Chapter 146
***
The dark mage Belgian was bewildered.
“So you’re telling me to grow these fungi now?”
That was the proposal Yulian had made to him as part of a plea bargain.
“When you said it was a plea bargain, I thought you were going to send me to a penal battalion. I never imagined I’d end up working for a merchant guild.”
Having been granted a special pardon and released from prison, he said this in Professor Yulian’s laboratory in the Academy territory.
“A penal battalion? Why did you think that?”
“The Empire doesn’t waste capable people. It gives them hope, then makes them struggle within that hope and burn themselves out for the Empire. Hasn’t that always been the secret to the Empire’s survival?”
“At least you’re aware that you’re capable.”
“Not as capable as you, but there was a time when ordinary folk praised me. I may never have become a star like you, but I flatter myself that I was at least a firefly.”
The condition for Belgian’s pardon.
It was that he would ‘help Professor Yulian with his dark-magic research.’
And that dark-magic research was……
“So I really don’t understand how growing these fungi is supposed to lead to treating someone.”
He was to help research fungi.
Belgian reacted as if he simply couldn’t believe it after hearing this.
“Or are you telling me this so I’ll research fungi, while the fungi are actually meant for the Imperial family’s secret guards? And then you’ll frame me?”
“You’re far too distrustful of people. Have you spent your whole life being deceived?”
“I have. From the day I was born until now, except for my mother, everyone has been trying to use me. I know not every crow is black, but at least every crow I’ve seen has been black.”
At Belgian’s crow analogy, I clicked my tongue.
It was because, after speaking with Belgian up to this point, I had gathered that he’d led an incredibly difficult life.
He had never told me his story directly.
But from putting together what he had said, it wasn’t hard to guess that he had suffered the usual tragedy of illegitimate children.
Having never known the hardships illegitimate children typically endured, I had no right to flaunt my own unblemished life before him.
While I was unable to think of an appropriate response, Belgian gave a quiet snort.
He tapped the glass lid covering the culture dish with his fingertip.
“But that has nothing to do with me, does it? You said that when the day comes that I achieve results, you’ll expose every last disgrace my loathsome father has kept hidden to the light of day.”
“I promise.”
He nodded in satisfaction.
“Good. Then I’ll willingly endure that degree of disgrace. I’ve already fallen as low as I can go. I’m in no position to be choosy about the means.”
“Before that, let me make one thing clear. Your dark magic will definitely be put to good use.”
Still, it wouldn’t be right to let him go on laboring under that misunderstanding.
A sense of purpose was the most important thing in research.
I will discover this.
I will achieve something through this.
Only by clearly understanding one’s direction could one avoid losing one’s way during research.
That was why, although I normally didn’t bother correcting people’s misunderstandings, this time I needed to correct Belgian’s.
“Do you remember this?”
I took an old notebook from the inner pocket of my coat.
I placed the notebook on the workbench between Belgian and me.
Belgian’s brow furrowed deeply.
“……My grimoire.”
“You remember it.”
“How could I not?”
The notebook was none other than Belgian’s grimoire.
It was a spellbook containing the results of his research and his accumulated know-how.
“I lose sleep over all the spells I can no longer use because I lost this.”
No matter how skilled a mage was, no one could memorize the formulas for every spell.
That was why mages generally wrote down information on spells other than their frequently used mainstays in notebooks like this.
Belgian had lost just such a notebook.
“So you had it. I secretly went to Sector D several times afterward, but when I couldn’t find it, I assumed someone else had taken it.”
“Thanks to it, I was able to create one of the greatest works of my life.”
“A great work?”
Belgian tilted his head.
He looked unable to guess what his grimoire had been used for.
“You’re saying you made medicine with dark magic?”
“Yes.”
Since he still didn’t seem to grasp it,
I picked up a vaccine ampoule sitting in the corner of the lab and held it up for him.
“I modified the spells written in this grimoire and created vaccines. Starting with the first vaccine, every vaccine developed since then has been based on the methods in this spellbook.”
What was it called again?
I was confused because I was trying to remember it after so long, but was it the Schnabel formula?
The formula for converting plague-based spells into a form from which vaccines could be made.
The dark-magic spell formula at the root of that formula had been created in this grimoire.
“Thanks to it, now, as long as we figure out the formula for a plague curse, we can run it through that formula and create a vaccine.”
It started with the smallpox vaccine,
but the merchant guild had continued using the formula to make vaccines ever since.
Vaccines for cholera, whooping cough, and the plague had already been made, while a tetanus vaccine was currently in development because tetanus had only recently been confirmed.
Belgian’s eyes widened at the explanation.
“Good heavens. You mean the foundation of vaccines was dark magic?”
“You didn’t know?”
“How could I know when no one told me? Even dark mages mistake vaccines for something like holy water.”
This was unexpected.
Was it because this world’s internet and information networks were not very advanced?
It seemed that people who weren’t healers weren’t properly informed about how vaccines worked.
Come to think of it, even in my past life, where the internet existed, there were plenty of non-medical workers who didn’t know much about them, so perhaps it was only natural.
“I’ll explain the formula in detail later. Put simply, once someone has contracted a curse, they become less susceptible to the next one, don’t they? A vaccine is made by using that principle to deliberately inflict a weakened curse on a person in advance.”
Belgian was silent for a long time after hearing the principle.
His gaze moved back and forth between the open page of the grimoire and my face several times.
His eyes, which had widened in shock at first, slowly calmed.
The corners of his mouth pulled awkwardly and stopped halfway, while a shadow fell across the brand etched into his forehead.
“…… To come up with such a different idea even when looking at the same thing... Perhaps it was only natural that I ended up like this.”
“I was simply lucky. I just happened to have good people around me who pointed me toward the right path at each crossroads.”
