Bruce ran back to the carriage. After making sure none of the medicinal ingredients were missing, he shook the horse's head for quite a while before it came to its senses.
By the time the sky began to darken, Bruce had returned to the manor gates.
When he opened the manor's iron gates, the two dogs stationed there came padding up affectionately, wagging their tails as though they had missed him terribly during a long absence. Bruce stroked their heads.
"Cousin?"
Bruce entered the manor and called out from the ground floor, then took off his wrinkled, mud-stained clothes and hung them on the coat rack beside the door.
"Bruce, how did you find time to come home today?"
Danvers emerged from an upstairs room and leaned out to look downstairs. She was impeccably dressed in an ornate gown.
"Are you going to a ball?" Bruce asked with a smile.
"Yes, there's a party tonight. Baron Mistvale's manor in Lane Village is finished, so he's hosting a celebration. Lots of prominent people and wealthy guests will be there. Want to come along? There'll be plenty of beautiful young noblewomen. Shall I introduce you?"
Danvers spoke half in jest. Introducing her cousin to other girls was out of the question.
"Baron Mistvale? Parties don't interest me. I just came back for a few books. I've finished all the ones I took with me, and my barren mind still needs watering with knowledge. I have to head back to Rhode Town tomorrow."
Bruce smiled as he spoke. Danvers leaving the manor now could not have been better timed. He was worried that something might interfere while he took the potion, causing unpredictable mutations. If Danvers discovered them, he would have no way to explain.
"Stay safe on the way, and have fun."
Bruce went upstairs, gave Danvers a light hug, and entered the study.
Watching Bruce enter the study, Danvers gently pressed a hand against her chest. That brief hug had made her heart race. Her body was growing increasingly sensitive, but it all seemed connected to her cousin. These unwelcome reactions only occurred when she came into contact with him.
"You're back. Did you get everything? Blood? What happened on the road? Are you hurt?"
As soon as Bruce closed the study door, Fawcett sprang into motion. Looking at the bundle in Bruce's hand, Fawcett caught the scents of various medicinal ingredients-and blood.
Human blood.
"I got everything. As for the blood, I ran into an assassin on the road, but I dealt with them."
Bruce opened the study window and looked outside. He did not explain what had happened on the road, nor did he mention the Swordsmanship Hall. He could handle those matters himself.
The study window offered a clear view of the manor gates, allowing him to see whether Danvers had left. Once she was gone, Bruce could prepare the potion.
Ghost had also arrived in the study.
"I'll keep watch over the manor for you. Fawcett, guard the door."
Seeing Ghost give orders, Fawcett thought, Trying to make your presence felt at a time like this again... Unable to help it, Fawcett rolled both eyes.
With a clatter, both eyeballs fell onto the floor.
Embarrassed, Fawcett picked them up and pushed them back into place. This doll body was becoming less reliable by the day.
As soon as Danvers disappeared through the gates, Bruce got to work.
He cleared the desk, dragged a chest out from beneath it, and opened it to reveal a thick layer of books.
It looked like a chest for storing books, but in reality, only the top layer consisted of books, placed there as camouflage. Beneath them were the medicinal ingredients Bruce had purchased, along with some vessels.
Bruce sorted the ingredients, selected those required by the Potion Formula for the Wizard identity, weighed out the proper amounts, and placed them into separate vessels.
This felt completely different from preparing the potion for the Believer identity using Eris's body. A mortal body could not keep perfect track of every minute change, and Bruce had no confidence in his success. Fortunately, he had bought enough ingredients to try a second time even if the first attempt failed.
After repeatedly checking that the quantities were correct, Bruce began adding the potion ingredients in order.
"One gram of red brick powder, half a milliliter of clearroot grass juice..."
Bruce's hands did not shake, but sweat poured from his entire body, which had almost gone rigid. Whether he could become an Extraordinary depended on today.
The Potion Formula for the Wizard identity required thirty-two ingredients in total.
As the thirty-two portions were added one after another, wondrous changes continued to occur. No one could explain the principles behind them; all anyone could do was watch as the ingredients turned into a small, sticky mass, then kept shrinking and bubbling. Liquid seeped out, mist evaporated, and before long, the contents of the vessel became a single blood-red droplet.
This was the potion Bruce needed to take-the potion made from the Potion Formula for the Wizard identity.
He had succeeded on his first attempt.
Bruce breathed a sigh of relief. Thankfully, he had firmly memorized the quantities and their order. His hard work had paid off. He took a clean dropper from the box and drew up the red droplet. There was only one milliliter.
This was the key to becoming an Extraordinary. Bruce drew a deep breath, then let it out.
Bruce opened his mouth and placed the dropper inside. With a squeeze of his fingers, the red droplet trembled and fell into his mouth. He distinctly felt the liquid slide along his tongue, down his throat, and into his stomach.
His heart pounded.
In that instant, waves of searing pain surged from his stomach to his head. Bruce's face flushed crimson, as though someone had punched him hard in the gut. But the sensation faded in less than five seconds, and other changes followed. A jumble of sounds began ringing in his ears.
People spoke and screamed. Strange names mingled with dripping water, the clang of hammering iron, and the beat of his own heart.
The dropper fell from his hand onto the floor. Bruce felt dizzy. He reached out to steady himself against the desk or chair, but his hand found nothing.
Everything spun before his eyes. The entire room began to twist and distort, seeming impossibly far away.
Bruce's legs gave out, and he collapsed onto the floor. Fortunately, the carpet cushioned his fall, sparing him any injury. He clutched his chest, his palm feeling the powerful pounding of his heart. It felt ready to leap out.
In his daze, he felt multicolored liquids begin to flow from his body, like the pigments used in oil paintings. The entire room filled with color, then those colors mingled and finally merged into black.
It was a deep black, as bottomless as an abyss, and he was like someone falling into it-sinking, powerless, dazed.
Countless fragmented images flashed through his mind: enormous trees with thick, twisted trunks, a gigantic black goat suspended high in the sky, and an indescribable thing with countless tentacles in the ocean depths.
The images scattered past, appearing and vanishing, fading from Bruce's memory as though they had never existed.
Bruce reached out a hand. He did not know why, but he seemed to be trying to grasp something.
The entire world turned pitch-black. Only the faint outline of a single hand remained visible between heaven and earth.
At the very instant he reached out, an enormous golden hand suffused with white light appeared before him.
Only then did Bruce notice that his own hand had also become unimaginably huge and utterly dark.
The two hands clasped together. In an instant, an unparalleled storm swept through the endless blackness. Light and darkness intertwined, and the world regained its original colors: gray soil, blue-green peaks, tender green grass breaking through the earth, white clouds, a golden sun, and red fruit. The world flourished.
Upon the soil, people rose to their feet. They towered like mountain peaks, every inch of their muscles immensely powerful and brimming with boundless might. They roared with all their strength, shouting a single name: "Behemoth!"