Klein's fingers left the surface of the inscription stone. The light patterns dimmed, sealing the text regarding "submission" within the internal recording space.
He let out a long breath, his shoulders dropping half an inch.
One thing after another. The mystery of the will of the deep sea remained unsolved, Ophelia's pollution required constant suppression, Aphros's potion was only half-finished, and now there was a sea folk who recognized Ophelia as kin.
The work in this workshop truly never ended.
He turned back toward the tank.
The sea folk remained in that slightly forward-leaning posture, her tail fin swaying slowly in the water.
"Regrettably," Klein said, looking at her, "though we can communicate now, I still have to keep you confined here."
The inscription stone lit up again. The light patterns flowed, encoding his words into the tremulous sound of bursting bubbles that rippled across the water's surface.
The sea folk's ear fins twitched.
She showed no sign of resistance; even the frequency of her tail's swaying didn't change.
She opened her mouth and emitted a short string of syllables.
The translation surfaced on the inscription stone:
—I see.
Only two words. Flat, without any fluctuation in tone.
Klein waited for two seconds, but no further text appeared.
"You aren't angry?" he asked.
The person in the tank shifted positions. She lowered her hands from her tail, spreading her finger webbing against the glass wall.
—I thought I would never get out.
The inscription stone faithfully transmitted her thoughts.
—But you said you 'still' have to keep me here.
—That implies it's possible I won't be later.
—I should be happy about that.
"There is indeed that possibility," Klein didn't deny it. "But that will take time. Before then, I need to conduct some research."
He walked to the workbench, opened a drawer, and took out a glass blood collection tube and a long, slender silver needle.
"I need to draw some of your blood."
He walked back to the tank with the items, holding the tube and needle at eye level for the sea folk to see.
"It will sting a little. Do you mind?"
The sea folk's gaze fell upon the silver needle.
She stared at the tip for a few seconds, then shook her head.
The movement was slight but clear.
She lifted her right hand from the glass wall, reaching it above the water toward Klein.
The translucent membranes between her fingers contracted rapidly once they left the water, clinging to the sides of her fingers. The fine scales on the inside of her wrist glinted coldly under the workshop lights.
Klein reached out with his left hand to support her wrist.
It felt very cool. Her temperature was much lower than a human's, and there was an extremely thin layer of mucus on the surface of her skin.
He pressed the silver needle against a vein on the inside of the sea folk's wrist. There were no scales there, and the outline of the vessel was clearly visible.
The needle pierced the skin.
The sea folk's wrist flinched slightly, but she stopped herself immediately.
Dark blue blood flowed through the needle into the glass tube.
The color was deeper than human blood, and it was less fluid, possessing a thick, viscous texture.
Klein drew a small amount, then withdrew the needle.
He pressed a clean cotton ball over the puncture site.
"Hold this here," he gestured to the sea folk.
The sea folk pulled her hand back, pressing the cotton ball with the pad of a finger on her other hand.
Klein walked to another workbench with the blood sample.
A row of potion vials and several alchemical array disks used for compositional analysis were laid out here.
He dripped the dark blue blood onto the center of an array disk.
The runes along the edge of the disk lit up in sequence. Red, yellow, and blue lights flashed alternately before finally stabilizing into a murky purplish-gray.
Klein took a nearby notebook and recorded several lines of data, comparing the color and intensity of the light.
Elemental affinity test, toxicity reaction, mana conductivity.
He went through them one by one.
The results came in.
Quite ordinary.
At least by conventional alchemical testing standards, there was nothing special about this blood.
Aside from its color and viscosity, its mana reaction was even less active than the blood of the low-level sea monsters found on the west coast.
Klein closed the report.
He sealed the remaining blood in a box with a freezing rune and pushed it into a corner.
The sea folk's uniqueness clearly didn't lie in her blood. That inclination toward Ophelia and the perception of the so-called "smell of the sea" likely originated from a deeper information structure.
This wasn't something that could be cleared up in a day or two.
He turned his attention back to another matter.
Klein walked to the innermost workbench.
On the table sat the tank containing the fish with legs, along with a row of potion vials labeled with Aphros's name.
The fish was still splashing in the water. The combination of a fish tail and human lower limbs caused it to lose its balance entirely; it could only manage to stay afloat by frantically flailing its appendages.
Klein picked up yesterday's log and flipped to the last modified page.
He took an empty beaker and poured a bit of colorless solvent into it.
Next, he used a dropper to draw a pale green liquid, suspended over the beaker.
One drop.
Two drops.
The liquid fell into the solvent, spreading a green ripple.
"What are you doing?"
The tremulous sound of bursting bubbles came from behind him.
Klein's hand paused.
He turned around.
The translation of the question appeared on the inscription stone.
