Chapter 7
There were far more recipes using aberrations or mysteries as ingredients than he’d expected.
However, since all he’d managed to tear off was an arm, he couldn’t touch recipes that required dumping in an entire corpse.
If he’d known this would happen, he should have used magic on the upper body somehow.
It was a shame, but it was already in the past. Regretting it now would be pointless.
Ian dipped a green tea bag into cold water, took a sip, and turned the page with a soft rustle.
[A Feather That Stops Bleeding]
[A Scented Candle That Makes You Unable to Distinguish Dream and Reality]
[A Fan That Drives Away Evil Spirits]
[A Vessel That Draws in Evil Spirits]
He scanned the various alchemical recipes, looking for something easy to make and highly effective. Since it had to include ingredients made from aberrations, he considered that too and quickly flipped through the pages.
Then, one item caught his eye.
[Dying Eyeball]
[If you engrave the image of a specific target onto the retina and detonate it, that target’s eyeball will burst.]
[Materials: 1 eyeball from a living creature, a small amount of aberrant flesh, 100 ml of human blood, 500 ml of water, 1 petal of poisonous herb, ether.]
[Caution: It may attract the gaze of the profane, so be sure to make it in a wizard’s workshop.]
It burst the eyeball of the target whose image was engraved on the retina. It was simple, yet had a remarkably bold effect. Since it could destroy one of the five senses without any risk, it would give him a major advantage in battle.
The ingredients were also simpler than he’d expected.
For the living eyeball, he could just pull one from a fish, and the rest were common enough to get right away. The 100 ml of blood was a bit of a hurdle, but if he thought of it as donating blood, it wasn’t impossible. As for the poisonous herb, he could get one petal from a flower.
However, separate from how simple the recipe was, the caution made it seem impossible to make right now.
‘A wizard’s workshop, huh…….’
Ian knew what a workshop was. A space artisans used for painting or making pottery. A place separated from where daily life went on.
According to the grimoire, it was a space made to handle magic and nothing else. An alien space devoted solely to wizards, thoroughly shielding them from outside eyes and intrusions.
Ian didn’t have anything like that. He had made a knife in his studio apartment, but that place was a living space, not a workshop. It was by no means a magically isolated space.
“This is a problem.”
At the moment, Ian didn’t have enough leeway to rent another room. Paying rent and getting by was already tight enough; rent another studio apartment to use as a workshop? His back would give out before he even got to use magic.
Unless he had some other way to raise funds, it was impossible for Ian to get a workshop right now. Even if he had become a wizard who dealt with mysteries, money was still a very real problem.
“Isn’t there some spell for duplicating money…….”
He searched through the grimoire just in case, but didn’t see any such spell. In the end, Ian let out a deep sigh and closed the grimoire.
At the same time, the food he’d ordered for delivery arrived.
Ian left the food in his room and went up to the rooftop for a moment to smoke a cigarette.
‘Isn’t there any way?’
Even if he didn’t make the dying eyeball, a workshop was essential to properly use the alchemy written in the grimoire.
He couldn’t keep tinkering only with things he could make without a workshop forever. To grow, he had to make more impressive tools and become familiar with magic. That was why a workshop wasn’t a choice but a necessity.
‘If I sold things made by alchemy to make money…… I’d be easy to trace.’
This was a world where an agency called the Administration Bureau roamed around openly. Rather than get tangled up with them for no reason after being traced, it seemed better not to sell anything.
More than anything, while many things made through alchemy were beneficial to humans, there were easily twice as many harmful ones. If he carelessly put something like that out there and someone lost their life because of it, he suspected he’d sleep very badly.
It was one thing to say he’d just avoid selling harmful items, but people were impossible to predict. He might start by selling only good things, get a taste for money, and then end up releasing other things too.
Did people addicted to gambling think they’d end up that way? Rather than add bad options for no reason, it was better not to try at all. Overconfidence was the shortcut to ruin.
“……Phew.”
Ian exhaled smoke into the air and roughly stubbed the cigarette out against the wall. He picked up the trash and threw it into the trash can at home.
‘If I abandon human decency, there are plenty of ways to make money. Worst come to worst, I could take assassination jobs on the dark web. As for how to do it, I can figure that out slowly.’
But he didn’t really want to go that far.
It wasn’t because he was some kind of saint. The moment he ignored even the bare minimum of human decency, he felt like there would be no turning back.
Once he crossed the line, he could no longer set foot in the world on the safe side of it. He’d be stuck on the outside forever, forced to evade the Administration Bureau’s pursuit, and he’d surely be shunned by the society of other wizards too.
The losses were far too great compared to the gains. It wasn’t something worth considering in the first place.
“Then what do I do?”
In the end, he was back to square one.
Ian let out a deep sigh and bit into the sandwich he’d ordered for delivery. The moment he took a sip of the Americano he’d ordered with it, the existence of the gallery suddenly came to mind.
It was a community where all kinds of trash posts ran rampant most of the time, but useful things were mixed in too.
With a sliver of hope, Ian posted on the gallery to ask for advice.
[Title: I’m thinking of trying alchemy, how do I make a wizard’s workshop?]
[ㅇㅇ]
Yesterday I caught an eight-footer, and I’m thinking of making something out of it, but apparently I have to make it in a workshop because it might attract the gaze of unholy things.
But I don’t have the money to get a workshop, so I’m stuck.
It’s frustrating, but do you have any tips?
[Upvotes 0][Downvotes 0]
After posting, he cleared away the food he’d eaten. A little later, when he checked the comments, a wizard with a familiar nickname had left a reply.
[Comments]
-Serious Magic Addict: If the grimoire warns you that much, I guess you’re planning to make something pretty powerful.
