kscans

Chapter 142 - Chapter 11: Latter Half – The Purification, Extraction, and Dyeing Arc

"That was a real pain. The dyes were one thing. But I had to talk to all the workshops that make inks and paints."

With several kinds of solvents in hand, Vinaldira said proudly. Her blonde twintails bounced. In the basket beside her were several substances that looked like dyes of different colors.

"You're a lifesaver. All we can get our hands on is beeswax. The only other thing is the lanolin I asked Dalgan-senpai for."

We can’t use an oil with such a high melting point that’s solid at room temperature. And the lanolin, or wool grease, is for another purpose. We could probably use cooking oil, but I have no idea how it would perform as a solvent. Alcohol is the most expensive, and on top of that, it’s water-soluble.

"So, which one are you going to use?"

"For now, probably the cheapest one."

"What are ye plannin' to do?"

"It’s a test to see whether it dissolves more easily in water or oil..."

Since we've removed a good portion of the impurities from the culture medium, I'd like to just dry it and call it done, but there's one more property I need to investigate for the anti-sorcery measures I have in mind.

I took a small glass bottle, added about 0.5cc of the medium and 0.5cc of the oil I received from Vinaldira, and shook it well. Then I put it in the centrifuge. When the rotation stopped, the mixture had separated into two layers, oil on top and the medium on the bottom. However, the previously transparent oil was now tinged green. Meanwhile, the green hue of the medium below had faded slightly.

"The upper layer has a stronger inhibitory effect, more than double, in fact," Fulsy noted.

"So it's fat-soluble, just as I thought..."

In other words, our target magic inhibitor, IG-1, dissolves more easily in oil than in water. I had anticipated this to some extent. Since it’s secreted by passing through a cell membrane, it was possible it would be fat-soluble.

This is pure speculation, but it might be a substance similar to a steroid.

"What's next?"

"We dry this purified medium to remove the water. Then, we use an organic solvent, either alcohol or oil, to dissolve and extract it."

The process is similar to making chili oil. Capsaicin, the spicy component in chili peppers, dissolves well in oil but is almost insoluble in water. That’s why frying peppers in oil allows the spiciness to infuse it, creating chili oil.

It’s also why you can’t get rid of the burn from chili peppers with water. If it doesn’t dissolve in water, you can’t wash it away with water. You could probably wash it down by drinking straight distilled spirits. Incidentally, the amber color of whiskey and brandy comes from the pigments in the wooden barrels, which are easily dissolved by the organic solvent, alcohol.

I put a portion of the medium in a test tube and heated it to evaporate the water, which left a greenish-brown powder. I had Fulsy confirm that the powder possessed a strong magic-inhibiting effect. This was to be expected, since a whole coffee cup's worth of the medium had been concentrated into a tiny amount of powder.

Of course, this powder still contains large amounts of substances other than IG-1. For example, the salt from the culture medium.

Up to this point, even an amateur could figure things out. It's just a physical process of removing junk from the medium. But the next step is chemistry. Honestly, I'm not confident. For instance, I can predict that because it’s highly fat-soluble, dissolving this powder in an organic solvent will preferentially extract it. This means we can separate IG-1 from less fat-soluble substances and increase its purity.

However, I have no idea what procedure would be best when considering yield and other factors. But we have an expert right here.

"So, with that said, I'm pinning my hopes on our dye specialist..."

"So the plan is to extract as much of the green color as possible, right?"

As expected, Vinaldira understood. Whether a dye is water-soluble is a huge problem. In fact, if it dissolves in water, it's useless as a dye. The color would wash out in the laundry, and a little rain would cause a disaster.

"Yeah, that green is probably the right stuff. Even if it's not, the Director can figure it out with his measurements."

"Sometimes we adjust the solution with wood ash lye, but doing that can change the color, you know?" Vinaldira mentioned. Hmm, so the solubility might change depending on the pH.

"No problem. That too..."

"Is somethin' I just have to measure," Fulsy finished.

Exactly. By manipulating minute samples with the pipettes, we can test numerous conditions in parallel, and through non-destructive magic measurement, we can track the behavior of the target substance. In my previous life, you couldn't do this without machines that cost tens of millions.

"Got it. I'll give it a try."

I handed the powder and one of Noel's custom-made pipettes to Vinaldira. After hearing how to use it, Vinaldira wore a puzzled expression. The first thing she did was take the supernatant from some boiled wood ash she had brought and use it to adjust the blue dye she also brought.

After operating the pipette a few times, Vinaldira looked at the tool's creator. Noel wore a troubled look.

"...I think you'd better give up trying to figure it out. Just think of it as being made of solid gold. That tip you just casually detached. Each one costs five gold coins. And that's just for the materials."

"I guess this is what a Vinder project is like."

Vinaldira sighed and held the pipette more carefully.

"What's that supposed to mean, a 'Vinder project'?"

