Chapter Thirty-Two: The Demonic Breath Potion (Part Two)

Successfully condensing the fine water algae, demon grass, and sun flower, Carlos found that, thanks to his experience with the algae, he failed only once when adding reagents to the demon grass and sun flower. He gazed at the three irregular, round pellets left in the cup, exhaled softly, and murmured, “Just as I expected, the amount of additive needed for demon grass and sun flower is slightly higher than noted.”

This gradual experimentation gave him a sense of accomplishment—quite pleasing for a newcomer trying his hand for the first time—so he whispered to himself, “Next comes distillation. If only I had a steam engine, this process would be much easier.” Rolling up his sleeves, he walked toward the long sofa and asked Du Bu Yi, “Teacher, do impurities in ordinary water affect the separation of the condensates?”

“Why do you ask?” Du Bu Yi replied.

“Didn’t you suspect there’s a prohibition in the air? I was worried about the water…”

Du Bu Yi shook his head as expected. “You’re overthinking it. Your guess is fundamentally impossible.”

Carlos nodded, realizing he was indeed overthinking. Water flows differently from air; it’s impossible to seal all water sources with a single prohibition. If such a thing exists, it must be a divine restriction. He shook his head, dismissing these absurd notions.

Distillation is a thermodynamic separation process; it exploits differences in boiling points among components in a liquid or liquid-solid mixture, allowing the low-boiling substances to evaporate, then condensing them to separate each component. Compared to other separation methods—like extraction, filtration, or crystallization—its advantage lies in not requiring additional solvents, ensuring no introduction of new impurities.

Simply put, he would now take the three solid materials, add water, boil them, and separate out purer, less contaminated raw ingredients. This process was swift and technically simple.

After distillation came corruption—the final step of separately processing the materials. The moist substances, now nearly perfect in their properties, needed one more step to unite them. When exposed to solar energy, they first turned into a greasy, viscous liquid. After heating, all the herbal calcined materials blended together.

With moderate flames, he slowly burned them into ash. At this stage, calcination was complete.

The marvelous mist released from their decomposition rose to the top of the bottle; the vessel filled with smoke, and the vapor separated from the mixture descended and reverted, until all of it became a rich, fatty syrup.

The vapor was called the sublimated substance precisely because it could soar, rising and falling within the glass vessel. The syrup slowly thickened, growing more viscous—almost like asphalt in its stickiness. The perfect corruption process imbued it with a scent reminiscent of a burial ground filled with decaying matter, as though corpses were naturally rotting and fermenting in their graves.

This substance had to be whitened.

Much like camphor balls shrinking over time, or ice turning directly into steam under heat, the materials were sublimated in this manner.

Watching the iridescent, sublime mixed gas swirling in the sealed glass bottle, Carlos was momentarily dazed, struck by the beauty of the alchemical creation.

“What are you daydreaming about?” Du Bu Yi suddenly barked from the sofa.

“Huh?”

“If you wait any longer, the sublimated gas will dissipate entirely.”

“Ah! Right, I almost forgot about the dissolution.”