‘Seriously? That many?’ Percy had to practically pick his host’s jaw up from the floor.

  The first four principles weren’t that surprising, as they were pretty widespread. Three were required for core cleansing, while extraction was arguably the simplest alchemic principle in existence. Even if the Vault didn’t have enough ingredients to waste on potions, it would have been strange if their alchemists hadn’t discovered it or at least heard about it from some other faction at some point.

  Percy found the last two far more shocking, however. He had only ever seen the scaling principle mentioned on Atlantis, and he’d been operating under the assumption that it was impossible to use without some version of the Alchemist’s Eye.

  Just as he was about to berate himself for not having looked into the Vault’s principles sooner, he realized that he might be getting ahead of himself.

  “Filter out any principles that you lack sufficient resources for an alchemist to study,” he said, amending his previous query.

  “Evaluating request…”

  “Evaluation complete. Database contains information on the ‘extraction’, ‘pacification’, ‘redirection’, ‘deattunement’ and ‘consolidation’ principles.”

  Percy exhaled in relief upon confirming that he hadn’t needlessly delayed mastering the scaling principle. Evidently, the Vault’s alchemists were only aware of its existence – not capable of using it. Perhaps, Atlantis or their allies were famous across the cosmos, but Percy would have still probably been unable to learn it anywhere else.

  That still left the consolidation principle though. Was it the one that allowed them to control the ratio of beast mana in the meat? Luckily, there was an easy way to find out.

  “What information do you have on the last one?” he asked.

  “Evaluating request…”

  “Evaluation complete. There are 3721 books, 8911 research logs, 17 encyclopaedias and 49553 news reports that mention ‘consolidation principle’. Part of the selection is restricted for your grade. Only 3517 books, 8890 research logs, 16 encyclopaedias and 41567 news reports are available for purchase. Total cost: 40211509 credits. Current balance: 14579.”

  Percy nearly had a heart attack upon hearing the eight-digit price tag, and another at his remaining balance, reminded that he’d spent over half of his hard-earned credits in just a few hours.

  Fortunately, he knew that he wouldn’t have to pay nearly this much to get what he wanted. The cost was only this high due to the vast majority of the books actually being available to him despite his low grade for a change, meaning that the topic wasn’t nearly as restricted as other things that he had tried to buy in the past.

  However, he guessed that most of the information was either repeated or otherwise redundant. It shouldn’t take a whole damn library to register a single principle. Hopefully, one well-written book would suffice. Five hundred credits at most…

  “I am a veteran alchemist, looking to study the consolidation principle and nothing else. Can you find me the cheapest book on the topic, or compile me an even cheaper document to that end?”

  “Evaluating request…”

  “Evaluation complete. Book titled ‘Consolidation Principle for Experienced Alchemists’ is recommended based on your search criteria. Summarizing the required information costs more than the selected item. Total cost: 2500 credits. Current balance: 14579.”

  Percy frowned. If summarizing the book was more expensive than the actual thing, it probably meant that it was compact enough already – getting the system to cut out the fluff just wasn’t worth it. That said, wasn’t twenty-five hundred credits still too much for a single book?

  Books on runes didn’t cost more than twenty or thirty credits, and even some rather intricate enchantments hadn’t cost more than a couple hundred. Hell, Percy and Gabe had only spent about this much on the Moirais’ books, but they’d purchased several of them at the time – not just one.

  Alas, overpriced or not, he couldn’t ignore a brand-new alchemic principle. Even if it ended up being mostly useless, it would still indirectly boost his brewing yield, strengthen his mutation and provide him with inspiration in the future.

  “Fine. Print it for me,” he spat with a heavy heart.

  “Evaluating request…”

  At least, its ridiculous price made him feel a little better over having not looked into the Vault’s principles properly in the past. Even if he’d learned about its existence years ago, he would have most certainly lacked the funds to buy it.

  Apparently, the system wasn’t done making his life difficult, however…

  “Evaluation complete. User does not have permission to purchase material on alchemy. Do you wish to spend one Yellow bonus reward to obtain permission?”

  “What sort of scam is this?!” he yelled, garnering odd looks from the passersby. Ignoring them, Percy continued. “You’re telling me that I have to pay a bonus reward just for the right to spend thousands of credits on a single book?”

  “Evaluating request…”

  “Evaluation complete. Alchemy falls under ‘non-essential magical subjects’. Its practical uses are extremely limited for the residents of the Vault of Magic, so studying anything on the topic is not recommended. Users are allowed to indulge in their curiosity if they insist, but such actions are severely penalized by the pricing algorithm.”

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  Percy wanted to strangle the asshole behind this, fully aware that it was probably a certain all-powerful titan that he wouldn’t be able to put a scratch on for a few millennia at least. At the same time, he couldn’t help but think back to other random books that he’d purchased in the past, wondering why he hadn’t been overcharged like this.

  ‘Shouldn’t it have done this for the Moirai information, or the stuff on demonic infestations?’

  Thinking about it some more, it didn’t take him long to spot the difference. The Moirai books had contained a lot of information on affinity fusion and fission – topics that were useful to anyone with a composite affinity – not just those with two cores.

  Meanwhile, Percy had never actually tried to go through with the purchase on demonic infestations. Metatron had interrupted him before he’d gotten the chance to. Presumably, the system would have tried to extort a bonus reward had the titan not saved him.

