Endless Debt

Walking into the living area of ​​the alchemy workshop... it can be regarded as the living area. There is a dining table, a kitchen, and Palmer's favorite refrigerator. The aroma of food is wafting in the air, and there are constant sounds of clanking, and there are people. Busy, playing with pots and pans.

Teda sat at the head seat of the dining table, picked up a knife and fork, and cut the sausages on the plate. Opposite Teda, there was an empty chair, and Boluogo sat on the chair.

"How did you sleep?" Teda asked.

"not bad."

After a week of getting along, Bologo became less reserved and integrated into the environment.

"That's good."

Aimu's voice sounded. She came over with a dinner plate and placed breakfast on the table in front of Boluogo.

"Did you do this?"

Boluogo glanced at the food on the plate, and then at Aimu. She was wearing an apron like a chef.

"Uh-huh." Aimu nodded.

The conversation that day ended with Aimu leaving angrily. Boluogo didn't understand why Aimu was angry, as if she, a cold alchemy doll, understood life very well.

After that, Boluogo thought about how to ease the relationship between the two. After all, if he wanted to continue the investigation, it would not be good to make the relationship tense.

Surprisingly, the next day, Aimu seemed to have forgotten all these things, and his attitude towards himself was the same as before, as if there was no such thing as grudge in the eyes of the alchemy doll.

This is the place that makes Boluogo feel most powerless. When faced with other problems, such as the battle between condensers, he has a lot of information to learn and understand, but facing the alchemy doll, everything is unknown. of.

Regarding this new life, Boluogo somewhat understood the feelings of those adventurers when they discovered the new world. Driven by pure curiosity, he tried to understand the will under this metal body.

"Don't worry, Aimu's cooking is quite delicious." Teda said with a smile.

"I have no sense of taste and can't eat, but as long as I strictly follow the instructions, I can make good food." Aimu added in a timely manner.

Boluogo nodded. In fact, Aimu didn't say that, and he had no idea of ​​resistance. When he participated in the war, he had chewed the bark of the tree. No matter how unpalatable the food was, it couldn't compare to the bark.

After forking the food, Boluogo took a few bites. Just as Teda said, Aimu's cooking was quite delicious.

Then...a warm and weird scene appeared.

On the weekend morning, in a quiet room, Teda and Boluogo discussed the next thing while enjoying the food that Aimu had cooked, harmoniously like the daily life of an ordinary family.

But if you think about it carefully, you can see that a debtor who will not die, a fanatical pursuer of truth, and an alchemy doll, the three of them are so calm in the same room.

The most important thing is that they are not in the residence of normal people, but in a large rift surrounded by fog.

Weird yet normal, all of this is simply ridiculous.

"It's been a few months since you became a Condenser, right?" Teda said.

"About that?" Boluogo calculated the date, and it was not much different from TEDA's estimate.

"Are you ready for the next promotion?" TEDA asked again.

"I haven't thought about it yet... I don't know much about this power yet. The soul has not stabilized yet, let alone crossed the three-fold law."

Boluogo said, thinking of the mechanical watch. His mastery of power was far from perfect.

In the promotion system of the Condenser, after the alchemical matrix is ​​implanted, the soul that has undergone form changes is not stable. You need to wait for the soul to gradually stabilize and the foundation stone to become solid again before you can be promoted to the next level.

In addition to these, there are three prerequisites for promotion, also known as the triple rule.

In the theory of alchemy, the human soul is divided into three souls: desire, will, and reason. They correspond to the three substances of salt, sulfur, and mercury respectively, alluding to the human body, mind, and spirit.

If a condenser wants to advance to the next stage, he must first condense his three souls one by one more closely into a tougher soul. After all three souls undergo ritual sublimation, the foundation stone created will make mankind The overall soul is sublimated and reaches higher authority.

Boluogo has only become a Sublime Master not long ago, and he is still in the stage of restoring stability to his soul. It will take some time before he can perform the ritual of the three-fold law.

"Not bad, at least the Order Bureau will pay for your ceremony," TEDA nodded after hearing this. "Many condensers who want to be promoted are first defeated by the alchemy materials consumed by the triple law."

Boluogo agreed silently. Teda was right about this. The performance of the three-layer ceremony required the consumption of a large amount of alchemical materials. As the rank increased, the consumption would also increase.

