Alchemy is an infamously complex craft. Whether it's Arcane Artifacts, potions, chimeras, or magic arrays, all these creations require multiple skills working in concert to produce the best results.
This craft demands more than patience and meticulousness from a wizard, it also requires improvisation and sometimes sudden inspiration.
After purchasing all his tools, Edwyn hung a "Do Not Disturb" sign on his door.
To him, the process of crafting the Pale Mask wasn't overly complicated, but he still treated it with double the usual seriousness.
Since he hadn't bought a pre-cleaned skull, Edwyn had to process the head of the black-striped water python himself.
He soaked the snake head in a special alchemical solution for twelve hours. Once removed, the flesh attached to the skull could be largely cleaned off. Then he repeated the soaking and cleaning process with the same solution until no trace of flesh remained.
While the skull was soaking, Edwyn didn't waste any time.
He crushed a low-grade Wind Runestone into powder and mixed it with carbonized dust made from decade-old magic wood. He added 500 grams of water and let it settle for three hours to extract the clear solution.
This was the bone-softening liquid.
Next came mashing sticky mushrooms into a paste and mixing it with toxic violet ink to create the ink used for alchemical runes.
This step was extremely dangerous.
The toxic violet ink is highly volatile. Its fumes are extremely poisonous. Mixing it with the sticky mushroom paste, even with a slight error in proportions, could generate intense heat.
For the safety of himself and his neighbors, Edwyn had to rent a testing zone just to perform the mixing.
Another extra expense.
With everything prepared, Edwyn soaked the python skull in the bone-softening liquid for an hour.
The skull was the main material for the mask. Softening it made it easier to shape.
Once softened, the python's skull had the texture of modeling clay, and Edwyn easily sculpted it into a pale mask.
Then came the most crucial step.
In most Arcane Artifacts, inscribing the spell is the most difficult part. But the Pale Mask was an exception. Its most challenging step was drawing the magic conduction circuit. Edwyn had to guide black mercury with threads of mana through the inside of the skull to create a mana conduction pathway. A single wrong turn or mana fluctuation would ruin the mask.
But since Edwyn had inherited Joron's techniques, his mana control was near flawless. He completed the process in just ten minutes.
"Whew, now all that's left is inscribing the runes."
Carefully, he opened the ink he had previously prepared and began etching runes on the back of the mask with a feather quill.
As the mana interacted with the alchemical ink inside the quill, the feather would deform, so after each rune was completed, Edwyn had to replace it with a new quill.
The spell inscribed was a First-Cirle Spell: Intimidation, used to mentally shake and scare enemies. It's a form of psychological attack.
An Elementary Apprentice hit by Intimidation could immediately lose focus. A timid one might even soil themselves or faint on the spot.
After inscribing the spell, Edwyn wiped the sweat from his forehead.
So far, he had spent four days crafting this mask. The process went smoothly, and while it wasn't top-tier, it was at least of passable quality.
It should be good enough to pass the exam.
"But why does this thing feel so brittle?" Edwyn touched the mask. It lacked the toughness described in the design diagram, probably because the skull came from an immature python. It felt like it might snap with just a bit of force.
"I'll reinforce it with an enchantment array to enhance the material's strength. Otherwise, one bump and this thing's toast."
...
"You finished it pretty quick," said Chayle, sipping from a flask and looking at Edwyn with some surprise. "This thing took me two weeks back in the day, and I failed once in the middle."
"Maybe I just got lucky and pulled it off on the first try," Edwyn replied, scratching his head with a sheepish smile.
He hadn't cheated, he'd done every step by hand.
"Not bad at all. Not bad at all," Chayle praised. "Miss Agnes was right, you really are a prodigy when it comes to alchemy. From today on, I guess that makes us brothers in craft. If you run into any issues, feel free to ask me. I may be a bit niche, but my foundation is solid."
Edwyn nodded, well aware of the dangers of working in isolation. After a bit more small talk, they heard quick footsteps approaching.
Bang.
Agnes pushed the door open. Unlike her usual look, today she wore a form-fitting black outfit instead of her wizard's robe, showing off her fiery figure in full.
"You finished?" Her phoenix eyes locked onto Edwyn.
"I'm done. Here's the final product."
Edwyn waved the bag containing the mask at her.
Sensing the faint magical energy from the bag, Agnes's face didn't change, but inwardly she sighed in relief.
She had judged him correctly, Edwyn truly was a genius.
"Come. Let's go see the mentor. Chayle, you come too."
They went to the 99th floor of the Central Black Tower. As before, Joron was sitting by a bookshelf, frowning at his notes.
"Another failure. What's missing? Is it the lab's location affecting my luck?"
"Mentor, Edwyn has completed his assignment."
"Hm?" Joron looked at his eldest disciple with a puzzled expression.
"Who's Edwyn?"
Agnes froze for a second, then helplessly pulled Edwyn forward.
"Mentor, the apprentice I brought you last time, remember?"
"Oh, right, right! Yes, you did bring a student over," Joron said, slapping his forehead. He finally recalled Agnes had introduced a student to him.
One that seemed to have potential.
Joron tapped his temple, trying to sift through his cluttered memory.
He had too much to remember. Small fry like Edwyn weren't worth storing in his head.
After a few minutes, he finally remembered the day's events.
Agnes had introduced a student. Thinking the boy had promise, Joron gave him a test.
But he'd been in a foul mood that day due to an experiment failure and… had probably given the wrong design.
He should've given the Concealment Mask blueprint, not the Pale Mask one.
Joron felt a bit embarrassed. The Pale Mask wasn't something an Initiate should be able to make.
Its mana conduction circuits required real-time magical guidance and had to be completed in one go. It demanded precise control of mana. Without that, the only solution was brute force and volume. Usually, only high-level apprentices with refined mana control could finish a Pale Mask.
Even his two exceptionally gifted disciples had only managed to make one after reaching Intermediate Apprentice.
But this student appeared to have actually done it.
"Probably a barely functional reject," Joron thought as he eyed the bag.
Arcane Artifact came in four quality tiers: Perfect, Fine, Functional, and Flawed.
Flawed Artifacts could still cast spells, but at a heavy cost: it consumed more mana and had weaker spell effects. Compared to functional gear, flawed items had much higher consumption with much less power.
Even so, producing a flawed piece of gear was still proof of talent.
Joron walked over to Edwyn and tried to put on a kind face. After all, handing out the wrong exam assignment was pretty embarrassing.
"No need to be nervous. Give me the mask."