River of Fate: Emerald Alchemist, page 36
Verse nodded as he considered the best approach. It seemed like the sect had definitely changed their plan or become more desperate. He didn’t know what their timeline was, but if they were willing to grab an official alchemist, they had to be at a critical juncture.
Perhaps they planned for Renzer to cover for them.
“Is that pointing in the direction of the sect?” he asked as he looked at the tracking plate. “Or did they go somewhere else?”
“It’s a little south of their main location, but it’s close,” Vesana said as she brushed her hair back from her face and studied the plate. “It’s probably a secret area where they’re holding them. I’ve already told my uncle about the kidnapping, and he’s hurrying this way. He wasn’t going to be here for another month, but if things go well, it should only be a couple of days.”
Her eyes were bright and her movements were full of energy, making it clear that she wanted to follow the trail immediately.
“This is almost enough evidence,” she added quickly, “and we have the perfect excuse. It doesn’t prove that Renzer was behind any of it, but it’s fully within the guild’s right to look for a kidnapped alchemist. At worst, we’ll just have to apologize.”
“That is good news,” he said as he tapped his fingers against the air in thought, unconsciously hardening it until it was like a table. It was very convenient.
“How long has it been since the new alchemist disappeared?”
“It was the day after you left, so just over a week,” Vesana replied quickly as she filled him in on the details. Her excitement was turning into focused attention now as she began to plan.
“This heritage alchemist actually arrived two weeks ago, and I thought nothing was going to happen to her, but she suddenly went missing. I was just waiting for you to get back. Now that you are, we can follow them and see what’s going on. Maybe we can find a trail for when my uncle arrives.”
“They moved faster than I thought they would,” he said with a frown as he considered the timeline.
It looked like the sect really couldn’t wait. They'd moved as soon as he left the city. He wondered what they were thinking now that the team they sent after him was dead.
Hopefully, they were in a panic.
They were cultivators from a dark sect, however, so a panic to them probably just meant seizing the moment. Demonic cultivators weren’t known for running around like headless chickens.
Vesana looked eager to run out of the room that moment and find the alchemist, but he held up his hand to hold her back.
“Before we go after them,” he said, “have you ever heard of the Desolate Mind Pill?”
Vesana froze at the question, her knuckles turning white as she gripped the tracking plate.
She was half turned toward him and he watched a series of emotions flicker across her face, from puzzlement, to a furrowed brow, to wide-eyed shock.
Apparently, the name of the pill rang a bell.
“That’s...not possible,” she said a moment later as her hand shook. “That pill is banned by the guild, it’s impossible to make without....” Her voice trailed off as she shook her head.
“So you do know about it?” he asked with curiosity. “How does it work and what does it need?”
“First, tell me where you heard about it?” she asked slowly as she regained her composure. “The name of the pill is known in a handful of records, so it’s not impossible to hear about, but the guild tries to discourage information. It’s in the top twenty on the guild’s list of banned pills. The hope is that it will eventually be forgotten. The only reason I know it is because a lot of my family is in the guild enforcement branch, and it’s one of the things they need to deal with. I’ve had that list memorized since I was five.”
“It’s what the sect is making, apparently,” he said confidently. “At least according to the sect elder who tried to kill me.”
It didn’t take long to fill her in on what he’d learned from Corpsewind, including the sect’s plan to take control of the region. Corpsewind hadn’t given him a lot of details, but the fragments were enough to paint a picture.
As he spoke, Vesana’s expression turned paler.
“You need to understand that it’s not just a spirit domination pill,” she said after he finished. She was hesitant to speak at first, but quickly got over it. “It requires two things to work: one is a mindless alchemist to make it. Usually that means one under a domination effect already and who has no stray thoughts. I imagine that the Crimson Shade Sect’s soul slave technique might qualify for that.
“The second thing is a drop of demonic blood. That’s the catalyst that brings the other elements together. The pill is a terrible creation. It devours the spirit of the alchemist who creates it, breaking it off into wisps that combine with the demonic blood and infuse the pills. That’s where it gets an initial burst of soul energy, which acts like a seed.
“When the pill is consumed by a victim, the seed begins to grow. The demonic blood sends tendrils throughout their spirit and slowly supplants their will. It can take years to finish, but even before that it results in people who will almost mindlessly agree with the demonic cultivator whose blood is influencing them. At the height of its strength, the demon can control their thoughts or kill them with a snap of his fingers.”
Vesana paused, her expression turning angry now as she glared at the tracking plate in her hands.
“If the sect is making that pill, it’s a huge problem. If you’re certain about this, I need to tell the guild immediately. My uncle might not be enough, but he’s probably the closest. He can summon more reinforcements.”
“I’m sure that’s what Corpsewind said,” Verse confirmed. “I’ll swear to it by my cultivation if necessary. And that’s not the only thing. I think I know where they might be getting the demonic blood.”
