章節 4: First successful potion

As for Armament Haki, it requires a very high level of physical fitness, which is impossible to achieve currently with my very young age.

I will become very strong, extremely strong, to be able to protect my new family and to be able to handle anything that is thrown my way.

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[POV RENKO SHINSUI]

"You look happy, Shinsui-sama."

Yuki, my personal attendant/guard, said to me with a soft smile. She was an average-looking girl with bright silver hair, a trait of the Renko clan. Most clan members have silver and white hair. Yuki had huge boobs and a very curvaceous figure that would make men drool.

She was a twenty-three-year-old chunin who had taken care of me from birth; she was more like a mother figure, but I treated her like an elder sister.

I had just come out of my father's study looking happy and met her.

"That is because I am happy. Guess what happened." I said with a grin.

"Umm, let me think for a moment…" She said as she tilted her head, appearing confused, and put on an expression as if she was thinking hard.

"The patriarch has allowed you to start your training." She said with a confident smile.

What?! How did she-

"Ah… You were eavesdropping."

Yuki had always known that I was frustrated by not being able to begin my training. She always supported the decisions I made, but I would sometimes ask her to train me secretly behind my father's back, and she would refuse because my father likely already anticipated that and explicitly forbade her from doing so.

When my father approved to start my training, she was the first person I thought of to share the good news. It may seem like a small thing, but to me, it mattered a lot to share it with the person who practically raised me and was the first step forward into the path I've chosen.

"I wasn't, though... Your voices were not exactly low."

"Okay, I get it. I just wanted to surprise you." I sighed.

She chuckled and said. "Even if I didn't happen to hear your conversation with Kuro-sama, I wouldn't be surprised by his decision."

"Oh, why?" I asked with intrigue.

"It was only a matter of time."

"Forget it if you're not going to tell me. Did you prepare what I requested?" I shifted the conversation as I was more interested in something else.

"Yes, Shinsui-sama."

"Great." I beamed with happiness. "Now take me to see the goods." I urged her impatiently.

"Follow me." She said as she led me to a relatively remote spot out behind our house after passing the training ground, surrounded by some bushes, there was a small, dark, metallic pot with two handles on the sides.

Beside the pot were various plants and herbs neatly placed on a paper parchment with a large bucket of water on the side covered in a white cloth.

These were all the ingredients I had requested Yuki to find a while ago; they were all for the purpose of alchemy.

I was finally going to put my talent for alchemy to good use.

The herbs and plants were all common ones, cheaply purchased and some directly found in the wild. The ingredients were simple and cannot be used to produce a high-level pill or potion; they would serve as a good way for me to begin my practice, and after becoming an alchemist, I became aware of one important fact: Never look down on any ingredient, as it could have some type of value.

I had no cauldron; even if I had it, it would be useless for the current me.

Why?

A cauldron would require me to have excellent chakra control to operate, which my current self did not have at all.

It would require me to have strange fire, which may not exist at all in this world for all I knew. I may even try to use normal fire to refine low-level pills and potions, but it would require delicate and precise control over the fire, which is not possible without the use of qi, a unique energy used in cultivation worlds.

I had already thought of a solution for that; since I cannot have precise and delicate control over even natural fire due to lack of qi, why not try using ninjutsu?

First of all, I did not even know a single jutsu, and using any jutsu would require hand signs, which is tedious, unless I had extreme chakra control, which could theoretically allow for the use of jutsu without hand signs.

Even without hand signs, it seemed impossible to be able to correctly use a cauldron.

To get an idea of why it seemed impossible:

I would have to use my mind to simultaneously control the fire, adjusting the temperature frequently with intervals, while also individually manipulating all of the ingredients inside the cauldron. On top of using my mind to do all those precise actions, I would have to control the cauldron and adjust it depending on the temperature coming from it frequently.

My hands would not be free either, as they would either have help to manipulate the cauldron while also using my qi to distribute the heat evenly from outside while also preventing any of the necessary heat from escaping.

This was just the tip of the iceberg; this is why in cultivation worlds, people with high spiritual and soul energy would usually be more suitable and talented in the ancient art of alchemy.

