16: Chapter 16 The Cauldron of Hecate: Forbidden Alchemy! Secret Elixir!

When he returned to White Cliff Castle, it was nearly dusk.

The sea cliffs were dyed molten gold by the setting sun, and the castle's stone walls cast long shadows.

Rowan brought back the corpse of the Mutated Wolf King, drawing suppressed exclamations from the servants and farmers.

Its golden mane remained conspicuous in the twilight.

He offered no elaborate explanation, simply instructing Butler Henry, "Have someone take care of this."

The old steward bowed in acknowledgment, his gaze toward his master filled with awe.

Then, without lingering, he went straight back to his own bedroom on the top floor of the castle.

"Bang."

The heavy oak door closed behind him, sealing off everything from the outside world.

No lamps were lit in the room; the last light from the window dyed the furniture gold.

He walked to the desk by the floor-to-ceiling window and sat down.

Then he took out the silver star ring.

Rowan could feel a faint but clear mental connection between his fingertips and the ring.

He focused his intent to communicate with it.

He saw the internal space of the silver star ring.

It was about two to three cubic meters in size.

Inside were some ancient gold coins and books.

He took the items out.

Silently, the air in front of the desk seemed to warp slightly.

Immediately after, several items appeared out of thin air, landing softly on the dark velvet-covered desk.

Dozens of dull gold coins glinted with a matte sheen in the low light, their patterns entirely different from the gold coins currently circulating in the Empire.

Beside the gold coins were several books of varying thicknesses and materials.

Rowan bypassed the gold coins without lingering, his gaze falling upon the books instead.

He picked up the one on top.

The cover was a strange dark brown leather, cool to the touch, with twisted and bizarre fungal patterns drawn in faded ink. Beside them was a title in cursive Common Tongue:

"Fungal Atlas of the Underdark: Toxicity, Hallucination, and Healing"

Rowan opened the book.

The inner pages were thick and yellowed, the handwriting neat and dense, accompanied by numerous detailed illustrations depicting various strange fungi growing in the underground world.

It recorded their forms, habits, collection methods, and their medicinal or toxic properties, which were either fatal or eerie.

"The underground world..." Rowan whispered, putting it down after flipping through a few pages.

He had no use for it for now.

The second book was slightly thicker.

The cover was leather with deep blue patterns, inlaid with silver stars and a compass design.

"Millennial Travels of Greta the Dragonborn Scholar"

There was a dragon-shaped emblem breathing fire at the author's signature.

This book was more like a massive tome mixing travelogues, geography, historical research, and personal essays.

A sense of long-passed years and transcendence permeated between the lines.

Rowan hurried through a few pages, which mentioned many place names, races, and secrets he had never heard of.

The amount of information was massive but too disorganized; it would take time to digest slowly.

He paused slightly as he picked up the third book.

The texture of this book was somewhat special; it felt warm and had a strange elasticity to the touch. It was pale ivory-yellow, with extremely fine pore-like patterns on it.

"cauldron of hecate: forbidden alchemy"

He carefully opened it; the text inside was written in dark red ink, occasionally accompanied by complex diagrams of transmutation circles.

The content involved the extraction of soul energy, the forced transformation of life forms, the paradoxical fusion of basic elements...

Just browsing the table of contents made one's skin crawl.

He flipped through it quickly until, in one of the chapters, he saw content related to "Basic Pharmaceutics" and "Common Material Processing."

This looked much more normal.

The cover of the fourth book was the most exquisite.

The cover was light green cardstock embossed with vines and crescent moon patterns, the title written in elegant, curling Elvish:

"Gifts of the Feywild: From Dew to Moonlight"

It seemed to be a collection of novels or prose poems by the Elven race; the writing was beautiful, but for the current Rowan, it had the lowest practicality, and he couldn't quite understand it.

As for Elvish, he could only understand a few simple words.

He sat at the desk, flipping through them one by one.

Although much of the content was like a closed book to him, it didn't dampen his enthusiasm in the slightest.

Until, in the appendix of the potion section of that heavy "cauldron of hecate: forbidden alchemy," he found something he seemed to be able to use right now.

"lionheart dawn secret potion"

The recipe itself was included in the potion section as an example of human enhancement techniques, mentioning several of the ingredients and processing methods.

This was a secret potion used to accelerate a knight's cultivation.

Rowan couldn't help but feel a surge of joy.

His progress with the Myriad Furnace Breathing Technique had been very slow.

Promoting to Great Knight required ten thousand proficiency points, and now he only had a pitiful hundred or so.

A secret potion that could be used for Knight Breathing Technique cultivation came at just the right time.

He almost held his breath as he began to read the recipe for the "lionheart dawn secret potion" word for word.

The list of secret potion ingredients wasn't long, but each one made him frown slightly.

Main ingredient: Radiant Griffin heart blood.

Auxiliary ingredients: Silver Moon Vine, Halo Stone powder, Mandrake pollen, water condensed from morning dew...

Among them, he knew of the Radiant Griffin mentioned as the main ingredient. In the inner circle of the Mess Mountains, there were such powerful magical creatures.

An adult Radiant Griffin possessed terrifying strength comparable to a Peak Knight and could wield the powers of light and wind.

And he, Rowan Flynn, was currently just a small border lord at the level of an initial-stage knight.

Go hunting a Radiant Griffin? It was no different from suicide.

He leaned back against the chair, closed his eyes, and rubbed his aching brow.

"I'm not strong enough," he whispered to himself.

But give up just like that? No.

He opened his eyes again, his gaze falling back on that "cauldron of hecate: forbidden alchemy."

Since the high-level secret potion was temporarily out of reach, he would start with the most basic ones.

At least, first step across the threshold of becoming an "Apothecary" or an "Alchemy Apprentice."

He quickly flipped to the "Basic Pharmaceutics" section, looking for entry-level recipes.

Soon, he found his target.

basic rock potion

Effect: Replenishes physical stamina consumption, promotes muscle fatigue recovery, and has an auxiliary effect on cultivation during the Apprentice Knight stage.

Ingredients: Ironspine Grass, Bluerock Flower, Red Berry, Ash Moss, rock salt, pure water...

The recipe was also followed by simple processing steps and boiling precautions.

Rowan read it carefully, weighing it in his mind.

Ironspine Grass could be found in the rock crevices near the territory.

Red Berries were common in the mountain forests.

Ash Moss was said to be found in old mine shafts or places that had been burned.

Rock salt and pure water were not an issue.

Most of the materials could be obtained within the White Cliff Territory.

But one was still missing: the Bluerock Flower.

This seemed to typically grow in the south of the Empire.

So, did he need to go to a merchant guild in a nearby large city to buy it?

Rowan fell into deep thought.

He recalled the commercial cities near his territory.

The largest should be Ice Lake City to the northwest.

Ice Lake City, true to its name, was situated on the shores of a vast glacial lake in the northern part of Will Province.

The lake water originated from the glacial meltwater of the Mess Mountains and was rich in a unique aquatic product called Ice Crystal Shrimp.

He had once eaten this small shrimp with his father; it melted in the mouth and was incredibly delicious.

...