He looked into my eyes in silence for a long while.
Then,
“Then does that mean I might have been able to walk the same path as you?”
“There’s no point in wondering about that now. Wouldn’t it be better to discuss what we can change from here on?”
Belgian nodded slightly.
“I understand that my dark-magic knowledge will be used for good. But fungi? Are these fungi really that important?”
To explain it to him once more, I led him farther into the cultivation room.
In the back of the cultivation room, round patches of fluffy white mold had bloomed across dishes lined up on every shelf.
“These white things produce a substance that treats diseases.”
I picked up one of the dishes and held it out.
“I discovered it in an old esoteric text of the Mencia sect, so I hope you’ll understand that I can’t explain the principles in detail.”
“When I heard that the Mercure merchant guild was hiring large numbers of dark mages unaffiliated with the Round Table, I wondered what was going on. Was this why...?”
Belgian surveyed the dishes.
“So I’m supposed to mass-produce these fungi?”
“No.”
His task was not to grow these white fungi.
“These are merely a fragment of the fungi’s potential. The fungi you’ll be cultivating are intended for an entirely different purpose.”
“……What is that?”
“This.”
I led him to a storeroom.
Inside the storeroom.
Countless yams of dozens of different varieties were taking up space.
“This is…….”
“Yams.”
“I can tell by looking.”
Wild yams.
These were yams I had asked adventurers, mercenaries, alchemists, and all sorts of other people to find and bring me.
Imperial yams, eastern yams (called 'ma' over there), western yams, southern yams, and yams from kingdoms across the sea.
In any case, I had gathered every kind of yam found throughout the world.
When I announced in Shun Isa’s name that I would give a million marcs to anyone who discovered a new species of yam, all kinds of yams really did come pouring in.
I explained to Belgian, who was entranced by the majestic appearance of those yams and gazed at them longingly.
“Recently, I extracted new substances from these plants.”
Those substances were progesterone and steroids.
Researching these substances had not taken very long.
Using the memories given to me by Babel, the cosmic big-brain in my head, I was able to extract them quickly.
‘The research was much easier than I expected.’
The difficult part I had originally expected in this research was not making the medicine.
In this world, where the laws of physics were just a little different from those of my past life, the problem was finding the ‘otherworldly Mexican wild yam’ from which to extract those compounds.
But then, to my surprise.
Before starting the research, I thought I would need to use a special yam.
But after conducting the research, I found that I could extract them from almost every wild yam.
There had been no need to search for a special yam just to extract those compounds.
‘In my past life, I had only ever seen the answer key.’
I had only seen the answer key for how the medicines were made,
not the process leading to their creation—in other words, I hadn’t seen the history behind them.
I hadn’t known that any yam would do.
In any case, thanks to that, extracting the compounds wasn’t difficult.
The only problem was……
“The substances were quite revolutionary. But to mass-produce them, we ultimately need to select the yams here.”
It was that the ‘discovery of a substance’ and its ‘commercialization’ were entirely separate matters.
I had definitely discovered the substances.
From that yam, and from this yam.
But some yams produced large quantities of the substances, while others produced only small amounts.
Naturally, from the standpoint of selling them, I needed to select the yams with the best yield.
Before I could even explain this, Belgian guessed my intention and nodded.
“I understand. You want me to select these yams. But what does that have to do with fungi?”
“By chance, I happened to see a certain fungus extracting the substance I wanted from these yams.”
It wasn’t something I discovered,
but something someone else had discovered.
In any case, it was ‘by chance.’
“That made me think the fungi might have potential.”
“Then couldn’t the dark mages affiliated with your merchant guild grow that fungus?”
“You said that although these yams can all produce the same substance, we need to select the one that produces the most, didn’t you? There may be a fungus among the ones I don’t know about that does the same thing.”
The history of penicillin tells us that.
Just as the blue mold in which penicillin was discovered and the blue mold used to mass-produce it were different species.
There must also be a separate fungus that extracts large amounts of the substance I want from yams.
The problem was that I didn’t know how to handle fungi freely.
That was why I needed Belgian.
“……So what you’re saying is.”
After hearing the explanation, Belgian said as he looked over the yams in the storeroom.
“Among these dozens of types of yams, I’m to select the one that can produce the greatest amount of that substance.”
Then his gaze shifted to the culture dishes containing the fungi.
“And then I’m supposed to select the fungus that produces the greatest amount of that substance as well.”
“As expected of someone at your level, you catch on quickly.”
“……”
He counted on his fingers in silence.
Then,
“Do you really think this makes sense?”
“Don’t worry. I won’t be taking sole credit for this achievement. Your name will be on it too.”
“That’s not what I mean.”
He said, becoming slightly agitated.
“Is it normal to expect me to do all that alone? If you have no intention of keeping your promise, just say so.”
Apparently, he thought I had deliberately made an impossible proposal because I had no intention of helping him get revenge.
I spoke to correct that misunderstanding.
“You don’t need to worry about that either. Once you try it yourself, you’ll realize it’s not as impossible as you think.”
“How am I supposed to believe that?”
I pointed to myself as I answered.
“I can manage this much, can’t I? So, Belgian, you should be able to do it too.”
Hearing that, Belgian glared at me with eyes full of contempt and said,
“As I thought, you have no intention of keeping your promise.”
No, seriously, why?
This is the kind of thing every graduate student and resident does.
I did too.
‘Now that I’m a professor, let’s put some lab slaves on auto-hunt.’
I’m telling you, if you try, you can do anything.
But true to his nature as a dark mage plagued by distrust of humanity, he showed no sign of believing me to the end.
In the end, Belgian began cultivating another kind of hatred for me,
and started selecting the yams and fungi.