Drawn to the Light [Solo]
Posted: Sun Apr 02, 2023 12:29 pm
Glade 9, Year 123
[Closed]
Hilana made her way to the alchemy shop and laboratory where she had endeavoured to undertake lessons, as arranged quietly by Sentinel Phocion. She was only an apprentice, and while she had the funds to set up a lab in her two-bedroom apartment, she didn’t have the space. Further, fumes happened, and she wouldn’t risk her snakes and their respiratory systems from her playing with this sort of thing. She had learned the basics of safety, but there was still a great deal she didn’t know, and further, she was not advanced in the arts of Scrivening or Negation. Her odds of doing something disastrous and damaging the whole building were certainly high. It was far better to practice her experiments and her lessons under the eyes of those who knew far better than she did what she was doing, and she could watch, observe, and practice.
Her pythons didn’t accompany her today for the same reason she hadn’t taken them hunting with her yesterday for the reagents she had stuffed in her backpack. Digestion was a sensitive matter for snakes, and it was best that they were left to process their meals without becoming accidentally stressed out. And if there was a lab accident, the girl preferred her darlings were not injured. And from yesterday’s trip, she had accumulated multiple bottles and jars of ashes, all collected from various shadow creatures that were around the kingdom within a few hours’ ride. She had over two dozen labeled containers, and in her notebook, the details of whereabouts it had been dispatched, and what element had been used to reduce them to this state of effluvia. She had used all four of those that were accessible to her without attunement, and Garr had been able to take others out with lightning.
She bowed her head and shoulders in greeting to the master Alchemist, and she looked her over. “I hear jars in that bag of yours,” she remarked. “Did you have success with finding the ashes?” The Moonborn Re’hyaean asked her, raising an eyebrow. Slender and willowy, she wore a form-fitting tunic and leggings, and Hilana’s own freer attire made her sigh. She was going to have to get her seamstress to put together an outfit for the purposes of her training and education when she was here. The girl was colourful enough that she looked like she should have been on a stage dancing to music, but she’d interacted with her enough by now to know that it was just her style. Had she told her to dress differently, the young woman surely would have.
“I did, Domina, yes,” Hilana beamed brightly as she was wont to do. “I’ve got about two dozen samples of different creatures that were dispatched yesterday. I took the notes as you asked, about what they looked like and what element I used.” Her paedagoga nodded with some approval, satisfied that her efforts had been effective. Two dozen different samples in multiple containers would allow them opportunities. The girl was productive, at the very least. That did have to be said for her. As she got better, efficiency would follow.
Clelia motioned the girl towards the large tables. The Vastiana knew the drill, however, and first dipped her hands into the basin to clean them off. The Master ran a tight ship, and she expected proper precautions and procedures to be undertaken. Hilana may have been a frolicking dirt child in many other aspects of her life, but she wasn’t one in here. It wasn’t tolerated; she had learned that the first day. Domina Clelia had high expectations, and she was in many ways sterner than Sentinel Ævril, but Hilana didn’t mind that either. She knew she was here because it was arranged by the Sentinels, even if no one really understood why, but Deus Avaerys and Domina Varvara had told her to strengthen her alchemical skills, and Hilana was not about to turn down any assistance, guidance, and education that she could get. With her hands dried, the girl shifted her rucksack and set it on the stool, pulling out her notebook and containers, jars and vials of various sizes and materials. Clelia wanted to see what differences, if any, the container might have on the properties of the ashes. These creatures were nothing mundane, so it stood to reason that they might well be influenced by different variables. As such, Hilana had three containers for the remains of the first ten shadow creatures, and the last fifteen were just in various jars. Everything had been labeled and lined up, and Clelia took up the leather-bound notebook and flipped through it. While the herbalist didn’t seem to be a studious sort to look at her, she was a willing and eager student, and she followed instructions to the letter. “Let us start with sample one. Hog shaped, destroyed by fire. We will begin with the sample from the clay jar.” Hilana produced the three containers, and opened the clay container, unhinging it, and using a long-handled spoon to put some of the samples on the glass dish in order for them to study the ashes under the aura glass.
“We are going to do a few things, Miss Chenzira, with the first handful of samples. We will study them and see if their properties are any different from normal ash from a brazier, and then we will introduce the agitation rod and look again,” Clelia instructed her. “This is technically an unknown substance, and it is best to understand what it is to the greatest extent of our ability so that we can try to predict how it will react when we introduce it to the acid and to the clay,” Hilana nodded, and she peered at it through the aura glass. “That is interesting, isn’t it? The rod, now,” the Moonborn instructed her discipula, and Hilana carefully took up the agitation rod and began to manipulate the bowl of ashes, stirring it until Clelia had had enough and gestured with her hand.
