Chapter 86: Blood Force Draught

*Date: 33,480 Second Quarter - Chalice Theocracy*

The moonlight slanted through the dorm window, carving thin silver lines across the cluttered alchemy room. The cauldrons still hissed from the morning's brew. Half-finished concoctions, burned herbs, and rows of failed vials dulled to ash gray.

Aris stood in the middle of the room, sleeves rolled, his hands trembling over a parchment covered in calculations. Circles, ratios, notes written in two different inks. He had rewritten the same line seven times.

*Catalyst intent flow, too high. Try blood reagent to stabilize internal essence conversion.*

Fox lay near the furnace, tail twitching, eyes reflecting the red ember light. "The intent might be more important than the blood, but what does it mean? It even reacts to the witness stone. How is it possible? How do NPCs get near infinite hours from witness stones?"

"Aris, that's the third night you're up. You're starting to smell like a potion yourself."

Aris didn't look up, hands moving through practiced gestures. "Just one more test. This batch... this might bridge the gap."

"The gap between what? Living and blowing yourself up?"

"Between theory and practice," Aris muttered. He reached for a vial of distilled moon dew, its liquid glinting faintly with internal sparks. "The Witness Stone reacted to potion energy before. If I can make it resonate instead of consume, maybe I can sustain power boosts for longer."

Fox groaned. "You sound exactly like that dead student they talk about."

"How would you know?" Aris asked sharply.

"I'm assuming."

"I'm not him," Aris snapped, voice cutting sharper than glass. Then, softer, "I'm just... close. Too close to stop."

He picked up a silver scalpel, nicked his thumb, and let a single drop of blood fall into the mixture. The moment it touched the cauldron, the liquid shimmered crimson and gold. Mana veins rippled across the surface like molten lightning.

The smell hit next. Iron and sweet rot, mixed with honeyroot. Fox gagged and backed toward the door.

"If every tier is gonna require more blood, more sacrifice, where is the line? Where will you stop?"

"There are no lines," Aris hissed, eyes wild. "Only walls people haven't learned to climb."

The mixture began to pulse. His hands moved automatically. Adding powdered slate for structure. Wild honey for flow. Crystal water for clarity. Each reagent hissed, the color shifting through a cascade of impossible shades. Blue, red, gold, then blinding white.

For a moment, it was beautiful.

Then the cauldron screamed.

Light erupted from it, a violent pulse that rattled the shelves. Glass cracked. Aris stumbled back, his shield spell flashing instinctively around him.

When the glow dimmed, the mixture had solidified. No longer liquid, but a thick, shimmering gel, faintly humming like a heartbeat.

Aris stared, wide-eyed. "It stabilized..."

Fox edged forward warily. "Or it died."

"No. It's alive. Look." Aris touched the gel with the back of his spoon. It vibrated faintly, golden ripples spreading outward. He grinned. An exhausted, half-mad grin. "This is it. Blood Force Draught. I did it."

Fox's ears flattened. "You named it? Already?"

Aris corked the substance into a vial, his reflection warping in the liquid light. "This isn't just a potion. It's energy crystallized. A compressed mix of force and blood essence. In theory... it should double the output of a tier two force potion for a short time."

"In practice?"

Aris shrugged. "There's only one way to find out."

Before Fox could stop him, Aris took one ladle of gel and downed it.

The world exploded.

Not outward, but inward. His veins lit like molten rivers. Every breath burned. Every heartbeat thundered. The room's colors sharpened, each hue too vivid, too alive.

"Aris!" Fox yelped, his voice warped and distant.

Aris staggered, clutching the table, laughing through clenched teeth. "It works! Look at this... my power flow, it's perfect. The resistance is gone!"

"I can see it. See a path to convergence," Aris gasped.

"What are you babbling?" Fox demanded.

He raised his hand. Light coalesced above his palm instantly. Not one, not three, but twenty missiles formed at once, orbiting him in a spiral of searing brilliance.