Knowing all this, I asked myself, is it possible to do all of this just using ninjutsu?

The answer to this was obviously a big no.

It seemed as if fate played a huge joke on me, giving me an unsuitable talent. Sure, I would still be able to use alchemy even in this world, but I wouldn't be able to create high-level potions and pills.

Although I was disheartened for a while in the beginning, I quickly became optimistic. The shinobi world was full of unexplored mysteries; I had seen it only from the screen and still did not truly know much about it.

There may be a way for me to use higher-level alchemy or to somehow create high-level pills and potions, potions being easier to make.

Potions could be made without using a cauldron, even some higher-level potions. The problem with them was that they had a very short shelf life compared to pills and always had impurities; even higher-level alchemists find it hard to create potions with low-level impurities.

With pills, it is possible to only extract specific medicinal properties and certain parts from the ingredients and simply discard unnecessary ones by letting them get consumed by the fire. It is not possible with potions, as they are all liquid; while brewing them, the unwanted properties and parts would all be mixed in and dilute the purity of the potion.

With this, I understood why most xianxia web novels focus more on pills and less on potions.

The sad thing was that for each potion grade, ingredients of a higher grade were supposed to be used because of the downgrade from impurities.

For example, if I wanted to create a grade 1 potion, I would need to use mostly grade 2 ingredients. The impurities would downgrade your concoction to a grade 1 potion.

Who could bear such a thing? Alchemy is already an extremely expensive practice; no one would like to spend huge amounts of money and resources on high-level ingredients just for a low potion.

This was why I did not put my hopes up for performing high-level alchemy with potions.

Even if I found good ingredients in the shinobi and made a good potion. Its shelf life would not be long and cannot be stored for a long time.

__________

"Yuki! Now!"

I shouted excitedly as I urged Yuki while mixing the ingredients inside the pot.

"Fast!" I was getting anxious.

"Fire Style: Fireball Jutsu (Katon: Gōkakyū no Jutsu)" She shouted as she quickly performed the hand seals and spat out fire to the bottom of the pot.

She did not spit out a full-powered fireball as it would ruin my concoction.

"Shit," I said as I looked at my concoction with some disappointment.

"You can stop now. It's already ruined."

Yuki stopped spitting out fire and wiped her brow, which had a bit of sweat rolling down. It was obvious that the activity was taking a toll on her.

She sighed... "I apologize for—"

-"Don't worry about it; I'm not in a hurry to see the expected results; we have plenty of time. If it doesn't work today, we'll try tomorrow and every day until we see the expected results. Now let us try again; I think I vaguely got the perfect timing now."

"Forgive me, Shinsui-sama, but I'm almost out of chakra." Yuki said apologetically.

"How many more times can you manage to use the fireball jutsu?"

"One more time," she replied.

I sighed... "Let us do it for the last time and stop this; we will continue tomorrow. I also have to rest for a while; I'm supposed to begin my training later."

I jotted down some notes in a notebook as I prepared the ingredients.

Yuki and I have been struggling for a while to create a simple healing potion, the lowest-level potion. I didn't even think it deserved to be graded, looking at the common ingredients I was using. If I were to classify the potion in a grade, it would be a grade 0 potion.

It was not that an ungraded potion below grade 0 was worthless; it was just less effective. I would have to truly successfully test it to see how effective it was before jumping to conclusions.

Our biggest issue was that we struggled to time our operations well. Sometimes I would alert her with perfect timing while also taking into account the time she takes doing hand signs, but she would either perform them faster or slower than calculated.

Yuki struggled to be consistent with her timing when making hand signs; it is understandable. It is very hard to be precisely consistent with this kind of thing.

I was not mad or impatient, because this method was just a temporary fix.

_________

After getting rid of the failed product inside the pot and rinsing it with some water, I added some clean water, filling half the pot, and added more firewood to the fire to increase the temperature.

