I decided to head back to the mansion first and eat breakfast. It was a typical English breakfast with hot coffee, which I happily consumed.
"My lady, what are your plans for the day?" Jane asked as she poured the coffee.
"I'm planning to get stuck in my laboratory," I replied. Jane's hand trembled slightly, causing the coffee to overflow.
"O-oh… is that so?" she said nervously.
"Don't worry, Jane, I'll come back before dinner, so pack me some lunch."
"Yes, my lady," she replied, her voice slightly relieved.
Jane had always been concerned about Josephine's tendency to starve herself for days to finish a project. It was so bad that she was often severely malnourished, but her dedication was undeniable.
"Oh, and just to be sure, if anyone looks for me, tell them I'm out shopping, okay?"
"As my lady commands."
-
I picked up my extra-large lunch box and headed towards the laboratory. Today was going to be a very taxing day, as the process described in the book was extremely strenuous, to the point that even an expert might give up. But I graduated as a chemist and Josephine was well-versed in alchemy.
The first hour was spent cleaning the entire lab because it was incredibly dirty. If Walter White saw this, he would definitely faint.
I should have brought Jane to clean with me. Next, I ventilated the room manually, using a makeshift vent and opening the windows to let in fresh air. After that, I carefully prepared the ingredients needed for the Philosopher's Stone.
In the novel, Josephine likes to hoard alchemic ingredients because of her tendency to create things both for practical and impractical things.
One of the more impractical is her schemes which usually ends up in failures.
The more practical is when she innovates and even invents products to sell for her business venture along with her fashion boutique
'Such a waste honestly'
Another one of her more less desired hobby is to collect rare alchemic ingredients like a collector of some sort.
Most of her wealth goes down the drain because of this tendency.
But it was more of her more "healthier" habits.
Anyways…
There were four main components to the stone: Elixir of Life, crystallized wisdom, purity of heart, and universal harmony. All of them were equally fucking difficult to create.
First is the longest time to create, the Elixir of Life.
In a flask, I put a high-quality mana potion as a base and boiled it over a blue flame. Next, I finely chopped a thousand-year ginseng into a pulp and then into a paste, adding it to the base. I sacrificed a branch of the world tree along with its leaves into the mixture. After that, I procured dried goldenseal, which only grows on the peaks of the north, ground diamond dust, which is a byproduct of many healing potions but only in small quantities, nectar of immortality from the arbor of metamorphosis, and the ambrosial fruit, which only grows on the celestial spirit tree every thousand years
'Ugh how expensive' that was the genuine thought of Josephine was how expensive this all was, even with her wealth.
After mixing it thoroughly, I left it simmering for 8 hours. It was an unnecessarily long process, but I cut it in half by incorporating condensation. I simmered it overnight with a mana flame and left it as it was.
Next was the crystallized wisdom, which was more of a resonance stone. I had to do this meticulously.
First, by harmonizing a transmutation circle by adding red gems, white gems, and a blue gem.
I was able to summon the crystal gate, which is said to be so mysterious in the realm of alchemy.
'Finding these materials was particularly a pain in Josephine's memories'
Water asteroid. It is a stone that requires a perfect balance of mana, time, and energy to form properly.
The water from an asteroid that contained mystical properties. The flowing water was more of an illusion, a mirage of some sort.
I placed a wind essence within the gate- a rare and difficult material to procure, harvested in a special way only a few could master. The gate I created reacted immediately, becoming a vortex that sucked in the surrounding wind before settling into a calm, grey-colored storm gate.
Next, I had to sacrifice the water asteroid with teary eyes, carefully feeding it to the gate, which gracefully accepted it, taking on a swirly pattern and stormy features. It was complete, transformed into a storm gate. I began feeding the gate raw materials in the correct order:
First, the tears of a sphinx, a beast found guarding the tomb of Tutankhamun, the first pharaoh. The celestial quill feather, which is normally the hardest to obtain because the divine beast of the sky only appears every thousand years and gives an oracle.
Occasionally, it bestows its feathers as a gift, and I had found that feather in a gift shop near a countryside.
