Wish upon the Stars chapter 502

Once we'd confirmed there was nothing in the room upstairs dangerous  to anyone but urban foragers we all climbed the steps to explore the  alchemy lab. When we stepped out into the room, the first thing that  struck me was the smell. Floral, a bit medicinal at times, but more than  anything...almost electric. I felt my skin buzzing from the fumes  alone, and my head might have started fogging without my mask, judging  by the slightly woozy look on Jessie's face.

Granted, that  might have been shock at the variety and appearance of the plants up  here, because the first thing we stumbled on were a series of planter  boxes filled with hundreds of types of valuable herbs and, if my nose  didn't deceive me, some spices.

"They're so...beautiful."  Breathed our healer. Which they were, and there were more than a few  flowers mixed in. Jessie had grown up around flowers, and developed her  original ability in horticulture. Her appreciation for pretty plants was  well documented.

Callie stepped forward, glancing down at  the label plaques at the base of each plant. "Interesting." She  remarked. "A box for each stat. No Impact plants, obviously. If they had  those they're probably either gone or kept somewhere substantially more  secure than what appears to be a classroom. Still, an impressive  selection, even if all of them are F-rank."

F-rank was  also the standard for the tests, so it was probably the lowest level of  student they accepted here. Maybe because that was the time when getting  your Azure Soul Body was easiest. I knew it was possible to do it  earlier, but being stronger when you did the trials was probably  helpful. They were aimed more at the soul than anything, but I wasn't  sure G-ranked me could have managed some of the things we'd had to do.

"What makes you think it's a classroom?" Asked Benny. "I'd have guessed plant nursery or something. Maybe a greenhouse?"

"The  rank of the plants." I answered for her. "All the lowest level. Plus if  you look back there you can see tables covered with cauldrons,  alembics, boilers. All sorts of alchemy shit that I don't know the name  or function of. Actually, do YOU know what that stuff is?" I pointed  back to the tables I'd just mentioned. "Maybe from your Inventing  knowledge?"

Spotting them, he walked towards the back of  the room with interest. "Huh. One or two things. That's an evaporator,  an essence extractor, and that's a malfas contextualizer." At my blank  look he just chuckled. "They're tools for removing specific elements or  qualities to add to inventions to try to steer your results. They're  also used heavily in Alchemy, which has much more concrete formuli  involved."

I knew it was possible for Mad Scientists to  exert some small amount of control at lower ranks, and that by  synergizing skills or mutating abilities you could even get to the point  where you could exert actual control over what you made, albeit in  exchange for a decrease in  power and capability. Part of the strength  of Inventing came from the unpredictability. The mass perception that  anything could come from a Mad Scientist's projects removed the limiters  on the ability. The more control you exerted the less powerful your  Inventions could be.

Benny had done some work learning to  guide his Inventions before realizing he got stronger items if he let  things take their course. It sounded like the tools in question were a  bit of a loophole though, altering the ingredients beforehand to  maximize your chances of whatever random item was created being a  specific type.

"Can I take these?" Asked my best friend greedily. "Because I could get some use out of this stuff for sure."

Celine  smiled placidly. "Of course, even more time you'll be spending  tinkering with your toys. That sounds lovely." Her voice was casual, but  I noticed Benny's eyes snap to her as he chuckled awkwardly. I was  reminded that she'd been less than thrilled by the hardcore nonstop  training for months on end during the trip here, and that adding another  thing to his plate was bound to cause friction.

He smiled  awkwardly at her. "Sorry Cel. I swear, I'm cutting back on training for  a while. It's Jessie's turn to put her nose to the grindstone."

We  all looked over to where Jessie had picked up a hoe and was trying to  use it to pry the flower boxes off the tables. She looked up in  surprise. "Huh?" When she saw our gazes she shrugged. "I can't fit the  tables in my ring, and the connectors are making it impossible to take  the plants. I need to get them off of here so I can ste- I mean, so I  can relocate these poor neglected plants."

Randall, who  hadn't been able to fit up the stairway in the column, wasn't around to  tear them loose, so I could understand needing to pry them up. I  chuckled. "Carry on. You got a place to put them when you get them? And  can we put still living things in our rings?"

She nodded.  "We can, though not sentient things. Also the temporal slowdown in the  rings doesn't apply to lifeforce, so the second they go in they start to  die. I did some tests on it with other plants. As long as you don't  leave them in there for more than a day without life energy they're  fine. I can recharge them with my healing every day until we get out,  and then find a place to plant them on the Necromedes until we get..."  She paused. "Where are we going after this?"

I laughed at  that. "I'm still wondering if there'll BE and after this. Even odds we  all get murdered here and never see our loved ones again." I glanced  over at my girlfriend, who was glowering at me. "Although I'm sure that  won't happen and everything will be fine." I tacked on belatedly.

