Chapter 26: Because There Is A Long Road Ahead

"Right, so if you sign this we can get started."

Ira said as he sat on top of a long cylindrical container that almost looked like a coffin, holding a piece of paper with blood on it. Currently, Ira, Harper, and Charles were inside Ira's basement. Lab equipment seemed to take up most of the space. The piece of paper Ira held in his hand was a soul contract which would kill Charles instantly if he ever decided to speak about or replicate the bloodline creation formula.

"Fine."

Charles cut the tip of his finger and signed his name in blood. As to the reason why he decided to sign the contract? Charles could be described as obsessive. The reason why he owned a run down store called "Charlie's Alchemical Concoctions" was because he was banned from the Alchemical Association for three years. His obsessiveness tended to endanger lives, and while most people would be banned outright, Charles was perhaps one of the top fifty most talented alchemists in the Kingdom. So the Association temporarily banned him and cut his funding. Thus, he opened a shabby store and sent out incredibly cheap jobs to the Mercenaries Union.

After the contract was signed it disappeared into black wisps of mist.

"What!"

Charles exclaimed. Most soul contracts ended with a flash of light, giving them a sacred nature, but the one he just signed gave him the impression that if he were to violate it, something far worse than death would reach him.

Ira ignored his outburst and waved his hand, producing a crumpled piece of paper.

"Here you go."

Ira handed over the paper.

"Careful!"

Charles berated as he gently grasped the piece of paper. It contained a process similar to genetic crossbreeding, he as an Alchemist was very familiar with the process. To spur on mutation in certain plants or herbs they could be cross-bred with species of close relation and create a hybrid, but the process could take months or years, sometimes decades. What the crumpled piece of paper held was an over-simplification of the process. Half of it was a blueprint for a micro-inscription array, which would work to filter out specific traits inside of DNA, and a micro-fusion array which would work to bond the different genetics. The other half was a process that was so open-ended, that the ingredients used could vary, allowing for a unique hybrid creation.

Charles stared at the piece of paper with reverence, the one who made the process had to be a being with incredible intelligence. He peeked at Ira, only to see him devouring pastries at a rapid rate, clearly, he wasn't the creator of the process since he didn't know what it was.

Charles went over to a table and pulled out a few colorful glowing crystals.

"What's that?"

Harper appeared behind Charles with a pastry in hand and asked curiously.

"Mana crystals."

Charles answered as he began to crush the crystals.

"What's that?"

Harper nibbled her pastry and asked again.

"What we call the crystals produced from dungeons."

Charles answered patiently, he knew this little girl was Ira's "sister" so he didn't want to upset her and cause Ira to prevent him from completing the experiment.

"Dungeon?"

This time Ira asked a question.

"Well, it's not really a dungeon, it's more of an underground habitat containing monsters and creatures."

Charles explained but felt as if he should elaborate more so he continued.

"Mana is theorized to be one of the origin forces. It affects us all as almost all living creatures have a capacity in their body to hold mana. It's akin to each person holding a cup and scooping water from a river. It can also gather in concentrations producing crystals underground and draw in monsters which burrow within."

Charles paused briefly as he assembled a pen-like tool.

"Some small crystals draw in a few monsters, while others draw in huge ones. The more dangerous monsters tend to create territories deep within, while the weaker ones stay on the outskirt of their territories, sort of creating different levels or miniature environments. Although most people simply call them dungeons, but they're more like infested caverns. The Kingdom sends mercenaries to clear any mines discovered, and then the crystals are mined to create arrays. They replenish at a very slow rate, but they are nearly infinite."

Charles finished assembling his tools and put the crushed crystals into a tube, before connecting it to what looked like a very large pen. He used it to carve arrays into a few metal funnels, which varied in size.

"This process can take a few days, I'd suggest you both find something else to do to pass the time."

Charles stated as he immersed himself into creating the arrays.

"Come on, Harper. Let's go to the Bluebird. I'm starving."

Ira walked up the stairs.

"Hold on!"

