Veylin named the grafted plant "Shadow Grave Grass."
It could kill the plague. That was a fact.
But another fact still stood before them.
"We used the blood of a supernatural individual as a catalyst to induce a mutation in the Bloodsucking Vine, then grafted it," Veylin's voice echoed through the laboratory. "Creating this mother plant consumed all the blood from sample G-31. And sample G-31 was a Level-Four Ranger."
He paused, a bitter smile crossing his face. "But we can't drain every supernatural individual in the territory dry to achieve so-called 'mass production.'"
The air, brimming with joy only moments ago, gradually cooled.
Yes, they had found a weapon, but they could not produce enough ammunition.
"So, our next objective," Veylin said, turning to the research team, "is to find an additive that can enhance its effectiveness. I need a material that can amplify the properties of the Shadow Hand bloodline in the potion and solve the problem of excessive consumption of our core ingredient."
The laboratory grew noisy again.
They diluted the Shadow Grave Grass stock solution into hundreds of portions, then tested different ratios of every documented mineral powder and plant juice they could find in the territory, one by one.
Failure.
Failure.
More failures.
Separation, recombination, testing. Beakers stood like a forest across the workbenches, liquids of different colors boiling and cooling under rune heating. Exhaustion showed on every face, but no one stopped.
At dawn on the fifth day, an alchemical assistant assigned to Group C was recording the results of experiment number 381 when his hand shook from exhaustion. Ground obsidian powder from a nearby container labeled "Waste-Highly Reactive" spilled into a culture dish containing Maidenhair Fern juice.
"Damn it!" he cursed under his breath, reaching to discard the contaminated sample.
But just then,