Dragon's Nest, Experiments, Advancement, and Enhancement (6)
Legendary-grade potion created by Dragon Alchemist Lee Kiyoung.
When mana is infused into it, two seconds later it releases Dialugia’s power in all directions, creating an explosion accompanied by a shockwave.
The strangely shaped glass bottle in my hand looked even more impressive than I’d expected.
Even its deformed appearance somehow made it seem unusual.
No wonder I was feeling absurdly good.
It was a tool to make up for my ever-lacking firepower, and a means of protecting my own body.
Of course, the two-second delay before the potion activated was a huge penalty.
That drawback meant it was a little lacking for direct fights against people, but even so, there was no denying how pleased I was.
Just having one more option besides magic was already a win.
My personal specs still weren’t enough to reach the Empire’s Eight Seats, but if I kept refining this potion, maybe I’d eventually build firepower strong enough not to lose to a great mage.
When I hugged the luminous little thing to my chest and wiped it off absentmindedly, a voice came from beside me.
It was Dialugia, who had returned to her human form.
“Incredible. I truly… truly didn’t think you could make it.”
She had already shown more than enough surprise when she saw it the first time, but looking at it up close again seemed to make her even more astonished.
I could only let a small smile curl at the corner of my mouth and speak. If she was this shocked, that meant I’d done it right.
That’s the power of alchemy.
“Didn’t I tell you? This is the product of science, magic, and alchemy. Of course, it still has a lot of room for improvement… and in some ways, it’s nothing more than a primitive prototype. But it’ll keep developing from here.”
“I… still don’t understand how this is possible. Of course, the power isn’t exactly immense, but….”
“I thought this was good enough, but… ahem. Anyway, the principle is simple. I simply modeled it after your organ, Dialugia. This glass bottle of mine has a bit of your cells mixed into it. It’s not perfect, but it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to call it a degraded version of that organ. The difference is that I shrank it down to an absurd degree, and instead of mana, what flows through it is purified blood.”
“……”
“Honestly, I’m not entirely sure by what principle that organ can emit mana waves in the first place, but well, that’s not the important part. What matters is that the organ inside you can release mana, and that I was able to copy it.”
“That’s possible?”
“Not for ordinary people. I just happen to have better eyes than most… Anyway, to keep explaining: your blood carries mana. Just as you send mana into your organ, I drop a measured amount of your blood into this glass replica. Guided by the engraved magic circle, the blood creates energy and activates the organ. The waiting time before activation is two seconds….”
“Yes.”
“And then….”
Vwoooooooooom!
Kwaaaaaaaaaaaaang!!
The potion I’d thrown with all my strength flew through the air and shattered, unleashing a massive surge of mana.
I wasn’t sure whether it was because of her mana, but the way it burst out in black looked pretty convincing even to me.
If it had just been a normal explosion, I wouldn’t have thought it was all that cool.
Thinking about how much that single glass bottle cost, it was a little painful to watch it shatter, but since it was a prototype, it didn’t really matter if it blew apart.
“Still amazing, even after seeing it again.”
“I’m amazed myself. Anyway, I think you can sit out the experiments for a while now. We’ve gathered the data we needed, and the rest is all on my side.”
“So the thing we originally set out to make is finished?”
“It’s almost done. I’d even say it’s basically complete, but… with my current abilities, I don’t think I can make anything better than this.”
The serum that would turn Park Deokgu into Captain Lindel was nearly finished.
Making two things at once had been a bit of a challenge, but Jung Hayan, who was currently off playing with Tonto, had been a huge help.
The reason was simple: the success rate went up only when I expanded beyond alchemy alone and brought magic into the equation as well.
Reworking the human body was harder than making Dragon Breath Potion.
I said it was complete, but honestly, I was still wondering whether this was really the right way to finish it.
Still, limits were limits.
At this point, this was as far as I could refine a potion.
Legendary-grade potion made by Dragon Alchemist Lee Kiyoung.
This potion, created using Dialugia’s serum as a catalyst, forcibly and permanently enhances the user’s physical abilities. It can only be used by players with Stamina 70 or higher and Endurance 70 or higher. The success rate is not very high. If it fails, the user dies, so please use with caution.
A green liquid that somehow looked ominous.
Even though I hadn’t heated it at all, it was bubbling away on its own, looking rather dramatic.
The reason it required stats of 70 or higher in Stamina was obvious. Of course there was a risk involved.
Even if I made the serum in the first place, there was no guarantee it would be safe to inject as is. The human body would reject dragon blood, and the minimum requirement to overcome that rejection was exactly what those Stamina 70 and Endurance 70 stats represented.
Of course, the success rate could be improved with the injector’s willpower and various kinds of magic, but even if I was generous, the odds would still stay under 62 percent.
You might ask whether it could be used on people like Kim Hyunsung or Cha Heera, but the answer was no.
For people who had reached that level, something like this serum was meaningless to begin with.
I wasn’t stupid enough to inject Captain Lindel’s serum into Hulk and Thor.
In other words, this was a custom-made item for Park Deokgu.
I’d designed it for him from the start, and refined it to fit his body.
Even so, the success rate was still this low, which only proved that enhancement procedures themselves carried serious risk.
“That does seem… dangerous.”
“You think so too?”
“Yes. Our blood also triggers rejection in other monsters. In the first place, the idea of doing this with another race’s blood is dangerous by nature.”
“Tch….”
