Seraina pouted unhappily, casting antidote spells one after another.

Elder Elwin sat cross-legged by the water, his fingers resting on some long grass, his eyes closed in meditation. The grass beside him swayed slightly, as if communicating with the surrounding nature.

Bernard, having nothing better to do, had already squatted down to help the miners break stones.

I’m sorry, but Garrett’s ability to read expressions wasn’t advanced enough to decipher what Apa’s facial expression meant.

However, the glow on the Silver Moon Deer as it cast antidote spells was unmistakable. The miners, treated by it, were full of gratitude, some with tears in their eyes, had already kneeled before the giant deer.

Clearly, Apa was the MVP this time, outshining even Garrett as the most effective healer.

Then, the most challenging task was left to Garrett:

How to teach the targeted antidote spell for cadmium to Seraina and his teacher?

In other words, how could their antidote spells identify cadmium?

“Garrett, so this cadmium you mentioned, what does it look like? Can you show me? I can’t figure it out just from the papers!”

After Seraina had thrown a round of antidote spells, she hopped over to ask. Garrett grimaced, propping his left arm with his right elbow, his right hand rubbing his temple:

“Don’t rush me, let me think…”

The simplest way, of course, would be to give them a piece of metallic cadmium, even a pinch of powder would do. Unfortunately, Garrett didn’t have any on hand.

Buy it from the council? Write to the mage who discovered cadmium?... It’s not that he couldn’t afford it, but the back and forth would take at least a couple of weeks, delaying things for so long…

Seraina was going to explode!

So, synthesize it himself? Extract the cadmium element from the waste mines in front of him?

How to extract it?

High school chemistry was too hard, they didn’t teach it, and college inorganic chemistry considered it too simple, so it wasn’t discussed…

Glancing sideways, Miss Silver Dragon hadn’t exploded yet. The silver-haired girl’s cheeks were puffed, looking a bit wronged as she stared at him:

“Garrett, so that cadmium… what does it look like in blood? Can it be removed together?”

The appearance in blood… Garrett pondered for a moment, finally understanding what Seraina was asking. Wait, was the antidote spell removing cadmium as an element, or the molecules it formed inside the body?

Ah, he remembered. If it’s the molecules formed inside the body, cadmium combines with substances within the human body to form metallothionein, commonly referred to as MT…

As an emergency surgeon, Garrett remembered this internal medicine stuff because a student had filled a song with lyrics about metallothionein. It was popular in the department for a while, everyone was singing it.

But the molecular structure of metallothionein was something… forgive Garrett, he wasn’t one of those big-shot molecular biologists, he really had no idea.

—Wait, when he targeted cadmium for detoxification, he directly locked onto the cadmium element! He hadn’t even considered dismantling the cadmium element, wondering what would happen to the remaining parts of the metallothionein…

Hmm, theoretically, that protein molecule should denature and then be expelled naturally. Considering the low amount of cadmium in the human body, measured in micrograms in blood and urine, the denatured protein molecules shouldn’t pose much of a threat to the human body.

So the question came back to the original point. How to target the cadmium element?

—Even a bit of cadmium oxide or cadmium sulfide would be helpful!

Garrett frowned and racked his brain. A gust of wind blew, and Apa suddenly snorted loudly, nudging him unexpectedly. Caught off guard, Garrett nearly rolled into the creek:

“Apa! What are you doing?”

The Silver Moon Deer grunted and pawed at the ground. Garrett, supporting himself with one hand on a rock and grasping the deer’s antler with the other, finally climbed up. What was this about? Work done? Or was it angry?

He followed Apa’s gaze to the side, only to see a puff of yellow smoke rising from the distant workshop roof, drifting and spreading throughout the valley.

One could imagine, on rainy days or when the air was still, this dust would settle to the ground, contaminating the soil and water sources…

No wonder Apa was angry. High-level magical beasts of the wastelands, with healing abilities, were innately sensitive to the natural environment. To see the natural environment spoiled like this, Apa probably wanted to dismantle the workshop—

Provided it clearly recognized that

the workshop was the chief polluter.

What did this workshop produce again?

Such questions, Garrett decisively called the foreman to inquire. Though the foreman knew only the basics, it could still point Garrett in the right direction:

“It seems, it seems they make ingots… lead ores, zinc ores, something like that. Oh, and dyes too? A few times coming back from there, I saw white and yellow powders on the road…”

Hmm… Garrett rubbed his chin thoughtfully. Lead seemed to be a famous dye, previously known as “lead powder”, regardless of which compound of lead it was, it definitely contained lead;

For zinc, zinc oxide was white, which he had previously messed with for sunscreen magic, one of the powders used was zinc oxide;

Yellow… what dye is yellow? Sulfur? Anything else?