Harper chased after him with a grin.

.......................................................

A few days later, a hysterical laughter could be heard from the basement in the middle of the day.

"Hahahaha! I'm done!"

Charles shouted.

Ira slowly walked down the steps.

"So what's next?"

He said as he stretched, for some reason Harper wasn't with him.

"The ingredients! Do you have them!"

Charles turned to look at Ira, his appearance was very unsightly. Bloodshot eyes, dark circles around his eyes, slightly gaunt cheeks. For the past few days, he barely ate and didn't sleep at all. He solely concentrated on his research.

"Sure."

Ira chuckled at his appearance and handed over a syringe with a gold colored liquid, a jar containing a glowing blue heart, a jar of small bones, and a vial of bright purple blood. Each of the item was labelled with the exception the golden syringe.

Charles carefully handled the materials, he placed them all on his workstation. He took small samples of each one and placed them on a petri dish.

"Food's ready Ira! The bill is 4500 Gre"

Harper yelled from upstairs.

"Alright."

Ira looked at Charles one more time before going up the stairs. The Bluebird restaurant had to increase it's inventory just to accommodate Ira, just one of his food bills was equal to a group of customers eating for a month. Slowly the restaurant's quality began improving as it underwent minor renovations using the money Ira provided.

...................................

A week and a half passed by, Avery visited once to evaluate Harper, and then she left. While Ira would be trained for three months by the Valkyries, Avery would train Harper for three months.

"Heh heh heh."

Charles chuckled dryly, he looked like an alcoholic vagrant, he lost most of his weight from only consuming soup-based meals, his total amount of sleep since he started was close to 4 days.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

Ira and Harper walked down the steps, and both went to sit on the coffin-like cylinder.

Charles turned around and was a little surprised. Ira looked as he always did, but Harper had a little bit of blood on her lip from Avery's "evaluation".

Crunch. Crunch. Crunch.

"So, I'm guessing it's all ready to go, huh?"

Ira asked with a nonchalant expression, while Harper looked at the workstation curiously.

"This array formation is simple but so complex."

Charles turned his decrepit and exhausted face to look at the piece of paper.

"The arrays separate the reactive elements on a molecular level, thus allowing for a seamless fusion into a new bloodline. The Kingdom is still discovering remanents of the Old Kingdom, but this is on a whole other level. Just think about it. We have teleportation arrays, but we still use candles, even though magic lights are still in development. We can make platforms levitate, but we can't grasp mass human flight. The arrays on this piece of paper makes us look like savages attempting to create fire"

He continued as he picked up four vials of bright pale blue liquid, a thoughtful expression was on his face.

"So, in other words...It's finally ready?"

Ira asked as he wiped his hands on his shirt. He turned to Harper.

"Go wash your face, kiddo."

He said with a laugh.

"Ok."

Harper said before she ran up the stairs.

Ira lifted the metal cylindrical container and placed it into the middle of the room. Charles had come to known about Ira's strength but still couldn't get over it, the solid metal cylinder weighed well over 4oo pounds, Charles brought it in pieces and assembled it in the basement, but now it seemed it was useless to do so. Ira moved to the corner and grabbed barrels filled with cold water, he began pouring them in the human-sized cylinder.

"I'm done!"

Harper giggled as she jumped down the basement stairs and rolled. She was wearing a black short sleeve shirt that actually fit her, a pair of black three-quarter pants, and no shoes whatsoever.

"You ready, Harper?"

Ira asked as he tapped the metal cylinder.

"At every opportunity."

Harper said as a smile beamed across her face.

Charles stayed silent and nodded his head. Harper climbed into the metal cylinder.

"Cold!"

She cackled as she fastened a breathing tube to her mouth. Ira smiled and clasped several leather belts to hold her in place. Charles loaded the four glowing blue vials into four slots, the mechanism was fixed to auto-inject once the lid closed and a power was put into the activation array.

Chik! Chik! Chik! Chik!

