Chapter 12: Is That Impressive?

Although Nadran was annoyed by Zosal's attitude, Nadran still paid attention to his actions. [Just because someone is mean and abrasive doesn't mean they don't have real skill. Maybe I actually can learn some things from him.] He wasn't the kind of person to hold a grudge against everyone who wronged him. If he did, he would have a list reaching the skies, and he would spend all his time on revenge and repaying petty grievances. While he certainly didn't like people like Zosal, he didn't want blow it out of proportion and lose chances to learn and improve himself.

Of course, this was only true if they didn't cross his bottom line. While he was still weak now, he would certainly seek justice against those who had wronged him and his family when he was able. First on this list was the person who had nearly killed his father! Compared to this, someone like Zosal was no more than a minor nuisance.

Under Nadran's attentive gaze, the third round of the exam began. Nadran focused on Zosal's actions as he collected and measured the herbs, seeing if he was doing anything noteworthy. [He seems to be well-connected and has chatted with a bunch of the other participants, and he seems confident in his own abilities despite knowing the strength of others. That probably means he has at least some skill, right?]

Zosal began measuring out herbs, and Nadran tried to figure out what pill he was making. [Hm, that particular combination of herbs… is that the Breath Enhancing Pill? I'm surprised he is making a pill I actually know about. I expected him to make some fancy high-tier pill. I guess not.]

Meanwhile, two other examinees were discussing the same subject. "So, do you know what pill Zosal is making?" one of them asked.

"It's probably the Breath Enhancing Pill," the other replied after looking for a little while.

"Isn't that a really common pill? Why would he make that one as opposed to some more complex pill?" they replied, confused.

"You didn't know? Zosal comes from a respected family of alchemists, and they focus on polishing the basics above all else. They would rather make a common pill at a high level than a rare pill at a lower level."

"Oh, I see. I guess Zosal is pretty skilled with such a background."

"Indeed he is. I'd say he's probably one of the most skilled people taking this test. In addition, he has reached the high slate sigil realm at the age of 17. He's got some talent in that field, as well."

Nadran didn't hear this conversation, though, focused as he was on Zosal's actions. After a little while, though, he began to get skeptical. [Why is he leaving the fire on for so long? The Breath Enhancing Pill only needs brief applications of fire between each step, but he's leaving it on the entire time. The fusion between the ingredients is a delicate process, and it is easy to burn the ingredients, lowering the grade or just directly ruining the pill if the heat is not properly managed.]

Nadran criticized Zosal's performance in his mind, feeling that any concept he had understood so easily should be common knowledge. After all, he was using publicly available books. What he didn't realize was that a lot of his knowledge was inferred from his knowledge of how the pill forms and the ingredients interact. It was not written explicitly in the books, and so most other beginner alchemists would not even consider these aspects unless they read a more advanced book that spoke about those matters directly.

[What, why is he already adding in the Violet Star Stalks already? The Jade Ivy hasn't had time to integrate into the mixture yet. The ingredients are going to clash and lower the quality. Does he even know the basics of alchemy?!] Nadran sighed in exasperation as he watched the walking train wreck that was Zosal's performance. He couldn't bring himself to watch the rest of the pill refinement, and instead resumed reading.

Within half an hour, Zosal finished his pill forging, and triumphantly brought out 2 light gray pills. He handed them to an instructor, who nodded approvingly. "One of them is even a mid-grade pill with a quality of 27%. Not bad, you pass."

Zosal smirked in satisfaction at this remark. The grade of pill determined the base efficacy of the pill, while the quality increased the concentration and speed of the pill's effects. For example, the Breath Enhancing Pill refined by Zosal was of the mid-grade. The Breath Enhancing Pill was designed to restore a person's stamina, allowing them to act for extended amounts of time without the need for rest. The grade affected the amount of energy restored, while the quality affected how fast the energy flowed into the body of the one who consumed it, as well as controlling the energy's purity. Low and high quality pills were like the difference between throwing a large rock and a spear. If both objects had the same momentum, the spear would do more damage. This is because the force of the spear is concentrated in one point, while the rock's impact is spread out, unable to have the same effect. In this analogy, grade would simply be the amount of momentum each object had, with a higher grade meaning more momentum. The exact effect of quality varied from pill to pill, but this general concept always held true.

Quality was a result of the precision of the steps taken in the forging process. The exact proportions of the pill's ingredients, the level of control over the temperature, the amount of time between adding the ingredients. These were the types of factors that affected quality. Percentages were used to quantify this, with 100% being the theoretical maximum. The effects increased exponentially with the percentage though, as did the difficulty in achieving such a result. 50% was far more than twice the effectiveness of 25%, and also more than twice as hard to achieve. Furthermore, the difference between 75% and 80% was greater than the difference between 10% and 50%.

Zosal was quite happy to get a quality of 27%, which was better than everyone else who had taken the test so far. He was also proud that he had managed to forge a mid-tier pill. A pill's tier was affected by the process used to forge the pill. The level and suitability of the method of forging impacted a pill's grade. Rather than relying on precision like for quality, it required planning and flexibility. While pill formulas existed, allowing the method of refining a particular pill to be read, this was not sufficient to create a pill by itself. Slight variations in the purity and age of the ingredients, the temperature of the air, the grade of the fire and forge, all of these and more could affect the process of forging a pill. When refining a pill, one needed to be able to react to the effects of this on a pill and keep the pill stable so that it would not bleed energy or fail. This was not something that could easily be written down due to the pure number of potential combinations of factors. Thus, unless someone was able to perfectly control all external conditions, they would need to be able to judge the best way to resolve any problems that arose during the forging.

Zosal walked over to Nadran, smiling smugly, and said "Did you see my skills? I forged a mid-tier pill with 27% quality."

Nadran blinked and looked blankly at Zosal. "Is that impressive?" he asked mildly.

Zosal looked surprised, then nearly exploded with anger. "Keep posing like that. You think you're impressive because you did well in the first round?! Let's see if you can keep calm when you fail the second test!" He stormed off, clearly frustrated by Nadran's blasé attitude.

[I was being serious though…] Nadran thought dejectedly. He honestly did not know if the pill Zosal had made was considered impressive. All he knew was that he was able to make better pills than that after only learning for 5 days. By comparison, Zosal couldn't be too skilled, could he?

Nadran shook his head and closed the book, walking into the pill forge room. Noctis walked in alongside him, giving him a slight nod before he turned to go to a pill forge. Nadran returned the nod and did the same. While Noctis seemed to be asleep all of the time, Nadran felt that he wasn't a bad person, and he seemed to be someone with at least some level of ability. At the very least, Nadran had a much better impression of Noctis than Zosal.

[Alright, time for me to take on the second test. I hope I'll be able to pass,] Nadran thought as he stretched, looking to the hundreds of shelves of herbs as he searched for the ones he needed.

"You may now begin," the head instructor stated, and everyone began their preparations. The instructor then began watching Nadran out of the corner of his eye, unable to contain his curiosity. [I wonder how he will perform. With answers like he gave in the first test, I'm sure this will be worth watching.]