Silvia, Slave and Cook, research notebook.

First entry, Sienday, tweni-five of Dorbuary, 1427 Keln Calendar.

Sir Mikhaïl said I have to write a book to. So I do like him. He teach me how to write, it is hard to do. But Ithink I’m doing wel. This is my research book. I have to write things I do in the lab in it and that is not necesary to put in the lab book. That another book were we right what hapen in the lab, its Damian who write it. Cause Sir Mikhaïl can’t write Kelnian well enough he says. I’m sure he can! But he also says it’s part of our training for becoming Alchemist. Alchemist!! I’m almost one! Sir Mikhaïl says I’ll soon be one I can’t wait! So I’m making my book like Sir Mikah Mikhaïl.

Hypothesis:

The plant is supper important! Akim will be dead soon. Not a lot of him left. I’ll be an Alchemist! Damian is stupid.

Tests:

Keep on working well for Sir Mikhaïl. Tirck Damian to show is stupid But do it smart, don’t want to upset Sir Mikhaïl.

If tests succesfull:

. .. ...

I dunno, it’s to hard to do like Sir Mikhaïl to note stuff. He says it’s the best way, but I found it hard. And I’m still learning to writ!! It’s too ard!

The plant is super important, but its scary. Everytime we cut a bit of Akim I cry after in my bed we give it to the plant ant it grows inside. Sometimes I feel like the muscle twitch when the root grow inside. I make nigtmares…

But Sir Mikhaïl is more and more nice with me. Last time he let me deal with a customer. After I failed with the bitch jeza and he said i was bad. i tried extra hard to be beter and now I can talk to customers. We have customers!

that means we have more money, and that means Sir Mikhaïl can do more stuff in the lab. And that means i have more occc occasion to do good!

The beats we cut from the plant are growing well. soon we will be able to sel them to the kitchen. Damian is working good as a gar Gardener, heh it makes hims useful so maybe i dont want him to go.

I see Lady Sarah every weekend to talk, Sir m Mikhaïl knows but doesnt care. He says it’s alright. She makes alusions to the time she kii kissss kissed me, but i don’t have the courage to go with her! a! Maybe i shouldn’t tal write about that here…

My hand hurt, it’s hard to write when you cut herbs all day to make potion.

---

Three weeks after Greeny’s explanation about the rules changing to Bazil, the plant was still a prisoner in the lab.

It worked every night to improve its Skills. Greeny had told it that the Alchemist was able to see parts of its Status, but only the parts relative to its Racial Class. So Bazil focused mainly on its general Skills. It hadn’t managed to get a new one and only a few levels in those it already had. It showed that the sentient plant didn’t have the leveling bonus of the Outworlder Skill anymore.

But it did manage to gain some levels, particularly in its current favorite Skill. Improve senses had leveled three times, an astounding feat according to Greeny. Bazil was focusing on this Skill because it wanted one of the possible secondary Skills linked to it, the Expand senses Skill.

Improve senses was a Skill that improved its owner’s senses as the name said. It meant that Bazil’s senses were better for it, it could feel with greater clarity the difference between night and day and perceived more detailed vibrations in the ground. But the Expand senses Skill would allow the plant to ‘expand’ the range of its senses. Greeny had explained that for someone able to see light like Humans it would progressively grant them the ability to see more wavelengths. While the Improve senses Skills only allowed to see further and with more clarity, like some good glasses.

Getting this Skill would finally allow Bazil to really take its surrounding. It could kind of detect the presence or absence of light, so it hoped the Skill would give it the ability to acquire a sense of sight. Once it gained levels, of course.

Greeny was coaching Bazil in the best way to unlock the Skill, she had explained to him that it needed to work on all of its senses, or else there was a risk it would have to choose a Skill that only enhanced one sense over all the others. Those kinds of Skills would eventually grow a sense more than otherwise possible, but Bazil really wanted the additional ones.

Something else Bazil and Greeny were working together was for Bazil to learn the local language. People on Hirt did not speak any of the languages Bazil knew, its French or English would not serve the sentient plant to communicate with people around it.

The evil being had decided that it would teach those close to him to speak Earth’s languages as a way to get a secret tongue. It wasn’t stupid and knew the other outworlders would probably speak a bit of English or could at the minimum recognized it. But having a language from Earth as a secret tongue would still be a boon. It may help in localizing its rivals.

But for the moment Bazil was learning Kelnian, the main language talked in the Keln Califa. It was rather hard to learn. Not that the language in itself was difficult, but it could only practice in the sanctity of its mind and that made it harder to improve than normal. Bazil assumed that it would have a strange accent when it would finally be able to talk.

Anyway, three weeks of learning was far from sufficient to speak a new language. But it would probably take years, or at least months before Bazil could articulate intelligible sound, it had time to learn.

---

Mikhaïl was overseeing the progress in the lab with a distracted eye, his assistants were working hard to produce the basic potions he wanted to hand over to the warehouse manager Antoine.

On his side, the Alchemist was working even harder to brew the best healing potion possible considering the circumstances. It was almost a month since he had become the bandits’ Alchemist, and he was still not satisfied with the ingredients he could put his paws on.

It was certainly better than at the start, Antoine had worked wonders to provide the Beorn with seeds for plants that would be useful in the lab. On his side Damian had taken great care of said seeds, as a Gardener he was the most qualified to do so, but they were growing so slowly. Mikhaïl knew their growth rate was accelerated by Damian’s Skills but it was still to slow for his liking. The Beorn was simply too used to the benefits a shop in a normal town provided, such as other shops to buy most of what he needed.

