Chapter 24 (part 1/2) - Antidote and Venom

  An hour later, the husks returned. They found enough vaporizers to potentially earn 200 silver towers, assuming the market could absorb that kind of volume in such a short time. It wasn’t just about production, it was about pressure on supply. If they flooded it too quickly, margins would fall or they would draw unwanted attention.

  Vincent suggested lowering their commission as much as possible before that happened. They did not know what the morning would bring, and immediate liquidity could be worth more than a percentage gain. He had to prepare. He handed over the vaporizers and dismissed them without much fuzz.

  The room fell silent again.

  The bathroom, now an improvised workshop, was barely ventilated. The mirror had been covered with cloth to avoid distracting reflections, and the sinks served as auxiliary tables cluttered with vials, files, and metal fragments. The burner, resting on one of the sealed toilets, emitted a steady hum. The air was thick with vapor, incense, and old moisture trapped in the tiles, making Vincent long to leave the Tower even more.

  Among the materials he had gathered to counter Takkio’s attack, he had managed to obtain a couple of books on poisons. They were forbidden texts for the common public of the Tower. Such knowledge was not displayed alongside restoration manuals. It was fragmented, hidden, scattered across incomplete copies and partial translations. That very fragmentation had allowed him to reconstruct one by combining languages and sections, like assembling a mechanism from discarded parts.

  He had two clear tasks. The first was to formulate a poison subtle enough to infiltrate the body without triggering immediate alarms, yet potent enough to weaken an experienced adventurer. The second was to design an antidote capable of reversing it quickly and precisely.

  Building upon the anti-mage potion he had already developed for the gun, he mixed small droplets of the blocking agent into pellets of common meridian-softening herbs. The resulting incense began to burn in the burner, releasing a thin column of smoke barely distinguishable from the original purple.

  “Let’s see. I’ll leave the burner on while I work. If my meridians show friction or slight desynchronization, then it worked.”

  The bathroom was not the ideal place to experiment with volatile toxins. Air circulation was poor. After a few minutes, he felt a faint pressure behind his eyes and a subtle resistance when circulating energy through his more superficial meridians. It wasn’t pain. It was interference.

  He smiled slightly.

  For now, it was reasonably safe to use himself as a test subject. He had no intention of employing lethal toxins. Partially disrupting an opponent’s capabilities would be enough. He would continue working as usual. If his performance dropped by even a measurable percentage, the poison was viable.

  His next task was to begin prototyping the potion inhaler.

  The device would be the convergence of three previous developments. From the vaporizer, it would inherit measured dosing. From the anti-mage gun, the speed of administration. And from his bottle-shaped torpedo, the idea of exciting a gem-linked gas from inside the container.

  The key was to modularize the complexity. If the reaction occurred inside the interchangeable bottle, the body of the inhaler would only need to regulate flow and cool the vapor before it reached the user’s mouth.

  Molding custom bottles was beyond his current budget. Glass remained on his pending list. For now, he heated pre-purchased bottles and worked on the neck, widening it just enough to insert a small catalytic marble. Then he reshaped it back to the proper diameter. The glass cracked faintly as it cooled, but it held.

  The next step would be to fill them with potion and seal them with wax. That would come later.

  Using one of those bottles as a base, he placed a lump of ceramic clay over its cap. The bathroom’s humidity made shaping easier. With precise movements, he molded the inhaler’s body and a mouthpiece fitted to his lips. In the casing, he left a measured depression for an activation gem.

  He put on the gauntlet and channeled energy. Magical heat dried the piece from the inside outward. A thin trail of steam rose as moisture left the ceramic. Within seconds it hardened, ready for further work.

  “This is far too convenient. Good thing I don’t have to climb several floors just to shape something this simple.”

  He lifted a sphere of argented steel over his palm. With his left hand he held the casing; with his right, aided by the gauntlet’s fine control, he began carving the internal cooling chamber. The improvised lathe spun with millimetric precision. He then drilled the channel toward the mouthpiece and the housings for the gems.

  The structure was ready, but it still needed a piece to pierce the bottle upon assembly.

  “Hmm… if I use only ceramic, it’ll break. I need metal.”

  Brass was sufficient for a prototype. More malleable than iron, less demanding than steel. He heated the material and shaped it with telekinesis, concentrating energy on the section that would become the needle. The process was taxing, unviable at scale, but acceptable for an experimental unit. He adjusted the piece several times until it pierced the bottle’s neck with a clean fit.

  He added a leather strap to secure the grip, and when he connected both parts, the bottle emitted a dry, satisfying “Thump.”

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  “I suppose this isn’t the moment to skimp on gems. The largest will cool and stabilize the gas. Another will bind it to the bottle. And a smaller one will handle activation and energy storage.”

  He inserted the gems into their sockets. Unlike his previous designs, communication between the binding pearl and the ignition gem had to be instantaneous. It could not depend on conscious deliberation. He carefully engraved the runes inside, defining temperature thresholds, flow regulation, and activation parameters. Then he distributed the flux with telekinesis until the lines glowed faintly.

  The mild dizziness caused by the incense was still present. Circulation through his meridians responded with a fraction of delay. The poison was functional.

  He already wanted to test the inhaler. To do so, he filled the bottle with the meridian restorative potion and sealed it with wax.

  “It would be a shame to inhale it without even needing it…”

  So he decided to create the need.

