Volume 5 Chapter 7-2 Alchemist Mahal
Edited by: Kanaa-senpai
Since neighboring buildings look similar, the neighbors have no idea a separate house has sneaked in.
Even though everyone is watching, it’s a secret hideout no one notices. If you knew the trick, it’s simple, but it still leaves you speechless.
”This mansion is the legacy of Duke Juacque, known as the mad alchemist.”
Duke Juacque was a man who served as the prime minister of this country about a hundred years ago, and he played a big role in forming the Anti-Magic Alliance and Hero Management Bureau.
He was a capable politician, but later in life, he stepped away from politics and dived into alchemy research. Maybe he was talented from the start, or maybe he simply pushed forward with his wealth and connections.
Anyway, until he died, he left behind many breakthroughs that overturned traditional alchemy. He didn’t worry about any taboos and even started forbidden research, though it seems he kept it secret in public.
Boldly, he built a secret lab right in the heart of the royal capital for that purpose.He bought a corner next to noble town and, calling it reconstruction, tore down all the buildings. He then built a fancy mansion district and a large cemetery for nobles──probably needing huge funds that he recouped by selling the estates and graves, ending up wealthy.
The town planned by dwarf architects became one of the most beautiful in the royal capital, but it was just a cover. Duke’s real goal was to build this secret mansion. The old public lab of Duke Juacque was where Ms. Mahal’s tool shop is now, and from there, Duke used underground tunnels to continue forbidden alchemy research until his death.
After Duke died, his secret mansion was left unnoticed, unknowing to anyone. The dwarf family responsible for its construction and upkeep apparently kept caring for it because they had a contract with Duke.
More than loyalty to Duke, it was probably because it seemed really interesting──no doubt about that. I’m starting to understand what kind of race dwarves are.
Ms. Mahal is said to be a descendant of a dwarf clan that made a pact with Duke. This mansion is essentially her bad debt.
Even so, it’s like a secret base, the remnants of some eccentric’s dream. I bet Duke just wanted to try out some trick he thought of. If he really wanted to keep it secret, there were plenty of better ways to do it.
”Now then, let’s get right to it. Shall we take a look at your sleeping princess?”
The room where they lugged in Ms. Nina, coffin and all, is quite spacious, with 6 tables lined up like surgical beds. The back is piled haphazardly with junk, making it look like a garbage dump, but the area around the front tables is neatly organized.
The room faintly smells of spices, sweet and cloying to the nose. It reminds me of the scent near the taxidermied animals displayed in Earth’s museums. Must be some kind of preservative.
Ms. Mahal is trying to remove Ms. Nina’s armor from the surgical table. No way, somehow that armor can only be taken off by me.
As the helmet comes off, Ms. Nina’s beautiful face is revealed. She’s breathing faintly; she looks just like she’s asleep.
Stripping the armor like this, it feels oddly like playing dress-up with a doll. When Ms. Nina wakes up, maybe I should ask her to indulge in this kinky play. She’ll probably get angry, but I’ll apologize right away and she’ll forgive me.
There, a bit of my tear glands are loosening up. I look up and take a deep breath.
After taking off all her clothes, I show Ms. Mahal the cut surfaces that I temporarily sealed with my mending skills.
”I see, that’s a clean cut. You destroyed the magic crystal faster than the self-destruct spell could activate.”
”We were attacked by the boss monster in the Puppeteer’s dungeon.”
”Hmph, attacked? The manager of that dungeon wouldn’t just mimic an attack, would he?”
What does that mean? You don’t mean that rare boss deliberately slashed the magic crystal to save Ms. Nina, do you?
”Well, I’m not exactly sure, but he cut around all the important parts, so it’s just that it looks too good to be an accident, that’s all.”
”So, you can fix it?”
”Fix it? This repair is already perfect. If you mess with the magic circuit, everything falls apart. As expected of Zenom, you still got the skills.”
”Then why not wake her up?”
”Showing you would be quicker than explaining.”
