The Runic Alchemist

But those weren't the things that kept Damian the busiest over the four years. His main accomplishment, from a business standpoint, was his mastery of

'Arcane Synthesis'

and the Mimicry spell.

After experimenting with countless chemicals and elements from the periodic table—those he could find in this world or synthesize in the lab through simple reactions—he began to uncover the fundamentals of how Arcane Synthesis worked in very unexpected ways. Initially, he assumed the synthesis aspect was connected to chemistry and devoted over a year to this endeavor. Then, one day, while keeping Arcane Synthesis active, he accidentally cut himself on a piece of glass and used a healing spell to treat the wound.

To his surprise, as he activated the runic circle for healing, he felt a faint, golden runic circle etch itself into his mind. It was a peculiar sensation, reminiscent of when he first used spatial storage. Unreal yet undeniably present, it lingered at the edge of his consciousness, ready to be summoned if he closed his eyes and focused.

At first, Damian couldn't understand what it was or how it functioned. However, the only variable that had changed was the presence of Arcane Synthesis. Intrigued, he tried using a mimicry spell on himself while keeping Arcane Synthesis active. This time, the golden runic circle was replaced by a new one—a gold-and-black combination that matched the mimicry spell's runic design.

It seemed the Arcane Synthesis skill had stored the spell..? Or, more accurately, it had recorded the spell's essence, turning it into "data." But how could he use this data? The skill description mentioned it could fuse with chemical compounds, but how did one mix a spell stored in the mind with physical elements?

Experimentation followed. Damian replaced the stored spell with a healing spell again and tried to activate the runic circle purely with his mind, bypassing the usual rune-drawing process. The result? He achieved nothing except looking like he was constipated. Then, he attempted using a simple water rune, hoping the water would somehow be imbued with healing properties. Still, it remained just ordinary water.

A month of confusion later, Damian realized what was missing. Just as runic scroll creation required both the

'Scholar'

and

'Scribe'

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skills, Arcane Synthesis alone wasn't enough. The skill stored the spell, capturing its mystical essence and fusing it into his mind, but he lacked the means to extract or apply it.

Frustrated, he devoured every spellcasting and alchemy book he could find or purchase, searching for anything related to recorded spell extraction. Nothing useful came up. Desperate, he explained a simplified version of his problem, not revealing much to his other research heads colleagues. While his colleagues offered advice, nothing worked. Finally, the head researcher, Erdan, suggested compiling a report on his findings and presenting a potential use case for the spell to the queen.

Though skeptical, Damian followed Erdan's advice. In the report, he let his imagination run wild, outlining potential applications for the skill. He speculated about creating products that required no spellcasting to activate, such as pre-stored mimicry spells or innovative methods for healing and whatnot. To be honest he wasn't even sure if he could deliver on a single thing mentioned, but it wasn't impossible.

By this time, Damian had already gained recognition for his contributions, such as his golem-making techniques and his method of repurposing iron and other materials using large-scale runic circles and mana dust. Though these discoveries were simple and not groundbreaking, they were practical enough to earn praise from royalty-owned workshops and runesmiths. His reputation as an eccentric but innovative researcher was solidified.

When the queen reviewed his latest proposal, she summoned him for a private meeting—the first of its kind. Damian arrived with little expectation and presented his ideas halfheartedly. He made it clear that much of what he proposed was purely theoretical.

The queen, accompanied by the third-ranker Spellsword elf who was Vidalia's cousin apparently, and two elderly mages in robes listened intently. Apparently they were following his weird experiments very closely and being experienced people understood the gist of what he was trying to do with all those experiments. After some deliberation, the queen made him an offer: access to a chaos-element spell from the royal archives, which might help him advance his research.

The offer came with a catch. Damian would need to sign a contract agreeing to use the spell exclusively for specified experiments. Any deviation would result in the forfeiture of his life. It was weird, this much for a single spell..? He was now really curious, also a bit hesitant to sign such a risky thing, but in the end his curiosity won over. Somewhat convincing point was also the subtle hint of how they wanted to keep him and would accept some of his requests to gain his favor. Was it because of his potential as a researcher or just the plain power of his constant experiments that mostly ended in explosions was hard to tell.

It was the decision that changed both his and the whole Eldoris kingdom's fate forever.

in the secret hidden library, he was taken with his eyes closed, the queen herself picked up the old heavy leather book and performed the chanting, and showed him the chaos spell that was terrifying to say the least. He was allowed to witness it for just once, and his ears were blocked by the spellsword elf so he couldn't memorize the spell.

Damian didn't think even they expected much from showing him this and were just trying to appease his curiosity by giving him this favor. Who the hell could even understand a spell by just looking at the effect for once..?

The spell was horrifying in its simplicity: it transformed inanimate objects into rust powder, seemingly disintegrating their atoms. During the demonstration, an iron sword was reduced to reddish-brown powder within seconds, as though it had been made of sand. No wonder this shit was forbidden..

Damian was stunned but didn't miss a single detail of the spell's runic circle. It was a rust-colored, chaotic design, embodying destruction rather than creation. Instead of conjuring this spell destroyed.. Why would they think it would help him..? Then he realized it.. they knew of his somewhat mix-mashing of spell creation, and this was the only spell he had ever seen that targeted an object and transformed an object into another thing entirely..

Conjuring with magic was no new thing but transforming things on a fundamental level.. That was a forbidden alchemy territory.. And was strictly banned in all five kingdoms. Not much knowledge about it was even known to anyone, even Damian himself had only learned of it when the head researcher Erdan told him about it in one of their chats about the possibility of mana recording and transforming device.

This spell was the missing piece Damian needed to create a whole new industry. In the world where the only popular potion was a healing potion.. Over the next few years, his experiments with the chaos spell and mimicry spell laid the groundwork for innovative potions that left people across the kingdoms in awe.

Damian had managed to create potions that were unlike anything the world had ever seen. He became known as

'The Morph Vialist'

throughout the five kingdoms, a title given to him for his unique glass vial designs storing potions.