10
Broadly speaking, there were three things needed to manufacture elixirs.
Materials, skills,
and ability.
The materials were already prepared.
Krushvalbi Elixir!
Then what he needed now was a skill.
However, Ki Ja-hyeon had not possessed a skill capable of upgrading the elixir he had made.
Two weeks ago, before he had begun steadily producing Krushvalbi Elixir, Ki Ja-hyeon, the F0 Grade druid, had definitely been that way.
But now that two weeks had passed, he possessed a skill that could enhance elixirs.
It was even a tremendous skill far beyond his expectations.
Ki Ja-hyeon recalled the skill list he had obtained a few days ago when he became F+ Grade.
[Assimilation with Nature (Active) (E) (15%)]
[Great Nature’s Call (Active) (E) (10%)]
[Compression (Active) (A) (5%)]
Among the three skills, the first was Assimilation with Nature.
[Assimilation with Nature (Active) (E) (15%)]
It was a skill that made one assimilate with nature. Naturally, rather than becoming transparent like a chameleon, it was closer to making others recognize Ki Ja-hyeon not as a “person,” but as part of the surrounding “scenery.”
It was a good skill, but it was not what he needed right now.
The second listing was the same.
[Great Nature’s Call (Active) (E) (10%)]
It was like an upgraded version of Nature’s Physical Aid, which he had not chosen before.
If that skill strengthened him according to the amount of natural mana he possessed, then this skill could be said to strengthen him the more lush forests surrounded him.
A skill that grew stronger the more natural power existed nearby.
If he were in a forest thick with greenery, perhaps. But this place was a bleak concrete forest. If he obtained this skill and tried using it here, he would be lucky if his stats rose by even 0.5%.
The final skill was the very skill Ki Ja-hyeon needed for the elixir production he wanted.
It was even the skill that stood unquestionably at the peak among the production skills he had wanted.
[Compression (Active) (A) (5%)]
“I really hooked a big one...!”
There were many methods for strengthening an elixir’s abilities.
Just the ones that came to mind immediately included stacking, elevation, transformation, and so on.
There were skills that produced a + effect by gathering the same materials, skills that produced an x effect by mixing in other materials, and even skills that transformed an elixir and made it produce an entirely different - effect.
Compression was on a different track from all of those.
It was, unbelievably, squaring.
That was why Compression boasted the highest difficulty by far among almost every elixir enhancement technique.
Even Ki Ja-hyeon of the past had had to endure hellish training in order to realize the principles of “Compression.”
It had been a secret art among secret arts, one that even a druid called a genius could only barely obtain after devoting more than ten full years to it.
[You have learned Compression (A).]
Like this, he had obtained both the materials and the skill to apply to them.
Then did that mean he simply had to compress the Krushvalbi Elixir now?
Would it be compressed if he used the skill and went poof?
“Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case....”
Ki Ja-hyeon had thought so at first too and tried to cast Compression.
That had been the natural thing to do.
But nothing happened.
The circuit for using Compression had merely opened; operating it was another issue entirely.
In other words, it was like having a cutting-edge airplane appear in one’s yard, but not everyone could immediately take it on a supersonic flight.
The airplane had appeared, but actually getting it into the air and piloting it were issues of a completely different dimension.
On top of that, Compression was a technique of such high difficulty that it was called the flower of elixir manufacturing.
Unlike in his previous life, when he had compressed things as routinely as eating meals, this was his first time in this life.
If he had some S Grade thing right now and tried to compress it, he would probably fail.
Experience or not, his body’s own capacity was lacking.
But if it was F Grade Krushvalbi Elixir, it should be possible.
He had risen to at least that much capacity.
Nevertheless, the reason he had not tried until now was....
“because of the penalty....”
Unlike other skills, Compression had something called a failure rate.
Thinking about it, it was not much.
It was just a light(?) mana shock, enough that he would recover after about a week of rest.
In the past, when he had plenty of time, that would have been nothing, but in this damned dystopian world, a week was huge.
That was why he had kept postponing it, thinking he would try safely once his Elixir Manufacturing skill rose and his natural power operation efficiency improved, until he arrived at the present.
“Well, it’ll be fine!”
In truth, it was already fully possible right now.
He simply had not tried because the penalty was large!
One success did not guarantee two successes.
But Ki Ja-hyeon, who had been a genius druid, was confident that even with a single success, he could perfectly remember the flow of that natural power.
A single attempt that would make all attempts succeed!
To do that, he needed a space of his own, where no one could interrupt him.
So although he felt sorry to Thunder and Cloud....
He closed the bedroom door and locked it.
Click!
No sooner had he locked the door than he heard frantic scrambling.
Soon, the sound of scratching at the door came through with vivid force.
Scratch, scratch.
Scratch, scratch, scratch, scratch!
The utterly maddening collaboration of Thunder and Cloud, who became curious whenever their owner was out of sight!
Woof, woof, woof! (Master, open it. Treat. My treat!!)
“Yeah, it’s not a treat....”
Myaaak! Hiss! (Friend. Together everywhere! Open!)
Scratch, scratch, scratch, scratch!
“Goodbye for a moment....”
He needed a space to himself, so there was nothing he could do.
However, that irritating noise would not end.
The two creatures were persistent things that did not know how to give up.
Fortunately, he had prepared a countermeasure for that as well.