“If it fails, his whole body might explode….”
I really didn’t want to imagine Park Deokgu exploding all over the place.
Even when I went to collect his physical data in the middle of all this busy experimentation, he was still swinging his sword around.
What I was trying to do now was, in a sense, no different from making a chimera.
And when you considered that every chimera had to bear some degree of side effect, it was hard to recommend this at all.
Still….
For some reason, I feel like this might work.
I had a strangely persistent confidence.
This wasn’t quite the same as overestimating my own abilities. To put it more precisely, I honestly felt that this experiment had a high chance of succeeding because of some transcendent force.
It doesn’t want Park Deokgu to die.
It was probably just my imagination, but for some reason, that was the feeling I got.
Considering that it had already interfered with the Mind’s Eye, this experiment seemed like it had more than enough room for interference too.
I can keep raising the success rate.
Maybe Park Deokgu’s mind could accept it. In the end, it would be Deokgu who made the decision, not me, but imagining him getting kicked out of Kim Hyunsung’s party if this went badly made me think I should at least bring him here and properly go through the possibilities.
Yeah. Let’s do that.
I’d wanted to reveal it as a surprise, but with the subject absent, it was hard to raise the success rate. He should probably be involved now, too.
“Hayan.”
“Yes? Oppa!”
“Could you bring Deokgu here for me?”
“O-oh… yes!”
Jung Hayan, who had been listening to me, nodded and dashed outside, while Dialugia looked at me with a strange expression.
“Are you really going to do it?”
“I’ll need to refine it as far as I can first. Since it’s a potion tailored to an individual, having him here should raise the success rate a little more.”
“In what way….”
“I think it would be good to check what kind of rejection his blood produces, then make another potion that can counteract the effects of this enhancement serum. If we inject that first, and then the serum afterward, it should raise the odds. We’ll also need to run a detailed inspection.”
“I don’t fully understand what you’re saying, but… I think I get it.”
“Yes, yes. It’s a little unfortunate that we can’t do a clinical trial, but anyway, this time I’m planning to approach it more cautiously.”
“Hmm… is there anything I can do to help?”
“You might be needed. Just infusing your mana could reduce the rejection response.”
I kept talking with Dialugia, who seemed unexpectedly interested in alchemy.
Maybe I should have the new recruits train with her when they come in.
I entertained that pointless thought for a moment.
Park Deokgu was one thing, but Dialugia’s socialization was another task I’d have to sort out on my end.
In the end, I had benefited from this laboratory, but I really didn’t want to go through such a heart-stopping experience again.
If Lee Jihye hadn’t helped me, I’d have gotten a proper taste of just how terrifying loan sharks could be.
The longer I stayed with her, the more I started hearing Jung Hayan’s voice approaching from outside.
She was clearly chatting with Park Deokgu on the way in, because the two of them were making quite a racket.
It was only natural that I found myself idly fiddling with the enhancement serum. I had prepared it as a sort of present, after all.
Well, it’s not much of a surprise anymore, but I should at least show him this.
No one understood the heart of someone without talent better than I did.
I was already curious to see how he’d react when I showed him something he’d be desperate enough to cling to like a piece of straw.
When I turned toward the noise, I saw Park Deokgu and Jung Hayan. Before I could greet them, Park Deokgu waved first and spoke up.
His face was lit up with delight, clearly because he hadn’t seen me in a while.
“Hyung!”
“Deokgu.”
“You doing well? Experiments are all fine and good, but you should show your face around Blue once in a while too. I’m serious, the admins at the guild are going crazy. Seems like there’s a lot more to prepare for the Tutorial Dungeon than we thought.”
“I’ve been busy lately making something.”
“I heard all about it from Hayan noona. She said you made something amazing….”
He was smiling happily.
Seeing the sweat still clinging to him, it looked like he’d just been training until a moment ago.
Listening to him, I worried for a second that Jung Hayan might have already told him about the serum, but I quickly realized the thing he was talking about was Dragon Breath Potion.
I knew that because his voice came right back.
“You didn’t call me here to show me that Dragon Breath Potion thing or whatever, did you? Krrr… I knew hyung would show it to me first! Hayan noona already spread the word all over the guild, didn’t she?”
“Haha. That too, but I made something new.”
“Really?”
My heart was naturally thumping a little harder. With his honest, guileless face as he came running toward me, he didn’t seem to have any idea that I’d prepared a gift for him.
I casually held out the enhancement serum at just the right moment, and his face filled my vision as he stared at it in surprise, demanding to know what it was.
“Take a look.”
“Huh? This?”
He hurriedly checked the potion through his status window, his face full of interest.
He must have been really curious.
Since I was already confident this was halfway to a success, I continued speaking to him.
“There are still a few things that need work, but since it’s made specifically for you, there shouldn’t be much of a problem. For now, I think it’s better if you stay around here with us.”
“Ah….”
“There are still a few issues if we try to use it right away, and we need to work through the possibilities. Oh, and don’t worry about the penalty. If I’m being generous, the odds are over 80 percent. The reason I called you here is all….”
“You called me here because of this?”
“Yeah. You’ve seemed a little worn out lately.”
“……”
“Why?”
The reaction was a little different from what I’d expected.
When I wondered if something about this had upset him, Park Deokgu quietly pushed my hand away.
“I’m not taking it, hyung.”
“What?”
“I said I’m not taking it.”
This pig….
For the first time, the pig in front of me glared at me.