Chapter 37 - Waterproof Alchemy (Patreon)

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"Careful!” Vesiphis grabbed the collar of Agwyn’s dress, foiling the girl’s plan of running off for the nth time that day. The little girl whined, for she rightfully wanted to inspect precisely how magic was used to build the huts. Still, the half-completed structures looked far too rickety to let the clan princess wander around inside.

Honestly, Elrhain was also curious as he threw another chunk of meat to the drooling Alleigh. The husky was as silly as ever, its ears drooping the moment Agwyn jumped off its back for other fun things.

So Elrhain could only cheer it up with some food and furious head pats.

The men and women strummed and hummed all over the mountainside, only sending some fearful glances at the new arrivals. They all seemed to be from the same tribe by their crests, and they were all to be positively terrified of Alleigh, for God knows what.

But that didn’t stop the dhionne from doing what had to be done.

The shouts of men breaking open boulders warred with the cries of the women dragging up log after log to where the new village was gradually taking shape.

Even the lush flora couldn’t keep the dust and soot from rising, as the construction was in full gear. Dhionne didn’t need cranes and bulldozers. Their sturdy physique and mastery of spells were enough for any sort of grunt work.

Stones were stacked inside the holes dug on the ground for the foundation. Then, wooden stumps were inserted where necessary as pillars or beams. Clay and mud served as a simple cement, filling in the gaps between the planks and rocks, which acted as the walls. Some dhionne used dried grass and straws to line their roofs, while others used fresh green leaves, each bigger than Elrhain, to keep their new homes protected from the wind and rain.

Finally, giant vines taken from the colossal trees of the primaeval forests of Earthloch bound together with the ramshackle structures as one last line of defence.

What amazed Elrhain was the myriad of magic even the servants employed to accomplish all this. It wasn’t anything new to the other children, but even spells that could raise rocks and shape mud were highly novel to the two foreign souls.

Though, honestly, one fact about he just learnt about spells disappointed Elrhain till he started sulking. It would seem that once a dhionne starts cultivating, they could not immediately control the elements however they liked. Spells needed strict chants and gestures to cast correctly. Only with cycles of practice could untalented servants manipulate the effects of common spells such as [Raise Rock] or [Shape Mud] to a certain extent.

According to Vesiphis, the kid proud of his vaster cultivation knowledge, only earthen realmers and up could even dream of freely manipulating elements solely by their will and manna alone. And even then, it was a chore to do that without sufficient training. Unless one was a Naeman witch, of course, individuals who could simply sneeze, and it would mysteriously turn an onion into a living, breathing unicorn.

Mundane spells for ordinary mortals depended not on the uniqueness of their cultivation roots or if they chose to properly ignite all their nodes to reach earthen. They could, of course, do that, and it would increase the effectiveness of the spell.

But spells didn’t needall that sophistry.

They had pre-selected steps that a dhionne needed to follow, nodes and channels in certain regions of their totemic souls they had to activate to create extremely specific frames. After which, the process would actualize the effect of the spell for a price of manna.

Almost like pre-packaged scripts written in python 91.0 that anybody could learn to use, regardless of if they even understood the intricacies, or put fire manna in water nodes. The latter case might cause the power of spells such as [Create Water] to be extremely weak.

Of course, mages would fling their middle fingers at whoever claimed spells were for the underdogs. Like all else systematic practitioners did, they had to elevate spells to such heights that apparently even the founders dare not offend the strongest ones.

…which immediately cheered Elrhain up, as he now knew there was an Archmage in South-Eastern Uoris Diosca who could gather light into a spear of destruction. The same spell had once erased an army of Horuxi invaders from the edge of the disc.

‘Isn’t that a friggin’ laser beam?! Ugh, I want one soooo bad!’ The boy bit his lower lips in both envy and anticipation.

Eudav also mentioned practitioners like the evil devil conjurers, rigid druids, and priests of some cryptic deities who preached to do away with spirits, each with their unique brands of spells and augurs Elrhain was dying to get his hands on.

The boy was so busy fantasizing that he almost didn’t hear the raucous shouting coming from the direction the mountain trail led to.

The kids quickly exchanged glances before hurrying towards whatever was happening on the now excited husky.

At the East end of the hamlet, huge metal cauldrons were lined up side by side, boiling with ominous mixtures spewing out nasty chemical scents from the brew within.

Arfon and Eudav squealed, sprinting to the site the moment it came into view, and the two fancily dressed dhionne standing there immediately put a hold on their loud disagreement with sour expressions. They disguised even that as soon as they recognized the tiny interlopers’ identities.

The two boys obviously cared none of the social etiquettes and excitedly bombarded the younger of the arguing duo, a shaman by the looks of his robes, question after question after question. They were not daunted at all by the noble who was now standing to the side awkwardly.

In fact, it was the noble, a spindly man with shaggy green hair and an ape-like snout who stood at attention at the sight of the children. More precisely, when he noticed Agwyn and Elrhain lazing on top of Alleigh.

“Master shaman, what are you doing in those big pots?” Elrhain asked, standing on his tiptoes after getting down from the husky and trying to take a closer look at whatever voodoo or witchcraft was going on.

The shaman first bowed. “Respected P-prince, this one is just an un-mentored apprentice from the Lochuir Shire. I am yet far from being a full-fledged shaman. And to answer your question, it is House Glue.”

