Flamel's House (Two Years Later)
Nick sat at his work desk. Beside him, an eight-year-old boy carefully mixed ingredients with extreme precision.
"You're better at this than I was at your age," Nick said with satisfaction. "Maybe you should add a bit more melted silver?" he suggested, offering advice.
Noah chuckled, picked up a vial of molten silver, and dripped two drops into the small cauldron.
"That's only because I have the best alchemist in the world as my teacher," he replied with a grin, stepping back from the cauldron and waiting for the liquid to stop bubbling.
"I can't deny that," Nick laughed, leaning over the cauldron to sniff the contents. "The sulfur scent is just right."
He dipped a wooden stick into the mixture. It dissolved instantly, making him smile.
"How long did it take this time? A month?" he asked, laughing as he reached for a crystal vial shaped like an hourglass.
"Twenty-six days," Noah answered, accepting the vial.
He then took a large slotted spoon and lowered it into the cauldron. Even at such high heat, the spoon didn't melt—it was enchanted to withstand the temperature.
From the cauldron, he lifted out a small, semi-liquid silver sphere. What remained of nearly half a bar of goblin silver was now reduced to a single orb smaller than an eye.
A pang struck Noah as he looked at the sphere. He always felt the same each time he reached this point—it was far too little. But without hesitation, he pressed on. Now came the most delicate part.
Noah's precision and control showed as he poured the content. He placed the sphere inside the vial, which had two chambers separated by a thin, sealed neck.
After sealing it, he summoned a yellow flame in his palm.
"Careful now, don't blow up my house," Nick said with a smile, though he didn't bother stepping back. He watched with keen interest at the way Noah created.
Noah didn't react, his entire focus on the flame and the vial.
As the metallic liquid reheated, a silver vapor rose through the vial's narrow neck, trapped in the upper chamber. As the vapor accumulated, the liquid below lost its color. Then Noah inverted the vial, forcing the "essence" back down, restoring life to the silver.
Each repetition reduced the quantity but refined the quality. It was the second stage of purification—the first had been in the cauldron, and now here.
The process stretched for nearly an hour. Noah didn't blink, sweat dripping down his face, his hair drenched.
When the silver was finally refined into a single drop, Noah stopped and looked to the table, where Nick had already prepared the next step.
On the table sat a large crystal vessel with a peculiar design. It had two empty chambers on either side and a connecting tube between them.
Noah placed the vial into one chamber while Nick set another flask into the opposite side, filled with a crimson liquid now turned gaseous.
As the two substances met in the central tube—the vapor from the red liquid and the refined silver drop—Noah pressed both ends with his fingers, cutting and sealing at once. His fingertips glowed hot.
Sweat dripped as he continued. Flames sparked in both hands.
Nick watched in admiration. The task demanded such delicate shifts in fire that even with spells or enchanted tools, he himself could never replicate it. Only Noah could.
The flame's temperature changed so often it would have been impossible to automate. The sheer manual control required was absurd—something Nick, in six hundred years, had never witnessed in anyone else.
Noah rotated the vial occasionally as he altered the flame. Another hour passed. He was exhausted but hadn't made a single mistake. Inside the crystal, nothing seemed liquid or gaseous—it looked empty, though it wasn't. And that emptiness was precisely the sign that it was almost finished.
Nick recognized it too and promptly brought forth a small goblet-sized cauldron. Inside was a blue liquid so cold it froze the air around it.
Slowly, Noah lowered the vial into the cauldron before letting go, and Nick sealed it shut.
Noah slumped into his chair, hands trembling, breath ragged, as if all the fatigue had crashed down at once. A wave of nausea hit, dizziness threatening to topple him.
"Why does refining have to be so hard?" he muttered, resting his head on the table.
Nick chuckled and, a minute later, opened the cauldron. He withdrew the vial, turning it under the light.
"You're the one who chose something this difficult to create," he laughed, gazing at the single whitish-red droplet inside. It seemed to shift between solid and liquid, moving on its own—as though it were alive.
Noah watched as well. "Just seeing it almost makes the exhaustion vanish—knowing I made this." He shook his head at his own thought. "But if I don't find another way, it'll only be ready once my hair turns white."
Nick smiled, storing the vial in a heavily warded cabinet filled with magical protections. At least five other vials like it were already there.
Noah chuckled, standing slowly. "You should have stopped me. I'm too ambitious sometimes."
Nick sealed the cabinet and shot him a playful look. "I tried. I told you to make something like a toy. Isn't that what normal children do?"
Noah waved a hand dismissively as he walked out. "Normal children don't have Nicolas Flamel as a teacher."
