Robert was busy for the next few days he had to oversee the production of cannons as well as building a factory for the production of gunpowder. Sophie had plans to sell the cannons in large scale and had already sent the word to big families and Knights who had a private Army.

Finally the day Robert was waiting for has arrived. A messenger has brought him a package which had the lenses that he ordered. He had also ordered a frame which he designed to create a microscope.

He fixed the lenses into the frame, these crystal lenses were not as good as the ones from earth but he had no other choice. Fixing a mirror in the bottom of the microscope, he directed the light into the specimen in a crystal slide.

He had prepared an onion skin for his first observation. after tweaking for a while he was able to get a clear picture of the cells and realized that he had made a mistake. He forgot the fact that he should be dyeing the cells before he could observe it. He was not a Biology major and had no idea what dye was used for this purpose.

He took a specimen of his blood and observed it under the microscope. He saw hundreds of little doughnut-like red cells and random big white cells, these were the expected ones. What surprised him was the presence of some half moon shaped cells.

These were black in color and had the same size of red blood cells. His knowledge in Biology was limited, but he knew the cells in human blood, the doughnut-like red blood cells, the soldier white blood cells, and the platelets that were not visible under this microscope.

He realized that his intuition had more chance of being right now. If these cells are the basis of magic then wouldn’t its number increase as the magic power increase? To draw the right conclusion, he needed more blood samples.

And soon, the maids and guards of the mansion were complaining to manager Naoki about the young man going around and asking for their blood. Some even doubted that he was a vampire.

And soon Robert appeared in front of Naoki,

“Manager Naoki! I was looking for you”, Robert smiled and said.

“...”, Naoki deduced the reason for him coming to him, It must be to apologize for pricking all the maids with a needle. He kept a poker face.

“It’s about-”, Before Robert could continue, Naoki spoke up.

“Blood?”

“Yes! I didn’t think manager Naoki was this wise”, Robert was genuinely surprised that Naoki guessed the reason why Robert went to him.

“Hmm. It’s okay this one time. Don't repeat it!” Naoki was not too happy with what Robert had done, is he crazy? To go around asking for blood from everyone? But he assumed that it must be for something important and thus decided to ignore it this one time.

“Thanks, manager Naoki”, Saying this Robert walked closer to him and drew a silver needle from its bamboo covering.

“He must be so afraid that he is surrendering with his weapon,” Naoki thought.

Naoki stretched his arm to receive the needle, but instead of placing it, Robert poked a hole in the right index finger of Naoki.

Naoki who was not on guard, and definitely not expecting to get pricked by a needle let out a loud cry.

“Aah! You- why did you do that?”, Naoki asked angrily, looking at his bleeding finger.

“You just said it was okay to take your blood, right? And you even showed me your arm to give me blood”, Robert feigned innocence.

Naoki was at a loss whether to laugh or cry. He had assumed that Robert was here to apologize and agreed to what he was about to say and even showed him his hands before hearing it. Who would have thought that he was here to poke me with a needle, I am the manager of this Black Dragon branch!

Understanding the misunderstanding, Robert slipped away rather quickly. But he didn’t forget to get a drop of Naoki’s blood before running away.

This guy! I should be careful around him from now on. And what the hell is he going to do with my blood? He is not going to do some black magic right? Naoki was still not sure of what to think of this man. He had given them a huge business opportunity by giving them the rights to sell the cannons that he had invented. But at the same time, his personality was too eccentric. He spent all his time in the library or laboratory, and at times went around asking for blood.

Robert collected many blood samples and was looking at each labeled crystal slide, he found that his speculation has been true. As the magic power increase, the number of these strange black cells also increased. He also found that these cells had different tints, he had a red tint, a wood mage had a green tint, water magus had a blue tint.

Does this mean that he can transfuse some other blood and get that elements magic power? The curious evil scientist in Robert woke up.

He went to market looking for spirit animals as lab rats. Taking a drop of a maids blood and adding a drop of another maid, he observed the results under the microscope.

And soon, the red blood cells started bursting, and finally, the blood clotted completely.

“as expected.”, Robert saw the reaction under the microscope and said with a sad tone.

Well if it was that easy to do this then what fun is in it, Robert thought.

He now wanted to find if these cells can exist together. But for that, he will need a centrifuge and lots of human blood!

An image of an evil mage draining blood from humans that he has slaughtered appeared in his mind.

“I can’t become someone like that,” he said to himself, shaking his head.

He had to find a way to get more blood. And his mind could be at ease only if the blood was volunteered.

Next morning in the free for all market, a man dressed in a black cloak and red face mask appeared in a corner. He had a board that read:

“Buying your blood, 1 gold for a bowl”

This caused many heads to turn, who is this guy, and why would he need human blood?

“Is he a cannibal?”, someone whispered in his friend’s ear.

“could be an evil wizard looking to do some evil magic,” someone else said.

Although he got the attention of most people, they were too scared to give him any blood. Only a soldier, stumbling out from a gambling shop came and gave him 3 bowls of blood.

Seeing that he was having no luck, Robert decided to stop this act. Even if he got blood, the concentration of the magic blood cells will be too low, it was not affordable.

He decided to use his plan B.

Walking into a large auction house, which had a huge board reading “Spirit Auction Center,” he searched for spirit animal blood. And when he found it, he was surprised at the price. Not because it was too high, but because it was too low.

“1 gold for 1 pot fiery bear blood”

Seeing that price, he asked the man nearby about the low price and got the answer, it was useless, it’s too sour to be used as food or medicines, it had no energy in it.

Robert couldn’t help but smile at his fortune. Although he was not sure if it will be compatible, his ideas were seeming more and more plausible now.

He spent 20 golds on acquiring different types of blood. He hoped that there were no antigens in the magic cells of animals. If he could inject himself with these cells and become a true multi-elemental mage, that would be awesome.

After getting all the blood to his home, he decided to make a centrifuge. He didn’t want anyone to know what he was doing and decided to completely make it himself.

He made a gear mechanism which can revolve three thousand times a minute and prayed for it to work.

After observing the spirit animal’s blood, he was reassured about his assumptions. The same blood cells were responsible for the magical property in every organism. Still, this doesn’t mean he could simply inject that blood into his blood and become powerful. There existed a hurdle namely antigen-antibody reaction. The chance he can inject the blood of these animals to his body was close to nill.

If he wanted to do that he will truly require a baptism in human blood.

What Robert was trying to do now was to separate this blood and mix the magic cells with different blood samples he had, and hopefully one will work.