The Echo of Oracle was next, a byproduct of divine oracles given by the cathedral from the gods. Securing one was against her will, but since it was a rare alchemy ingredient, Josephine still managed to obtain a few.
The rarest and most shittiest to get was the Mysterious Library Dust, which required burning a bunch of books from the Ethereal Library, a monumental historical place. Josephine had literally stolen them from a high-security place.
After feeding the library dust to the gate, it reacted violently, floating in the air as lightning spewed from it while it rotated rapidly. Fortunately, it was in a sealed environment, so I only had to step out of the room. After spinning for a while, a bright flash enveloped the room, and a light encased in what seemed to be a diamond dropped as the gate disappeared.
I slowly approached it and held it up: crystallized wisdom.
What an expensive material. I wished I had some appraisal thingies, but those were rare.
I pondered this while eating the sandwiches made by Jane.
It would be convenient to have a means to store things like sub-space magic or appraisal.
"Isn't that just like a game?" I sighed.
Of course, this wasn't a game; it was a novel, and those constraints made it harder.
'The easier, the better.' Is what my lazy ass thought.
"Time to get back to work," I said as I stretched and braced myself for the next nerve-wracking ingredient: Purity of Heart.
Unlike the first two, we were dealing with a "concept", trying to create something "intangible".
I proceeded to my mana fusion chamber. I had to focus really hard or else it will be impossible to capture their "essence"
By placing the begging bowl of Bodhi, a legendary figure of a religious sect who attained enlightenment, I was able to obtain the "Tears of Compassion."
Next, I used the cowrie shell born from a swallow to obtain the "Hallowed Dewdrops."
The next ingredient was the Robe of the Fire Rat, made from rats who offered their hides in a plea for forgiveness for eating the crops. This robe was the first and last of its kind, and because no one knew its worth, I bought it for cheap. I infused it and obtained the "Essence of Forgiveness."
The last component, which was the hardest to obtain, was the legendary Jewel from a dragon's neck, located in the reverse scale. Only by "seducing" a dragon could it be obtained. Disgusting as it was, I secured the "Radiant Ember of Love" from it.
The final step was to fuse all these essences with a powerful catalyst. Using a magic circle, I infused it with the branch of the Hourai tree, which violently turned into a rainbow color. This branch was even rarer than the world tree, but it couldn't be helped. I placed all the essences inside and added a powerful trigger, the Arrow of Eros. Josephine had originally wanted to use this on her father.
As everything fused together, orbs surrounded the magic circle, progressively creating a rainbow spark.
'It reminds me of that certain gacha game'
Then, a bright light engulfed the room, revealing a gem with a weird shape once it faded. I laughed hysterically, as if I were a war veteran seeing a nightmare.
"Is this just a fucking saint quartz?" I stored it away so it wouldn't remind me of anymore
"Purity of Heart" obtained.
The last and arguably the easiest component was Universal Harmony.
This was your typical alchemy process in a large cauldron. I filled it with mana potion, mixing while adding fire gem, water gem, wind gem, and dark gem. Eventually, I boiled it with a blue mana flame. Transforming it into green by adding dryad dust, I left it to simmer.
The base was done, and now I just had to dump a bunch of ingredients: Harmonic crystal shard from the Harmonic Mountains, Zephyr's Essence from Zephyr, the guardian beast of the North, Aqua Vitae from the world spring, a Phoenix Feather from the immortal flaming bird, Heartstone from the deepest vein in the earth, Hallowed Light from a dying angel, and Death's Robe from Death himself.
After mixing it with an adamantite ladle, it made a poof sound, and I scooped out a gem full of rainbows, about the size of a large marble.
I had it, the Universal Harmony.
I returned to the distilling station and saw that the elixir was already done. I strained and filtered it meticulously, and there it was: a glistening potion with a dark red hue, the Elixir of Life.
Wiping the sweat from my brow, I slumped into a chair.
"Phew..."
This was exceptionally tiring, both physically and mentally. I sipped the dark coffee Jane had given me earlier and began inscribing for the final part.