He took “that thing” out from inside his clothes and put it in his ear.
Ding!
[Noise canceling activated.]
A cold mechanical voice dug heavily into his ear canal.
And in the next instant,
.......
“Whew......!”
It was, in every sense, per-fect silence!
The cries of the beasts(?) who had seemed ready to break through the door just moments ago evaporated without leaving even a single strand of noise behind.
This was the very essence of modern civilization forged by capitalism...!
Come to think of it, this too was one of the benefits of this life.
After all, meditation spaces in his previous life had been absolutely terrible.
Would it seem good because there were fewer people?
No. Nature did not leave people alone.
Whenever he tried to set the mood for meditation, the wind slapped him across the cheek, nameless insects put on an orchestra beside his ears...and the mosquito bastards whining in 8-bit right next to his ears were the final bosses that made not only Ki Ja-hyeon of his previous life, but even great sages slam the table.
In the case of sensitive personalities, there were even instances of people going to meditate, only for their mana to run wild and leave them recovering in bed.
But what about now?
If he simply clicked one of these into his ear canal, even a single-room apartment in Area 4 transformed in an instant into the inside of a soundless barrier laid by a 7th Circle mage...!
Grandmasters or whatever, great sages or whatever, if he had possessed even one of these, unifying the continent would have been a piece of cake!
This was precisely,
“technology...!”
Enjoying as naturally as breathing the moment when tens of thousands of years of druid history was miserably humiliated before an electronic product worth only a few hundred thousand won,
“Whewww... Here I go!”
Inside the sacred silence blessed by capital, Ja-hyeon held the Krushvalbi Elixir tightly.
Now, all that remained was to compress an ordinary Krushvalbi Elixir well. Very well. Here inside this silent “ear-canal sanctuary.”
The moment had arrived to turn an old one-thousand-won bill into a ten-thousand-won bill. No, into a fifty-thousand-won bill...!
Like that, Ki Ja-hyeon’s Krushvalbi-squaring work began.
[Using skill: Compression.]
Hummmmmm...!
Refined natural mana gathered in his hands.
It was truly fascinating.
In his previous life, even the process of refining his natural mana to make it easy to use “Compression” would have been an obstacle, yet that process had simply vanished!
Should he say it felt as though every difficult section had been completed, and only the result remained in his hands?
This life was different from his previous life.
It was the power of the System.
‘Is it really okay for it to be this easy...?!’
The jet engine had started.
Now it was time to surpass the speed of sound and create a sonic boom.
Tsssssssss!
The Krushvalbi Elixir boiled and bubbled.
Ki Ja-hyeon held tightly onto the sensation as it tried to run wild.
Inside the extreme silence created by noise canceling, he held it with high concentration, and after holding and holding, he was able to find it.
Although his body was F Grade, his sense for handling essence had already reached the peak.
‘Right. I was a genius.’
The penalty of a week of recovery?
Of course, it was large.
But he should not have been frightened by it.
He should have believed in himself a little more.
Once he actually tried it,
‘it’s this easy...!’
Swoooooosh!
The Krushvalbi Elixir gradually compressed.
But he could not relax.
He maintained this degree of compression.
Only then could he compress it to its limit without letting it burst.
Until when?
Until, like rice cooking into a meal,
it was crushed to its limit and reborn as something entirely new!
Fwoooooosh!
Natural mana extending from Ja-hyeon’s fingertips softly wrapped around the elixir bottle. The liquid inside the bottle surged, then began to shrink in volume with a bizarre sound.
Like that,
the Krushvalbi Elixir that had filled the bottle to the brim had only about one quarter remaining.
No,
it had been compressed that much!
The thing had already been dark and thick, but now it had become outright round.
The liquid had become jelly like that...!
“Ooh...ooooh...!”
Ja-hyeon carefully lifted the result.
And the moment he confirmed the detailed effects of the enhanced elixir that appeared before his eyes,
the corner of Ja-hyeon’s eyes trembled.
“With this, it might be pretty good, right?”
Its performance had not simply doubled. The result created by the squaring operation known as Compression had surpassed even Ja-hyeon’s expectations.
Thinking about how this one small bottle would soon throw Hyeonmu Shelter’s market economy into chaos, a capitalist smile bloomed across Ja-hyeon’s lips.
However, there was one worrying part.
“This is...really something.”
Sure enough, these were options that would sell well.
There probably would not be any hunters who saw these options and still did not buy it.
However,
“They’re all thick-lettered options....”
On top of that, only the good options had been chosen and written in thick letters.
Just like last time.
“Word of mouth will spread someday, but....”
It had happened last time too.
Starting with the Huntuber Buy This, algorithm-abusing Huntubers who copied and pasted the information Buy This found had spread his elixirs far and wide for him.
This elixir would probably flow the same way too, and the price he presented would be transformed from price-gouging into cost-effectiveness.
That was a natural phenomenon.
But it would take that much time.
During that time, he would get cursed out mercilessly.
“I don’t like being cursed at for no reason....”
He wanted to shorten that time.
In that case?
“Well, the answer is obvious!”
Ki Ja-hyeon decided to artificially advance that natural phenomenon.
The druid of old, who had lived as nature’s friend, was literally dead.
Now,
it was time to show them the terror of a druid thoroughly steeped in capitalism.