As the screw on the final metal plate was tightened into place, Anbaixiu flicked the switch on the mana refining furnace.
Energy from enchanted gemstones was channeled and converted through the magic circle, pouring into the massive apparatus. Row upon row of indicator lights blinked on, and the towering furnace roared to life.
From this moment until it broke down, its core would run ceaselessly, unable to be stopped.
Anbaixiu flipped a cluster of switches across the control console and keyed in several alchemical formulas.
The hundreds of feed inlets began taking in a vast variety of raw materials. Minutes later, an equally massive array of discharge spouts began streaming refined alchemical fluids.
Anbaixiu had long since set up an automated bottling line here. Before long, hundreds of glass bottles were filled to the brim with potions of various colors.
These were not finished products, but base concoctions. Only after secondary processing and blending would they become potions ready for retail.
If Anbaixiu had a second mana refining furnace, he could simply feed these liquids back in to generate finished products directly. But the machines were far too expensive—not merely in upfront cost, but in the terrifying amount of magical power required to operate them long-term. Running another one would bankrupt him.
The sealed bottles of base liquid were automatically sorted into crates, which were then hauled off to various warehouses by golem puppets Anbaixiu had crafted.
Undead could not be used for this hauling. Low-tier undead lacked the ability to suppress the diffusion of dark magical energy, which would contaminate the potions. The energy of the golem puppets, on the other hand, was sealed strictly within the conduits of their mechanical bodies; barring physical damage, no energy would leak.
The materials for these golem puppets had also been swindled from Gustavo Fring. They were the most basic models, but their only task was carrying cargo, so precision was unnecessary. As long as their shock absorption held up and kept the bottles from shattering, they were good enough.
The underground facility looked bustling, but it still paled in comparison to the former City of Alchemy.
Anbaixiu had seen the central alchemical complex in their capital. That place alone had boasted hundreds of mana refining furnaces and a million golem puppets toiling away inside—a sight so magnificent it had made his very soul tremble.
How wonderful it would be if he could claim just half the gold that factory raked in!
Still, it was only a matter of time before he built a grand alchemical city of his own, and this underground facility was merely the starting point.
The base solutions were sorted and stored neatly. At their current pace, provided raw materials remained abundant, every warehouse would be packed to the rafters in about three months. Factoring in secondary processing, that window could be stretched to six months at most.
This meant sales had to be taken into consideration; he could not just stockpile goods indefinitely.
Following Harvey's market research, Anbaixiu intended to introduce two distinct potions to the desert.
The first was the ubiquitous Vigor Potion. There was no way to optimize its formula, ruling out any price war, so he would simply have to contest market share with established vendors.
Fortunately, luck was on his side. Several local distributors had originally partnered with the City of Alchemy, but after the guildmaster brought down the city, their supply chains were severed. Anbaixiu had already directed Harvey to negotiate with them. Tapping into those ready-made distribution channels would save immense amounts of time.
The second product was a brand-new formula of Anbaixiu's own invention—sunscreen.
Desert dwellers spent their days bundled in dark goggles and keffiyehs, swaddled head to toe in sweltering layers. Yet without such heavy protection, every race aside from lizardmen would end up baked red and peeling.
There was definitely a market for sunscreen; at the very least, it would allow people to expose their arms and legs for some fresh air.
Of course, others had noticed this demand long ago. Sunscreens did exist on the market, but their prices were exorbitant. Only the desert nobility could afford them. They catered strictly to the high-end market, boasting different scents and variants.
Anbaixiu planned to target the common folk, which meant he needed to devise an affordable alternative.
This required reverse-engineering the competitor's formula and refining it. For most alchemists, that might have demanded years of arduous labor. Most craftsmen encrypted their formulas, tossing in useless filler ingredients alongside the essential components to make the concoctions bizarre and difficult to decipher.
Only formulas like the Vigor Potion—studied to death by generations—were known by every amateur, reducing competition to a grueling war of labor costs.
Anbaixiu, however, needed no such time. All he had to do was compile a list of plausible ingredients, roll a few dice, and he would hit upon the answer nine times out of ten.
Such was the unfair advantage of a divination wizard. If you trusted in fate, fate would reward you in turn.
Within days, Anbaixiu had cracked the bulk of the sunscreen formula, and he quickly understood why the product commanded such a steep price: one critical ingredient was exceptionally scarce, commanding exorbitant prices on the open market.
It was myconid spore powder from the Underdark.
Countless adventurers ventured into the perilous, opportunity-laden Underdark every year, and it was they who brought back the spore powder. Supplies were meager, and shortages were frequent.
This bottleneck made sunscreen a luxury reserved for aristocrats—much like Anbaixiu's modified Potion of Youth, which preyed solely upon the wealthy rather than fleecing the poor.
Once he realized this, Rose of Decay sprang immediately to mind.
