Chapter 236 Chemical Accident
Roland immediately rushed towards the laboratory next to the Redwater River. Arriving at the scene, Roland discovered that the damage wasn’t as severe as he had imagined. At least the main building for refining acid completely lacked any damage, while the windows at the side building had shattered into pieces.
“My Lord, please save our teacher! He is so badly hurt, almost on the point of death.”
Seeing that Roland had appeared, the group of disciplines immediately gathered around him but were soon stopped by his personal guards . Roland waved his hand, indicating that they don’t need to be so anxious, “Where are the others? Let me have a look at them first.” Then he turned Carter and whispered, “Where’s Nana?”
“I’ve already sent someone, so I estimate that she will be here soon.”
“Alright.”
Roland nodded and then entered the laboratory, under protection of his guards.
Kyle Sichi was lying on the ground, leaving a bloodstain on the ground, which extended from him to the side room, giving the general idea that the accident must have happened in the side room and that he had been dragged to the main room after. His face was only an indistinct mass, with blood and other liquids mixed together, which should have been caused by the strong acid which had splashed on him during the explosion. He was also missing several fingers on his hands, and within the flesh he could see the white finger phalanges.
The apprentices had already provided him with emergency treatment, letting Roland see that they had also met similar situations in Redwater City. Dragging the people away from the danger, binding the wound to stop the bleeding, then seek help… these measures were all done quite well. However, receiving this kind of injury, and only having herbal medicine and the body’s own healing ability as treatment, would lead to ten out of ten people dying.
Roland ordered his guards to wait at the door not letting anyone enter. Waiting for Nana’s arrival, Carter and he went into the side room, trying to find the alchemist’s fingers. Otherwise, even if the little girl healed his injuries, he would no longer be able to carry out his chemical experiments – which definitely would be a great loss for Border Town.
“It looks like a violent wind had swept through here,” Carter said and then pointed at his nose, “Furthermore, there is an unpleasant odor here.”
“That is the smell of nitrogen dioxide.” Roland carefully swept his eyes all over the room. Seeing that the all the windows were open, he concluded that the possibility of poisoning wasn’t large, at most, there were merely some leftover fumes which hadn’t yet vanished. On the test stage, one bottle laid broken on the table, its acid had flown over the table’s surface, gathered on the floor and left behind a damp patch.
“Remember as you search through the tools, never to touch them directly with your hands,” the Prince reminded Carter. “There are gloves in the closet.”
Since Soraya’s ability had evolved, he had also sent a dozen pairs of thin and anticorrosive gloves to the laboratory, but looking at the alchemist’s horrible injuries, it was evident that he had been working on the test object without wearing them. In case he had worn the gloves, even if the explosion had blown his fingers away, at least his fingers would still be within the gloves.
When Roland looked through the closet above the test stand, something unusual attracted his attention. After he had taken the unusually formed bottle down and taken a closer look, he was convinced that it was actually the liquor he sold at the convenience market – and the amount left inside showed that a lot of it had already been drunk, leaving only half a bottle behind.
Kyle actually brought white liquor into the laboratory? It is hard to imagine that an experienced alchemist would be drinking during an experiment!
“Your Royal Highness, Miss Nana has arrived,” a guard reported.
“Good, continue to guard the door, don’t let any of the apprentices enter,” leaving Carter behind, who continued to rummage through the chaos to find the fingers, Roland immediately went back to the main room.
“Is it him?” For Nana, treating this sort of level of injury was already nothing out of the ordinary. The little girl who had previously been so scared of seeing blood and fainted whenever she encountered terrible wounds, had already grown up a lot — whether it was in regards to ability, or courage.
“First start with curing the corrosion wounds on his face,” Roland nodded. “Carter is currently looking for his missing fingers, when he finds them, you can connect them again later.”
“That won’t be necessary,” Nana responded proudly, “By now I’m already able to heal such small wounds.”
The startled Roland could only look on as she laid her hands on top of the Alchemist’s chest, closed her eyes, and Kyle’s injuries immediately began healing —his face was soon completely restored, and his disabled fingers unexpectedly began extending, healing at a slower rate. First, the bones regrew, followed by the flesh, and finally nails and hairs. About a quarter of an hour later, his fingers had been completely restored.