The sea folk in the tank was leaning against the glass wall, her upper body almost entirely out of the water.
Her gaze went over Klein's shoulder, staring intently at the jars and bottles on the workbench.
"Concocting a potion," Klein replied.
The inscription stone sent the message out.
The sea folk tilted her head.
—What kind of potion?
"A potion that can change physical structure," Klein said, squeezing a third drop of green liquid into the beaker. "It's for another of your kind with a similar origin. She wants to live on land."
The sea folk didn't respond immediately.
The sound of splashing water came from the tank.
She turned around, swam a lap, and then leaned back against the glass wall.
—Live on land?
"Yes."
—Why?
"Because she likes the land." Klein placed the beaker on a heating array.
—What is so good about the land?
This question was a bit difficult.
Klein thought for a moment.
"Many things. Sunlight, wind, soil, and all sorts of people and food."
The inscription stone translated these terms.
The sea folk's ear fins were moving vigorously.
She seemed to be struggling to understand the meaning of these words. For a creature whose cognitive starting point was only "water," these concepts were too distant.
—Does she not have a tail?
"She does," Klein said. "But having a tail makes moving on land very inconvenient."
He pointed to his own standing legs.
"Humans on land walk with legs. So she needs a potion to turn her fish tail into a pair of legs."
The light patterns on the inscription stone finished flashing.
The workshop fell silent.
The only sound was the faint bubbling of the liquid in the beaker on the heating array.
Klein turned back and continued adding a powdered stabilizer to the beaker.
The pale green liquid gradually turned deep blue, before finally losing all color and becoming a nearly transparent, viscous gel.
It was done.
The carrier for concept replacement.
He picked up a glass rod and stirred the beaker.
Then, carrying the beaker, he walked to the tank containing the fish with legs.
He used the glass rod to pick up a bit of the transparent gel and dripped it into the water.
The gel dissolved the moment it hit the water.
The fish in the tank began to struggle violently.
Its original fish tail, which sat horizontally above the two human lower limbs, began to wither. Scales fell off, muscle tissue rapidly receded, and the bone structure reorganized within seconds.
The fish tail vanished.
In its place, the two human lower limbs became sturdier, their length increasing by a third as they fully occupied the position where the tail had been.
It was now a creature with the upper body of a fish and human legs for its lower half.
It used its two legs to tread water; though the posture was clumsy, it was much more coordinated than the previous state where the four appendages had been fighting each other.
Klein marked a check in his notebook with satisfaction.
The direction was perfectly correct.
Next, he just needed to adjust the dosage and duration of the effect to a level suitable for a mermaid.
He closed the notebook.
A faint splashing sound came from behind him.
Klein turned around.
The sea folk was looking down at her own lower body.
Her broad, fan-like fish tail unfurled slowly in the water. The edges of the fins, as thin and translucent as silk, rose and fell with the current in an incredibly fluid arc.
She ran her hand over the scales of her tail.
Then she looked up at Klein.
Then back at the tank with the half-human, half-fish creature.
"Do you want to try?" Klein asked.
He had leftover potion anyway. If he could gather more data from this sea folk, it would be very helpful for Aphros's final treatment plan.
The inscription stone translated Klein's proposal.
The sea folk didn't answer right away.
She stared at the long-legged fish treading water in the tank for a long time.
The fish kicked in the water with its two pale human legs, its posture comical and extremely unnatural.
The sea folk withdrew her gaze.
She looked back down at her own tail, which shimmered with a dark blue luster as it stretched out in the water.
She shook her head.
—Never mind.
Words surfaced on the inscription stone.
—I think my tail looks better than that.
In the tank, that broad fish tail gave a gentle flick, pushing out a ring of fine ripples.
...
The area around the pool where Aphros stayed hadn't actually been lonely these past few days.
Not far from the pool was an open space where Ophelia practiced her sword every day. The light whistle of the blade cutting through the air and the faint sound of footsteps scuffing against the ground had become the best background noise for Aphros when she was bored.
She would lean against the edge of the pool, her chin resting on her folded arms, watching that golden figure tirelessly repeat the movements of piercing, hacking, slashing, and parrying. It wasn't a dance, yet it felt more rhythmic than anything she had ever seen. Ophelia was very focused when practicing her sword and rarely spoke, but her presence alone was a silent companionship.
To Aphros, this was much more reassuring than the mysterious voice claiming to be her "mother."
However, that was only the case until yesterday.
Today, that tranquility was shattered.
Just as Ophelia drew her longsword as usual, preparing to warm up, a set of footsteps approached from the other side of the courtyard. Diancie had followed her over with several of her royal guards, looking quite enthusiastic.
"Sister Ophelia!"
The Princess's crisp voice rang out across the open space.