Ms. Mahal suddenly starts to dismantle Ms. Nina’s body with a squishy sound. The abrupt lawlessness is so shocking that one could almost stop breathing.
”What are you doing?!”
”None of these parts are usable anymore. You do want to keep this girl alive, right?”
Roughly but skillfully, she continues to take apart the body. It’s unsettling, but it seems like we have no choice but to leave it to the expert.
”Hey, the self-destruct magic circle is covered in blood. You don’t think it was used in some weird ritual, right?”
Inside the detached body parts, a silver-colored magic circle was painted. After being slashed by the rare boss and destroyed, my blood stained it, leaving it completely unusable.
”My blood. When I was fixing it, I got hurt and bled on it.”
If my blood had protected Ms. Nina, that would be a nice story, but there’s no point if the blood just got on an already destroyed magic circle.
Moreover, getting blood on a magic circle is a major no-no when handling magic circuits. My carelessness.
”Well, whatever. This thing doesn’t need to function in the first place. It’s just some nonsense that idiots attached to hide the doll princess’s tricks.”
It seems like a kind of self-destruct device meant to prevent the doll princess from being disassembled.
”To keep the classified parts from outsider eyes? It’s not funny. They must have been ashamed of their primitive tech being seen.”
Ms. Mahal might seem to be haphazardly tearing apart the body, but she’s meticulously removing parts with the magic wires using special tools. She definitely understands the structure and is disassembling it carefully.
Since the doll princess was made to be disposable from the start, it seems you can’t take it apart without breaking it to some extent.
In the blink of an eye, Ms. Nina’s body was expertly disassembled. Below her exposed neck was connected to a glass jar, with wires leading from its terminals to all parts of her body.
Once Ms. Mahal disconnected all the wires, only Ms. Nina’s head remained emerging from the jar. How surreal.
”Is it okay to cut off the mana supply?”
”No problem. In fact, keeping the mana flowing in this state is pretty gross. Take a closer look here.”
The jar was filled with murky liquid. Upon closer inspection, there seemed to be a fetal human form with bent limbs crammed inside. Could this be Ms. Nina’s real body? It’s almost half her usual size. The sight of it, a desecration of life, was grotesquely fascinating.
”The artificial amniotic fluid has deteriorated to its limit; it’s impossible to restart it like this.”
”Then, can’t we just replace the deteriorated one with a new one?”
No matter her appearance, I want Ms. Nina to live. She would be shocked to learn of this form, so I must mislead her carefully.
”It’s only a temporary fix. Even if we do that, it’s uncertain if she can survive another ten days. She’s already pushed beyond her limits. Originally, this method was too impractical. Trying to keep the Homunculus’s lower body from growing and just bottling it up is a cheap imitation.”
I’ve sort of got the gist. The artificial human, Homunculus, had only its head allowed to grow, while the body below remained fetal and was sustained in a life support device. Although we’ve reused the cheapest Golems for limbs, there’s no doubt that the doll princess is a Homunculus.
”Is there nothing we can do?”
”There’s one thing I can think of. If we take the Homunculus out of the bottle and let it grow completely, I think all the problems would be solved.”
”Is that even possible?”
”That’s the only method I know. I don’t know about keeping just part of the Homunculus in a bottle, and I don’t want to know either.”
Growing completely means Ms. Nina would become just like a human, right? If we can do that, wouldn’t it be the best option?
What the hell, I should have just come here from the beginning, without making a detour to the Puppeteer dungeon.
”Prepare 300,000 common gold coins for materials. You’re Zenom’s disciple, I’ll do it without any business.”
I can’t believe what Ms. Mahal says. 300,000 gold common gold coins? That’s 3 billion gold. 1 gold is about 10 yen, so that’s 30 billion yen! It’s not an amount that an individual can manage, it’s just outrageous.
I feel like I’ve been thrown from heaven to hell. I already know what I’m going to do, but it’s too far. 300,000 common gold coins is too far away.
What should I do?
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Edited by Kanaa-senpai.
Thanks for reading.
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