"..." "..."

Ignoring the silence my question was met with, the next phase was Vinaldira's show. She adjusted the greenish powder with lye and acidic liquids, judging by the color, then smeared the resulting green liquid for Fulsy to test. It was a repetitive process.

I should have asked for her help from the culture medium stage. From what I could see, she was probably adjusting the pH to where the green substance dissolved best, extracting it, neutralizing the solution, and then dissolving it into a solvent.

"...It's done."

The glass bottle Vinaldira held out glowed a beautiful emerald color. Fulsy nodded.

"Then let us conduct a precise measurement of its effect," he declared, shaking the stock solution of IG-1. For the record, we defined the stock solution as one liter of culture medium ultimately dissolved into 10cc of solvent.

◇◇

When the glass plate was removed from the magic-sensing paper, a 2x4 grid of spots appeared. The four spots in the top row were the existing black magic inhibitor, diluted from a stock solution to 10x, 100x, and 1000x. The bottom row was our newly obtained green magic inhibitor, IG-1, diluted in the same way.

Of the eight spots, the rightmost column was completely black for both top and bottom. This meant they were completely inhibiting the minute amount of magic Fulsy had applied. No difference in effect could be seen. But...

As the dilutions increased, a cruel difference became apparent. The existing magic inhibitor began to fade at a 10x dilution, turned grey at 100x, and was only barely visible at 1000x. In contrast, IG-1 was still pitch black even at 100x. Its 1000x dilution was about as dark as the existing inhibitor's 10x dilution.

"There's no comparison."

"So it's nearly a hundred times more effective."

"And what's more, we can make as much as we want... It's a bit late to be askin', but why aren't you a magician?"

"Because I'm a commoner. It's rare for a commoner to have an aptitude for magic, right?"

"You’re not like any commoner I know."

"Just try to get along with your fellow commoners until we graduate."

I shot back at Noel's remark. She comes from a noble family to begin with, and once she's no longer an apprentice, there's no doubt she'll be given a title. In fact, in Noel's case, it's the kingdom that would be in trouble if they didn't bind her to them with a peerage.

"I don't understand even half of what just happened. But this is something incredible, isn't it?"

"Indeed it is. And I'll say this just in case, this recipe is not to be spoken of outside this room."

"I understand. Even developing a new color is treated as a closely guarded secret..."

Vinaldira flinched. And with that, we had one more person involved in a state secret. I hope she'll resent the Empire for it.

"Why are you looking at me like this has nothing to do with you? You're the one in the most danger. If I were the Empire, I'd target you first."

Vinaldira said something so ominous.

"The bacteria made IG-1 on its own, we just borrowed it. This experiment wouldn't have even been possible without the Director's magic-sensing paper. And without Vinaldira's techniques, we couldn't have extracted it in such a pure form. I can't do anything on my own."

All I had was knowledge from my past life. I'll admit I might have gone a bit too far this time, but it's an undeniable fact that I can't do anything by myself. Besides the members here, I've had help from pretty much everyone in the Central Garden.

"Anyway. Since the magic inhibitor worked out well, let's start on the red soil next. If I recall, Director, you were more interested in that, right?"

"That's right! I'd forgotten all about it after seein' this."

"Ah, because we can use IG-1 to improve the sensitivity of your antenna."

"...Precisely."

"I'm looking forward to that, too. After all, measurement is the foundation of everything."

Measurement is, in essence, information gathering. It may seem mundane, but its precision can change the time, cost, and labor required to verify a hypothesis by an order of magnitude.

"Speaking of forgetting, the original purpose of this was as a countermeasure against the Empire's sorcery, wasn't it?"

"You really shouldn't forget that."

Hey now, what was all that about this being top-secret just a moment ago?

"Ahem. So, are we to paint this on shields?"

"...That kind of simple application is the most obvious, but I'm thinking of something a little more elaborate."

Fortunately, IG-1 is fat-soluble. There's a high probability it can be used for the purpose I have in mind. However, I'll need to run a few tests for that.

"Could that cream-like stuff have something to do with it?"

Noticing my gaze, Vinaldira looked at a jar containing a milky-white, semi-solid substance. It was the grease extracted from the wool I had Dalgan acquire.

"Sharp as ever. But this is an ingredient for an ointment to treat the prisoners. We have to help those prisoners suffering from the side effects of the sorcery seals carved into their bodies. Cutting off their arms is just too cruel."

The grease from wool, lanolin, was used in cosmetic creams in my past life. I'll mix IG-1 into this natural ointment base. To put it simply, it's like a steroid treatment for a skin disease.

It's purely a humanitarian measure. Of course, I'll take the opportunity to investigate things like the necessary concentration of IG-1, but it's unavoidable since it's all for the sake of their treatment.

Oops, I should probably do a patch test beforehand. If it turns out we used poison on them, it would complicate post-war relations.