ㄴㅇㅇ: Yeah, it’s meant to be an offensive item.
ㄴSerious Magic Addict: Then you definitely have to make it in a workshop. If you ignore that and end up drawing the attention of mysteries like demons or evil spirits, it’s a pain.
So the unholy things mentioned in the grimoire were demons or evil spirits.
‘No, maybe it isn’t just those two.’
Maybe it could draw the gaze not just of Outer Gods or their creations, nor of beings derived from urban legends or ghost stories, but of something truly born from mystery.
When he still didn’t have any proper means to defend himself, meeting them could literally get him killed.
It was time to think carefully.
-ㅇㅇ: Then I guess I should just give up. I need to save up money first.
ㄴSerious Magic Addict: Hmm.
ㄴSerious Magic Addict: If you really want to try alchemy, would you like to come to my workshop?
That was an unexpected offer. Ian tapped at the keyboard with a surprised look on his face.
ㄴㅇㅇ: Is it okay if I come?
ㄴSerious Magic Addict: As long as you’re not a villain, it’s fine. It’d be a chance to see firsthand how alchemy works, so I’m fine with it. It’ll be the first time I’ve let someone else into my workshop, but it’s also a space I don’t really need to hide.
ㄴㅇㅇ: I’m not a villain, at least;;
ㄴSerious Magic Addict: Wait a moment.
Serious Magic Addict said that and then wrote a new comment.
-Serious Magic Addict: Godmother.
Godmother.
The administrator of the wizard community, essentially the equivalent of a mod if you compared it to a gallery.
Godmother replied immediately the moment Serious Magic Addict called for her.
ㄴ★Godmother: Yes, what is it?
ㄴSerious Magic Addict: I’m thinking of inviting a new wizard who recently joined to my workshop. Is there any chance something goes wrong for me if I invite him?
ㄴ★Godmother: You mean the anonymous username ㅇㅇ?
ㄴSerious Magic Addict: Yes.
ㄴ★Godmother: Please wait a moment.
Godmother left that comment, and the moment she did, Ian suddenly felt something looking at him and gave a startled shiver.
It was not a malicious gaze. In fact, it wasn’t even a normal one.
A gaze that felt more like a sensation than something seen with the naked eye.
It was a look that peered into a person’s inner self rather than their outward form. The grimoire reacted at once to that gaze, but Ian restrained it.
‘……So Godmother used magic.’
He understood it instinctively.
He’d expected her skill to be fairly high, given that she headed the community, but he hadn’t expected her to be able to probe a distant target remotely.
What’s more, she’d used it instantly, without even any preparation. It was proof not only of her level, but of her considerable mastery of magic itself.
She wasn’t the administrator for nothing.
Ian wiped the cold sweat from his forehead and checked the newly written comment.
-★Godmother: You’re basically a good person. I don’t think anything harmful would come of this for you.
ㄴㅇㅇ: Did you just use magic?
ㄴ★Godmother: Hmm. Did you perhaps feel someone’s gaze?
ㄴㅇㅇ: It was so blatant that it was harder to pretend I didn’t notice.
ㄴ★Godmother: I used it as discreetly as I could, but you seem to have considerable talent. Even if you hadn’t been chosen by the grimoire, I think you would have entered magic someday.
It was an unexpected compliment. Ian let out a dry laugh.
ㄴㅇㅇ: That’s a pretty unpleasant spell.
ㄴ★Godmother: I’m sorry if it felt that way. But personally, I feel it’s my duty to keep Korea’s wizards safe, so I need to distinguish villains from good people.
When people join the community, we don’t distinguish between good and evil, but when there’s a chance we’ll meet face-to-face like this, I prefer to verify safety personally. If the person I meet turns out to be a villain, a dangerous situation could arise.
People don’t usually go around hurting others just because they’re in the same community, but there are always exceptions.
So whenever something like this comes up, I tell each person about the other’s disposition and leave it up to them whether they want to meet.
“That’s a reasonable method.”
Ian quickly accepted that.
ㄴㅇㅇ: Okay, then. So I’m guaranteed to be a safe person, right?
ㄴ★Godmother: That’s right. You haven’t committed any crimes, and your disposition is close to good, so there’s no problem. For reference, ‘Serious Magic Addict’ is also a good person, so there’s no need to worry.
-Serious Magic Addict: Since the verification is done, now we just need to pick a day.
ㄴㅇㅇ: I’m fine anytime.
ㄴSerious Magic Addict: Then let’s meet this Saturday. I’ll send the address by DM, so come whenever it’s convenient for you. I’ll be there all day.
ㄴㅇㅇ: OK, really thanks. I’ll bring a gift too.
ㄴSerious Magic Addict: Got it. See you then.
The conversation ended there.
Ian stretched, gazing out the window as the day outside began to fade, letting his body go slack.
‘Since today is Friday, I guess I’ll have to go tomorrow.’
He didn’t need to go to his part-time job either. The convenience store had been destroyed, so he was on forced leave for the time being.
The manager thought the convenience store had been destroyed because a group of drunks had caused a ruckus.
With the appearance of the aberration, the CCTV had gone dead, so he couldn’t see what had happened that day. He was grinding his teeth, intent on catching the drunks based solely on Ian’s statement.
It was unfortunate for him, but he probably wouldn’t catch the culprit.
Ding.
While he was thinking, a message arrived. Ian immediately checked the address that had come in and frowned slightly.
“……So he was from Busan?”
The long address had the words Busan Metropolitan City clearly printed on it. For him, living in the Gyeonggi area, it was quite a long distance.
He’d probably have to take the train.