The description of the pill made him think of Corpsewind’s transformation. If the sect was planning to use the pill to take control of the region, there was no way he was the only one.
At his best guess, the sect master had to have a similar demonic physique, one that was close enough to the recipe for the pill that it worked.
Given the mentality of the Crimson Shade Sect and demons, there was no one else he would trust with that sort of power.
“There have been records of demonic cultivators using this pill before,” Vesana said with a frown, “but I’d never heard that the Crimson Shade Sect had them. They kept that secret close.”
As soon as she finished speaking, she pulled out a guild badge that was a lot more ornate than the one Verse had. She set it on the table and swiftly drew a complex formation around it.
Ten high-grade spirit stones went into key locations between the arcing lines and sigils. As soon as the design was complete, she focused all of her attention on it. Waves of spiritual energy flooded the air around her, pouring into the badge.
She spoke into the air for a while, but her words were obscured by the formation. Verse watched her expression go from anger to hesitation, and then to pure determination.
Eventually, she looked up from the formation and the high-grade spirit stones disintegrated into sparkling dust. All of their energy had been used to reach across whatever distance she had just crossed.
“My uncle is rushing here now,” she said with a deep frown. “It’ll still be a day or two, since the teleportation formations he needs are slow to charge. He wants us to investigate and use the full force of the guild branch here.”
“That means dealing with Renzer,” Verse said. “You think he’s going to cooperate? Your desire for secrecy might be affected by this.”
“Unless Renzer wants to be branded as a traitor, he won’t have a choice,” Vesana declared firmly. “Secrecy isn’t as important now. If the guild acts to suppress a banned pill, the missing alchemists and everything else will be seen as related issues. We’re within our right to act on this. The real problem is if Renzer is helping the sect, he might warn them too early.”
Her frown deepened.
“I’m only the assistant branch manager. Renzer should be the one taking charge of this, but I still don’t have evidence that he’s the traitor. With my uncle’s support, I can seize authority from him, but it’s politically risky. We have evidence on the sect, but not enough on him yet.”
“Then we need to go and see him,” Verse said with a flash of emerald flame in his eyes. “Quietly and with a way to block his communications. There’s a risk that the sect will try to reach him, and if they can’t, they will know that something is wrong, but it will have to be good enough. There is still a small chance you’re wrong about him, so we can find out when we get there.”
“But he’s at the early Primal Spirit realm,” Vesana said. It was clear she wanted to agree with him, but she was worried. “I might be able to block his communication with an artifact, but I’m not confident in stopping him if he tries to warn the sect himself. I’m only at the middle stage of the Aligned realm and you just broke through. That’s not good odds”
“I’ll take care of it,” Verse said with a short nod. “Even if he’s a Primal Spirit realm cultivator, leave him to me.”
“Are Imperial Knights really that strong?” Vesana’s eyes widened as she looked at him. “I’ve heard of people fighting up ranks, but that’s a full realm above you, if not more! The difference between realms is too big. That breaks every standard of cultivation in the empire!”
“Just leave it to me.” Verse nodded as he gave her an easy smile. “In fact, you could say I’m looking forward to it.”
He kept his bloodline under tight control, but emerald flames were still sparking off his skin as a wave of anger rolled through him and his heart sped up.
He hadn’t forgiven the sect for trying to assassinate him, and Renzer was probably the one who had gotten them involved. He didn’t have too many rules when it came to this life, but for anyone who tried to kill him, he was more than willing to return the favor.
First Renzer, and then the sect.
Chapter twenty-five
Renzer's Bluff
The Alchemists’ Guild building hummed with activity as Verse and Vesana headed through the gate. Once inside, they took the shortest route possible to Renzer’s office.
After his breakthrough, Verse had refreshed his array of soul talismans. Now the draconic runes circled around his arms and neck, floating just above his skin and beneath his clothes. They hummed with elemental energy, waiting for him to speak.
He’d discovered that combining the soul talismans with a spoken command intensified them, especially if his bloodline was active to pour more power into the rune. The draconic language resonated with the power of the world, and it made them much more dangerous.
He was looking forward to testing them out against Renzer if the man didn’t want to cooperate.
The guild building was a sprawling complex, but with Vesana leading the way through one secured door after another, it didn’t take long before they reached Renzer’s office.
The branch manager’s hallway was decorated in rich wood that had a pale golden grain and an understated elegance. It was a grade above the rest of the guild’s interior, but it showed its wealth in quality and endurance rather than in an ostentatious display.
Renzer’s door was the exact opposite.
The door was made from a darker golden wood that released a faint but constant spiritual pressure. It was inlaid with an elaborate pattern of white and black oak trees, which were made from tiny chips of high-quality elemental ore and high-grade spirit stones.
All around the door, there was a pleasant haze of fiery spiritual energy and a wisp of something smoky that calmed the mind and heart, like high-quality incense.