[Bzzt!]

The interference hit like lightning through his skull.

"I created it," Aris whispered in awe. "Radiant Convergence."

Then the pain hit.

The glow in his veins flared white hot, his breath hitching. He fell to one knee, sweat pouring. "No, no, no. I can handle this."

A violent pulse erupted from his chest. The Witness Stone in his pocket flared in response, absorbing stray light until the entire room dimmed.

Aris gasped. The stone pulsed again, its internal rune rearranging, a new symbol glowing faintly.

Then everything went black.

When he woke, he was lying on the cold floor. Fox had dragged him to the corner, a wet cloth on his forehead.

"You were burning up," Fox said, voice tight. "You screamed for a full minute. I thought your blood was going to boil."

Aris's throat was dry, but his eyes were bright with feverish excitement. "It worked."

"You nearly died."

"Fox," Aris said slowly, staring at his trembling hands, "do you realize what this means? The Witness Stone didn't reject the fusion. It adapted to it. That means the system, the rules, they're flexible."

"They're lethal."

Aris forced himself to sit up, grimacing. The ladle he'd downed had spilled during his collapse. It still glowed faintly where it had hit the floor. A scorch mark, but also... a rune. A simple circle, pulsing softly.

He touched it with two fingers. It responded to his touch.

Fox backed away. "Don't."

"It's residual mana resonance," Aris murmured, voice distant. "This shouldn't even exist after detonation. It means my essence mixed properly with blood energy... but the strain was too much."

"Our essence," Fox corrected. "You're dragging me with you every time you go half mad. One time I wish Lyra was here. You're playing with forces you don't know, kid. After the game controller was taken from the hands of creators, who is dictating outcomes of your stupid experiments?"

Aris ignored him, pulling himself up by the edge of the table. His body hurt all over, but his mind felt sharper than it had in months. "I need to refine it. Stabilize with different ingredients. Replace honeyroot with wild marrowroot. Slow the reaction and make actual potion, not jello."

Fox groaned. "You mean make another one?"

"Yes. A safer one." Aris looked up, eyes wild. "A better one. This... this could change everything."

"Or it'll change you into ash."

Aris chuckled darkly. "If that's the price, so be it."

He began scribbling notes again, calculating half-remembered ratios while his fingers still trembled from the strain.

Hours passed. The candles burned low.

Outside, storm clouds gathered. Rain pattered against the academy's marble walls. The whole world quieted, save for the drip of condensation from the ceiling.

Aris leaned over a new cauldron, every motion measured. The process repeated. Careful, methodical, obsessed. Only this time, he added the blood drop with a sliver of glowing dust scraped from his witness stone.

The result was subtle. No explosion, no screaming light. Just a potion that looked like every other one.

Aris smiled faintly. "Good. Controlled."

He poured it into vials, sealed them, and sat back, exhausted.

He laughed quietly to himself, the sound brittle and hollow. "See, Fox? Even the world agrees with me."

Fox yawned, too tired to argue. "If you're wrong, I'll sell your bones for reagents."

"Fair. Just make sure to label the jars correctly."

He leaned back, staring at the faint blue glow of his vials.

But somewhere beyond the alchemy room's heavy door, a shadow moved.

Footsteps paused.

A whisper, barely audible: "We should take him too."

The door creaked shut again, silent as a knife sliding from a sheath.

Aris never heard it.

He was too busy sketching new diagrams. Circles merging with triangles. Spells folding into potion symbols.

He wrote in his notebook: *Solar Flare + Light Missile = Radiant Convergence created, but unlike my other spells I need to practice holding and controlling the globe and aiming my flares. Stabilization reagent of the enhanced tier 2 force draught: witness stone dust. Risk factor: manageable.*

The candlelight flickered.

The Witness Stone shimmered.

And Aris, smiling through the exhaustion, whispered to himself:

"If the stupid game designer lost his system, I'll rewrite it. I'll rewrite it until it sings my name."