Rolling  her eyes, my girlfriend snorted. "Nice backpedal. But yeah, things  aren't great right now. Do you see any signs that this place is what the  BMP are looking for?"

"Well for a  minute I thought it might be that box in the corner marked 'secret god  resurrecting potion' but that seemed to obvious." At her glare I just  shrugged. "What? You don't think I'd tell you if I saw some sort of clue  to why we're all here? My eye of revelation isn't picking up any secret  doors or passages. My overlay has about five golden arrows showing  right now, so I don't know which might be which."

One  of them was probably leading to Gabriel, as for the other four, who  knew. She rolled her eyes, but I saw her lips twitch a bit, and I could  feel her amusement. She knew I was just messing with her through the  bond anyway.

"Eeeek!"  Squeaked Jessie from behind us. We all whirled as a crash sounded out,  finding out healer on her back with a planted box on top of her. It had  broken on her costume without hurting her much, but she was covered in  dirt and a long stalk of green with purple bell shaped flowers was  wrapping itself around her neck.

Benny  walked over, grabbed the stalk, and pulled. The thing snapped in half,  one half still around her neck and the other lashing up to grab HIS  neck. Pulling out my staff, I whacked it against the plants one after  another, the life energy being sucked away enough to make them let go  and fall to the ground. Jessie scrambled free of the dirt, spitting and  grimacing as she put distance between herself and the plant.

"Ok  first of all." I said with repressed humor in my voice. "Did you just  SAY eek when that thing grabbed you? And second of all what was that?"

She  leaned down to pick up the plaque, which had fallen into the dirt, and  held it up for me. "Choking violet. Might focused. I didn't realize it  was so literal. Apparently the anchors that keep them on the tables also  prevent them from doing things like...well, that. Also I didn't say  eek. I said...Zeke. Like your uncle. Because...I was hoping he would  save me. Because he's so powerful. But I forgot he wasn't here."

Bethy  gave her a pitying look. "Jessie. Even I know that's a terrible lie.  And I believe most stuff. Do you want me to have Poptarts follow you  around for a while until we can join back up with Randall?"

My friend's shoulders slumped. "Yes." She said sulkily. "Speaking of, Abel, can't you bring him up now?"

"Nope."  Said my mentor with a shake of his head. "Not until we get into a  hallway or something. So we should move on from this room and figure out  where we're going."

Sighing,  I gestured to the tables. "Lets see if we can figure out how to take  the plants without them trying to murder us. These could be useful  later. We should really find an Alchemist actually. Anyone here know  Alchemy?" That just got head shakes from everybody.

Once  we decided that, we all looked around to find the most harmless  sounding plant, and then worked together to try to sever the link  between it and the table. My Enchanting was way out of date and I didn't  know this style anyway, but luckily Nat was here and my cousin knew a  bit about this kind of thing. She studied the runes carefully, tracing  them with her fingers until she finally located one and jammed a knife  in it.

Jessie  tried again to lift the box of dirt and plants and it came up easily.  She squealed in joy, storing it in her ring, and then the two of them  started cleaning the whole place out even as Celine helped Benny take  all the equipment.

After  that, we searched the room for documents or any kind of books or maps. I  used Eye of Revelation to speed things up, and to my delight I actually  found a book hidden behind a wall panel. We pulled it out, and I  couldn't read a word of it, but Chelsea, being more versed in older  languages, was able to decipher some.

She  flipped through the book for a while before slamming it shut. "Ok, this  is a journal from the person who taught this class. Sadly no convenient  mentions of secret weapons, but the person DID make an offhand  reference to a vault in the headmaster's office. I can't say for sure  that's where the thing we're looking for will be, but it seems like as  good a place to start as ever."

"That's  awesome!" I crowed in excitement. That was a hugely lucky break. "You  did it Chelsea." My smile dropped as I saw her frown. "You don't seem  like you did it though. You seem worried."

She  flipped the book back open to the last page. Due to her high Focus  she'd skimmed it unbelievably fast, but I think she wanted to recite  this part aloud just to make sure we got the point. "The school has  fallen." She said grimly. "The enemy are at the gates. Even now they  invade our halls, perverting the sanctity of our most noble place of  learning. Their greed will be their undoing. Soon we will be gone. But  death...death will remain."

I  froze, looking down at the book. "I don't suppose the word for death  translates into something else? Something happy? Maybe puppies? Could it  be puppies that remain?"

She  shook her head. "Whatever killed the people who ran this place, they  didn't want it to get what it wanted. They left safeguards. Something is  in here with us, and it doesn't want us here. I'm not sure how many of  them are still here, or how strong they might still be, but I don't  think we should take it for granted. We should get Randall up here soon.  We can't leave him alone. None of us should be alone." I swallowed hard  but nodded. She was right. The Blood Murder Palace had brought us to a  bad place, and I hoped we would all make it through.