“Radiant fire oak,” Vesana said with a grimace as she indicated the door. “The wood gathers ambient spiritual energy to strengthen itself, even after it is cut. If there’s any excess energy, it releases it into the area. The stones inlaid on the door are a formation that intensifies the effect. It’s a good aid to meditation and a hallmark of many meditation chambers, but it’s expensive, especially for a small city like Boreas.”
It almost made Verse chuckle to hear her call the city small, but compared to the capital, it apparently was. The royal palace was supposedly as large as Boreas, and the city around it was the size of an entire province.
“He had the door changed out when he came here,” Vesana added, “claiming that a branch manager needs to impress visitors. It’s one of the more expensive ways the guild has wasted money on him. We’ve never been stingy with our people, but most of the support goes into ingredients and research. We have elaborate meeting rooms for important visitors, but those are in more public-facing areas. They don’t have any reason to come here. These offices are for private work.”
From her frown, she saw the door as an embarrassment.
“Let’s see if he’s inside,” Verse said as he double-checked his talismans and focused his mind in case he needed to fight as soon as the door opened.
The Knight’s Seal on his shoulder began to glow, surrounding him with a radiant golden aura. It came with its own sense of spiritual pressure. He planned to use it to hide his bloodline aura as much as possible.
Now that they were officially dealing with the disappearance of the alchemists, it was good to look the part.
As far as the guild and the public were concerned, from this point forward, Vesana’s uncle had empowered her to investigate the disappearances, and she had requested the assistance of a nearby Imperial Knight to help.
If Renzer didn’t want to acknowledge that, it would mean he was opposing the investigation for his own purposes.
That wouldn’t go well for him.
Verse cycled his cultivation as he brought himself to peak condition and then nodded at Vesana.
She immediately pulled out an intricate jade plate and placed a high-grade spirit stone on the surface, which disintegrated into dust. A moment later, a pulse of heavy spiritual energy flooded out around the area, making it feel like everything was underwater.
“That should block his communications for a while,” she said as she tucked the plate into a pouch on her belt. “Let’s tell him we’re here.”
Verse rapped on the door with a loud thud that was half physical and half a pulse of spiritual energy. He could just hear the echo inside the office.
What he didn’t expect to hear was a weak groan from the other side, nor for the door to immediately swing open like it was waiting for them.
The office was large, about thirty feet across, and paneled in the same light golden wood as the hallway. Here and there, expensive-looking paintings gleamed on the walls, their frames made from woods that looked just as expensive as the door.
The artwork was a mix of calligraphy that gleamed with a touch of the dao, spiritual herbs in special pots that released waves of dense energy into the office, sculptures from rare ores and stones that released their own unique signature of spiritual energy, and ornate pieces of art studded with gems that flickered with elemental auras.
It was like walking into a treasure room where everything was as rich and ostentatious as possible. Some of the pieces were very nice in their own right, but they had clearly been thrown together by someone who had no sense of taste.
Just seeing it made Verse grimace.
Immediately, however, his attention was pulled to the center of the room, where a man was slumped over a large golden desk. His face was pale and slightly ashen, and there were strange red streaks running across his cheeks and forehead.
Beads of sweat hung on his forehead and nose, looking like they were about to fall, but before they could, they boiled away into a strange type of steam that looked like screaming faces.
The man’s hands clawed at the desktop, contorting into painful arcs as he tried to pull himself up. Several of them were already broken, and his fingertips were bloody. It looked like he’d been at it for a while, but he wasn’t able to stand up.
The man was dressed in a rich golden robe that was streaked with blood and sweat. As far as Verse could tell, that had to be Renzer.
It was also the origin of the groan he’d heard from the door.
Verse took in the situation at a glance. He frowned as he studied the branch manager, trying to figure out what was going on.
His eyes narrowed as he searched for assassins, scanning over the pile of expensive art on the walls for signs of where they could have entered or left, but there was nothing. Nor was there anyone else here.
This wasn’t what he’d expected.
After a moment, he frowned and turned to look back at Renzer. He’d come here to fight, and finding the man already defeated by what looked like poison was...a little disappointing.
It would have been much more satisfying to hit him than to deal with whatever this was.
Renzer stared at the two of them, his hands still clawing at the desk. His mouth moved, but it was quickly replaced by a painful muscle spasm that made all of his veins stand out. It looked like he was trying to ask for help, but his body was barely under his control.
“What happened?!” Vesana shouted from beside him as she started to move forward.
Her initial plan to confront Renzer had been thrown out the window, and she was now looking at the branch manager with shock.
They were in a hurry to gather forces from the guild and follow the trail to the missing alchemists, but seeing Renzer like this was enough to make her hesitate.
“Wait.” Verse’s hand locked around Vesana’s wrist as he pulled her to a stop beside him before she could go more than a step. “Don’t touch him yet. He’s clearly been poisoned, and it could affect you as well.”
He frowned as he looked around the room, ignoring the pain that was on Renzer’s features.
He didn’t trust this. It felt like a trick.
