comes over me. Things get messy like this? Because of an unexpected incident that occurred in a place where nothing could be done?
“I don’t know how much chance there is, but it seems to be small. But it’s still too early to give up!”
Father waved his wand. Blue torches bloom on every wall of the dark basement, becoming bright.
A full-scale alchemy facility was revealed, resembling a military facility that did not fit the size of the simple house.
There are two differences from Villena’s hideout. One. Everything is as orderly as a knife. Two. It’s ten times bigger.
If the ‘Eternal Fire’ explosive is cast here, it seems possible to reduce the ‘Giant’s Waist Mountain’, which embraces Borvet Village, to a pile of dirt the height of a goblin within 15 days.
Her mother had reason to be worried. My father smiled in satisfaction as my eyes turned round.
“There are still things we can do.”
This is what I would have said if I had maintained my composure. My mind becomes clearer and my hands gain strength.
“···You said we had to synthesize the medicine, right goddess?”
The goddess nods her head. The father further asks:
“Are you saying it is made from the tears of a high priest named Methy?”
As the goddess nodded her head enthusiastically, her father slammed the thick old book down on the lab table. And the professional gambler shouted, flipping through the pages like shuffling cards.
“What on earth are contained in those tears that make you think they can defeat the power of the sun god?”
“Pure love.”
My father paused at the goddess’s squeezed answer. Then she glared at the goddess in disbelief, then shook her head and turned the page again.
“This is amazing. Is it the ‘Hubris Declaration’ or the ‘Eucharist of the Resurrection’ that you want me to make?”
The goddess, having exhausted her strength, twitches the corners of her eyes and speaks with the shape of her mouth. Both.
“Both! They say both!”
My father held out his hand as if that was enough, but then stopped.
“Both? Are you sure you mix them?”
“You’re right!”
“…I don’t know if it’s just one, but both of them are a bit nervous. The two potions have never appeared together in the same era…”
“Is this drug that difficult to synthesize? Is it impossible?”
My father, who had been rummaging through the ingredients box, turned around and grinned at my words.
It is quite conscious.
“No. It’s possible. It’s so cool that I’m nervous. It’ll be the first time ever! Take the flask down from the shelf over there!”
“What flask!”
“The hair branches look like lung bronchi!”
My father went into the material box and came out with a bunch of treasures. Cobalt dye, high-purity gold bars, and even a horn believed to belong to a unicorn.
While I was struggling to turn my head and concentrate on my task, my father continued to express confidence, perhaps to reassure me. With sweat on the back of his neck.
“Actually, this would be the first time in history that a warrior’s entire body was taken over by the Sun God. But I am a Magus-level wizard. If someone creates a miraculous potion that drives the god out of the body and restores the lost soul, that is a Magus. It has to be…What is it?”
“Yes?”
“How do you know how to set it up? Do you know what that pipe was for and put it in?”
“···Thermometer or adapter?”
“Both.”
“You asked me to take out the phlogiston distillation flask, so I assumed you were going to do a fractional distillation process… Did I make a mistake? Should I take it out?”
I asked hesitantly. Holding up the heater that has not yet been connected to the stand. My father said as he was busy preparing the ingredients with his hands.
“Have you tried it?”
“Often. When catching monsters, there are times when you need to make something on site. A scent enhancer for decoy, or something like that.
“···Lufus Alecto? You can make Lupus Alecto? You do alchemy in the field?”
I know how to do it. But like so much of what I know how to do, it’s improvised and improvised.
It’s like a special skill that was desperately prepared to counter the whispers of somewhat reasonable people in the world who said, ‘I don’t understand why that great hero hires a porter.’
However, compared to a true alchemist, that is, a person like my father who has such facilities, what I know how to do is only pranks on a shabby scale.
So I don’t understand why you are surprised again.
“Didn’t I tell you about the medicine that imitated the smell of trolls using cow dung and sulfur?”
“It was a product so precise that it fooled the nose of a troll. Of course, I thought it had been bought somewhere.”
Yes. It is reasonable to think that way. Because he’s a porter.
A faint sense of entitlement is like dust under your fingernails, and even if you clean it off by cutting it off, it quickly piles up again.
“It’s easy as long as you have the raw materials. I made it.”