The Order Bureau, a large and powerful company, will provide free resources for the ceremony for the Condenser to be promoted to a Prayer. However, in the subsequent stages of the Prayer, you need to work hard on your own. Many alchemy materials are in extremely short supply even for the Order Bureau. of.

Fortunately, only a few people are promoted every year, and the time for everyone's soul to return to stability is different. Some people need a few months, some need a few years, and the ceremony is also accompanied by extremely high risks, and Not everyone will chase power blindly.

But these problems do not exist for Boluogo. He is a debtor. Although his soul is incomplete, which makes his promotion ceremony difficult, he will not die. He just needs to try a few more times.

"You have also provided alchemy matrix implants for many people...will you provide them with promotion ritual services?" Bologo asked abruptly.

TEDA will implant alchemical matrices into ordinary people and charge a high price to maintain the operation of his alchemy workshop.

"How is it possible? These equipments of mine can barely support the implantation ceremony. Let alone the promotion ceremony, even the alchemy materials are difficult to gather," TEDA said. "Those key materials have been destroyed by many Extraordinary organizations control it secretly, and few are circulated in the market."

"Indirectly controlling the number of sublimators, right?" Bologo said.

"Yes, this is the consensus of many organizations. We can allow a large number of condensers to wander outside, but do not allow higher-level people to exist. Instead of spending a lot of manpower to maintain order, it is better to directly make promotion difficult. ." TEDA explained.

Boluogo understands that for ordinary people, the first stage of Sublimation is a powerful existence that is difficult to fight against. If they are believers and those with power... If these people are powerful enough, they can easily Capture a city.

"But the emergence of the Gray Trade Chamber of Commerce has broken all this. These people not only bring alchemy weapons, but also bring enough alchemy materials to these condensers who are struggling for promotion, as long as they are willing to pay the price."

Boluogo thought of all this, his expression became serious, and he asked TEDA, "Do you have any contact with the people from the Gray Trade Chamber of Commerce?"

"You want to track them down through me?" Teda understood what Boluogo meant, and he shook his head, "I have no contact with them. This is the truth, and even if I have contact, I can't reveal too much to you. Isn’t it?”

"Too."

Boluogo knew that he was still too naive. After TEDA left the Bureau of Order, even if he sat in TEDA's house, ate the food cooked by Aimu, accepted TEDA's teachings, and cooperated with his research... no matter what he did, he couldn't Change, they are not a group of people.

Everyone is in different camps, but they are temporarily bound together by the same interests. When the interests are no longer consistent, no one knows what will happen.

"Have you finished eating?" Teda asked.

"You've finished eating, do you want to start?"

"Well, let's go to the second floor."

Teda said as he picked up the lab coat hanging on the back of the chair. The white skirt covered his knees.

…

The facilities in the alchemy workshop cannot be compared with those of the Bureau of Order. With the strange characteristics of the "reclamation room", Boluogo can destroy it as much as he wants, but here he has to be restrained at all levels.

"Control your power and don't affect the surrounding buildings." TEDA warned repeatedly.

The alchemy workshop is a closed internal circulation as a whole, with the virtual domain covering it. Bologo's recruiting hand is very suitable for destroying the building. Once any damage is caused, the closed virtual domain may collapse.

TEDA has spent a lot of effort here. If Boluogo fails like this, this old guy will definitely kill Boluogo, even if Boluogo is undead.

"I know." Bologo promised.

Seeing Boluogo's serious attitude, TEDA was somewhat relieved, and then said, "Actually, you should have discovered that when you activate your recruiting hand, you need to extend your own alchemy matrix first."

"Well, because of this, there will be a short delay from when my secret power is activated to when it takes effect."

As Boluogo spoke, he called out the silver snake, which crawled along his fingertips, with cyan trails between its silver scales.

"In fact, we can think of it this way. You are not manipulating the materials you come into contact with, but through the extension of the alchemy matrix, you turn the materials covered by you into a part of your body, thus distorting and modifying part of your body... …give orders to the extended parts of the body as to the limbs.”

Teda stared at Silver Snake and suddenly said this theory. From this perspective, the Hand of Recruitment is similar to the Ascension School. .

"Is that so? Interesting idea."

Boluogo twirled his palms in confusion, and the silver snake was also tumbling in it. Suddenly Boluogo thought of something, and he continued.

"Actually... can all this be understood as my alchemy matrix spreading to those material souls?"

Boluogo looked away and looked at Teda.

"The alchemical matrix is ​​rooted in the soul, and these substances also have souls, right?"