CHAPTER 173: ACCEPTABLE MARGIN OF ERROR *

"Damn," Arlette said sounding sympathetic to Caius’s plight.

Except Caius hadn’t lost the smile he gained after that momentary successful extraction.

"No, no. It’s progress," he said, finding himself filled with confidence as he retrieved another canister of Beast Blood from his Storage ring and dumped a good bit into the Alchemical kit.

Caius remembered exactly what he had done for every one of the failed attempts. His brain grabbed every bit of detail locked it down so he could replay it with incredible clarity. Due to this, he knew exactly what he had done he had done differently for the last try.

It is nigh impossible for someone to do something the same way multiple times. There will always be minute differences with every trial. That’s why there’s a margin of error acceptable for every Alchemical recipe. The issue with Blood Alchemy is that, it seems like something that was never meant to exist. As such, it’s very finicky and particular, leading to less margin for error and a demand for perfection that is frankly just not human.

Anyway, Caius knew this already.

Blood Alchemy was a big thing in the original story so he knew already what to do when he started following the steps laid out in the booklet Arlette had handed him. Every trial, he had done something, taken note of exactly what he did, and then done something else the next time.

In other words, he was actively taking note of the margin of error and being as particular as the process of Blood Alchemy required. Which was why, with the one time he had managed an extraction, he knew exactly how he had arrived at that result.

He repeated it exactly with an unnerving precision that could really only be possible by a rare natural talent. When the properties within the Beast Blood came apart and were ready to merge with ingredients, he began to add in the last batch he had left and soon, he was extracting them all.

And then, he had reached the end of what he knew from his now two successful attempts. From then on, he’d have to play it by ear.

Now, to be fair, this was already a success. He had burned through many batches of ingredients but that was to be expected when one dabbled in this art. But, Caius wasn’t yet satisfied.

His confidence continued to be his main driving force but he tempered it with caution. And, partly due to his talented work and mostly due to luck, there was a spark of homogenous synergy with the properties he was working with.

Now he allowed himself to have an even larger grin than earlier because there was no way he could fail anymore.

He had already succeeded.

A small crimson blurb floated out of the Alchemical Kit. It formed and deformed in the air but mostly kept a spherical shape.

"Well done," Arlette said and she sounded like she really meant it,

"One out of seven tries. That’s definitely a start to beating the less than Ten Percent odds."

"Thank you," Caius said with a little chuckle as the blurb now undulated above his outstretched hands,

"Of course, this is only a practice run. An actual attempt will prove more tricky."

"True," Arlette said and held out a vial she had taken out of a cabinet in the room.

The Vial collected the solution and she handed it to Caius who paused for a second before downing about half of it in a single gulp.

He felt revitalised. He felt full of energy like he had just fed on the blood of a humanoid and not that of a Beast. He had successfully improved on what was normally just supposed to soothe his thirst.

That was the benefit of the products of Blood Alchemy for Vampires. It can’t help with evolution and would never substitute the joy they feel when feeding but it’s a better fix for issues like lack of energy and healing than just chugging blood.

Arlette offered him the cork for the vial and after he snapped it in place, Caius sent what was left of the Revitalising Blood Potion into his Storage Ring to retrieve his pen instead.

"May I?" He asked Arlette as he hovered the tip of his pen over the booklet she had given him that still lay open.

"Go ahead," Arlette said immediately.

"Thank you," Caius said with a smile and scribbled away. Adding in a few words to the instructions that had been written up. Mostly just detailing everything he had done to succeed at the recent refining process to be perused and taken note of at a later time.

When he was done, he picked the booklet up, flicked through a few more pages, mostly just taking note of what he’d be working on in the time leading to the Mid-semester tests, and then he snapped the book closed and sent it into his Storage Ring.

He looked at Arlette then and saw she was stroking her hand across her Alchemical kit. She must have felt Caius looking because she looked to the side at him and smiled.

When Caius held his hand out to her, she took it and got pulled into his arms. There really wasn’t much more he could do today as far as Blood Alchemy was concerned. At least practically.

He could keep reading through the booklet but why bother when he could do that at home when he wasn’t in the presence of his sexy lover.

As his lips attacked her neck, Arlette moaned and moved her body against his.

"Break is almost over," she said.

"Hmm?" Caius said and only now realized how long he had spent working on those failed attempts. He and Arlette truly only had a few more minutes before he had to get to class.

But then again, as long as there was time, how little of it they had didn’t matter much as Caius captured her lips and they moved against each other’s bodies. The way they rocked, Arlette realized they could fall and it would be on her Alchemical kits, creating a very annoying mess so she ensured they stumbled their way out of the room completely.

They collapsed to the ground where she got on top with her ass resting on Caius’s bulge, rubbing against it as she thrust her tongue as deep into his mouth as it could go.

Caius used the space between their bodies to grab hold of one of her breasts. He pushed past the material of her gown to touch her boob directly, squeezing and kneading much to the Professor’s delight while his cock continued to grow larger and strain with an intent to be free.

Alas, it wasn’t going to get that freedom, and that frustration added to the angsty pleasure that Caius was feeling in the moment. He and Arlette simply dry humped each other over and over again.

He felt the moistness in her groin against his pant-covered cock and she was sure she could feel the pulsing of the tip of his large member as it oh so wanted to pierce into her warm caverns and explore within as it had done many times already.

There was a thrill all over Arlette’s body and as the minutes continued to tick by and the time for eventual separation between her and Caius kept getting closer, she got even more aggressive with her humping.

All in all, though, there was enough charge of arousal in her blood to make Caius decide he might as well enjoy that taste. So as Break finally ended, his fangs extended and he sank them into Arlette’s neck for that delicious taste of hers that he could never really get tired of.