At this point, Carter also came back out of the side room, “Your Royal Highness, I was only able to find three of them, the last one might have already been destroyed during the explosion — eh?”
“Since when have you been able to do this?” Roland asked Nan in surprise when she opened her eyes again.
“Roughly a week ago, when the current chicken for my training lost a limb, I discovered that as long as I pour enough magic into it, I can slowly let it regrow.” She stuck out her tongue, “Probably because I recalled what you had said— that every part of the body is composed out of the same cells, which meant that the cutoff area was also only a loss of cells. Since my magic can make up for the damaged parts, why shouldn’t it also be able to make up for the lost parts? And then I tried to do it.”
“Are you able regrow every part?”
“The regrow takes a lot of effort,” Nana said, shaking her head. “Even though this method is very easy, and as long as it is only fingers, it is okay. But if it’s an arm or a leg, I cannot help it. After all, the amount of magic I can hold is far less than that of Sister Anna.”
That’s because you’re a still a minor, Roland thought. Moreover, was this new capacity because of the evolution of her magic, or is it just the result of her training, leading to an increase of her magic capacity, allowing her to achieve an effect which had previously been impossible? Currently, Nightingale is not here to determine whether Nana’s magic source had given birth to changes or not. If this change is only because of an increase of her magic, the little girl’s performance after she reaches adulthood is something he looked forward too.
“Your Royal Highness, he woke up,” Carter interrupted.
“I was… what’s wrong?” Kyle frowned, first looked at his intact hands, then touched his face, “Shouldn’t I—”
“Should you have been killed during a chemical accident? Usually yes, but this witch saved your life. This person besides me had undertaken the task of rescuing and giving medical treatment to your people, Miss Nana Pine.” Roland decided to directly reveal Nana’s identity to the chief alchemist. A man who had rushed to Border Town because of an equation for a chemical reaction, shouldn’t be an incorrigibly or stubborn person, even if he thought of witches as disgusting in his heart, it would be unlikely that he would abandon his work and run over to the Church to report. And now since they had Lucia in town, it was only a matter of time until the alchemists and witches had to work together.
“For goodness sake! Do you mean that this witch can cure alchemy — no, the trauma caused by chemical experiments?” Roland hasn’t foreseen that Kyle’s reaction was totally contrary to what he had expected, “Hahaha, this is excellent, Your Royal Highness, this means that I can go through with experiments, without worrying about the dangers!”
“In the end, what happened?” Roland sighed in relieve. “Why did you bring the liquor into the laboratory?”
“No, Your Royal Highness, it is merely a test item,” the alchemist became entirely excited, “The thing I needed to produce for you, I did it!”
“Are you speaking of… Mercuric Acid?”
“That’s right, Your Highness! It turned out that the missing reactant was alcohol!” He said in one breath, “Previously I had already tested dozens of raw materials, but I was unable to make any progress. Annoyed I went to the market and bought some liquor, but then I suddenly remembered that the “Elementary Chemistry” mentioned that alcohol is an organic solvent, which is necessary for some raw materials to react. I then distilled and purified the liquor and used it for a new reagent test, and finally, on the sixth it try was a success… Within several tubes, the gray crystal’s precipitation occurred, so I recorded all of their heating time and temperatures. Afterward, I extracted some of the crystal and tested them. The features they showed were the same as what you spoke of — the ash gray needle-shaped crystal powder is extremely sensitive and irritable. Just when I wanted to filter out the rest of crystals in the tubes, the test tube suddenly exploded.”
So, it is done like this, at this moment, Roland also suddenly remembered it, to get mercury fulminate it was necessary to add ethanol to the mercury to excess the nitric acid, or, perhaps it can be produced from the direct reaction of mercury nitrate and ethanol.
“Well done,” Roland said and patted Kyle’s Sichi’s shoulder. “This feat is enough for you to receive Border Town’s highest honor and rewards.”
Thus, with the cartridge problem fixed his centerfire ammunition finally took shape.