The Cure

After I got Loki to update my status I ate bathed and went back to my lab, with the increased growth of the ethereal bloom, it had bloomed after a few days. Now it was time to experiment for a cure.

I brought some chairs that I had laying in storage and placed one of the dead bodies on it, making sure that I was in a fire-proof room. I then cut the body's palm and grafted a small amount of tainted flesh into its body.

I then fed the taint some vis to accelerate its growth, and after a few hours, it was similar to my arm. I repeated this process with the other arm so that I could have 2 samples to test on.

My first try was to graft the ethereal bloom into the tainted arm, to see if that worked. While that was going, I made a mixture of ethereal bloom sap, and silverwood sap, and tried injecting that into the other arm.

As I observed the injected mixture, I watched as the taint slowly receded, but I also saw the flesh wither and turn to dust. While I tinkered with the mixture to try to counteract the decay it caused, I saw that the ethereal bloom had grown a decent way into the flesh.

It also had mixed results, the taint was removed from the area where the roots had grown, but only from that area. Plus I doubt having a plant grow in your arm would be a pleasant experience.

If I had a live subject things would probably move along much faster. With the failed attempts I worked on another project Alcheponics.

Inanimate matter is easy enough to modify, living matter, however, was not the case, so instead of modifying it, I tried to accelerate its growth. By soaking seeds in lux, aqua, and terra essentia I could grow crops in almost an instant.

This process however takes its toll; the plants invariably die shortly after fruiting. With this discovery, the next step was to try a similar process on animals. By providing an egg with ignis and victus essentia, it guarantees the survival of the embryo when the egg is broken.

Better yet, by limiting the process to just the infancy of the bird, I seemed to have solved the rapid aging problem which plagued the crops. Now that I had a solid understanding of how alchemy affected a living being's natural growth, it was to test on some other living things.

With some selective application of this technique, I figured out how to propagate individual living tissue without growing a whole animal. Small portions of meat could be grown to arbitrary sizes without losing their texture or flavor.

After discovering this process I thought of an idea, the injection of the silver-bloom mixture caused decay because it wasn't mixed for that body specifically. The body was not meant to break down raw essentia, so the mixture often caused the decay of the flesh.

By mixing small portions of essentia with my blood, and then alchemically treating it I could in theory fix the decay issue. Of course, it was not that easy, I spent a few days and dozens of different tries to get the ratios correct before I finally did it.

I had made a potion that contained enough sano essentia to kill the taint but not enough to kill my body, it took hours to make a single dose but I had a method to repel the taint. I made a dose using one of the bodies I had and after testing to see if it worked.

It was a success! There were no visible side effects, and the taint was pushed back a decent amount. Now it was just to test it on me, for this test I decided to go to the Twilight Manor just in case something bad happened.

POV change

"Oh hey Ais, do you know where Riviera is?"Stella asked

"Yea, she's currently teaching Lefiya why are you asking?"Ais responded

"I have made a temporary solution for the taint, I don't know how it works on a living body though, so I wanted Riviera to watch just in case I explode or something."Stella explained

"Yea just follow me, can you actually explode though?"Ais asked

"I doubt it."Stella said

Stella followed Ais to a small library where Riviera was teaching Lefiya.

"Stella it's rather rare to see you in the manor what do you need?"Riviera asked

"I made a treatment for the taint but I have no idea the effects on a living body, so I wanted you to supervise me just in case something does happen."Stella explained

"I can do that, we will stop here Lefiya."Riviera stated

Stella watched as Lefiya breathed a sigh of relief before turning to watch her. Stella took out the syringe filled with a crimson liquid and injected it into her arm slowly.

At first, Stella didn't feel anything and she watched as the taint receded from her elbow to the middle of her forearm. Although the pain cut in shortly after, it started as a small lingering pain and grew into a searing pain in her arm.

Stella dropped to the floor clutching her arm, letting out squeaks of pain as she tried to hold the agony in. Riviera quickly got Ais to carry Stella to the medical room where she was laid down. The pain died down shortly after, and Stella steadied her breathing, she was ecstatic about finding a temporary cure for the taint she wasn't going to completely cure herself but now she could use the taint with far less worry.

Plus with her discovery of blood alchemy using essentia, she wondered what other effects she could come up with.

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Word Count: 971

I had a ton of fun writing this chapter! There will very likely be one more chapter before we head back to the dungeon. After all, there is only so much you can do without ender pearls. Suggestions and power stones are always welcomed!