Han Yu regretted everything the mont he stepped into Li i’s hut again the next morning.
Technically, it wasn’t even a hut anymore. It was more like a shack that had suffered repeated alchemical accidents and adapted to them through pure trauma. The wooden walls were scorched in artistic patterns. Several of the support beams looked slightly lted. One of the windows blinked at him for so reason.
He took a deep breath.
"Okay, Han Yu," he muttered to himself. "You survived the soup. You survived the spontaneous breakthrough. You can survive this. Probably."
The door opened before he could knock.
A puff of pink smoke escaped the threshold, accompanied by a small girl wearing goggles.
"Morning!" Li i chirped, poking her head out from behind a stack of cauldrons. "You’re just in ti. The Slumbering Vine accidentally woke up again and now it’s trying to eat the broom."
Han Yu peeked inside and saw what looked like a plant possessed by a caffeine demon wrestling with a mop.
"...I have made a terrible life choice," he whispered.
"You’re wearing your servant uniform, good!" Li i clapped. "It’ll make cleanup easier. Most of the stains are magical, so just... don’t inhale them."
Han Yu looked down at his fresh robes and made peace with the fact they would die young.
The lab itself was sothing out of a sect horror story. Shelves were stacked with glowing jars, several of which hissed when he passed. A cauldron in the corner was breathing. Breathing.
There was also a tea table.
The tea table was... alive.
It opened one eye as Han Yu walked by.
"Hey," it said gruffly. "You the new guy?"
Han Yu froze. "...Yes?"
"Na’s Tea Table. Don’t spill tea on or I bite."
Han Yu nodded slowly. "Understood, Tea Table."
He had no idea how the table could talk, but he reckoned it probably had to do with one of the experints that Li i had done.
"Good lad."
"Ignore Tea Table," Li i said. "I originally made him as a test for a broken formation I found sowhere."
"A broken formation can turn a table alive?" Han Yu couldn’t believe it.
"Well, it was a rather mysterious formation. Likely part of a larger array. Large arrays like that can have their own formation spirit. Basically, a soul with its own consciousness. It didn’t work at once but I spilled a bunch of failed experintal vials on it." Li i explained. "The Tea Table ended up gaining consciousness without any of its useful functions." She added.
"..." Han Yu had no words for that.
Only Li i would be able to turn a table sentient with a broken formation and so failed experints.
Having said that Li i then tossed a rat in a lab coat onto Han Yu’s shoulder. "This is Warlord Sniffles. He’ll guide you through the basics."
Sniffles saluted.
"I rember him. Though..." Han Yu blinked. "Does... does he actually understand alchemy?"
"More than you do," Li i replied with a shrug. "He and other several rats like this have begun to understand basics of alchemy over ti."
Han Yu opened his mouth. Then closed it. Then opened it again. Han Yu had alreyad seen the miraculous abilities of the rats before. He had even been blessed by them as such, believing that they could also do so basic alchemy didn’t seem that strange.
"...Okay."
They got to work.
Han Yu’s first task was to help organize Li i’s "potion backlog," which turned out to be a euphemism for ’the shelf of unlabeled chaos.’
One vial emitted giggles.
Another kept changing colors and screaming "Pick !" Clearly having gained so level of sentience due to another formation.
A third had a note that read: "Do not open unless you wish to relive the worst mory of your childhood in 4K spiritual clarity."
Han Yu left that one alone.
Next ca the pill testing. Again.
Li i had set up a table of "safe-ish" pills she wanted to test "in a more controlled environnt," which apparently just ant "not inside soone’s soup."
"I’m going to say no," Han Yu said imdiately.
"But—"
"No."
"Just a small one."
"No."
"What if it gives you laser vision?"
"Laser vision isn’t worth the risk of butt wings, Li i!" Han Yu replied.
"Butt wings are majestic," she muttered. "besides do you even know what Laser vision is?" she asked.
"I don’t, but I’m still having nightmares from the slightly translucent skin incident, so it doesn’t seem all that good."
"Okay, that one was mislabeled. And to be fair, you did look very glowy."
"NO MORE PILLS TODAY."
"...Tomorrow?"
"Maybe."
"Yay!"
Han Yu buried his face in his hands.
Eventually, after narrowly dodging three more experintal explosions and a very flirtatious jar of spirit sli, which was created from an amalgamation of who knows what, Han Yu finally flopped onto a chair near the window. Warlord Sniffles sat on his shoulder, chewing a dried apricot with the confidence of a rat who had seen things.
"I used to have a normal life," Han Yu sighed. "I swept floors. I fetched water. Occasionally, I got chased by angry servants. But this? This is madness."
Sniffles squeaked in agreent.
Then again... he hadn’t been chased once today. No mop duty. No chamber pot assignnts. No one threw a shoe at him. And he had broken through to the Ninth Stage of Body Tempering.
He sighed.
"...Maybe this isn’t the worst job in the world."
"Exactly!" Li i said, popping out from behind a bookshelf. "Besides, you get front-row seats to scientific history. Also, possibly front-row seats to your own funeral if you drink the wrong potion, but that’s part of the adventure."
"I want a raise," Han Yu muttered.
"I’m already paying you two silver coins per pill test."
"I want hazard pay."
Li i grinned. "Done."
Han Yu blinked. "Wait, really?"
"Sure. One extra spirit stone every ti you explode and survive."
"...Fair." Even Han Yu couldn’t say no to a Spirit Stone when he was just a servant.
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