Chapter 349: Act 115 – The Alchemist’s Treasury (1)
Traveling always seems to begin between expectation and unease, finding yourself immersed in it when you are completely unprepared.
The Tribe of Towers has a saying, “The hardships of travel can erase all ambition.” This group, fond of wandering and rich in merchants and adventurers, has deep insights about traveling.
In the blink of an eye, Brendel and his team had spent a week in the Black Forest—
Although Kuran had suggested to Brendel to camp on the outskirts of the forest and depart the next day, Brendel believed they had no time to waste. Moreover, he had more experience with the Black Forest than Kuran and felt it was unnecessary to waste time.
Deep in the Black Forest, it seemed like layers of emerald clouds, densely shrouded above with support from black tree trunks nearby.
Light leaked through the gaps between the clouds, tinting the surroundings a fresh green, while the backlit areas were nearly pitch black. In the darkness, beams of light illuminated the air, with dust rising and falling beneath the light beams; the spots of light fell on the knotted tree roots—
Beneath the roots, a green pond in the forest was as calm as a still well, disturbed only occasionally by a water spider gliding over it, causing ripples.
Light and dark intertwined, sketching a tranquil yet bizarre scene, but time was already nearing evening. Brendel held a notebook, where various records written with luminescent ink detailed items such as:
Black Mage, Moonflower, Four-Leaf Clover, Witch’s Suffering…
The term “Black Mage” symbolizes mystery in the secret language of witches, used to extract a meditative state. With Level 3 Alchemy, one could acquire Calm Breath, the main ingredient for meditative incense.
Meditative incense is a rare commodity in the Amber Sword, allowing practitioners of mysterious professions to achieve double the result with half the effort, making it easier to comprehend the mysterious existence within the misty, tranquil chambers.
This is particularly evident in the summoning arts.
In gameplay terms, it’s represented as a 5% increase in experience gain speed.
With Level 7 Alchemy, one could extract a Level 2 material—one of the lowest levels in the Amber Sword—called Mysterious Essence. This item could be consumed directly to provide a slight increase in bloodline, but it could only take effect once.
Moonflower is a mage flower that nurtures magical power, which can be consumed directly to restore about 1 point of mana. However, after extraction from Level 5 Alchemy, one can obtain Pure Essence of Magic Water—along with a bottle, it becomes a Beginner’s Mana Potion.
The Four-Leaf Clover represents luck, rare in the wild, but not uncommon in the Black Forest. This plant can be used in almost all potion-making to increase the success rate.
But Brendel knew a unique technique that allowed him to extract Luck Essence using Level 8 Alchemy. This essence could be used in all forms of alchemy, including forging and array production.
The Witch’s Suffering is likely a material for some poison, the Suffering Poison. This pungent poison is considered low-tier and worthless in the eyes of nobles skilled in conspiracies.
However, that is not its true use; cultists use this substance as a dual element of “suffering and poison” to summon beings from the lower realms.
The Lord of Pain among the Demon of the Inferno or the Malicious Queen.
Witch’s Suffering is a strictly prohibited item carried according to the regulations of the Temple of Fire, but these rules cannot stop those who truly understand the value of this plant—Black Fire Cultists, Goat-Faced Cultists, who are more than willing to acquire it at a high price or through murder.
Of course, Brendel was not particularly afraid of this, so he tucked it away.
These items were the results of over forty young people under his command over the past week. In fact, during the first three days after entering the Black Forest, the youngsters had gained nothing and complained incessantly. But Brendel naturally did not bring them out for a picnic—if anyone slacked off or worked passively, mercenaries would use whips to mercilessly push them forward.
Every morning at dawn, the young people were awakened by the mercenaries—some turned and tossed in the cold, damp forest, unable to sleep, possibly just having entered dreams. However, the training schedule did not care about such matters; even dragging tired bodies, they had to complete their “homework” every day.
The content of the training was actually not complex; aside from the necessary traveling, there were group confrontations, along with some swordsmanship and combat skills.
Then, every evening before camping, they would gather materials for Tam—of course, under the guise of cooperation, survival training was also an important part.
After a week, the number of materials recorded in Brendel’s notebook had significantly increased, and their rarity had begun to rise, indicating they were leaving the borders of the Black Forest and entering the wild outskirts.
After recording the gains of the second squad, Brendel marked the end of the entry with a dot made by his quill on the parchment. Sixty young people were divided into six groups, each assigned a leader. The leader of the second group was a young man named Mars, from Vurn’s mercenary group, known for his solid strength and strong organizational skills.
He could be a bit too rigid, however.
