"Fertilizer? Something which... replicates the effects of manure and ash, but produced from plants more effectively? That would be of great value. The others all seem more extensions of existing techniques than wholly novel approaches, but we fund the University's ongoing research into the subject for a reason. New developments from a distinct school of thought can only be helpful. If you have questions about the Gift, you are welcome to ask — we have not all the books of a true library, but between Numair and Zaimid and I we can provide many answers."

"Yes! Though - the fertilizer that alchemy makes doesn't tend to come from plants. It's made from - I don't know the words for them in this language, nitric acid and sulfuric acid. It does however require kind of a complicated setup that I'd need to help you create, and I'm not entirely sure if your magic could cut corners - the first comes from essentially blasting air and water with lightning very carefully until it makes nitric acid. Sulfuric acid is slightly easier, though more based around using -" Squint. "... Sulfur? I think that is the correct word in this language. Bright yellow, crystalizes, very smelly?"

"The Gift forms fire by nature, but lightning can be done with training. Numair!"

He wanders over.

"How strong a Gift would be needed to produce lightning in small quantities with time to prepare? Iovetra claims a method for producing a manure replacement with one component formed of air and lightning."

"She does? Ah, you do? Are you able to demonstrate it? Do you know how fast the discharge must be for proper effect? Can the lightning be a direct manifestation of the Gift, or— you wouldn't have experimented, we must try. What components of lightning are needful?" He is clearly excited by the idea of magic experimentation.

She is too, and furthermore finds his excitement adorable.

"Ideally the lightning should be in a small, continuous stream, contained in a small volume, with air being blown through. The result is then collected and separated from the... part of the air that is not nitric acid. Sorry, I'm a bit handicapped on my technical vocabulary in this language. I don't see why a direct manifestation of the Gift wouldn't work, but I also don't know specifics of your magic or if it's cheating somewhere important? Heat is the most necessary component of the reaction, but it's - when heat gets..." She gestures, vaguely. "... Natural lightning hot."

Then she pauses. Daine said he should be resting his Gift, apparently. "... Should you be playing with lightning when Daine says you are recovering?"

"Oh, if it's heat that you need that's much easier. Coming and going as lightning does, or is consistent heat as good? The Bright Shield can do a held plane of heat which can be forced hotter with more power for quite a ways, but it is best cast over time. The same heat in the space of an instant would be impossible for most adepts. ...resting doesn't mean no spells, just nothing large! Making a spell for as little Gift as possible will be fine!"

This is probably not entirely false, but he's certainly trying to justify getting to play with things.

"Consistent heat is as good, and the directionality of the lightning is not what matters, it's the - state of matter around the lightning. If you have a word for it, I don't know what it is. It's plasma in my native language. But I believe we should check with Daine before using any of your magic, you have already made something to let a vampire walk in sunlight, perhaps an hour ago."

"The state of matter near lightning? ...it's moments like this I wish we could have brought more of the library. No Gift use today anyway, I'll have to see what we brought on battle magic. Do we have av'Heidya's Storm and Flame, or Ulak's On the Calling of the Thunder from the Storm? Surely we brought The Ways of Rain, it might have something useful..." Unless someone interrupts him, Numair will wander away to, presumably, look for books.

... Giggle. Back to talking to the Emperor, then.

"I think that means that probably the use of the Gift will make this possible without a living castle to do the heavy lifting of the creation of nitric acid. Though on a less large scale, systemic level... one of the mushrooms I have can, with proper treatment, make decent fertilizer. The complicated lightning process fertilizer is better, and if you mess up the mushroom treatment process you can kind of just accidentally make poison, but. I do also just have a mushroom. Which is perhaps more approachable for the common people, though they can be a bit finicky about growing conditions."

"Unless Numair can refine a spell to need only a hedgewitch's talent, a treated mushroom is certainly easier to spread. Do you have any with you? Many herbs and extracts can be enhanced with a touch of magic, and it is a common shape for the Gift to take. I have a strong version of the same, and can test whether the magic takes and how quickly it will drain. Whether it further enhances the properties is less simple to determine, but we may have options."

"You can really get a very large volume of fertilizer made with the other method! Which is why I thought of it first. The mushroom system comparatively takes a while, and still needs processing after, and air and water are plentiful, and sulfur is one of the most common elements available! But yes, mushrooms first, I have some in my castle, one moment. I'm just going to bring samples from most of my garden, how about?"