When the water started boiling, I added the first ingredient and started stirring as a medicinal smell hit my nose and the water changed color. After five minutes of nonstop stirring, I removed some of the firewood, reducing the flame by half, and added the third ingredient while gently stirring for a while.

I continued the process of manipulating the heat and adding new ingredients to the pot accordingly.

"Prepare yourself."

I warned Yuki when I saw that it was turning yellow, indicating that a very high temperature would soon be needed. firewood cannot provide that, hence the need to use fire-based ninjutsu.

"Anytime now."

She became tense.

"Aaaaaaand now!"

"Fire Style: Fireball Jutsu (Katon: Gōkakyū no Jutsu)" Yuki quickly performed the hand signs as she started spewing fire to the bottom of the pot.

The mixture inside bubbled and threatened to spill, but suddenly changed color and became red.

"Stop!" I quickly stopped her as I gazed upon the red liquid in excitement and quickly put out the fire.

This was it, my first successful potion.

"Yuki, we did it!" I exclaimed happily and jumped on her with a hug, catching her off guard.

"Ah... Shinsui-sama, I—"

I quickly realized that I was dirty along with my clothes and hugged her without thinking.

"Sorry, Yuki, I got a bit too excited and got you all dirty." I cut her off and apologized.

"No, I don't really mind; it's just that I am filthy and didn't want to dirty you, Shinsui-sama." Yuki hastily said.

I thought that she just wanted to take care of my feelings and was being dishonest; I was far more dirtier than her after all.

Thinking of this, I brought back my attention to the finished potion.

"How are we going to test it?" I mused out loud.

"Shinsui-sama, if I may ask, what exactly is this mixture?"

Yuki asked curiously. Come to think of it, I never really explained to her exactly what I was attempting to do; she just followed my orders and assisted me without fully knowing what was going on.

"It is a healing potion; it could be ingested or applied directly to the wounded area."

"So, it is basically medicine?" She was confused.

"In a way it is, but it is far more than that."

"Oh, how?"

"Um..." You will find out gradually." I said, scratching my head, not sure of how exactly to explain.

I took a sharp piece of wood nearby to quickly scratch my other hand and left it bleeding.

"Shinsui-sama! What are you doing?!" Yuki exclaimed as she quickly rushed over and took my hand, examining it anxiously.

Quite an overreaction, but I was already used to this reaction from her.

"Relax, it's just a scratch. I wanted to test how effective the potion was on the wound."

"Why did you do that? You could have harmed yourself far more than intended. Look at all of this blood; I should get—

I listened to her rant patiently; I knew she was just worried about me, so I was not annoyed.

"-So next time you could just ask me to do it for you; I wouldn't mind at all."

"No!" I refused firmly. "I can't hurt you just to achieve my goals."

And I was telling the truth; after my father, she was the one I cared about the most.

"But—"

"Anyway, it's already done; let us test how effective the potion is."

I cut her off, knowing that she was about to argue, and scooped a small amount of the potion with a small cup and poured it over my wound.

I watched as the small wound closed. It was very slow but visible; Yuki gasped when she saw this.

The phenomenon brought a frown to my face. This potion had a very pitiful purity and was made using common herbs. Even the process of creating it was not very smooth or that well timed.

"Why is it so effective?"

To be continued…

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Renko Shinsui: 3 years old

Tsunade, Jiraiya, and Orochimaru: 5 years old

Sarutobi Hiruzen: 23 years old

Shimura Danzo: 24 years old

Akimichi Torifu: 28 years old

I do not update frequently, so I gave you guys a longer chapter.

Sorry for the info dump; I tried to reduce most of it. Originally, this chapter had around 5k words, but I reduced it along with most of the info dump.

How was it? I tried to explain alchemy in my own way, not just pill making but also potion making.

There will not be cultivation and stuff like that just because the mc has the alchemy and arrays/formations talents.

Please add this to your library and review it.

If you have any questions, do not hesitate to comment, and I will do my best to answer.

If you have any suggestions, please do not hold back and comment on what you are thinking.

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If you don't mind, please give me some power stones so that I could move forward in the ranking and let this fanfic be visible to more people. I would be grateful.