““House glue?””

The apprentice nodded. “To help with the constructions of the hamlet. It is mixed with the mud when building a dwelling for the people to make it sturdier, to ward off damage by the storms and rains.”

““Ohhh!””

“How does it work?” Arfon beat Elrhain to the punch.

“That,” the apprentice thought the question over as he stirred the mixture some more. He ladled a bit out for a sniff before pouring it back in. It was evidently not completed yet.

“Do you know of Rubra trees?”

The kids nodded while Eudav held up a hand, shouting, “Yes! Those giant leaves they are using to make the roofs, those are Rubra leaves, right?”

“Correct. How perceptive, my lord. As expected of the main house’s scions. Yes, they are indeed from the same trees. Rubra leaves have a certain magical property that repels water, and its sap can stick two stones firm enough that if enough is applied, it can even thwart the full-powered charge of an adult Kaloxen.”

“But why is that magical? Normal leaves and saps also have those properties.” Elrhain asked, and the apprentice chuckled.

“Certainly they do. But if you use a normal tree leaf to repel water, it will maybe last this monsoon at most before it starts to rupture and rot, then it will have to be changed again for every cycle. But a Rubra leaf, if properly prepared, can last tens of cycles. The inherent magical aspect of the tree makes water shy away from even touching its leaves. Here, watch.”

He took one of the giant leaves stacked beside the cauldron and gently sprayed some water on it from a waterskin.

The kids huddled around eagerly to watch, and Alleigh, who was left behind, dishearteningly sniffed some of the leaves in a pile before sneezing as it jerked its head away.

Elrhain gasped in shock as his superhuman vision caught the water droplets… float above the leaves, and did not touch the surface membrane. It was completely different from the banana or taro leaves back on earth, altogether magical and out of his expectations. This phenomenon was like the…the…

「Leidenfrost Effect?」 Agwyn guessed.

Elrhain nodded.

Above the Rubra leaf, water broke apart into perfect spheres as they gently bounced off. The apprentice started spraying more and more water, even using a [Spray Water] spell, but the leaf was utterly immune.

Then, he poured. And finally, the large volume of water broke through whatever magical shenanigan was going on and hit squarely on the leaf’s surface.

“As you can see, it works better when the water comes down in droplets, such as rainfall. Even a rainstorm can hardly damage it. But even like this,” The apprentice stopped pouring the water and slanted the leaf to one side, the same angle they would be positioned on the hut roofs.

The water slid off like oil, not leaving behind a hint of wetness.

“See? Well, it’s still a rather low-grade material, so it can’t do much against a dedicated magical offence. But for these people, it is more than sufficient.”

“Then the sap?”

“That would be harder to demonstrate as it takes time for it to dry.” The apprentice shaman pointed towards the cauldron. “Here, we mix the leaves’ extract, sap, along with a few other materials such as blood from specific gheists and manna core powder to strengthen the effects. Combine this with the viscous mud that can be found anywhere, and any house smeared with it will stand strong even in a hurricane.”

‘Impressive!’ Elrhain admitted. If what the young man said was true, this was some kind of concoction that turned simple mud into a modern cement-like compound.

“Wait,” He thought of something, “I saw many dhionne bring back mud from the riverbanks and simply using them as is. Are they also using this stuff?”
“That…” The apprentice scratched his head stiffly.

It was then that the nobleman finally spoke up. “As expected, no way would the prince not notice this crucial point!” He exclaimed, then introduced himself. “This one is Onthoakt Slanout, your highness!”

Elrhain waved his hand nonchalantly. It had become a habit by this point, responding to noble greetings with impassive annoyance.

“Continue what you were saying before.”

“Certainly! Your highness, this Rubra house glue simply takes too long to concoct! We expect this batch to finish today, but it’s been boiling like this for a week already.”

Elrhain turned back towards the cauldrons. They looked about a metre high and half that wide. And there were seven of these currently in use.

“Are they not enough?”
“Absolutely not. We need a third of each cauldron for one measly servants’ hut. Even us cultivators have to make do with lesser and smaller dwellings far below our prestige. My people number four hundred strong. How can we afford to wait till all the homes have used the house glue, with the first monsoon of the collapse right around the corner? Even if us cultivators can, the weak servants cannot withstand the storms without a roof above their heads, not to mention the elderly and children!”
“Can’t you simply make more cauldrons? Since metal is limited, then what about using clay or stone?”

It was the apprentice who replied, “No, my lord. These are special alchemical tools lent to us by Palaikt Maegan Earthloch Blethen of the North Lakes, and of course the ever so generous main house.”

Slanout nodded, “My meagre Onthoakt house only had two to begin with, so we can only depend on your kindness. This mixture is, after all, alchemical. It will eat right through normal clay or stone. And more importantly, while Rubra leaves are plenty, the sap, gheist blood, manna cores, and even some of the other supplementary materials and harder to find nowadays.”

Elrhain thought it over for a bit. “There are hundreds of mountains around Lochuir being turned into settlements. Of course, there would be deficits.” He looked towards the two men. “Are there no alternatives?”

Onthoakt Slanout and the apprentice looked at each other awkwardly, “There are, but they are even more valuable.”

“I see… Hey! Annie, what the heck are you doing?!” the boy suddenly yelled, his eyes glaring in the direction of one of the bubbling cauldrons.