Chapter 81
Chapter 81
Wizards Gathering
“Sadia. Just in case, I’ll say this—if you show too much favoritism toward a student, it could become a serious issue. Giving her that pot might pass under the Spirit of Covenant’s judgment as you said, but if you go any further, it’ll be dangerous. Exercise restraint.”
“I already know that. Don’t underestimate me. Tch… damn it!”
Sadia was caught in an internal conflict.
Idnia’s noble status as part of the aristocratic class, and the fact that she personally carried out intense physical labor.
To Sadia, a revolutionary, Idnia was someone who should be overthrown.
Yet as a laborer, Idnia was the very embodiment of perfect labor itself.
She even felt the urge to erect a statue in her honor as a symbol of the great worker.
Idnia added water and nuruk mold enzymes, gently heating the mixture until the bread completely broke down into a mash.
Then she stood before a nearby rock.
“Alright, then!”
She cast a shield spell on her wand and swung it.
—Crunch!
The rock split cleanly.
Idnia lifted the cut stone and placed it over the pot like a lid.
“That should be enough for now… but to continue properly, I’ll need a lot more equipment. I’ll need proper alchemical supplies.”
Idnia continued collecting leftover bread from students, and with Heukrang’s help, she brought in jars.
“Hey, boss. You asked for jars, right? I brought them.”
“Ah, thank you, Heukrang. They must’ve been expensive?”
“The cost was covered by the bishop’s support funds, but getting them inside was the hard part. The gatekeeper got suspicious and inspected everything thoroughly. He even licked the inside of the jars to check if they were coated with sugar or something.”
“Gibbles did that? …I should sterilize them before using them.”
That night, Idnia carried the jars into the misty forest again.
She filled them with the hydrolyzed bread mash.
“Now I need to select and isolate the strains. Ideally chromatography… but without a proper medium, centrifugation will have to do.”
She poured the mixture into a glass potion bottle, tied it with a string, and spun it rapidly by hand.
A process that normally required machinery—
—but with enough strength, the body could replace most tools.
After spinning at tremendous speed, the mixture separated into layers. Idnia carefully extracted each layer and distributed them into different jars, adding small amounts of mash to each.
Various microorganisms would have entered during fermentation. By separating them, she could determine what each strain metabolized.
Ludwig and Sadia watched again.
Even though Sadia wasn’t on duty tonight, she came out anyway—so great was her interest in Idnia’s “illegal brewing operation.”
“So it’s not moonshine after all.”
“Then what is she doing?”
“She’s selecting yeast.”
“Yeast?”
“Yes. In brewing or fermentation, you isolate and cultivate strains that produce the desired flavor.”
“Then it is moonshine!”
“It could also be soy sauce, fermented food… or fructose.”
“Fructose?”
“Let’s keep watching.”
As Ludwig predicted, Idnia was producing fructose.
By breaking down starch from bread into glucose and converting it, she created a syrup even sweeter than sugar—about 1.6 times sweeter.
Using alchemy, she tested each strain’s productivity, selecting the most efficient one.
But the yield—
—was absurdly low.
Of course it was.
On Earth, fructose is produced from corn or potato starch in massive industrial facilities. Idnia was trying to extract it from baked bread.
The starch content was low, and the process inefficient.
“Hmm… this won’t do. Bread supply isn’t stable anyway. One sack only yields a single bowl of fructose… though, even that would be worth a fortune here.”
For personal use, it was more than enough.
She could share it—or even sell it for a high price.
Sugar in this world was extremely expensive.
But that wasn’t her goal.
“I don’t want small profits from a few students… I want to move all of them.”
“…This isn’t enough. I need farmland for raw materials, and facilities that keep production running even when I’m absent.”
Idnia gathered her hard-earned fructose.
Despite the effort, she had gained something more valuable—direction.
She used all that fructose on the turnips.
Since enrollment, she had been saving bread and converting it into fructose—and now she used it generously.
“With farmland secured, starch will be easy to obtain. Now I just need to gather people.”
She planned to win over students by demonstrating the value of the garden.
“Professor Buremhyde said he’d grant farmland if I formed a Wizard Ball circle…”
At first glance, it seemed like a reward.
But properly used—it had limitless potential.
She could command members to farm.
Expand facilities.
Build storage.
Even dig underground.
And if questioned—
“Professor Buremhyde approved it.”
A perfect justification.
Even if all her stored fructose was spent, it was worth it.
“By the way, Lady Idnia… where did this come from?”
Maria asked.
Other students leaned in, curious.
“I’ll explain.”
Idnia spoke clearly.
“Professor Buremhyde has agreed to provide farmland to students forming a Wizard Ball circle. These turnips were harvested there and sweetened.”
“I see…”
The students murmured.
“Wizard Ball… that’s the mage sport, right?”
“I like watching it…”
“You’re forming a club?”
“Yes.”
But their expressions turned uneasy.
Wizard Ball was popular—but mostly among lower classes professionally.
Talented nobles had better paths—government, academia, corporations.
Why would a duke’s daughter join it?
Then—
Karl raised his hand.
“I, Karl Gustav Oxbach, will join.”
His guards—Eirik, Rivald, Olsongard, and Durbin—followed.
Karl had his own thoughts.
“She lives frugally despite being a noble… yet suddenly presents sugar-coated turnips. There must be meaning behind it.”
“Also… our northern region imports sugar the most.”
“I’m interested.”
“But the advisor is Buremhyde—the Tyrant of Lancaster. Our enemy.”
“Then all the better. To catch a bear, you enter its den.”
Seeing Karl join, Lorenzo quickly raised his hand.
“I’ll join as well.”
“But… we support the Vigen Lions, don’t we?”
His attendants panicked.
“If we do well, we might face them someday…”
Lorenzo almost laughed.
“As if that would happen. They’re a top-tier professional team. We’re just students forming a club.”
Still—
it seemed they were already dreaming big.