The door shut, leaving Nick alone.
The old alchemist stared where Noah had gone, then glanced at the cabinet of vials. Doubt, apprehension, and admiration mingled in his eyes.
"Formless…" he murmured, lost in thought.
Noah left the laboratory, went straight for a bath, then stretched out on a veranda sofa with a book, letting the breeze play across his face. His hair, uncut for some time, gave him a slightly disheveled look.
The book was a hefty tome on magical creatures, written by Newt Scamander—the third volume he'd read. His aim wasn't just to learn about magical beasts, but to search for possible ingredients for his project.
Still, he felt something was missing, as though pressing against a wall that refused to yield. The weather was pleasant, and he hardly noticed when day gave way to night.
"Noah, dinner's ready!" Penny's voice carried out to the veranda, though she was in another room.
With a sigh, Noah set the book aside. The smell of food quickly lifted his mood.
In the dining room, Penny was already serving. The air was filled with the rich scent of roasted meat and fresh vegetables. Nick arrived at the same time as Noah—clearly he'd heard her call from the laboratory.
They sat down, and Penny looked curiously at the two. "So, what have you been working on that keeps you so busy lately?"
Nick chuckled lightly. "Ah, it's Noah's invention. Truthfully, even I don't fully understand it."
Penny raised an eyebrow, intrigued. "Oh really? Then tell me more."
Revived by her interest, Noah explained, "We're enchanting molten silver. But not just that. I'm enchanting every single droplet of it, piece by piece, to create a formless liquid."
Penny frowned. "What's the base? You're using goblin silver, aren't you? Ugh, I hate working with that stuff."
Noah nodded, agreeing completely. "Yeah. The base is a hundred milliliters of Philosopher's Stone elixir, goblin silver, and fairy essence. As you can imagine, none of those are easy to handle."
He sighed, remembering the wall he'd been hitting with the project. Penny noticed at once.
"What's troubling you? Even unfinished, I can tell it's something incredible," she asked.
"I feel like I'm going about it the wrong way," Noah admitted, poking at his food. "Enchanting silver drop by drop is like trying to open a door by smashing your head against it."
Penny tilted her head thoughtfully. "Is it the materials? Could you alter the project's foundation?"
As an alchemist herself, she knew well how to probe. "Tell me the ingredients and what each one contributes."
Nick stepped in to explain: "The Philosopher's Stone elixir, as you know, reacts at high temperatures. Noah discovered that if we push its boiling point alongside silver's and then condense them without letting them separate, we get silver that's nearly indestructible. With the right enchantments, I'd wager it could be the toughest material in existence."
He paused, letting her absorb it. He himself was still amazed by the discovery Noah had made while simply experimenting with fusing two high-temperature fluids.
It took Penny a while to digest the thought. She and Nick were the only two alive who could truly grasp the complexity—after all, they alone had both the Philosopher's Stone and elixir enough to occasionally "waste" on experiments.
Nick continued, "That's the project's core. The fairy essence breathes life into the inanimate, and goblin silver is the purest metal compatible with the elixir of life."
Penny nodded, clearly impressed. "That's… remarkable." She smiled at Noah. "So, what's the exact problem?"
Noah explained, "Goblin silver is extremely difficult to refine—especially once fused with the elixir of life. When the process is complete, we end up with only a single drop."
Penny understood at once. "So little… and the process must be exhausting."
Nick gave her a weary look. "Noah's the only one who can pull it off. Hours of work each time, and he needs days to recover afterward."
Penny smiled gently, running her fingers through Noah's hair. "You really are gifted, Noah. I'm proud of you."
"Thanks," he smiled back. "Any ideas?"
Penny laughed softly. "What do you want? To lose less silver in refining? To speed up the process? To replace the metal? Point me in the direction, and I'll help."
Noah thought for a moment. "At first, I was searching for a metal to replace goblin silver. But all the others are too impure—they'd only make things worse."
He shared his current thought. "Now, I'm considering another material to add at the base. Something to give volume to the silver, even if I have to sacrifice some of its final durability."
Penny nodded. "Trading quality for volume—it makes sense. But not too much, or the whole structure collapses. Which leaves us with only the finest options out there…"
"I thought of dragon's blood," Noah said. "It's rich in magic, and at high temperatures it behaves strangely—refusing to evaporate completely. I figured it could help preserve more of silver's less toxic impurities, giving me more than a single drop, though less pure."
Nick listened and seemed to approve. "Sounds promising. And if dragon's blood isn't enough, we might even brew it into a potion."
Noah nodded, continuing to share more ideas.