But being rigid is not necessarily a bad thing. Brendel thought of Kargaris nearby, who was leaning against a tree, polishing his longsword—this sword resembled the command sword from the th377 before the November War, with a wave-shaped hilt, and the entire sword leaned toward a lightweight style—Brendel liked this style very much, so he equipped all the young people with swords of this design.
The sword was made by Master Berun, so there was no worry about quality.
Brendel’s design had certainly succeeded, as the youngsters—whether or not they had ever wielded a sword before—were enamored with it.
This greatly surprised the young men. However, he quickly seized the opportunity to elevate the sword to a symbol of honor—telling the youths that this sword was a symbol of the White Lion Guard, and as long as he remained part of the White Lion Guard, he would be accompanied by this symbol of honor for life and by the beliefs that this sword represented.
The young men had privately asked Brendel what belief this sword symbolized. Brendel pondered for a moment and replied:
“Bravery, exploration, and resilience, symbolizing a righteous sword.”
This statement gained widespread recognition among the youth who admired chivalry and romance.
Brendel reflected on this, returning to the memory. He turned a page, and with a gentle movement of his quill, he wrote in the top right corner of the next page:
“Sixteenth day of the month of the Sleeping Moon, clear—
The Black Forest has begun to grow denser; sometimes we pass through places with not a hint of light even in daylight. The tree canopy is filled with huge spider webs and cocoons the size of fists, with moths and millipedes densely clinging to the tree trunks in the darkness.
Strange thorns have started to appear in the forest, such as the Witch’s Suffering.
This indicates the team is gradually leaving the border regions of the forest; for the first time during the day, we observed traces of magical beasts, which from their size and the signs left behind, seem to be black wolves.”
At this point, the young man’s writing paused, the quill delicately lifted off the paper; magical beasts are a reflection of twisted magic in the material world, divided into several major categories, which include feral animals, corroded entities, arcane creatures, shadow beasts, abominations, divine beings, or nightmares.
The black wolf is a type of shadow beast, which is quite low-tier among magical beasts; however, even this low-tier creature can reach a biological level as high as twenty-five.
The black wolf has a pitch-black body, blood-red pupils, and white, knife-like fangs. In battle, physical damage is difficult to inflict effective harm—because the wounds of shadow creatures heal rapidly—but its fangs can easily pierce through any armor with a level below 2.
In other words, no armor below plate armor can withstand a single strike from this magical beast, even plate armor can only rely on the highest defensive parts of the chest and back to manage a barely effective defense.
However, Brendel did not announce this news, and the guardians mutually maintained a consistent silence.
They wanted to see how the young men would react after a week of training, especially combat training, when faced with a sudden attack.
As for the danger, it could be regarded as negligible; in front of any being from the Golden Realm, these black wolves are not much different from the most gentle of lapdogs.
“This is the seventh day of entering the forest, Brendel—”
He continued to write this passage and then glanced around—there was no peaceful scene in the forest; in the distance, the young people were divided into six groups and fighting against twelve stone leopards produced by the Earth Sword, six obsidian leopards lay nearby, lazily watching the proceedings. They covered their noses with their paws or squinted lazily—apparently uninterested in the battle of their kind.
They seemed puzzled about why these humans could be so engrossed in fighting when their fellows were clearly not trying their hardest; they looked around, thinking that if they were in the arena, they would surely bite a person’s neck.
Of course, the young people were clearly unaware that these seemingly gentle big cats were interested in their necks; otherwise, they might have felt a chill down their spines. However, what made them feel most uncomfortable at the moment were Xi, Kuran, and Julian standing aside.
The captain of the city guard was the commander of this mercenary team, and one could say that the mercenaries’ task was the most demanding; besides supervision, they sometimes had to act as protectors as well.
At least at the beginning of their entrance into the forest, the mercenaries had seen many times how these young people tried to sleep on the damp ground. They were responsible for patrolling at night, kicking those sleeping on the ground with their boots, then uncovering their blankets to show them the centipedes and venomous snakes curled up beneath, as thick as arms.
One must say that this tactic was very effective; many people were scared out of their minds and began to obey these mercenaries from that point on.
However, now Julian had another job: scoring the young people’s performances in combat. The group with the lowest score would be sent to complete a three-mile return cross-country run.
Three miles is nothing on the plains, but it could take one’s life in the Black Forest; setting out in the evening might mean returning only by midnight, and as for dinner, one could only hope their companions would leave something behind.
Of course, it was usually a vain hope. (To be continued, for more chapters, please log in to support the author and read legally!)