“Even the synthesis of lupus alecto is highly difficult, and even the formulation has to be changed as needed. You can make such a difficult drug right away? And that is not in a clean and controlled environment, but in the mountains, where even the wind can easily get dust into the fusing agent?”
“···If you don’t believe me, don’t. We have work to do now-“
“Yes, there is work to be done. And it will be a lot easier than you think. I have a much better assistant than the vast majority of undergrad bastards who don’t even know how to make coffee in a fully equipped lab!”
My father patted my back and passed me by. The wizard’s sweaty face showed clear pride in me.
I was momentarily entranced by the unexpected encouragement. Only when I heard my father’s more detailed instructions did I stop idling and start moving.
The reason I became familiar with assembling alchemy equipment was because I played house with my father’s belongings that were left in the basement. This is because my younger brother and Thena liked playing reclusive wizards when they were young.
But the reason I went along with that game was only because I cared about them.
Not because I enjoyed imitating something I couldn’t be.
Even though my younger brother didn’t show any signs of displeasure, he quit the job around the time the academy admissions committee came by our house. It was also around the time when I somehow managed to read an academic book I had found somewhere and pass it along to my younger brother. With the intention of getting his younger brother into the academy and giving him a good life.
At that time, I had to fulfill the duties of mother, father, Tena Party’s porter, and tutor at the same time. My younger brother, who thought that if we studied hard, we could all live in the school dormitory in Magic Tower City, only understood the situation when he heard that there was no academy program for porters anywhere.
We were born different, and our fates cannot be the same.
My younger brother, who no longer forced me to play as a wizard, became less and less talkative. As if I finally understood the crushing weight I had decided to bear.
However, according to my father’s words, my younger brother’s entrance into school may have been planned without my effort. I can’t reveal it publicly because of King Danar’s concern, but my father’s connections at the Academy guaranteed his entry into the Magic Tower.
Anyway, the fates were different. I sent my younger brother off to a better life, and following Thena’s dream, I moved into the narrow and difficult crossroads of life and death.
But on the other hand, I envied my younger brother. I wanted to walk along the shortcut to an extraordinary life. I think that’s why I read academic books on magic and alchemy so intently.
I also wanted to become a wizard like you.
“He is an assistant recognized by the wizard.”
The ingredients, mixed and reacted with much effort, were finally put into the cauldron for completion.
My father sat down and said, “Let’s wait until it starts to boil.” Let me be glad that I didn’t get blown off into the future during an urgent task.
I wanted to fall down with him, but I held on to my knees. And he muttered with vague self-satisfaction.
“He is an assistant recognized by the wizard.”
“Recognition?”
“···You’re not trying to say now that you’ve never done something like that, are you?”
“Do you need my approval? Didn’t the front-line party recognize you, all those girls recognize you, the Dragon’s Nest and the Compassion Valley recognize you, and your goddess recognize you? And yet you’re still thirsty? ?”
“Hmm. So what?”
“Then there’s nothing I can do about it. I’ll admit it. Tan Bantai is quite the hitter.”
His father looked back at me with a mischievous smile. It’s a familiar expression. I’ve never seen it before, but it’s a smile I would probably make.
While listening to my father’s words with my ears, I looked at the humming ventilation hood with my eyes.
It feels as if the core of my heart, which had been condensed without my knowledge, is being sucked into the hood along with the cauldron steam.
“For someone who isn’t a wizard.”
“You’re terrible…”
————
The ‘Hubris Declaration’ uses dense emotional ether extracted from human mucous membranes as its material.
Mortal emotions can have a profound impact on a spirit body that derives its energy from spiritual interaction with the mortals of this world. At high concentrations, it often acts like a hallucinogenic drug.
Taking advantage of this, the drug was used for special exorcisms. It is useful when expelling from the victim’s body a ghost-type monster that clings desperately to the human soul, or an apostle of God who has gone astray and is tainted by a demon.
For example, when Nidroga chased away Lilith, who had possessed him while he was unconscious… A lot of the raw materials of my ‘Hubris Declaration’ were injected into Nidrogar, or something like that.
‘The Eucharist of Resurrection’ mainly uses salt extracted from the bodies of believers from birth.