On the other hand, his treasured plant was growing splendidly. It was consuming everything Mikhaïl fed it, be it blood, flesh, bones, potions, or rests of diners. The Herbalist in Mikhaïl was elated to see the plant turn all that it absorbed in vegetable matters or poison.

The cuttings he had operated were also growing well, but not as much as the original plant. Mikhaïl was puzzled to see that those new plants were far more mundane than their parent. They were growing fast, with poison and thorns, and making the strangely shaped reservoir organ, all right. But they lacked a certain quality that the Alchemist could not put his finger on. It puzzled him and he would like to make more research on the subject.

Unfortunately, he lacked the number of plants to try all that he wanted. But that would not last for long. The parts he had planted were almost ready to be harvested and cut to make new ones. Mikhaïl made a note in one of his notebooks to make a deal with the kitchen to sell them the dicktatoes when he had enough, and to ask for a piece of earth to put Damian at work and grow even more. Either two would be good.

But those were idle thoughts and Mikhaïl had work to do, he had a potent healing potion to finish.

The first month of his indentured work was coming to an end and he hoped to impress Karim, the leader of the bandits, with his work. Mikhaïl was supposed to work for three months as a slave himself before getting a shot at freedom and a significant rise of budget, but proving what he could fast and that he was motivated could not hurt. Or so he hoped.

That was one of the reasons he wasn’t conducting as many experiments on his prized plant as he wanted too, the others being the lack of replacement and the need for the plant to grow more.

Mikhaïl was also waiting for the end of the month for another reason. His test subject, the unfortunate Akim, was nearing the end of his utility. The man had no arms or legs at all anymore, so cutting more flesh or bones was starting to be dangerous. He had also drunk or eaten so much of the plant that he would soon develop habituation then resistance to its effects if he had not already. Whatever effect, the plant had, they were too weak for Mikhaïl to measure them, hence his intention to sell some to the kitchen.

The man’s spirit was also completely broken, he was unresponsive and that tended to make observation less precise. How was Mikhaïl suppose to know if Akim was suffering from pain if the man didn’t scream anymore?

Fortunately, the end of the month, and more precisely the beginning of the following month, would provide Mikhaïl with a new test subject. As per his contract with Karim.

Maybe the Alchemist would try to keep the new one in a better state. If he could make it last longer, he could perform more experiments on it. ‘Slow and steady wins the race’ the proverb said.

The Alchemist was also wondering if he would get to choose his next test subject or not. He would like to get another Human male, which would allow him to compare data with the first test subject. If he could gather information about a good quantity of similar test subjects, he could establish what was an effect of the plant and what was not.

But if he had to work with a female or a non-Human the Alchemist would not despair, he would simply start on the comparison of effects depending on criteria such has sex and species. Maybe that would be best for the moment, he lacked material to test at the moment, the plant was still too young to mass test. And there weren’t that many effects to measure anyway.

For a second Mikhaïl doubted the Skill that had lead him to the plant, but when he recalled the plant Status his excitement dispersed all doubts he may have had. The plant would be his greatest discovery and would allow him to leave his mark in the history of Alchemy.

Mind pupped by his future professional recognition, he went back to the potion he was brewing. He had managed better potions in the past, but this one would still be the focused work of a master. It would be the kind of potion that could reattach an arm if applied fast enough, no matter the user.

---

In a particular street of Wadrabak, a peculiar potted plant - completely unrelated to Bazil - had been moved, it wasn’t standing on the same side of the window anymore.

Making sure no one was watching an inconspicuous silhouette reach under the pot and grabbed a bit of parchment before replacing it with a silvery coin.

The Spy left the place quickly but not too much as to not attract unwanted attention.

Once in a safe place it looked at the message and what was written on it. Nothing important, just some information on a raid the Blood Sand Bandits were preparing. If the Spy’s informant had access to that information, it meant it wasn’t an important operation for the bandits’ leader, or else the secret around it would be far more tightly kept.

But the Spy would still make sure to check the information with the rest of their network. It was important to have a good network of informants to gather and check info, one wouldn’t want to make a stupid mistake and succumb to disinformation.

If the caravan marked was real and if the raid really took place, it would mean the Spy’s informant in the bandits’ camp was getting access to more information.

The plan was coming along, and the Keln Califa would be rid off the Blood Sand Bandits before the end of the year.

---

Far away, on a secluded and forgotten place, a being awoke. They were old, older than the current continents, and were happily sleeping in the sanctity of their lair.

They had been contacted by their patron and had a mission to accomplish. Something to deliver. But it was not pressing. The old being patron had even precise to them that the mission would be best accomplished in a few months.

The being was annoyed to have been stirred from slumber, but it was also thankful for the opportunity to do something, eternity was kind of boring. Well, it could not be said than running a simple delivery was particularly entertaining, but at least it was something.

Another thing for what the old being was thankful concerning their patron was the time they had given them to accomplish the mission. The being needed time to regain control of their body, millennia of slumber had made it quite stiff. They would also need to retrieve the object to deliver. And finally, the being would need to familiarize themselves with the new layer of the world, it had changed a lot since they went asleep.

Fortunately, their patron was a nice and considering one. Yes, the being was lucky to work for Gronarityuerocjequa The Purveyor.