"Alright, Miss Alia," Reynard said at last. "Where should I bring the gold?"
"I will arrange a eting for us later, when I’m ready. I don’t think I will be able to take the manual away for more than a month, so free your schedule for this ti. Oh, and if you want soone else to study it—such as your female friend—then they should co with you. It might be their only chance."
"Alright. But... That’s a lot of strangeness, Miss Alia. Is the manual really can’t be copied, even by soone who learned all they could from it?"
"Well, it’s hard to explain to soone who didn’t see and study it. The manual... Is a bird."
"A bird?!"
"Yes. The Loremaster of Frost nad it Frozen Balance. The refinent technique AND the bird. The bird serves as a teacher of the technique, but also as its helper. Not a catalyst in the common aning of a word, but similar."
Reynard understood that he understood nothing.
"I will wait impatiently for you to arrange things, Miss Alia. I don’t think I will see until you show that thing!"
***
It turned out that Reynard had to wait two entire months. His inability to work on the magical gold in the anti was frustrating him.
He busied himself by earning more money from the Order of Snow, training Chili, and trying to make a better, more powerful version of Boom Powder.
After two weeks of trial and error, Reynard achieved a drastic improvent in explosive power.
By using more potent—and expensive—ingredients, he created a concoction that exploded with thrice the power of the Boom Powder, while having the sa volu. This ant that bullets using it would fly thrice as fast, and the grenades—the potential for grenades was especially great.
However...
***
BOOM!
If Reynard wasn’t covered in Spirit Armor, the explosion would’ve singed his eyebrows.
If Reynard wasn’t doing his current work in a yard behind the workshop, instead of inside, then half of the building would’ve been in smithereens.
Instead, it was only his small alchemical table and everything in it!
A stone mortar, tal pans, and a chair—broken into pieces—were lying for several ters around.
"Fuck!" Reynard cursed, slamming his fist into his hip. "Again! Did it literally just explode from the cold wind?"
He sighed and began picking up the pieces that weren’t strewn around too far.
Reynard’s new concoction—which he nad White Powder, since it was white—was a failure so far.
Sure, it was powerful. But what use was this power, if the White Powder exploded from just about anything?
The White Powder was such a precariously balanced mix of fire- and water-aligned minerals that any shift in this balance created a chain reaction and an explosion.
The latest experint in trying to make a safe container for the White Powder showed that even slight cooling created such an explosion.
The sa happened if Reynard let the White Powder heat up.
With a sigh, he was about to write this mix off and try sothing less volatile.
’Perhaps adding so earth elent for balance... I wonder if Earth chemists had similar difficulties when they invented gunpowder.’
The line of thought suddenly gave Reynard an idea.
He pursued it for the next day, changing the recipe for White Powder, which stopped being powder at all. Reynard has diluted it in water, adjusting the ingredients accordingly.
This didn’t change the overall volatility, but now Reynard could keep the fire-half and the water-half of the explosive separately. Until mixed, they would be inert and safe.
From that, it was simple to design a bomb with two halves of White Powder and a Black Powder detonator. Its tiny explosion created a breach inside the bomb that let the White Powder mix.
After which it detonated from the remaining warmth of the explosion, or just because the mix was uneven, or just because soone looked at it wrong.
Reynard was quite proud of his design until he realized that in a regular battle, smaller Black Powder grenades would be faster and more effective anyway.
And that, in general, he didn’t advance his main goals in the past weeks.
But by then, Alia called him again and told him to prepare.
***
Another week later, Reynard and Marien stood in a grove several hours of walking away from the Darland city.
The spring has already lted so of the snow off the trees, but it hasn’t put leaves on them yet. It was the ti when nature looked to be at its most miserable, and the ground was a checkerboard of half-lted snow and last year’s yellow grass.
Alia fit into it so well that Reynard didn’t notice her approach at first. She was wearing a white wool cloak over a black leather riding suit, which hugged every curve of her body perfectly.
Magic let her walk over the snow without falling in it, and she was holding a cloth-covered birdcage.
Reynard could feel the magic inside imdiately.
’Alia didn’t lie about the manual being sothing special...’
Marien’s gaze darted back and forth between Alia and the cage in her hand. This was the first ti they t, and Marien was deciding what she thought about the other woman.
Reynard watched this interaction with trepidation.
Alia smiled at Marien warmly.
"Hello, Miss Windblown. I’m glad to finally get to know you in person. I hope that we can beco friends just as with Mister Faust."
Marien stared holes in Alia for a while longer, then nodded.
"Perhaps. I feel that we have sothing in common. Besides my... Besides Johan, that is!" Marien shot a glance at Reynard. "And your generosity with the spell manual won’t be ignored. My own refinent has been stumped lately—I have high hopes that your magical bird will help."
Reynard exhaled with relief.
’They are getting along! This gives hope.’
"I hope the sa. So... Will you show it to us at last, Miss Alia?"
"Of course. Look at it... Frozen Balance."
With these words, Alia took off the cover from the bird’s cage.
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