Chris’ arm devoured the last of the Skill Gems. He missed out on Aerosolization, but he did get a trait from one of the Skill Gems, called Extraction. The trait gave the ability to better separate out reagents within materials. It was a simple skill, but one with broad utility.

With those absorbed, for better or for worse, Chris picked up the pace, back to the entrance of the Tower of the Manifold Adept.

He retrieved the leaves from his pocket. Slime trickled out through the gaps in his gauntlet, dissolving, but not consuming the leaves. Alchemical Flesh converted Slime to alchemically usable suspension solution, and then Extraction leeched out various chemicals from the dissolved leaves.

That was where the problems began to crop up. He had no idea what the chemicals produced by Extraction did. Thankfully, Carnivorous Pharmacopeia came into its own. Chris absorbed part of the chemicals, and was instantly able to determine the ones which created the soap and lather. He absorbed everything else, keeping only the few chemicals that contributed to making the soap.

Then came Internal Alchemy, and a whole new host of problems. It was a very different skill from the others he’d gained so far. All his previous skills did one thing well. Internal Alchemy was not like that. It had hundreds, maybe even thousands, of possibilities. Frankly, Chris didn’t know where to start.

He cycled through various different processes, without luck, until he felt a slight prickle in his arm.

He slowed his run back down the jungle path and looked at his arm. Was that it? He repeated the previous process. The prickle intensified. He was on the right track!

He continued for a while and quickly the prickle became a burning. Was that right? No. No it wasn’t.

He jiggled his gauntlet half off, suddenly seeing red and inflamed skin beneath. That wasn’t right at all. He’d poisoned himself.

Quickly he tried to remove the poison from his arm, but the Slime didn’t seem to be capable of doing that, its ability to destroy the poison affecting him was much slower than its ability to consume its constituent chemicals. He switched to his Extraction trait, but it was slow going. It should have worked quickly, almost immediately, yet there was a certain block on the ability, a lack of dynamism. He was using it for a purpose it wasn’t really intended for, and its typical speed and efficiency had plummeted correspondingly. Nonetheless, he persisted with it, and, combined with his resistance to poison, the inflammation began to fade as the poison exited his system.

That had been… strange.

Chris looked into the problem. It had, it seemed, begun when the poison managed to leave the area of Alchemical Flesh. Within that area, chemicals had been easy to manipulate and consume, but once they left, they reacted strangely with the Slime. That same reaction had impaired his arm’s ability to easily and efficiently deal with the poison attacking it.

The problem was three-fold. Alchemical Flesh amplified his Slime’s ability to alter, breakdown, and absorb materials, but only within its bounds; liquids inside him would continually diffuse out of that area; and his Slime, when not modified by Alchemical Flesh, was unable to deal with poisons when it was under attack.

He supposed the last part made sense. If it was able to just dissolve anything and everything at will, regardless of circumstance, he would be immune to poison, rather than just resistant.

Still, he hadn’t quite expected to poison himself, so that had come as quite a shock—Carnivorous Pharmacopeia hadn’t even indicated that poison was possible with the leaves, which meant it didn’t show everything. Internal Alchemy was obviously something better experimented with when he wasn’t in a tower filled with man eating monsters.

Alchemical Flesh was still in effect within his arm, so it was relatively easy to push a blob of converted Slime, containing his experiments, out of his fingers. It dribbled through the chinks in his armored fists before draining into the jungle path.

Soon, Chris found himself at the pit where he’d had his first run-in with the Devil’s Pitcher. He vaulted over it, then ducked to one side when one of the monstrous cats came flying toward him out of the jungle. Apparently he’d been away long enough for others to respawn, or move over here to fill the territory of their deceased counterparts.

While he’d been doing his experiments, he’d transferred his Nuctite hammer over to the hand holding the ballista and its poison vat. Now he fumbled for it as the cat landed in a billowing of dust beyond him, paws sliding to complete a sinuous turn with feline grace.

He didn’t grab hold of the weapon before the cat jumped; at the last moment, rather than retrieve the damn thing, he backhanded the monster with his gauntleted right arm.

The cat yowled and went flying away, flipping in midair to land on its feet in a crouch. Chris took the reprieve to grab his weapon firmly, then wallop the creature’s torso into a fleshy paste when it tried for a second spring.

The monster died instantly and Chris’ arm registered a Skill Gem inside. For a moment, he was tempted to leave the Gem, however, he realized others back in Kingscastle might be able to benefit from it—and if not, he could at least sell it. Also, letting his arm regain a small amount of mass from the cat would be useful—he’d lost a small chunk in his experiments.

The skill the Gem granted bestowed increased efficacy to any herbs consumed. He was tempted to give absorbing that a shot—since it might power up most reagents he absorbed—but he decided against it. It only applied to herbs, rather than potions, which made it too niche to use a Class Skill slot on. Meanwhile, his Assimilation ability only worked sporadically. His options were absorb the skill for an all-too-specific skill, not use it, or risk destroying it for a low chance at acquiring a trait.

Ultimately, he went with the second option and slipped it into his pocket. No big deal. He wanted to see whether he could give Slime Battle Alchemist skills to his citizens in Kingscastle, or at least feed it to Blibl if not. Actually, with all things Slime in mind… he was sort of disappointed by the lack of Slime relevant skills on the first floor of the tower, but beggars couldn’t be choosers. Alchemy relevant skills would probably be more useful right now anyway. They’d allow him to develop a niche for himself that would fit in well with his class.

It took only a few minutes—without any more distractions—for him to reach the entrance. He rushed through the door and almost went sprawling on his ass when a force jerked at him, tugging him back.

He felt the seams of his pants scream as a force tugged at his pocket. The Skill Gem. Well, shit. He couldn’t leave with it. It did make some sense.

Complaining to himself, he let his arm devour it. Nothing.

“Figures,” Chris muttered.

Mostly because he wanted to fuck shit up, he checked his Settlement Core. Usage was blocked inside as well as outside the tower. Thaumic Strata it was, then.

He edged out through the door again, worried about the ballista being pulled back. It passed through without issue. Breathing a sigh of relief, he stepped onto the pillowy firmness of the plain of clouds. He pulled his extensible pole back out and continued navigating around the pitfalls, back to the tower vine ahead. He had a Tower Seed to reclaim.

Yet, he was still several hundred paces away when he spotted movement, a head rising above cloud. There was something else moving up the vine.