If he could secure bulk shipments of myconid spore powder through her, he could churn out cheap sunscreen on an industrial scale and corner the market completely.
As for intellectual property... The Dwarf Kingdom had no copyright protections. So long as you did not steal physical products to sell, anything went. Anbaixiu felt not the slightest twinge of guilt in copying the recipe, nor did he fear legal repercussions. Since the component hailed from the Underdark, reaching out to the Queen of Decay was the obvious step, given that the Underdark was now under her command.
Pulling out his Necrotic Codex, he was about to send the Undead Queen a private message when he noticed the group chat was in a frenzy.
This was a rare sight. The members of the Elegy Poetry Society were typically hermits who rarely chatted with such fervor unless something monumental occurred. Scanning the message logs, Anbaixiu was surprised to discover the center of attention was Heji Stone.
The dwarf vampire had been bragging about his latest historical research in the chat, catching the eye of the Poet.
The Elegy Poetry Society took its name from the Mourner and the Poet.
The Mourner served as president, while the other—though never formally declared—was recognized by all as the vice president.
After reading Heji Stone's lengthy discourse on Arthur Ryan, the venerable elder had chimed in.
[Poet: Arthur Ryan still has a heroic spirit lingering about? Is that the Lord of the Dawn's mercy upon him?]
[Dislikes Humans: Mercy? Senior, what do you mean by that? Arthur Ryan accomplished so much—why make it sound as though he committed a crime?]
[Poet: You truly don't know? After Arthur Ryan died, he couldn't even enter the divine realm. His soul was utterly annihilated. That heroic spirit might be the only trace of him left in the mortal world.]
This revelation sent shockwaves through the group.
[Crown of the Headless Horseman: What is going on? How could Arthur Ryan's soul be obliterated? He was the chosen of the Lord of the Dawn. It wouldn't have been unusual for him to ascend while still breathing. How could this happen?]
[Pale Little Skeleton: Exactly! That's impossible. He drove all of us dragons out. Enemy though he was, that achievement alone should have earned him entry into the divine realm.]
It was not just the undead couple gossiping; even Mute and Non-Vegetarian, who typically lurked in silence for years on end, joined the conversation, voicing their utter bewilderment over Arthur Ryan's fate.
Opening his Necrotic Codex, Anbaixiu caught the Poet's explanation as it appeared.
[Poet: That lad... I met him back in the day. He had too much to drink and, together with some elven punk, started mocking my poetry for sounding awful. So I beat them both black and blue and locked them up for three days. To top it off, I slapped a punishment on Arthur Ryan: whenever I composed a new poem, it would echo straight into his soul to see if he'd ever dare mock me again. But later on, that punishment vanished. I could sense that his soul had dissolved completely.]
Anbaixiu did not even know where to begin picking that apart.
The elven punk drinking alongside Arthur Ryan... That had to be the old king of the Silvermoon High Court.
A mere heroic spirit of Arthur Ryan had traded blows evenly with Mute, a demigod. In his prime, Arthur Ryan must have been even stronger than the old Silvermoon Knight.
Yet Arthur Ryan and the old elven king—two legends at the peak of their power—had been strung up and beaten like dogs.
This senior, the Poet, was almost certainly a genuine deity.
A deity of the undead... Could it be Velsharoon? No, Velsharoon's temperament was nothing like that.
Now was hardly the time to ponder the Poet's identity, so Anbaixiu hurriedly typed: [Senior, could it be that the Lord of the Dawn personally intervened to erase that spiritual imprint?]
[Poet: Impossible. If that god had intended to intervene, He wouldn't have waited so many years. Besides, had it been forcefully unraveled by an outside power, I would have sensed it. That imprint was obliterated alongside Arthur Ryan's soul. Of that I am certain. It's a pity I was slumbering when Arthur Ryan died, or I would have gone to see what happened for myself.]
Given the Poet's absolute certainty, Anbaixiu trusted his judgment.
The undead understood souls better than anyone. When a god of the undead declared a soul obliterated, it was obliterated; even Cyric, the Prince of Lies, could hardly have fooled him.
Yet it made no sense. Why would Arthur Ryan meet such an end?
If a Holy King of such monumental renown could not even step foot into the divine realm, who else could possibly dare enter?
"What on earth did the Lord of the Dawn do? What happened to Arthur Ryan all those years ago? Could it be linked to the Dragon Blood Curse?"
Anbaixiu felt the mysteries piling up. Still, group gossip was mere idle chatter; his immediate priority was to revive alchemy.
Tearing his gaze from the chat, Anbaixiu quickly dispatched a private message to Rose of Decay.
Moments later, her reply arrived.
[Rose of Decay: Myconid spore powder? Which variety of myconid are you looking for?]
That stopped Anbaixiu in his tracks. There were multiple varieties of myconids?
Chapter 250