"Even a slower method is of value if it can be Gift-touched, a Gifted healer's medication is far more than twice as effective and doubling the effects of manure on crops would be worth a great deal of refinement time. —Ooh yes please garden samples sound delightful." Everything about this conversation has been making Kaddar steadily happier. Presumably the thought of massive improvements to crop yields does that to an emperor. The offer of new plants, though, makes his eyes truly begin to sparkle with enthusiasm more immediate than strategic.

"Very well. I'll be a little while as I collect everything."

She doesn't return to her coffin this time; she has a bag, and while its contents don't matter very much, she doesn't particularly want to have to either empty it out, or get another. So - off to her castle on foot. The front doors open for her without any kind of prompting, and she murmurs explanations to her castle as she works.

When she returns, her satchel is filled with samples of flora and fungi.

"The fungus for fertilizer is this, it's called inferibucina - the translation is something like 'Hell's trumpet,' or maybe 'Demon's clarion' -" she hands over the little mushroom; it is indeed shaped like a little trumpet, hollow and thin at the base, then expanding in size. Inside of this, it's glowing a faint red, shining from inside the hollow neck like coals in a fireplace. "The fungus itself is extremely fussy about light, and won't produce the fruiting body at all if it's not dark enough. The method to turn it into fertilizer involves pulverizing it, then mixing it with a solution from the flower ignilos - 'fire blossom' and then burning the mixture so the toxins are properly broken down and dissolved. I brought a sample of the solution along with the flower it's made from, and can show you the reaction itself -"

Iovetra is an expert in these things. She can, very happily, talk for a while.

"Chaos's trumpet? We must be able to find a better translation..." He inspects the mushroom, taps it, and does something which makes it glow a pale green. "I see what you mean about being fussy. Kitten! Daine!"

She isn't long coming over, Kit rapidly following. "Yes?"

"Can you look at this with your Gift-sight? It's supposed to replenish the land, Numair said you could see that. And Kitten, it's poisonous, can you detect that? And the final product shouldn't be, so if you can watch the process with me and keep up your poison detection maybe we can see something. You said you could do the process here?"

Daine closes her eyes, breathes deeply, and opens them again. Her pupils might have a spark of copper light dancing within them if Iovetra looks very closely? Or maybe it's only an illusion.

Kit chirps agreeably and gives a warble-trill, which she holds. Anything poisonous nearby begins to glow faintly.

The mushroom glow brighter: it's naturally poisonous.

"I can do it now, yes," she agrees, retrieving a pair of gloves, and a small covered glass container of disassembled mushroom from her satchel. "This is freshly mulched, it's pretty important that it be in very small pieces."

On go the gloves, because she is flammable and the gloves are not. The container of mushroom has its cap removed, then she carefully pours in a pre-measured ignilos solution, re-caps it, and shakes it. "Together this can - I don't know the word for it, but after they're mixed, continued exposure to air is bad. Once the two are well combined it's necessary to move on to igniting it quickly, when one is working in a," oxygenated, but she doesn't have the word for that, "... environment with air."

Anyway, now she can set the whole thing on fire. She has a little stick of - something - that she strikes against the top of the container, which ignites without the use of magic. Then off comes the top and in goes the fire, and the whole mixed solution quickly catches in near invisible blue flames. The glow of poison begins to burn away.

"While it's burning it does need exposure to air for the continued reaction, and in fact in larger batches should be stirred, but with this amount it will be okay," she explains, now carefully keeping her gloves fingers away from the container.

The whole thing will, soon enough, burn itself free of toxin.

"Yes, I see it. Apart they're all sharp and pointy, but that all smooths out when you burn it and the ash feeds the Goddess. Kaddar, can you do the burn infused? And best set the fire and feed it with your own Gift — is the air just to feed the fire or d'you need something else?"

"The air's just to feed the fire, yes. If you can feed it with the Gift that would probably work better, though I'd have to study the results to say for sure. Or, well, it sounds like you can just look at it and tell if it's okay or not? So. Or that."

"Studying is good too, I can see that it fits with the ground like most dead things do but not fine shades. Kaddar?"