Chapter 221: Mental Focus

Now that Thor had finished his enhancement, that left the two large vials on the cart, waiting for someone to remember about them in all the shock and confusion of a Lightning Cerro using [Circle of Protection].

Thor was basking in all the attention that he was getting from the clerics, who were making intensive notes on his abilities, completely forgetting that everyone was here for a reason that wasn't studying Thor.

"Right, now getting back on track. This particular concoction should be perfect for Commander Alice. It's designed specifically for wind element mages and should strengthen your abilities and future growth rate.

I know for Commanders that is usually the most important part, as the growth can be painfully slow." The ancient professor announced, looking much more healthy than when he had hobbled into the room.

Alice looked more than a little skeptical about drinking a potion that held more than the average coffee mug, especially since they were intended to be ingested in one go, and not sipped over an extended period of time.

But it was a Commander Rank potion, and designed specifically for wind mages, which she was. There was probably no better resource for her, and if they were going to part with it without arguments, she would be an idiot to turn it down.

So, she found herself swallowing the entire vial full of the herbal concoction, while energy built all around her and her power level steadily grew.

The beasts could feel it, the strengthening of the magical power that Alice could wield, and through them, Karl had a fairly accurate guess of her current growth state, but for the others in the room, it was just a lot of bleeding energy, and then they would have to test afterwards to know how well it worked.

"My maximum mana control rate is definitely better than it was before, and I can feel the wind magic more clearly." Alice did her best to explain the changes that had happened with the potion.

"We will run a suite of tests later when we have more time. I need to study the salve that you provided once I return to my labs, and then there are all the other results as well. But there is still one more vial here. What was that one again?" The old professor asked his assistants.

"That is an attunement potion, double dose for humans, so it can be split between the two clerics in the group." The assistant reminded him.

"Oh, that's right. High Priest, we made this one for your people. The ingredients are a bit rare and therefore difficult to obtain, but with the Church's resources, it shouldn't be a problem to obtain enough to provide this to all of your promising members."

The Professor passed over the ingredients list and a packet of details to the High Priests, who looked at some of the ingredients in concern. Sure, they had access to vast amounts of resources, but they also had a massive number of clergy.

Plus, this was a Commander Rank potion, and the side effects on a Common Grade or Awakened priest could be catastrophic. At best, they could administer it after reaching Ascended to see if the promising priests could make it to Commander Rank and become high priests.

The potion was split in half, and handed to both Tessa and Lotus, who gave it very different looks. Tessa was holding it away from herself to avoid the smell, while Lotus was intrigued and taking careful sniffs, trying to determine what was in it without looking at the ingredients list.

"Well, bottoms up." Tessa reluctantly agreed.

She tilted the smaller vial back and downed the potion in one long slug, followed by Lotus. Both Priestesses grimaced at the flavour, but their bodies were gathering energy into themselves, and giving off a sense of Divine Power.

It was a shame that Sergeant Rita missed out on this opportunity, but everyone else had made out very well today, and their advancements had given the beasts a chance to learn new skills in the future.

Rae was eagerly looking forward to deciphering how to make her Golems wear clothing, colour adaptive camo netting to be specific, so they could hide as well as Rae herself did. But even Thor was looking forward to combat so he could try to learn the cleric tricks now that he knew he could make a Circle of Protection.

The High Priests were about to lead everyone back out, Karl could sense it in their demeanour, but the researchers weren't done.

"There is one more left. Now, the field of Warrior enhancements is pretty well studied, but we do have a few things left that might help the Beast Master himself. This next one could be considered a somewhat exotic potion, and we weren't certain that we would ever find a suitable test subject, but today might be the day.

Assistant, could you go fetch item FLA112C3?"

The assistant looked confused, but went and gathered the object from a storage room down the hall, still steaming with the intense cold of the ice magic that was used to preserve potions and pills that might become unstable when left at room temperature.

Inside was what appeared to be a gummy bear. It was even gummy bear shaped.

Karl gave the priest a questioning look, but he just shrugged.

"I ran out of other moulds, as this was a side project, so I used what I could find in the foods' lab."

Karl made a mental note to avoid gummy bears from the university. He would never trust their equipment after it had been used for experimental potions. But then, they were making experimental food products out of magical plants and monster meat already, so perhaps it was no worse than any other piece of equipment.

The Professor passed the gummy to a clean Petri dish with a pair of sterilized tongs, and carefully warmed it with fire magic using a handheld device.

"There it is, right back to perfect temperature. You will want to eat that quickly, I didn't do a good job of stabilizing it as a gummy, and the flavour could be unfortunate."

Karl nodded, and tipped the gummy directly off the dish and down his throat, the same way that Hawk usually ate anything he didn't have to tear apart.

The energy of the gummy hit him like a sledgehammer to the head, and power flowed from it through his body, completely bypassing him to fill the spaces.

It was probably a good thing that the beasts were outside at the moment as Karl focused on concentrating the energy into the sun and moon equivalents he had been using in place of the candlelight that the monks centred their space around.

There was a lingering power in the spaces, Karl could feel it, but he couldn't quite grasp what he was supposed to be learning from the pill, or what sort of skill it should be.

Then, as the energy settled and his spaces began to change in nature, becoming more alive, as if they were a real place, and not just a bubble of mental energy. That was what they had been missing, Karl realized, the bottleneck that was holding the beasts back from their advancements.

It would still be some time before any of them were actually Commanders, but they should be able to make it there now.

But the energy wasn't done. It was leaking from the spaces to his own consciousness, and to the void he focused on to meditate.

A soft golden light filled the space for a moment, then coalesced into what looked like a Holy Stone, or a golden dragon scale. It wasn't doing anything, but when Karl focused on it, he could feel the improvement in his meditation speed.

Everyone was staring at him, waiting for a verdict.

"It enhanced the spaces for my beasts, and I think that it improved my meditation as well, there is a golden stone in the void where I meditate now, and it gives off an impressive amount of energy." Karl explained.

"There is something in your void? That is quite interesting, and very close to our expectations for Psychic type mentalist Classes if they were given the treatment. The concoction is made with the neural nodes of a mind flayer, Drake blood, and an assortment of herbs. It is safe to say that it is unlikely to see another of them made in the near future, but I do have a few others from the same batch.

Now that I know they will really work as intended, we might be able to use them to help the accuracy of the Oracles and the Seers. For some reason, they don't trust my creations." The Professor ranted.

They could see the future. There was likely an excellent reason they didn't trust his creations.