CHAPTER 4: THE ALCHEMIST’S PRICE

Getting out of the apartment was a stealth mission with a single, high-level boss: his father.

Marcus was on the couch, the Hunter News Network flickering silently on the screen, but Michael knew he wasn’t watching it.

His senses, even dulled by retirement, were a passive radar sweeping the small apartment.

"Just going to the library," Michael lied, slinging his backpack over his shoulder.

It felt different now, holding the cold, dark weight of the Reaper’s Fang instead of a calculus textbook.

"It’s late," Marcus grunted.

"Big test," Michael said.

The lie felt flimsy.

His father’s eyes scanned him, lingering for a moment.

It was the same look he gave the skyline when a new Gate alert flashed on the news.

A look of deep, profound worry, assessing a threat he couldn’t see but knew was there.

"Be careful," Marcus said, turning back to the TV.

The words were a surrender.

I know you’re lying, but I don’t know how to stop you.

Guilt twisted in Michael’s gut, sharp and bitter, but he slipped out the door before it could take root.

The entrance to the Undercroft was exactly where an old, encrypted forum post said it would be: an abandoned subway station near the industrial yards in Queens.

The stairs down were coated in grime and smelled of damp earth and ozone – the city’s rot.

The platform was a den of neon-lit misery, a black-market starter zone pulled from a cyberpunk game.

Hunters with hard eyes and non-regulation gear haggled over glowing monster cores.

Vendors sold everything from illegal cybernetics to shimmering potions in unlabeled vials.

Michael pulled his hood lower, trying to look like just another piece of the scenery.

He found the Alchemist’s shop at the very end of a dark, dead-end tunnel, marked by a single, glowing blue rune on a slab of reinforced steel.

He knocked.

A slot slid open at eye level, and a single, cybernetic red eye stared out.

"We’re closed," a gravelly voice rasped.

"I’m looking for the Alchemist," Michael said, trying to keep the tremble from his voice.

"The System sent me."

He immediately cringed.

Great, lead with the crazy.

Flawless social skills, Michael.

The red eye stared for a long, silent moment.

"The System, huh?" the voice grated, a flicker of something ancient and knowing in its tone.

"Been a long time since I heard that name."

The door hissed open.

The man inside was old, his face a roadmap of chemical burns and scars.

One arm was purely mechanical, polished chrome fingers tapping restlessly on a counter.

The shop was a chaotic marriage of ancient alchemy and high-tech medicine.

Bubbling beakers sat next to humming data servers.

A small, four-legged drone that looked like a metallic spider skittered across the ceiling, its single blue lens tracking Michael’s every move.

"What do you want, kid?" the Alchemist asked, his red eye boring into him.

"I’m not running a charity for stray puppies."

"I have... a problem," Michael said.

"A seal."

The Alchemist grunted.

"Everyone’s got problems."

"What makes yours special enough to interrupt my work?"

"It’s a Bloodline Seal," Michael said.

"Divine-Tier."

"It’s blocking my access to the Legacy Archive."

The Alchemist stopped tapping.

He slowly turned his full attention to Michael, the bored shopkeeper facade melting away to reveal something far more intense.

A flicker of raw, scientific curiosity lit up his cybernetic eye.

"Legacy Archive," he repeated, the words tasting like rust and opportunity.

"You’re an Arcana."

He gestured to a metal chair that looked more like an instrument of torture.

"Sit."

"Let’s have a look at this... fascinating variable."

Michael sat.

A mechanical arm lowered from the ceiling, its tip glowing.

It scanned him.

A screen on the Alchemist’s console flickered to life with complex data streams – and then sparked violently, a loud POP-FIZZ echoing in the shop as the monitor went dark.

"What in the hell..." the Alchemist muttered, smacking the side of the console.

He wasn’t angry; he was delighted.

"Void Energy."

"Raw, untamed, and completely off the charts."

"Heh."

"Kid, you’re not just an Arcana."

"You’re a beautiful, chaotic, and highly unstable science experiment."

He pointed a chrome finger at Michael’s chest.

"That seal on your soul isn’t just a lock."

"It’s a cage."

"A divine-tier cage built by someone terrified of what you are."

"My father," Michael said.

"An S-Rank?" the Alchemist guessed.

"Sounds about right."

"He didn’t just lock your power away, kid."

"He tried to erase it from your very existence."

"What a fascinatingly futile gesture."

"Can you break it?" Michael asked, his voice tight.

The Alchemist let out a harsh, barking laugh.

"Break it?"

"Kid, trying to break that thing head-on would shatter your soul into a million pieces of useless dust."

"No, no."

"You don’t break a cage like this from the outside."

A greedy, predatory glint appeared in his cybernetic eye.

"You rust it."

"Weaken it."

"Corrode it from the inside out until the bars are thin enough for the beast to claw its own way free."

He walked over to a heavily locked medical fridge and pulled out a single syringe filled with a viscous, black liquid that swirled with faint purple light.

"Void Integration Serum," he said, holding it up like a holy relic.

"My own special brew."

"Highly illegal, incredibly dangerous, and painfully effective."

"This won’t break the seal, but it will agitate it."

"Force the seal to use its own power to fight off the serum, weakening itself bit by bit."

He placed it on the counter.

"It will also cause you agony beyond your comprehension."

"Fun, right?"

He gave Michael a grin that was all steel and bone.

"Consider this first one a free sample."

"A taste."

"The rest... will have a price."

"Everything has a price, kid."

"What do you want?" Michael asked.

"Monster cores," the Alchemist said simply.

"High-grade."

"Or favors."

"Information."

"Rare materials."

"You’re a Hunter now, whether you like it or not."

"You need to earn your keep."

Michael looked at the syringe.

It was a vial of poison, a key, and a promise of pain, all in one.

It was his only path forward.

He picked it up.

"I’ll do it."

"I know," the Alchemist grinned.

"The desperate ones always do."

He pointed to a vein in Michael’s arm.

"Right there."

"Push it in slow."

"I want to see the reaction."

Michael’s hand was steady.

He rolled up his sleeve, pressed the needle to his skin, and pushed the plunger.

The black liquid entered his bloodstream.

For a second, nothing.

Then, the cold fire started.

It was a soul-deep burning.

His vision exploded in white-hot static.

The Bloodline Seal on his status screen flared with a furious, crimson light, fighting back.

He screamed, a raw, ragged sound of pure agony.

The Alchemist just watched, his expression one of detached, rapt fascination.

The spider-drone on the ceiling clicked and whirred, its blue lens recording every agonizing second.

The last thing Michael saw before he blacked out was a new line of text from the System, glowing with a terrible, pulsing light.

[WARNING: SYSTEM INTEGRITY COMPROMISED. BLOODLINE SEAL ACTIVATING DEFENSIVE PROTOCOLS. SOUL DEGRADATION IMMINENT.]