Chapter 73: Alchemy
Anna stepped down the stairs, signaling Aldric to follow her.
As he started down the stairs, Aldric discovered that it was longer than he had expected.
It actually went deep underground.
Occasionally they would encounter a shop employee carrying some bottles from below.
Like the previous cashier, they saluted Anna as they passed by.
After descending about a hundred steps, only then did they arrive at the end.
Fortunately, in this game, they had powers so descending a hundred steps could be considered trivial.
Aldric would be fine even if he jumped straight down.
At this moment, he finally realized enough why Anna said the basement was bigger than the shop.
Judging from the length of the stairs, the end was practically outside the shop area.
In other words, the basement was indeed built in a larger area underground, encompassing other buildings and the street.
At the end of the stairs, there was a sizable door.
It was open. At first glance, Aldric saw smoke of various colors behind the door.
Anna, who arrived in front of the door first, pushed it fully open, revealing a truly vast room, filled with cauldrons of various sizes.
Aldric instantly became amazed.
He saw several people standing in front of a large cauldron, seemingly controlling the fire beneath the cauldron while stirring in various ingredients.
From inside the cauldrons, there was sometimes smoke rising.
They were of different colors, which made a lot of smoke of different colors in this basement.
Aldric also saw a group of people gathered around, listening to a shopkeeper talk.
They seemed to be studying alchemy.
As a beautiful woman with an elegant body, Anna\'s arrival naturally attracted the attention of everyone in the basement.
Those who had already seen her gave a brief salute from afar, but those who had come here to study were mesmerized.
"I have a private room here, I will teach you there so that there are no distractions," Anna said to Aldric, ignoring the stares of the people around.
She took another step while signaling him to follow her.
Her destination was one of the doors at the end of the basement.
Going to her private room, Aldric felt somewhat uncomfortable.
After all, it was not a good thing to be alone with a woman in a room.
Even if Anna was much older than him, it was still nerve-wracking.
Of course, he could not think badly. Anna also looked serious that she really wanted to teach him.
Not long after, they arrived in front of the door they were aiming for.
It was locked, so Anna unlocked it first to open it.
She walked in and invited Aldric to enter.
Once he was inside, she closed the door.
Several players who joined the group of people studying alchemy observed them more intensely.
"They should be players too, right?" said one of the players.
"That woman is Lady Anna. She\'s a billionaire woman in London, one of the rich people who use a lot of money in this game. I happen to work in her company. She has even bought a few percent of the shares of all the branches of the Heaven Valley Alchemy Shop," another player replied.
Apparently, someone recognized Anna.
"But why did she bring that young man?" The player who first spoke asked again.
He had bad speculations and this made him jealous of Aldric.
"Maybe he\'s her subordinate who helps her with her work," replied the player who recognized Anna.
He seemed to respect her.
Probably because he worked in her company.
"Is it like that? Why don\'t I feel that way? Look, that man looks so different. I don\'t think a woman would hire such a striking man unless she had other desires from him, desires for pleasure, of course."
"What? Aron, take your dirty mind off my boss. She\'s an honorable woman with a kind heart." The man who worked at Anna\'s company became angry at his friend\'s words.
His face turned red and his eyes bulged.
However, Aron didn\'t seem to care. He casually replied, "It has nothing to do with kind and honorable. Everyone wants the opposite sex who has good looks by their side. I guess, your boss must not have a husband, right? Of course, they probably won\'t do anything weird here, but I\'m sure they\'re very close to each other and do important things together."
"..."
Actually, when Aldric entered Anna\'s private room, he felt calmer.
The room was about 5×5 meters, not very spacious, and it was full of cauldrons so space was limited.
Even if Anna was also a crazy woman who liked handsome young men, there was no way she would seduce him in a place like this.
She walked to one of the large cauldrons, then stood in front of it while facing him and holding the cauldron.
"The complexity of alchemy lies in controlling the fire. Hence, to become an Alchemist, possessing the power of fire is basically the main requirement. However, with the development and many innovations, there are artifacts that can be used by everyone to create and control fire.
Although this had many limitations such as it could not be used to make certain potions because the fire it produced was not hot enough, it was still quite reliable. At least you can still make Vitalis Pills by relying on that artifact. So, Aldric, do you have the power of fire or not? If not, you can only rely on that artifact." Anna ended her words with a question to Aldric.
The latter had no fire power at all, he naturally shook his head.
"I can\'t use the power of fire," he said.
"Okay!" Anna wasn\'t surprised at all to hear his answer.
She then took out something from her Storage Artifact.
It was an object similar to a rhino horn except that it was longer and appeared to be made of steel, having a hole like an exhaust port at the top.
At the bottom was a handle covered in red leather.
Aldric wasn\'t sure what it was.
"Hold it!" Anna handed him the horn-like object.
He accepted it, holding the handle covered in red leather.
As he held it, he suddenly felt a spiritual connection to the horn-like object.
"This artifact is called the Horn of Fire," Anna said.
"You basically just need to send your spiritual energy into this horn. After that, you can convert your spiritual energy within the horn into fire by sending it out through the top of the horn." She explained.
Aldric looked at the horn more carefully, finally sending his spiritual energy into it.
It turned out to be quite easy as the artifact called the Horn of Fire was already so well structured that using it was not difficult at all.
After his spiritual energy entered the horn, he sent it out.
Buzz!
Suddenly a huge flame shot out of the hole on top of the horn, heading towards Anna who was standing right in front of it.
Aldric\'s eyes widened as he thought, \'damn, I sent out too much spiritual energy!\'