Stuck as a Dungeon Mob

Ed went back to the shack with the recipe tablets and quickly found his target. It was the Body Supplement Recipe.

The tablet contained the exact dosages of fort flower, Orc Blood fruit, and serenity buds necessary to create the potion. It all seemed rather simple but Ed wasn't very trusting of faithfully following this recipe.

'Mhm… it's no surprise this potion is so dangerous' The ingredients used were simply three. Orc blood fruit even had the built-in side effect of causing rage when consumed in large quantities. It was also likely the culprit for the dumbing down of consumers. The serenity buds simply lowered the efficacy or potency of the potion, it wasn't too bad then right?

Obviously not. The lowered efficacy also had a large part in the dumbing down of the giant orcs. It wouldn't have been necessary to feed them so many of the potions if the effects were more prominent.

'Although the serenity buds might also suppress the side effects…' Ed wasn't sure since his potions would just turn into duds. Regardless, out of the current ingredients for the body supplement, only the fort flower had any place in his new potion.

Ed even suspected that it might resonate quite well with the earthen spirit bone. A fort was obviously not made out of wood, it wasn't very wise when people were capable of shooting fire out of their hands. That only left the ever-handy earth.

'But this alone won't be enough' As much as Ed didn't want to he would definitely need to use the serenity buds. But that wasn't what he referred to. But… what was he missing then?

'Water isn't enough' That was right. The current solvent was entirely lacking. Water wouldn't melt bone within any acceptable measure of time. At the very least the water would need to be slightly acidic.

In that case, it was just a matter of finding something acidic. Unfortunately, the only thing Ed could think of was fruit juice. There was only one fruit available at the moment.

'I might just need to ground the bone into a powder then' Ed wanted to avoid this measure simply due to the fact that the bone would not be properly dissolved. It would just become small particles in the potion. This would in turn lower the potency of his potion and be inefficient resource-wise. Trenches didn't grow on trees after all.

After having this back and forth debate of ideas, Ed ultimately resolved himself to use the ground into powder method. Though he hadn't mentioned it before, there was something else that Ed was wary of when using this method.

[Spirit Bone (Material)]

To verify this Ed retrieved a regular spirit bone from his storage. The spirit bone was made using bits of Callow's consciousness and body. Unsurprisingly the end result was a plain ol' bone with nothing but a hint of personality.

He activated his sixth sense skill and observed as the brown bone took on a light blue glow. This indicated the bone was harmless.

Ed grabbed the bone and crushed it using by curling his hand into a fist. The sixth sense skill then instantly showed him how bits of consciousness seeped through his finger and faded into nothingness. The soft blue glow that used to exist on the material disappeared and now all Ed held in his hands were shards of bone that served no purpose.

'Indeed, grounding the spirit bones doesn't work' He had suspected this due to the nature of consciousnesses. Both the human and orc zombie for example had its soul continue to expire over time even though it had a body. The body had died and suffered injuries and that was enough for its soul to dissipate.

It was needless to say what would happen when the so-called body was entirely shattered in that case.

'In the end, I do need a stronger solvent' Ed tried to look through the tablets again and found nothing of use. All of the potions depicted by the tablets used plain old water. Ed could now tell why the alchemy potions were so poor in quality, the alchemy didn't get a chance to evolve to a higher level due to the lacking resources.

The orcs showed a much greater capability in the field of enchanting and formation making. The two things were essentially the same but enchanting was usually used when it referred to bodies or weapons. The main difference was the science behind how the necessary runes were carved as well as the precision and flexibility behind them.

The resources for both of these things were cheap. Blood.

'Hm…' It was really troublesome.

Measures such as applying serenity buds to the orc blood fruit to remove the side effects would also remove the acidity making it a bad solvent. The largest compromise Ed could think of was using a diluted mix but in that case, much of the potential in the bone would be wasted.

