Synthesis-type adventurers

Chapter 32 The Ultimate Secrets of Alchemy

"monster?"

Old Hansen seemed to have been touched on a sore spot, and suddenly jumped up from his chair, almost dropping the detonator in his hand.

"This is evolution, this is sublimation! What the hell do you know!" His spittle flew everywhere. "The human body has its limits! Even if you become a legendary warrior, your bones are still bones, your blood is still blood! As soon as you're touched by a higher rule, you'll instantly crumble to dust—cough cough cough…"

He coughed a few more times in agitation, quickly panting to calm himself, and then poked his chest with his withered fingers.

"Look closely, my heart is a mechanical pump, and the curse of the ancient gods flows in my blood! But I am still alive—and I have lived for nearly two hundred years, longer than the last pope of the Holy See!"

Old Hansen opened his notebook and pointed to a page filled with intricate runes and anatomical diagrams.

"The key lies in the 'anchor point.' To fuse with a different bloodline, even a drop of dragon blood or the bodily fluids of an ancient god, you must first establish a sufficiently strong anchor point at the soul level."

"Without an anchor, the power of those higher-level beings will instantly breach your dam of consciousness, turning you into a lump of rotting flesh that can only drool!"

Rhodes's gaze fell on the blueprints.

Although he couldn't understand the specific alchemy formulas, he quickly grasped the core logic of the pioneering thinking that came from another world and far surpassed the current era.

Establishing an anchor point is essentially about loading yourself with a pre-defined term that can withstand high pressure.

"For example?" Rod pressed.

"For example..." Old Hansen revealed a strange smile, "...with intense obsession, or...the most extreme pain."

He opened the drawer and pulled out a dusty glass bottle containing half a bottle of murky, dark red liquid.

"This potion is a semi-finished product that I concocted based on the theories in the book. I call it 'Embrace of Pain,'" Old Hansen explained. "If you drink it, it will make you experience the pain of your soul being torn apart. But if you can endure it, your mental strength will undergo a qualitative change, forging a rudimentary 'mental anchor.'"

He pushed the bottle and the notebook together in front of Rhodes: "Take it."

"Why give it to me?" Rhodes didn't reach out, but instead asked, "Wouldn't it be perfect for you to keep it for yourself?"

"Because I'm going to die," old Hansen said calmly.

He lowered his head, looking at the mutated hands, his eyes revealing deep weariness: "This notebook is my lifelong pursuit. But it is precisely because of this pursuit that I have taken too many detours and tried too many forbidden methods."

"The pollutants and toxins left by those experiments have seeped into my bones layer by layer and cannot be completely eradicated. Now, I am less like a human being and more like a source of pollution that could explode at any moment."

I noticed that, and I almost caught it from you.

Rhodes wholeheartedly agreed.

Old Hansen took a deep breath and looked at Rhodes again: "I don't want this thing to fall into the guild's hands. Giving it to them will only create a bunch of controlled killing machines. Giving it to you... at least you're an interesting bastard."

He looked Rhodes up and down, his gleaming eyes clear and bright: "Although I was barely alive yesterday, my consciousness is still active and I can still sense the movements around me."

Rhodes appeared unmoved, but inwardly he was suddenly jolted.

No wonder he knew I saved him... Luckily, I didn't do anything inappropriate yesterday because of the old man's near-death state.

Old Hansen chuckled and continued, "When you saved me, I couldn't see a trace of sympathy in your eyes. There was only calculation and weighing the pros and cons. You even smuggled several bottles of my valuable potions as interest for saving my life; I heard it all clearly."

He laughed like a child.

"I like people like you. Only an extreme egoist can survive to the end in this cursed world and pass on this craft."

"--boom!"

Just then, a loud bang reverberated outside the house.

Immediately following was Avira's urgent banging on the door.

"Thump! Thump! Thump!"

"My lady! The guild members are here!" Avira cried anxiously. "They're forcibly breaking down the outer iron wall and have already started fighting with the Gear Brotherhood!"