A harsh metallic sound indicated the syringes were injected into Harper's body. The sound of water being splashed was the next to be heard, and what could only be described as Harper's muffled scream.

"MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM!"

Harper's muffled scream continued loudly and didn't show any sign of dissipating.

Ira placed his hand over the cylinder and closed his eyes. His bloodline resonance let him communicate his intentions without speaking. Soon the screams stopped, but the sloshing of water still continued. A pale blue light leaked from the seams of the container and then the movement stopped. Ira could still hear Harper's heart beating so he knew she was ok.

Charles looked on with an expression of obsessive anticipation. Ira finally opened his eyes and looked at Charles.

"Open it."

He said plainly. Charles nodded in response and moved to undo the activation.

Chik! Chik! Chik! Chik!

Four empty vials emerged from the cylinder, Charles removed them and placed them on his workstation.

"You can open it."

He said as he watched on.

Ira grabbed the lid and opened it easily.

"Hahaha, Holy shit!"

Ira laughed loudly as he took out the breathing tube Harper had fastened to her face and undid the leather belts holding her in place.

He slowly lifted her small body out of the cylinder.

"It...wo...worked..."

Charles said amazedly.

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Harper's current appearance was far different than it was before. The roots of her hair were pitch black, but the rest was completely pale blue and now hung to the middle of her back. Between her two black eyebrows, were three small black dots, one above the other, each decreasing in size as it went down, and her fingernails were completely blue.

"Ira...Ira...I can't...everything's so...Ira...I can't see...everything's blue..."

Harper opened her blue eyes and started to panic, everything except for Ira was a neon blue and her perspective Charles looked like a bright blue flame. Only Ira remained the same, with the exception of a black mist-like orb on his chest. Her eyes irises were gone and instead, both of her eyeballs were completely blue.

"Close your eyes and focus."

Ira chuckled. Harper closed her eyes, but her breathing was unsteady.

"Remember what everything looked like before."

Ira said softly, the bloodline resonance between Ira and Harper grew stronger and he could convey his intentions very easily.

The blue glow was still emitted from under Harper's eyelids before it slowly receded. When she opened her eyes, her irises returned and were a bright pale blue. Ira placed her down and let her stand on her own two feet.

"Woah."

Ira laughed as he looked at Harper, who was staring at her pale blue fingernails.

"You should go look at the mirror upstairs."

Ira said as he ruffled her hair.

"O-Ok!"

Harper excitedly ran upstairs.

Ira turned to Charles who still stood in shock and ignored him, he walked over to the bloodline filters and picked them up.

"Oh? Hey, were they meant to disappear?"

Ira asked surprisingly, the arrays began to deteriorate rapidly.

"Huh? Hey! No! No! No!"

Charles ran up to see the arrays breaking down, he ran to the crumpled piece of paper with the original formulas on it.

"No! No! NO!"

Charles tightly held the piece of paper and looked as if he was going to have a breakdown.

"Please tell me there is another copy!"

Charles turned to Ira with hopeful eyes. Ira waved his left hand and opened the black book, only to see the previous formula slowly fade until the page became empty. He shut the book and waved it away.

"Nope."

He said non-caringly.

"WHY?!"

Charles shouted, his mental state couldn't handle the sense of loss he felt.

"Hey, remember the important thing here."

Ira said in a friendly manner.

"..."

Charles looked up with a bit of optimism.

"You still have to make the prosthetic arm."

Ira laughed cheerfully, while Charles clutched his head. Ira's laughed slowly dimmed down while his eyes showed a strange look.

"...It all returns to the void..."

Ira said in a voice too low for Charles to hear.

................................................................

"Ira! Now I'm like you and Miss Avery!"

Harper shouted as she evaluated herself in the mirror, she couldn't help but touch her hair, which looked to be a mix of white and blue in color. She then traced her hands over the three black dots going downwards on her forehead. Lastly, she peered into her pale bright eyes and stared. Ira's voice woke her up from her distraction.

"Here, Harper."

Ira handed over the white status card, she accepted it and activated it quickly.