They looked through the aura glass again. “Ah, you see the difference? Good. Our first little jar of acid, Miss Chenzira…” There was a reason that they had yet to use the ashes in another solution, inasmuch as they might like to, it was because there was so much to discover about it. While Clelia could and did use Semblance to understand more, Hilana wasn’t quite there yet. As such, the aura glass, along with trial and error for some things like this, were necessary. The Master Alchemist was a thorough teacher, and she liked to let the Vastiana make mistakes so long as she didn’t damage equipment or look like she was going to blow something up. She had some of the basics; she needed to learn to think on her own and see what all she could come up with. This was the girl’s project. While Clelia was aware of the creatures and had heard the girl grumble and complain about them, she had very little to do with anything and everything outside of the city. She relied on suppliers who dealt with all of the logistics necessary for those beyond the walls to get her the goods she needed, and if those materials didn’t show up, that was her supplier’s problem. Unlike Hilana, she was less inclined to go chase the source herself.
Frolicking dirt child indeed…
Hilana moved the cylindrical glass container over. It had a measurement of the alchemist’s acid in it, already prepared and primed, and when Clelia nodded to her, the girl tipped her glass dish of activated ashes into it. They watched the results for a minute before the apprentice picked up the agitation rod and began to stir it. “Now, let’s do it again,” she instructed her, when the rod was removed and they were watching the acid-ash mixture to see what came from it. “This time, we will add the activated ashes to the primed alchemist’s clay. That will of course have to rest, but we shall see what results we get from it.”
The girl repeated the procedure, working the ashes with the agitation rod before leaving those for the moment and adding a fist-sized amount of alchemist’s clay to a Lyrethillium mortar that had been scrivened upon with sigils of catalyzation. The clay was activated and primed with the agitation rod, and at Clelia’s approving nod, Hilana transferred the activated ashes to the bowl. She used the accompanying pestle to work the ashes into the clay, stirring and kneading it, trying to mix it as thoroughly as possible, noting the way the colour of the clay changed as the ashes were mixed in. They had another look with the aura glass, and when Clelia was satisfied with the girl’s efforts at blending the two substances, the mixture was placed in the stoneware box, and the lid placed on top of it to seal it.
The process was repeated, over and over again, with the different samples from the different containers. The goal, after all, was for Hilana to understand more about what these creatures were, how they could be dealt with, and what, if any, benefit she could derive from them going forward for different uses. They were susceptible to magic, but reports said that they were much harder to kill by mundane means. Could that trait be isolated? Could these shadow creatures help her attune to that element? Hilana had so many questions, and hopefully, these experiments and observations would help answer them.
[Closed]
Hilana made her way to the alchemy shop and laboratory where she had endeavoured to undertake lessons, as arranged quietly by Sentinel Phocion. She was only an apprentice, and while she had the funds to set up a lab in her two-bedroom apartment, she didn’t have the space. Further, fumes happened, and she wouldn’t risk her snakes and their respiratory systems from her playing with this sort of thing. She had learned the basics of safety, but there was still a great deal she didn’t know, and further, she was not advanced in the arts of Scrivening or Negation. Her odds of doing something disastrous and damaging the whole building were certainly high. It was far better to practice her experiments and her lessons under the eyes of those who knew far better than she did what she was doing, and she could watch, observe, and practice.
Her pythons didn’t accompany her today for the same reason she hadn’t taken them hunting with her yesterday for the reagents she had stuffed in her backpack. Digestion was a sensitive matter for snakes, and it was best that they were left to process their meals without becoming accidentally stressed out. And if there was a lab accident, the girl preferred her darlings were not injured. And from yesterday’s trip, she had accumulated multiple bottles and jars of ashes, all collected from various shadow creatures that were around the kingdom within a few hours’ ride. She had over two dozen labeled containers, and in her notebook, the details of whereabouts it had been dispatched, and what element had been used to reduce them to this state of effluvia. She had used all four of those that were accessible to her without attunement, and Garr had been able to take others out with lightning.
She bowed her head and shoulders in greeting to the master Alchemist, and she looked her over. “I hear jars in that bag of yours,” she remarked. “Did you have success with finding the ashes?” The Moonborn Re’hyaean asked her, raising an eyebrow. Slender and willowy, she wore a form-fitting tunic and leggings, and Hilana’s own freer attire made her sigh. She was going to have to get her seamstress to put together an outfit for the purposes of her training and education when she was here. The girl was colourful enough that she looked like she should have been on a stage dancing to music, but she’d interacted with her enough by now to know that it was just her style. Had she told her to dress differently, the young woman surely would have.
“I did, Domina, yes,” Hilana beamed brightly as she was wont to do. “I’ve got about two dozen samples of different creatures that were dispatched yesterday. I took the notes as you asked, about what they looked like and what element I used.” Her paedagoga nodded with some approval, satisfied that her efforts had been effective. Two dozen different samples in multiple containers would allow them opportunities. The girl was productive, at the very least. That did have to be said for her. As she got better, efficiency would follow.
