10 A Small Luxury
Jonathan figured out what the metallic ring was used for fairly quickly. All he had to do was put it onto one of his fingers. Any of his fingers would do.
The ring was actually an interdimensional storage space, allowing the wearer to put in or take out any sort of items of their choosing with a single thought. There were some restrictions, however. But even so, it was still an incredible invaluable piece of equipment for any alchemist.
For anyone, actually.
While there were already some items – alchemy ingredients – stashed inside the ring as gifts, courtesy of the Alchemist himself, Jonathan attempted to stash everything within his reach into the ring just to test out its capability.
Once Jonathan had ran out of things to grab, he stood up and move onto bigger objects in the storage room of the bunker. There were many things stored there. Things that he had spent time and energy to scavenge.
Jonathan learned that the storage ring would work as long as the item he tried to store was grabbable as well as holdable. That meant he could not put the entire bed inside the ring, as the bed itself wasn't holdable.
Of course, such a restriction was simply due to his physical prowess. If he could pick up the bed, then theoretically, he should be able to stash it inside the storage ring.
There was also a total weight limit as Jonathan had reached that limit. Once the limit was reached, he could not put any more items into the storage space. He would need to remove some of the items to make room.
After some more extensive tests, Jonathan understood the storage ring fairly well. More than a couple of ideas of how to use the storage ring popped into his mind. The ring obviously wasn't used for storing items only. If one was ingenious enough, it could prove invaluable in battle.
To that end, Jonathan removed all the items within the ring barred the alchemy ingredients and some long-lasting supplies. The rest of the space within the ring were used to store weapons. From guns to knives to mines. All the weapons he was familiar with was stored into the ring.
Jonathan then tested by summoning them to his hands and placing them back into the storage space within the ring. Since taking thing out and putting thing back in was instant, the storage ring had given him the power to switch weapons instantly.
That alone made the storage ring beyond valuable within his eyes.
Jonathan then moved onto the next item, the book. He did not need to open it to know that it wasn't for reading or learning. If the Alchemist had wanted Jonathan to read to learn the art of alchemy, then the Alchemist would not have parted any wisdom directly into his mind.
Therefore, the book within his hands was not for reading or learning.
It was obviously for something else, and Jonathan had a good idea what it was for.
Jonathan opened the book, and the instant that he did, a glowing magical array manifested within the center of the room. An alchemy lab emerged from the array, readying to be used.
Alchemy was more or less the art of transmutation, so for a beginner like Jonathan, he would require the use of an alchemy lab or similar to brew potions, pills, bombs, and all manner of alchemy products.
In contrast, the Alchemist himself did not need such thing. He could craft potions with the ingredients on the go. Jonathan would be able to do that one day, but it would not be any day soon.
For now, Jonathan would need his alchemy lab.
There was another reason to why the Alchemist had given Jonathan the book instead of teaching him a summoning spell. Other than the Alchemist himself had said that he would only teach Jonathan the art of alchemy and nothing more, of course.
The reason was simple. Jonathan was unable to use magic. This was because he was born on Earth, a world that once relied heavily on science and technology. That had all changed once magic integrated into the fabric of reality of the universe.
It was also the reason why everything electronics had failed, basically sending the human race back to the stone age.
Jonathan knew all of this, as the Alchemist decided that he should. But even if Jonathan was aware of the reason to why electronics had stopped working, he could do nothing to undo it. Nor there was any reason for him to undo it.
He was just a child when the world had completely changed. He had not experienced the joy of living in a technological era. Therefore, he did not miss anything. Well, except for a single person.
Jonathan placed the book into his storage ring. It was too important to be left on his person or within his backpack. Yes. He decided that he would carry his backpack despite having a storage ring.
There was a real reason for that. As a scavenger and survivor, if he wandered about with any backpack or a visible weapon, he would look incredibly suspicious.
Jonathan did not want to stand out in a crowd. Standing out made him a target. It was better to simply remain inconspicuous.
The remaining item that he needed to check was a doorknocker. A small one, and while it looked very ordinary, it was not ordinary by any mean.
Jonathan doubted his master, the Alchemist, would waste time to troll him.
Although Jonathan did not know what the doorknockers was for, he could test it to find out. Of course, there was no doors left within the bunker. Jonathan had removed them a while back for their materials as well as making sure there were no obstructions between all the rooms within the bunker.
There was actually a door in the bunker. The blast door.
Jonathan headed to the entrance of the bunker and placed the doorknocker onto the steel surface of the blast door. The doorknocker stuck to the blast door, allowing Jonathan to use it to knock.
He checked the slit on the blast door and looked out of it into the darkness of the night. He then pulled the doorknocker and used it to knock on the door. Nothing happened, so Jonathan repeated.
After the third knock, light flooded into the bunker, nearly blinded Jonathan, forcing him to back away from the slit. He blinked and rubbed his eyes to regain his vision.
Once Jonathan recovered for his momentary blindness, he stared at the opened slit once more, finding nothing but darkness beyond. He wondered what was that all about, and after a minute or so, he tried knocking on the door again.
The second time around, Jonathan was ready, and he was able to see a vast bountiful field beyond the opened slit of the blast door. It was something impossible. Utterly impossible.
Jonathan turned the lever and opened the blast door. His eyes widened in awe when he was greeted with the same scenery from beyond the slit window.
It was like the promise land. The land that every person dreamed about in the harshness and cruelness the world had become.
Jonathan did not step into the promise land. Instead, he closed the blast door and exhaled deeply. His eyes paid attention to the doorknocker before his hand lifted it off the blast door.
The beautiful landscape beyond the slit window melted away, leaving only the darkness of the freezing night behind.
Jonathan closed the slit window and returned to the storage room afterwards. He then examined the doorknocker once more before putting it into his storage space for safe keeping. He knew that wasn't really the promise land, but it was some sort of land within an interdimensional space.
The land was for him to cultivate alchemy ingredients. A private farm of sort. However, he could used it for something else. Like a farm.
Jonathan did not ponder too much on it anymore and picked up his scarf. He covered up his face once more before checking the shelf for something to fill his stomach.
It was still early for breakfast, but Jonathan was hungry.
Since Jonathan was going to leave the bunker along with everything that he could not bring with him on his journey, he might as well have his fills.
It would be the first time in years that he had a full breakfast. This was because there was no need to ration the foods that were being left behind. The foods had long passed their expiration date, but they should still be edible.
Jonathan hoped that the meal would not be his last since finding a new home was going to be a difficult task. It was a necessary task.
He picked up a can. Without opening it, he knew the content had the toxicity of 59%. That meant there was more than 1 in 2 chance that he would get sick if he ate the content of the can.
Jonathan examined each can on the shelf before picking the one with the least amount of toxicity. He then opened it and have breakfast. Sure, it was risky to eat something that had any amount of toxicity, but then again, every piece of foods that he owned were unsafe to eat to various extent.
And besides, it wasn't like Jonathan never had an upset stomach before, so instead of worrying about getting food poisoning, he should enjoy the little luxury instead.