It was back to the drawing board and this time Ed thought to consult magic. The two boulders he had assimilated so far helped him understand something. This was the plant-pseudo element.

Well, understand was a stretch. At most Ed could say he now acknowledged its existence. This pseudo-element was the one responsible for the entangle spell he learned from Vorgarag but it could much more than that.

Ed just hadn't thought to do so. Until now.

If the problem was the negative side effects of orc blood fruit then all he needed to do was somehow find a way to modify the fruit through magic. It sounded like Ed would need to do a lot of waiting but he already knew of a way to speed up the process.

The entangle spell worked by using mana to boost the growth of grass or vines as well as shift them to his will. This meant that Ed could take a seed and apply the same technique. He could have it grow in a matter of seconds. The only downside was that the tree would die immediately after he cut off his mana.

'Luckily, we have a large stash of crystals here' Ed didn't know what he could find in the following floors but topping the resources of the current one seemed like a tough challenge.

'My ability to make formations hasn't been recognized by the system but…' Ed knew he was capable of making this into a simple array. He could have the array supply the mana, he would control the growth, and that would give him the fruit.

From there he would need to make a secondary condition for the array. Stop growth! Maintain the status quo!

Ed wouldn't be able to control the tree all the time. If he didn't add such a clause the tree would expand infinitely until the mana crystals became exhausted.

'Let's review…' Ed needed to lessen the side effects of the orc blood fruit…

'Damn, I don't know how to start' It was weird how Ed could plan the following steps but not the first one. It was all due to the fact that he knew nothing about modifying plants through genetics or otherwise.

'Genetics…' Ed had briefly touched on the concept of DNA previously when thinking back on the orc ancestors and how they were likely very genetically similar. At that time, he had concluded that his memories were still insufficient to delve into it.

Plus, even if he could, what was he supposed to do with high school level science? As for magic, it was magical but not omnipotent.

'...or is it?' In the first place, regular fruits wouldn't make you prone to rage. This was a magical problem more than anything. In that case, he needed to look at things from a more spiritual perspective.

Why did the fruits have such an effect? Similar to how the drop items each carried a personality, Ed could only assume that a tree nurtured by the blood of fallen orcs would carry either their anger and regret or contain the barbaric nature of orcs. Of course, if he was comparing it to drop items then the answer had to be the latter.

Ed activated his sixth sense ability once more, but this time he took a gander at the garden. The trees and grass glowed with extremely faint consciousnesses. They were living things, that was normal.

So Ed had to walk closer to the garden and approach one of the many fruit trees there for closer scrutiny.

At this point, Ed could tell a subtle difference. The sixth sense skill did the following, it gave one a peek into the paranormal world and assigned it a color based on the risk it posed. Also, if there was a particularly high risk the skill would self-activate to act as a warning. 

But… how could it assess the risks in plants? Wouldn't they all be equally harmless? As far as Ed could infer, the skill most likely considered the strength of the consciousness instead of the traits or skills of the creature.

The dungeon for example was always a deep red while pretty much everything else he peered at had a soft blue glow. If the skill considered skills then the human he had faced in the crypt would have made the skill activate.

Therefore, the skills didn't matter.

Ed's face was basically touching the tree's trunk but he could finally catch traces of a difference.

'The blue color is slightly more vibrant and reactive' It was weird. The consciousness inside of trees worked oddly similar to the blood coursing through veins. For other living creatures the consciousness would be in the position of the brain but for the trees, it wasn't the case. They didn't have a brain, they had a sort of nervous system.

'Fascinating' But what mattered most now was that Ed knew it was a spiritual problem. The fruits contained conscious power similar to the spirit bones but due to the weird nature of plants, the consciousness didn't simply vanish upon having the fruit cut and sliced.

This lay in the expertise of the system. Now, all he had to do was take this tree and throw it in the forge!

'Wait why does my idea sound so stupid all of a sudden?' The forge wasn't real fire so it should be fine right?