Clelia motioned the girl towards the large tables. The Vastiana knew the drill, however, and first dipped her hands into the basin to clean them off. The Master ran a tight ship, and she expected proper precautions and procedures to be undertaken. Hilana may have been a frolicking dirt child in many other aspects of her life, but she wasn’t one in here. It wasn’t tolerated; she had learned that the first day. Domina Clelia had high expectations, and she was in many ways sterner than Sentinel Ævril, but Hilana didn’t mind that either. She knew she was here because it was arranged by the Sentinels, even if no one really understood why, but Deus Avaerys and Domina Varvara had told her to strengthen her alchemical skills, and Hilana was not about to turn down any assistance, guidance, and education that she could get. With her hands dried, the girl shifted her rucksack and set it on the stool, pulling out her notebook and containers, jars and vials of various sizes and materials. Clelia wanted to see what differences, if any, the container might have on the properties of the ashes. These creatures were nothing mundane, so it stood to reason that they might well be influenced by different variables. As such, Hilana had three containers for the remains of the first ten shadow creatures, and the last fifteen were just in various jars. Everything had been labeled and lined up, and Clelia took up the leather-bound notebook and flipped through it. While the herbalist didn’t seem to be a studious sort to look at her, she was a willing and eager student, and she followed instructions to the letter. “Let us start with sample one. Hog shaped, destroyed by fire. We will begin with the sample from the clay jar.” Hilana produced the three containers, and opened the clay container, unhinging it, and using a long-handled spoon to put some of the samples on the glass dish in order for them to study the ashes under the aura glass.
“We are going to do a few things, Miss Chenzira, with the first handful of samples. We will study them and see if their properties are any different from normal ash from a brazier, and then we will introduce the agitation rod and look again,” Clelia instructed her. “This is technically an unknown substance, and it is best to understand what it is to the greatest extent of our ability so that we can try to predict how it will react when we introduce it to the acid and to the clay,” Hilana nodded, and she peered at it through the aura glass. “That is interesting, isn’t it? The rod, now,” the Moonborn instructed her discipula, and Hilana carefully took up the agitation rod and began to manipulate the bowl of ashes, stirring it until Clelia had had enough and gestured with her hand.
They looked through the aura glass again. “Ah, you see the difference? Good. Our first little jar of acid, Miss Chenzira…” There was a reason that they had yet to use the ashes in another solution, inasmuch as they might like to, it was because there was so much to discover about it. While Clelia could and did use Semblance to understand more, Hilana wasn’t quite there yet. As such, the aura glass, along with trial and error for some things like this, were necessary. The Master Alchemist was a thorough teacher, and she liked to let the Vastiana make mistakes so long as she didn’t damage equipment or look like she was going to blow something up. She had some of the basics; she needed to learn to think on her own and see what all she could come up with. This was the girl’s project. While Clelia was aware of the creatures and had heard the girl grumble and complain about them, she had very little to do with anything and everything outside of the city. She relied on suppliers who dealt with all of the logistics necessary for those beyond the walls to get her the goods she needed, and if those materials didn’t show up, that was her supplier’s problem. Unlike Hilana, she was less inclined to go chase the source herself.
Frolicking dirt child indeed…
Hilana moved the cylindrical glass container over. It had a measurement of the alchemist’s acid in it, already prepared and primed, and when Clelia nodded to her, the girl tipped her glass dish of activated ashes into it. They watched the results for a minute before the apprentice picked up the agitation rod and began to stir it. “Now, let’s do it again,” she instructed her, when the rod was removed and they were watching the acid-ash mixture to see what came from it. “This time, we will add the activated ashes to the primed alchemist’s clay. That will of course have to rest, but we shall see what results we get from it.”
The girl repeated the procedure, working the ashes with the agitation rod before leaving those for the moment and adding a fist-sized amount of alchemist’s clay to a Lyrethillium mortar that had been scrivened upon with sigils of catalyzation. The clay was activated and primed with the agitation rod, and at Clelia’s approving nod, Hilana transferred the activated ashes to the bowl. She used the accompanying pestle to work the ashes into the clay, stirring and kneading it, trying to mix it as thoroughly as possible, noting the way the colour of the clay changed as the ashes were mixed in. They had another look with the aura glass, and when Clelia was satisfied with the girl’s efforts at blending the two substances, the mixture was placed in the stoneware box, and the lid placed on top of it to seal it.
The process was repeated, over and over again, with the different samples from the different containers. The goal, after all, was for Hilana to understand more about what these creatures were, how they could be dealt with, and what, if any, benefit she could derive from them going forward for different uses. They were susceptible to magic, but reports said that they were much harder to kill by mundane means. Could that trait be isolated? Could these shadow creatures help her attune to that element? Hilana had so many questions, and hopefully, these experiments and observations would help answer them.