  He approached the artery and, like before, began with minimal contact. First the fingertips, then the full palm. Energy entered his body like a compressed current. He let it circulate through his meridians until the friction became sharp, as if tiny cracks were trying to split open inside him.

  Maintain the pressure. Control the output.

  “Thirty… thirty-one… thirty-two…”

  He counted up to a full minute.

  It wasn’t much. But during those seconds he could appropriate enough power to atrophy a low-level opponent… provided there was an artery nearby.

  “If I could siphon power from any artery without belts or so much preparation…” Vincent muttered.

  That was the ultimate goal. But his current gauntlet would not allow it. Not yet.

  The faint numbness caused by the incense reminded him he was operating at the edge of error. Poison and antidote. Control and risk.

  For now, it was enough.

  He would not risk attempting to return his energy to an artery again. Without someone watching him, the margin for error was too high. He had no intention of dying a second time. Instead, he began experimenting with conventional magic.

  The bathroom was still heavy with the altered incense smoke. The burner’s flame flickered slightly, distorted by nearly imperceptible air currents. Vincent raised his hand and conjured his own flame, smaller, trying to expand it with a more precise mental command. He held it for a few seconds, compressed it, made it oscillate.

  Then he picked up a small pebble from the floor and tried to propel it like a bullet. Telekinesis responded, but the velocity was mediocre. The stone struck the tiled wall with a dry sound and fell without much impact. He froze a bottle of water. Ice spread from the center outward, cracking the glass with a faint snap.

  Not much.

  The flamethrower was a passable trick. The stone lacked speed. His control was imprecise.

  I’m approaching this the wrong way. I can’t just give an order and expect results. I need to be more specific, more granular. But for that I need more energy. I need to grow.

  The process of meridian cultivation was brutal. Each cycle tore invisible fibers and forced them to reknit. It left him hypersensitive, his nerves stretched like overloaded wires. Under normal conditions he would have handled the pain better, but the poison lingering in the air interfered with his fine control. Circulation grew clumsy in certain points, amplifying the micro-tears.

  A faint tremor ran through his right hand.

  That was enough.

  He concentrated the remaining energy still circulating through his body and transferred it into the gauntlet’s accumulation crystal, the external battery that allowed him to work without draining himself completely. The light within it flared briefly, then stabilized.

  He picked up the inhaler.

  He trusted his design. Still, the image of the bottle-torpedo exploding in his pursuers’ faces resurfaced in his mind with uncomfortable clarity. Shattered glass, blood, pain.

  With extreme care, he inserted the interchangeable vial into the inhaler. With slight pressure and a small lateral twist, the wax seal gave way with a muted snap.

  Hmm… it’s a bit difficult to insert. The next iteration should include a metal fitting in the bottle’s neck. Something that allows reloading without having to look.

  The device did not activate on its own. Good sign.

  A bead of sweat ran down his temple. The pain in his meridians was constant, an internal pressure that refused to fully dissipate. The airborne poison continued interfering with his control, forcing him to spend more energy than usual on simple tasks.

  He moistened his lips.

  If he activated the inhaler now, outside his mouth, he would waste one of its charges. After that he would have to refill the vial, maybe even brew the potion again. He was considering something reckless.

  How much confidence do I really have in myself?

  In the past, his ego had been disproportionate. He had believed himself infallible, but death had taught him limits. He had learned caution, but that did not mean he would retreat.

  This is what I know how to do. Build devices. Build systems. And this system is well designed.

  He pressed the mouthpiece of the inhaler against his lips. He could not hesitate. The vapor would enter instantly, so he would need to manage the pressure by inhaling at the same time. It would likely be somewhat hot, though he hoped the cooling chamber would do its job.

  Okay… here we go…

  He injected energy into the activation gem.

  The liquid began to bubble inside the vial with a sharp sound he felt more than heard through his palm. The bottle heated and vibrated under the growing pressure. Half a second later, the gas filled the cooling chamber and was forced toward his mouth.

  Vincent was already inhaling to balance the pressure, but the discharge was stronger than expected. The vapor inflated his cheeks and flooded his lungs all at once. Intense heat slid down his throat.

  He pulled the inhaler from his mouth before it scorched his windpipe..

  Cough Cough

  The device kept releasing vapor. Even outside his mouth, the pressure was excessive. The leather seal did not hold. The vial shot free, struck the bathroom floor and shattered.

  Cough

  He coughed again, leaning slightly against the sink. The air was now saturated with a mixture of residual poison and restorative potion.

  It wasn’t what he expected. But it worked.

  Despite the irritation in his lungs, he felt the potion entering his system. The damaged meridians began sealing almost immediately. Internal friction diminished. The pressure behind his eyes eased.

  The poison, of course.

  Part of his discomfort had come from the saturated environment. As his lungs cleared, the interference dropped at once. The blocking component of the incense relaxed the meridians until they became clumsy at manipulating energy. The potion had counteracted that effect.

  Was it really affecting me that much? How did I not notice?

  He always measured his energy output. When it declined, he assumed it was due to a lack of personal power. But combined with the borrowed energy from the gauntlet, he had failed to notice that his real baseline had been reduced.

  He had been operating while weakened.

  He looked at the shattered remains of the vial scattered across the damp tiles. The inhaler, still warm, rested in his hand.

  He needed to reduce the discharge per activation or better concentrate the contents. He would also have to physically hold the vial while using it, at least until he redesigned the fastening system… and regulate the temperature as well. Even so, it was a partial success.

  He had solved the antidote delivery problem.

  Now all that remained was to strengthen the venom.