  “Fine. Just do it, you greedy bastards. So much for my bonus rewards…”

  “Choice confirmed. Deducting credits. New balance: 12079. Delivery in 12 rits.”

  Between the spatial seals, the spectral capacity test and this, Percy had already used up all of his Yellow rewards. From a cursory browse earlier, he hadn’t found anything worth spending his Red or Orange rewards on either.

  The best that somebody in the lower grades could hope to get would be a Refined spell for their affinity. For a Red or Orange, that could indeed be rather useful, making a real difference in the combat challenges. However, Percy hadn’t seen anything that would benefit him too much.

  The good news was that bonus rewards could apparently be combined – three Reds for an Orange, three Oranges for a Yellow, and so on. If he failed to find anything useful, he could just keep merging them until he did.

  Leaving aside the sealing enchantments that he needed from the Green reward pool, he wouldn’t be surprised if the Vault had affinity-changing treasures or other goodies at the higher grades.

  ‘Let’s not get ahead of myself. Unless I find a powerful host, getting even a single Green reward won’t be easy – not to mention anything higher. I should ask Gabe if he’s willing to team up again.’

  A hole opened by his host’s feet with a burst of compressed air, snapping him out of his thoughts. Picking up the steaming-hot book, Percy resumed walking toward the residential area, flipping through the pages quickly and skimming through the content. He’d have to spend more time reading it carefully later, but he was curious to see what exactly he’d just spent all this money for.

  ‘Hmmm… so this principle can be used to combine and skip multiple similar alchemic steps…’

  It sounded like a rather niche application. It was useless for elixirs, since every alchemic step required a different type of secondary ingredient and had its own purpose. Combining them was out of the question.

  Trying to come up with another application, he thought back to the various flavours of healing potions that he’d come across in the past. The regular ones that he brewed out of the green mushrooms acted immediately, providing an instantaneous burst of healing. Meanwhile, regeneration potions had their effects delayed by pacification to last for several minutes.

  Finally, rejuvenation potions – like the ones that he had used in the Guild – were pacified multiple times, to further delay their effects, so that they could last overnight. Of course, those also included mind mana, but that was a whole other topic.

  ‘I guess that the consolidation principle would allow an alchemist to combine a couple rounds of pacification, infusing twice as many secondary ingredients during a single step…’ Percy deduced.

  This wasn’t as simple as just tossing double the ingredients in one’s cauldron. Normally, that was a bad idea, as introducing too many secondary ingredients would not only alter the recipe substantially, but also exponentially raise the number of reactions.

  All things considered, it was generally better to just go through two separate rounds of pacification. Even though it took twice as long and resulted in extra losses, trying to skip one would be worse.

  At least, that was the case without the consolidation principle.

  The logic behind whatever the Vault’s alchemists did to sizian meat was probably similar. Percy didn’t know how exactly they removed the excess beast mana from the meals, but the principle likely allowed them to stack as many instances of this mystery step as they wanted, to carefully adjust the ratio of beast mana and nutrients in the final product.

  As for how the principle itself worked?

  Well… Percy wasn’t surprised to learn that it was all thanks to magiscript. Their advanced enchantments allowed them to control the temperature, pressure and rotation in their concoctions with far greater precision than normal.

  It was even possible to have opposing rotations inside the cauldron, heat some parts of the mixture while cooling others, and all sorts of specialized techniques that wouldn’t have been possible with simpler enchantments.

  With so many options at their disposal, it was no wonder that they could learn how to eliminate the additional impurities generated by the consolidated steps.

  ‘Huh… my cauldron is already a bit like that,’ Percy realized.

  He’d even used a few of the tricks mentioned in the book while trying to figure out the compression principle, though there were many that he hadn’t even thought to try. For example, it had never occurred to him to fuel some of the heating enchantments with ice mana to cool off parts of the concoction, allowing him to heat other spots even more than usual.

  The good news was that he probably had everything he needed to register the principle within a couple of days after returning home. That still begged the question of whether it would even help him – outside of the slight improvement to his brewing yield that every new principle provided.

  After all, he had no intention of brewing rejuvenation potions anytime soon. Enlightenment potions weren’t out of the question now that he had the whole Guild at his disposal, but rejuvenation potions were meant to help people sleep better, which his Insomnia trait had rendered obsolete.

  ‘Consolidating repeated alchemic steps…’ He creased his brow as a new idea took root.

  In a way, wasn’t the scaling principle that on steroids? It wasn’t exactly the same, because the ratio of ingredients was identical to a regular brew, but Percy was using forty times the ingredients at once, essentially stacking just as many brewing sessions together.

  The excessive number of reactions involved was precisely the source of the additional losses that he incurred. His spherical and transparent cauldron, coupled with his mutated eyes, allowed him to cut the losses to an acceptable level, but mass-producing elixirs or potions was still inherently inefficient.

  ‘Hmmm… if the two principles can be combined, maybe I can get rid of the losses from scaling entirely or at least minimize them!’ he realized, his heart skipping a beat.

  Even better, this might allow other people to use a weaker version of the scaling principle without his mutation. He didn’t think they’d be able to brew forty times as many elixirs at once, but doubling or tripling their output might not be entirely out of the question.

  If the losses proved acceptable, this might even be the answer that he was looking for, to help the Alchemists’ Guild keep up with the hive’s increased nectar production!

  ‘Alright. I’ll go through the book again later. For now, let’s see if the others are back home,’ he thought as he reached the residential building.

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