Ophelia's sword momentum faltered for a moment.
The state of mind she had immersed herself in was disrupted by the gazes falling upon her. The guards' eyes were complex, carrying the scrutiny of soldiers toward the strong, as well as reverence and curiosity toward the legendary Sword of the Empire.
This feeling made her a bit uncomfortable.
It wasn't like Klein's gaze. When that man watched her practice, his eyes held only pure admiration, occasionally mixed with a bit of teasing that made her heart flutter.
Well, actually, Klein's gaze wasn't that special, but who could blame her? After all, they were husband and wife.
Since he was her husband, he could look at her however he wanted.
Ophelia silently put away her sword, performing a flourish before precisely returning it to the scabbard at her waist.
"Your Highness." She nodded slightly.
"I'm not interrupting you, am I?" Diancie didn't notice the slight shift in her mood at all. She walked to her side quite naturally, looking around curiously. "Nelisa said you were here, so I came to take a look."
Her gaze soon fell upon the figure peeking halfway out of the pool.
"Oh, is this that mermaid?"
Diancie had heard about this from Nelisa as well, and her eyes lit up.
She stepped quickly to the edge of the pool, squatting down to look at Aphros with great interest.
"Hello there," she tried to greet her.
Aphros blinked, looking at Diancie, then back at Ophelia, seemingly seeking instruction.
Ophelia gave her a reassuring nod.
"Her name is Aphros," Ophelia explained.
"Aphros..." Diancie repeated the name, then looked at Ophelia and whispered, "Nelisa said all those newly discovered creatures were kept under strict supervision in his alchemical workshop—why is she here? Why the special treatment?"
"She is a guest." Ophelia cleverly borrowed the answer Klein had given Nelisa.
"A guest?" Diancie was stunned for a moment, then showed a look of realization. She didn't press further, turning her attention back to Aphros.
"Hello, Aphros, I'm Diancie." She friendly reached out her hand, but quickly realized the other was in the water and awkwardly pulled it back. "Can you... understand us?"
Aphros nodded.
"Of course. Why would you think I wouldn't?"
"Wow, you really can talk!" Diancie was even more delighted.
Diancie was full of interest in this novel "guest." She squatted by the pool and chatted with Aphros about this and that. The topics were all over the place, from the water temperature to hair color, filled with a young girl's curiosity.
"Then what do you usually eat? Raw fish? Or seaweed?" Diancie rested her chin in her hand, her eyes sparkling.
Aphros thought for a moment and answered seriously, "I eat whatever Klein gives me."
"Huh?" Diancie was taken aback. "So if Klein gives you roast meat, you eat that too?"
"What is roast meat?"
The conversation between the human and the fish was full of childishness, yet it made a faint curve pull at the corner of Ophelia's lips as she stood nearby. Her royal guards stood tall; though their eyes remained on the Princess, the corners of their vision were constantly scanning the surroundings with vigilance, including the mermaid in the pool who appeared completely non-threatening.
A soldier's instinct kept them at high alert toward any unknown creature.
This was exactly the scene Klein saw when he hurried over.
The Princess and the mermaid were chatting happily, his wife was watching from the side with a smile, and several guards stood there like stone statues, marring the otherwise harmonious picture.
Klein paused in his tracks.
He was in a good mood today; the newly concocted potion's effects were encouraging, and it looked like it could officially be used on Aphros.
He had specifically chosen this time when Ophelia practiced her sword to come over. He had planned to use the opportunity of delivering the medicine to see how Aphros and Ophelia interacted when alone, and perhaps probe for some information.
Now it seemed those little plans of his had fallen through.
There were too many people.
He gave a soft click of his tongue, feeling a bit helpless, but he stepped forward nonetheless.
"Your Highness, Ophelia."
His voice wasn't loud, but it successfully drew everyone's attention.
Ophelia straightened slightly from her relaxed posture against a pillar.
"Klein."
Diancie stood up immediately, turning back in surprise. "Mr. Klein! You're finished with your work?"
Her gaze was instantly drawn to the item Klein had brought. It was a crystal bottle containing a half-full translucent blue liquid that refracted a charming glow in the sunlight, looking like a piece of the melted sky.
"What is this? A new potion? It's beautiful."
"It's for Aphros." Klein walked to the pool, placed the tray on a stone platform, and then squatted down to meet Aphros's eyes.
He shook the crystal bottle in his hand, and the blue liquid inside rippled in beautiful circles.
"Remember our agreement?" Klein's tone held a hint of light teasing. "The potion to give you legs is finished."
As his voice fell, the courtyard instantly became silent.
Klein ignored the reactions of the others, merely looking at Aphros with a smile, as if showing off a novel toy.
"Are you ready to walk on land?"
Rate on N.U.
