Chapter 61: Basic Alchemical Principles

Thankfully, nothing distracted Suria as she spent the dead days prior to the term preparing as much as she could. She worked on all her runic exercises, in addition to the meditation to progress her soul talisman, which she hoped to complete in this loop. There weren't very many textbooks for her Alchemy classes, so she had less urgent reading.

Xuhriha meandered in and out of their room without troubling her, occasionally reporting when something happened on campus. The only thing that surprised Suria was that apparently Maut-mai and Kiznua had decided to room together on the opposite side of the Taedric Building... maybe that would be good for both of them.

When the first day of classes began, Suria had increased her runic capacity to eleven, which made her comparable to most of the first year students even without having taken any runic potions. If she mastered her soul talisman and found a reliable way to do the necessary alchemy, she hoped that in future cycles she could begin the school term with an exceptionally high capacity, which might be enough for her to enter into more advanced classes.

This term, Suria intended to completely skip Fundamentals, so her first real class was Basic Alchemical Principles. It was also the first class, across all loops, that took her deep into the campus forest to find Woodward Hall.

The first part of her walk was easy, since she'd headed to the outskirts several times, and if that wasn't enough she had Xuhriha with her. But though their classes started at the same time, the other woman was headed up to Skypiercer Tower, so they needed to split.

"Don't worry, Suria," Xuhriha told her. "The forest isn't too confusing, just keep heading northwest. Oh, but don't go too far west or you'll run into the carnivorous trees."

"Very funny," Suria said. "See you after class."

"If you aren't eaten."

Obviously Xuhriha was joking about the trees, but as Suria walked deeper into the forest she felt like she was leaving the civilized part of campus behind. The trees grew larger and darker, and while there were still a few trail markers, those details seemed to disappear into the shadows of the canopy. Even though many students should have been heading to Woodward Hall, they didn't seem to be anywhere around her.

Would it be possible for a tree with enough magic to become carnivorous? Suria found herself opening her runebook and checking on the new flame spell she'd inscribed, even though it was completely irrational. Then again, she remembered back to Professor Abouric's Naturalism course and he'd said that plants with some magic tended to develop protection from flame first.

As she grew nearer, Suria did spot a few other students and the older ones seemed completely unconcerned. She had spent a while looking for Murtiel Hosmar, who should have been easy to pick out with Albree, but there had been no sign of her. It was always possible that something had changed her decisions in this loop.

After getting used to all the grand multi-story buildings on campus, Suria almost didn't recognize Woodward Hall at first. Its walls and roof were a part of the same curving surface, and though the building was long, it had an organic undulating shape that merged with the forest. Not just around the trees, but apparently designed for some of the largest trunks to form parts of the architecture. All of it seemed to be wood except for the windows, which were soft green glass.

It would have been difficult to parse if not for the students, who reminded her that this was a building and not an eldritch phenomenon simply because they moved in and out like any other. As she approached what appeared to be the main entrance, Suria saw that the building was taller than she'd thought at first due to the size of the trees around it. The entrance doors were twice her height and many portions of the building had enough space for a second floor.

Stepping inside, she discovered that the interior was actually brighter than the exterior, since it was illuminated by soft glowing motes instead of shadowed by the forest. The magical lights illuminated a wooden hallway that wasn't much of a foyer, just a welcoming entrance that branched into several differently-sized corridors.

Fortunately, there was no difficulty finding her classroom, since the majority of students were going to the same place. Down the left hall, she followed them into a chamber that proved to be far larger than expected - not spatial magic, it was just built into the earth, dozens of descending rows of desks each with their own equipment set on top. Suria had to go multiple steps down to find an unoccupied table and discovered that the whole room was unexpectedly cool.

Despite having spent much of a year at Darkmoon, Suria wasn't familiar with the majority of the objects on the table in front of her. She opened her textbook, since she remembered some discussion of different alchemical tools, and it wasn't as much help as she wanted.

The room grew increasingly full and Suria realized that she was going to have to share her table with others. A few students at the edges managed to get by with just two students per table, but many had four people. Since she hadn't come with anyone, Suria ended up with a group of three young women who were constantly giggling to one another.

Just before class began, the professor entered from a hidden door in the back. Slagterwese looked exactly the way Suria remembered her from the basement: a bent old woman with dark Shantic skin, her clothes ornate yet her hair pulled back in a stiff bundle. Now that Suria wasn't overwhelmed by so many other thrones, she saw that Slagterwese had green slitted eyes like many Shantic nobles, and that the cane she clutched in one hand had a large amber orb that burned with magic.

"There you are." The professor tapped her cane against the floor and the sound seemed to resonate through the wood of the entire building. "Quiet down. This is Basic Alchemical Principles. I know some of you are just taking it as a prerequisite, and I expect you all to keep your mouths shut. Those of you who care about Alchemy, take this seriously. The basics are the soil in which anything more advanced will grow.

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"Now, I know what some of you are thinking. Isn't Alchemy just a branch of the new sciences? Shouldn't it be part of the Naturalism or Medicine departments? Isn't it just a legacy of outdated old civilizations before the Glyphic Imperium?"

Her rhetorical questions hung in the air as the students waited for her to continue, then abruptly she stabbed a finger to the side.

"Get out. We're not going to ramble about hypotheticals here, we're going to do some godsdamned alchemy." Professor Slagterwese settled both her hands atop her cane and peered out over the class. "Now, we're going to start the whole class by making a pain relief potion. Can anyone tell me why?"