It is used to heal those whose souls have been damaged for some reason. It also prevents the spirit from leaving the body or this world. It is a recovery potion that acts on the human soul.
However, like the Hubris Declaration, it is difficult to find a record of the Eucharist of Resurrection being properly synthesized even once in a century. This means that it is not something that was created overnight.
Moreover, the two have never been synthesized to form a single drug. There has never been a need for that.
A possessed spirit as large and tyrannical as Mithra has never existed on earth before.
Did we do it right?
For now, let’s hope so. Whether it was because of the materials or the equipment, my father declared that the same production process could not be repeated twice.
The first ultra-difficult synthetic drug in history, completed in just a few hours, was an attractive light pink color.
And occasionally, a light like powdered silver flashed greedily within it. If I didn’t close the cap properly, I feel like I would be possessed and drink it myself.
This is a masterpiece by Wintemeyr and Tannhäuser. It is also our first and last joint work.
My father said everything was according to theory and design, and he was confident in its performance. And I believe in you.
May this be the key to bringing the impossible mission against the sun into the realm of the possible.
‘How to separate Mithra from Thena’ is now in my hands. Even if the goddess says she can’t hold out any longer and goes back like this, the mission is a success.
There was also an additional harvest. You also wrote down a recipe for a drug that can temporarily deal with ‘aptitude loss’.
Danar, you’ll be surprised. If it is true that he later kills his father, this drug will be our rich man’s revenge on his face.
The job is done. So now it’s leisure time. It might be okay to send it a little inefficiently.
So I stood in front of my mother’s door. And I hesitated for a while.
He supported the staggering goddess and held tightly a sealed flask resembling a milk bottle.
“···Are you going to see your mom?”
“Just think about it for a little while. If you startle me because of me, something might go wrong with your child.”
“Then let me ask the question a little differently. Are you going?”
I looked to the side to see what he was talking about.
Oh my god.
“If I had met you as 27 years older than I planned… Maybe I wouldn’t have acted like I did now.”
My father is trying to keep a calm expression, as if he has his own concept of fatherhood.
It seems as if he is trying to imitate an old man who is as hard as a rock. At an age not that far from me, with emotions that are not that far away from me.
However, whatever the 27 years my father had gone through, it did not seem to have strengthened him that much.
So it becomes unreasonable. Because of that, it leaks. Something you don’t want me to see.
“Can’t I go?”
“···Maybe if I leave now.”
I bite my lip gently. As I usually do when looking for something I can do.
Sometimes there is no such thing.
“We won’t be able to see each other again in the future.”
“Damn it, what’s the use of all the Magus? They couldn’t even be there for my babies. If only I could have done something more for you.”
“There is something I can do for you.”
Instead of being discouraged, you should do what you can now.
This is my father’s teaching. It is also a word of will that flows in my blood.
I held the vial tightly and spread my arms wide.
After sniffling and taking a deep breath, my father nodded twice. Then he came over and hugged me and patted my back.
It’s an embrace that I probably won’t be able to embrace again in the future.
“Be sure to save that childhood friend who said you would go through all this hardship to save him. If you are talented, you will definitely be able to do it.”
“I’ll try.”
“Don’t lose, Tan. Whether your opponent is a demon lord, a sun god, or a demon god, break his nose with the item I gave you. Do you understand?”
“Let’s try that too.”
“I just can’t figure out what message fate is sending us through this amazing reunion. Maybe it just wanted to give us a gift.”
He patted his father on the back and nodded. It is only now that I can pretend to listen to your wisdom.
Why didn’t you pass on the aptitude for a wizard to me? Why weren’t you there for me when I was having the hardest time? Was it your best?
And my father did his best for me a little while ago. This new feeling that is filling up in the place where the faded questions and melted sediment left behind is probably regret.
I remember my father’s voice. I remember what my father looked like. The reason the present is precious is because it is the last moment.
So let’s be faithful.
My father pushed my shoulder. He seems to believe that he has succeeded in maintaining the dignified expression of an elder.
It’s actually quite plausible. A smile slowly forms.
“Now I’ll go in first and tell your mother. Don’t be too surprised.”
“I hope this doesn’t change our fate too much. Is that okay, Goddess?”