• Name: Harper

• Rating: B-

• Growth Capacity: A+

• Bloodline:

• Blessings: None

• Mana Capacity: Very High

• Passive Skills: Enhanced: Strength, Agility, Reflexes, Regeneration, Endurance. Partial-Spectral Physique, Spectral Senses, Spectral Manipulation, Spectral Control, Lunar Force Absorption(Inactive), Greater Sickness Resistance, Greater Cold Resistance, Greater Mental Resistance, Decelerated Aging.

• Active Skills: Phase Shift, Spectral Vision, Conjuration, Illusion Creation, Phantom Creation, Purgatorial Embodiment(Sealed).

"I don't know what it means."

Harper read on but didn't know what was good or bad. She could only look towards Ira.

Crunch. Crunch. Crunch.

Ira chewed a pastry while he looked over the status card. Harper's lycanthropic senses were converted into "Spectral Senses", much like how Ira's intuition and comprehension were converted into "Instinct".

"Come on."

He said as he went to walk down the stairs to the second floor, Harper trailed behind him still looking at her fingers.

They arrived in the sparring room and stood in the center, Charles already stood on the second floor, waiting in the corner with a depressed expression.

"Take a look and see what you can make of it."

Ira tossed him the status card. Charles caught it and opened his eyes wide, his gaze alternating between Harper and the status card.

"...Her physiology should be mostly spirit based...Maybe she'll instinctively pick up the abilities."

Charles said in an unsure manner as he tossed back the card to Ira, who caught it and took a few steps back from Harper.

"Conjuration."

Ira clapped his hands with an expression of realization.

Vssshing!

He drew his sword from its scabbard.

"Try to recreate this sword."

Ira instructed to Harper.

"Ok."

Harper said in an enthusiastic manner as she stuck out her hands. She closed her eyes as she tried to recreate the image of the sword. Slowly a translucent blue sword came into existence, faint blue ripples were constantly being emitted from around it. She opened her eyes in surprise.

"Ira! I did it!"

She giggled in an unrestrained manner as she waved the sword around.

"Here, hit me."

Ira said as he held his sword up, Harper nodded in response and ran forward.

Whoosh!

She swung the translucent sword and upon touching Ira's silver sword it broke.

"It's too weak."

Ira said as he watched the blue sword dissipate.

"You should try to create a Phantom."

Charles spoke up. Ira nodded and Harper closed her eyes again.

"Phantom."

Harper said as her eyes flashed blue. Slowly a translucent blue figure began to take form from thin air. It had no face or body features, and it looked similar to a doll.

"Get it to attack me."

Ira said as he crossed his arms.

"Attack."

Harper turned to the blue phantom and ordered. On cue, It slowly began walking forward.

"Are you controlling it?"

Ira asked as he stood casually.

"No."

Harper responded as she watched the phantom walk with hopeful eyes. The phantom stood in front of Ira and punched towards his chest.

thum.

The sound of a soft impact resonated within the silent training room. The phantom stood motionless as its fist remained on Ira's chest.

"Same as the sword."

Ira said as he raised his hand slowly.

Thwack.

He slapped the phantom away, it flew through the air and dissipated as it hit the wall.

"I think I understand now."

Harper said as she closed her pale fluorescent blue eyes. A blue shimmer began to radiate from her body and it grew increasingly vivid with the passing of each second.

"Then you attack me."

Ira said as he smiled.

"Phase Shift!"

Harper shouted as she ran towards Ira, she moved with an incredibly fast burst of speed, leaving blue after-images behind, her whole body was a semi-transparent blue.

Whoosh!

She appeared in front of Ira within a second and threw a punch. Ira reached out and caught her hand, swinging her to the side. Harper sailed in the air but began slowing down before she gently touched the floor. The blue shimmer covering her body began to disappear.

"You're pretty quick, Harper. Wait until Avery gets a hold of you."

Ira nodded with praise, Harper just giggled in response.

Whether she still would giggle when the training started remained to be seen.

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