This question seemed like a real one, because she waited silently. Eventually a student ventured, "Because it's easy?"

"Not wrong, but not specific enough."

"Because it's practical?" another student tried. "Pain relief potions are a profitab-"

"Wrong!" Professor Slagterwese half-screamed the word and the class flinched. No one wanted to answer after that, but she kept watching the class like a hawk and it was clear that she had the patience to outlast them.

"Because it's... safe?" someone tried.

"Good." The professor tapped her cane against the ground in satisfaction. "We're going to start with a simple mixture because that way when you screw up, you won't blow your own heads off. Now, you might be thinking: why would we start a basic class with any potions that could be dangerous? The problem is that you're underestimating just how much students can fuck things up. I saw someone turn a hair growth concoction into a deadly poison, s-"

The sound of the door opening was so quiet that Suria barely noticed, but Professor Slagterwese turned toward it like an uncoiling trap. That made everyone else look and Suria saw that Murtiel was in the back, freezing as everyone looked at her.

"I expect students to be on time," Professor Slagterwese said flatly.

"My apologies," Murtiel said, lowering her head. "I was delayed."

"If you don't care enough about this class to be on time, perhaps you shouldn't take it."

"Are you going to throw me out of class for being tardy on the first day?" Murtiel asked. "If so, I'll take another course."

Most students recoiled, turning to see what the professor would say, and one of the women at Suria's table let out a gasp. But Professor Slagterwese only chuckled and tapped her cane on the floor a couple times to silence the crowds.

"Alright, just be on time in the future. Find a seat."

That pulled attention away from Murtiel and most turned their full attention back to the front, but Suria watched her a while longer. The other woman had spoken boldly, but she was a little flushed and her eyes glistened. Suria wished that she could have invited her to sit nearby and felt an irrational stab of hatred for the random women who had taken over her table.

"Now, I need to do a little lecture on terminology, just so you don't all drive me crazy," Professor Slagterwese told them. "I used the word 'potion' once before, but you won't hear me use it very often. 'Potion' is a term for customers and suckers. It refers to a product. If you want to be an alchemist, or at least a miserable imitation of one, you need to be more precise. Everything in our craft is just a component, and no component is truly finished..."

Despite her abrasive nature, Professor Slagterwese was a clear speaker and didn't waste any time. Once the class had been introduced to the potion - or mixture - for the day, the professor hobbled between the tables, making corrections to their work. She spoke sharply, but not demeaningly, always guiding students toward the proper methods.

For her part, Suria had no trouble with the basic recipe, since it wasn't so different from crushed bilegrass. No matter their shape or material, a mortar and pestle weren't that hard to use. She worried that she might be rushing when the professor stopped by their table and frowned, but the old woman just muttered "Adequate" and moved on.

The mixture they were creating was about equivalent to the pain relief spell Suria had been able to cast when she arrived at Darkmoon, and definitely inferior to the augmented versions she could cast now. But it had the advantage of being able to store the effect for the future, which was extremely useful to give to patients, and even potentially valuable for a mage, since it effectively saved mana for other uses. Still, Suria was eager to get to the more advanced parts of the course. With over sixty days within the new cycle, she should be able to learn the basics of Alchemy.

Because the other women at the table wouldn't stop chattering, they took all class to finish their mixtures, which disrupted Suria's attempts to read ahead. She glanced over the room, spotted Murtiel steadily working at her own potion in the back, and resolved to find her afterward.

In the end the students weren't able to keep the potions they'd made, since Professor Slagterwese insisted that they'd find some way to drown themselves. Some students grumbled and Suria wondered just how all the leftover potions would be used. Did the university have to dispose of everything made by students, or could they eventually sell products that were good enough? It seemed a terrible waste to throw out so much... though Suria had come to realize that most here didn't view waste in the same way she did.

As soon as they were dismissed, Suria grabbed her satchel and got ahead of the crowd. She lingered within the wooden halls, making sure she didn't miss Murtiel, and then matched pace with the somewhat older woman so that they ended up walking together once they got into the forest.

"Hello," Suria offered. "I'm Suria Northbrook."

"Murtiel Hosmar," the other woman said with a weary smile that didn't reach her eyes. "Do you need something?"

"I just wanted to say I felt bad for you, being singled out like that."

"I had trouble finding a place for my daughter before class. This university just isn't built for parents managing children."

"I understand."

"Do you?" Murtiel asked sharply, her frustration boiling over. "I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that you don't have children, haven't been married, hav-"

"I was only a local healer," Suria interrupted her, "but I assisted the midwives with over a dozen births. Many of my patients were children, and I took care of their mothers as well. I know a little about the challenges of being a parent."

Murtiel looked at her in surprise, then the frustration drained out of her and she spoke in a lower voice. "I'm sorry, you didn't deserve that. It's been... a very difficult day."

"That's alright." Suria favored her with a smile. "The truth is, I didn't feel like I had much in common with the women at my table, and I was hoping we might make better partners."

"Perhaps so. You said you were a local healer? I've worked with some healers, but in the Akrashic Union we usually work more with farmers and agricultural mages..."

They talked on their way out of the forest, and though Suria didn't get to meet Albree, she thought they hit it off well. In this cycle they could work together in the alchemy course, and perhaps in future cycles she could find a way to improve how things started for Murtiel.

One class down and a whole term to go. But as Suria returned to the campus, she saw Wynchard and other loopers rushing about, engaged in their own plans. If only they would all stop and leave her to her studies... but she doubted she'd have that luxury, this time.