The goddess has no answer. Instead, only the sound of long exhaled breaths can be heard. I feel somewhat anxious.
My father’s eyes are shaking. As if sensing the possibility, my father grabbed my hand holding the medicine bottle and pulled me toward him. He then grabbed my wrist and the glass bottle tightly and said,
“Never forget. Me and Calais are proud of you-“
It becomes dark before my eyes. The world shakes.
Everything in sight crackles like sparks of a chemical reaction.
The next moment, my father was nowhere to be found.
———-
My father’s grip remains as inertia and his body stumbles forward. He is the last trace he left behind in me.
Even the dissipating kinetic energy was disappointing, and I flinched as I unconsciously tried to grab his arm. The thought of almost dropping the bottle of medicine he was holding made his hair feel sore.
I put the pink flask neatly in my pocket and looked around, everything was shabby. There was mold on the walls, and there were no traces of people in the time-worn hallways.
I closed my eyes tightly for a moment and then opened them. And without even telling my mother that I was going in, I opened the door to the living room.
No one is here. It’s empty, as if someone stole all the furniture.
I know the culprit who left the house empty. His name is Tan Bantai.
When he left home, he put everything, including his bed and wardrobe, on a cart and sold them in the city. If you leave it alone, it will just become a nest for a horde of monsters that have taken over the village.
Perhaps we have arrived in the future after the village community has disbanded.
I slowly walked out the door. The mountain village of Borvais, where everyone had left, was in ruins. There are no signs, and the sheepskin used as a village bulletin board is torn and strewn in the mud.
The only thing that is the same as before is that it is raining. I caught the raindrops with my face and glared at the gloomy sky.
The goddess riding on my back also hears a long moan as if the cold raindrops have hit her. I stepped back into the gate again.
Then he closed his eyes and sighed.
“Are we going back?”
“In a little while, you will see a future that is even later than now. And in a little while, you will be back in Daeelan again. It’s a pity. I wanted to hold on to you a little longer.”
“···If you think about it, goddess. Thena loved the sound of rain very much.”
As my shoes got wet, I took a step further inside.
“But I guess I don’t like the rain very much. It’s so damn wet.”
“There’s a lot I want to say.”
“You’ve already done a lot for me, so I shouldn’t complain, but thoughts aren’t something you can suppress, so I’m sure you’ve already read that.”
“Say it calmly. Like my apostle.”
“There are so many things in life that we naturally desire, but there are always things we can do something about. Don’t you think we were created as completely absurd beings?”
“If your soul were to become part of a god after being repeatedly formed and dismantled in the distant future, you could probably conclude that living as a god is similar. What we can do is limited. Furthermore, you should have been the best among us along with Mithras. I, who was meant to do something, lost most of my authority due to his shameful behavior, and now… I’m forcing an honest and simple porter to dress up as a soldier and force him into a battlefield where he is on the defensive. What a coward. “Isn’t that shabby?”
The goddess takes a deep breath and laughs.
“But just as you will too, I will also confidently answer when life asks me a question. I did my best.”
“It’s for the best.”
“I used that impossible greed as a flame to light up the darkness of the deep universe, and I walked forward to an ideal beyond limits. So don’t be sad.”
I grabbed my bottle cap. It contains Thena’s mother’s tears, which were turned into weapons through alchemy.
The tears from my father’s hand are also on the outside of the bottle. The goddess’s face, which changes at every angle, coincidentally resembles Thena when reflected in the glass bottle.
A universe made up of the sorrow of loved ones. We are thrown into space where we cannot see our loved ones.
Was it best?
“You have already done your best. And in your hands is the best you have made through sacrifice.”
The goddess held my hand.
“Feed him the best.”
————
I opened my eyes.
I can’t feel the cold rain or the smell of the wooden planks of my house, which I already miss.
I can only feel the warm body temperature and the smell of flesh. I woke up on top of my sister’s body and looked down at my lover, panting.
Sister Monica, who was taking a deep breath with her head bent, eventually smiled at me, wiping away her sweaty hair.
“Did you have a good dream?”
Suddenly, my hands scattered across the bed caught something solid. The feeling in my hand is as cool as in my memory.
I have in my hands the best that I have salvaged from the past. I was able to answer with confidence.
“Yes.”