"Did you hear that?" Old Hansen's smile vanished, replaced by a crazed, resolute expression. "Those bastards are more impatient than I thought."

He grabbed the notebook and medicine, roughly shoved them into Rhodes' arms, and pushed him away forcefully.

"Get out of here! I don't know how you got here, but if you want to leave, you can go through the secret passage at the back. The manhole cover leads directly to the main sewage ditch."

At this point, Old Hansen seemed to remember something, and waved his other free hand, pointing to the junk scattered throughout the room: "I almost forgot. Take whatever you like in this room. It'll just turn to dust anyway. Rather than letting those bastards in the guild profit from it, you're better off getting it for free."

Upon hearing this, Rhodes' gaze quickly swept across the entire room, finally locking onto a corner of the cabin—where an old man had modified a "miniature magical centrifuge."

This is a crucial piece of equipment for separating impurities from potions and improving their purity; for alchemists, it's practically a second life.

But this thing weighs several hundred pounds just from its cast iron base, and it's firmly welded to the floor, making physical transport impossible.

Since we can't take the physical form with us, let's take the "concept" instead.

A glint of light flashed in Rhodes' eyes. Ignoring the urgency of the moment and the possibility of Old Hansen noticing something, he immediately mobilized his mental energy.

A large amount of mental energy was forcibly applied to that heavy machine.

Within his field of vision, which only he could see, countless complex clusters of light were forcibly extracted.

[Entry obtained: [Precision Centrifuge Structure (Blue, Excellent)]]

[Acquired stat: [Magical Stable Circuit (Blue, Excellent)]]

[Acquired stat: [Grandmaster Alchemy Calibrator (Purple Rare)]]

……

As the entry entered Rhodes's consciousness space, the machine seemed to instantly lose its "soul," becoming dim and lifeless.

Although the outer shell is still there, the core technological essence inside has been completely packed away and taken away by Rhodes.

After finishing all this, Rhodes didn't stop. He grabbed the few remaining bottles of high-concentration potions on the shelf—high-purity calming potion, potent flesh activator, and rare high-level mana recovery potion—and stuffed them into his pockets and toolbox as much as possible.

Afterward, he quickly stuffed the notebook into his pocket and grabbed the bottle of Painful Embrace from the table.

"Thanks." Rhodes turned and walked towards the door, his hand resting on the cold doorknob. He paused for a second. "Old man, your skills are impressive. If there's a next life, remember not to build your lab right under the guild's nose."

"Get lost!" Old Hansen laughed and cursed, his finger already pressing the edge of the bright red button. "I don't need a next life! This life was worth it!"

Rod opened the door and waved to Avira, who was standing in the shadows outside.

"Walk!"

The two rushed out of the small house and plunged into the manhole cover they had just climbed up.

Just as he closed the manhole cover, Rod took one last look at the container cabin through the gap in the cast iron.

Old Hansen sat upright in his broken chair, clutching the detonator.

Facing the scrap metal wall being torn apart by the mechanical constructs, and the guild guards swarming in, the old man's lips moved.

Rhodes understood the lip movements: "The ultimate secret of alchemy..."

The next second, a white light brighter than the sun engulfed everything.

"Boom—!"

The earth trembled violently, and a terrifying shockwave swept through the pipes, carrying intense heat and knocking the two people who hadn't run far into the sewage.

Above them, tons of scrap metal were turned into a deadly rain of iron in the explosion, completely leveling the area.

Rhodes lay prone in the mud, protecting the notebook in his arms, his eardrums buzzing.

He spat out a mouthful of blood, looked at the tunnel behind him that had collapsed more than halfway, and a smile curled at the corner of his mouth.

"Is the ultimate secret of alchemy explosion? This old madman... he really is a genius."

Rod patted the stiff notebook on his chest.

Regardless, this high-risk deal turned out to be incredibly profitable.