“Lead the way, let’s have a look.” Garrett ordered without hesitation. The foreman grimaced, “Please don’t… it’s very dirty over there… the smell is awful… just call the people over, no need to go there specially…”

“I’d rather see for myself. Some things can’t be explained clearly.”

It turned out, the combination of high-ranking priest + high-ranking mage + high-ranking magical beast was unbeatable.

Garrett walked to the workshop door under a bubble spell, and before he even settled, the workshop door swiftly opened, and a foreman dressed in a short coat and high boots, his chest buttons gleaming, quickly walked out.

“Honored spellcasters gracing us with their presence, my apologies for not greeting you from afar, forgive me, forgive me. Honored ones, may I ask what brings you here?”

“We’re here to see your products. If they meet our needs, we might buy a bit.”

The workshop foreman stiffened. He wanted to say “Our workshop deals in bulk, no retail,” but looking at the group before him, he didn’t dare. Please, these were high-ranking spellcasters!

Not to mention buying a bit, even if they took a bag, as long as they didn’t dismantle the workshop, the boss probably wouldn’t do anything… Although he was a warrior himself, he hadn’t even reached the knight level, let alone beat them…

Garrett easily stepped into the workshop’s goods warehouse. Boxes and bottles of various products were dazzling before his eyes:

Lead ingots;

Zinc ingots;

Zinc oxide (Garrett thought it should be zinc oxide);

Dispersed yellow…

“So what’s this stuff?”

Garrett stared at the bottle of yellow powder, straining his brain. The stuff was between lemon yellow and orange-yellow, sometimes tinged with a bit orange-red, looking impure. His intuition told him this was related to cadmium, so what exactly was it?

Cadmium oxide?

No, cadmium sulfide!

It was cadmium sulfide!

Displaying such a light yellow, it should be cadmium sulfide, also known as cadmium yellow, a widely used dye for coloring enamel, glass, and ceramics… Yes, that was it!

Garrett pinched a little bit with his fingers. Closing his eyes slightly, he locked his mental power on the powder in his hand, using it as a reference to cast the antidote spell. A light yellow glow gently fell, shining on a young assistant following them:

“How do you feel?”

The young assistant burped loudly, expelling a foul breath. Then, he moved his shoulders, moved his arms, jumped a few times on the spot, his face full of surprise:

“It feels much lighter! Sir, what did you do?”

Garrett smiled and remained silent. He handed the bottle of cadmium sulfide to Seraina:

“Try using this as a casting reference?”

Seraina took it half-doubtfully. She left the workshop, found a miner, drew blood, cast an antidote spell, then drew blood again. Two identification spells fell, and her slender eyebrows tightly furrowed:

“Garrett, it’s not very effective! There’s some effect, but it’s not good, the cadmium in the blood has only reduced, not completely removed!”

“emmm let me think…”

Part of the cadmium element combined into metallothionein, part combined with hemoglobin. So, did they still need to produce a cadmium ingot?

The workshop foreman watched her running in and out, his face tense, his heart aching. Garrett, smiling, tossed him a gold coin:

“What, can’t bear it? We’re not leaving without paying… Besides, you’re poisoned too, don’t you need me to treat you later?”

With the gold coin in hand, the workshop foreman breathed a sigh of relief, then immediately became anxious again. His eyes wide and round, he opened his mouth to inquire, but Garrett had already pointed to the mining foreman beside him:

“Explain the poisoning to him. Hmm, let me think, how

to get this stuff out…”

Cadmium yellow… cadmium yellow… cadmium sulfide… cadmium sulfide should dissolve in… dissolve in…

That’s right, according to its properties, it should dissolve in acid! Then the properties of cadmium are more stable than zinc, maybe try replacing it with zinc to see…

“Bernard! Help me drag a table over here! —Bring some dilute sulfuric acid, and some zinc too!”

Fortunately, the workshop had all these items. At Garrett’s command, the workshop foreman, confirming his own poisoning, had already driven the assistants into a frenzy:

“Did you hear that? Hurry up and get the items for the mage sir! Dilute sulfuric acid! Zinc ingots! Move quickly! If you dawdle any longer I’ll fire you! —Mage sir, is this big zinc ingot enough?... Just a small piece will do? Someone! Quick, bring the scissors over!”

Cadmium yellow dissolved in the dilute sulfuric acid, forming a beaker of pale yellow solution. Garrett carefully snipped the zinc into small grains, tossing them into the beaker, constantly stirring. Amitabha, God bless, God of Nature bless, God of War bless…

Please give me some cadmium!

The pale yellow in the beaker gradually lightened. After a long time, among the zinc grains, extremely fine silver-white particles fell.

Next came what was a supremely boring task in inorganic chemistry: filtering, drying, pressing into pellets. After a long while, Garrett pinched a small pinch of dust-like powder, handing it to Seraina:

“Try this?”

“Alright!”

The Silver Dragon girl cheerfully ran out. Elder Elwin silently watched, speechless for a moment:

Hey, got a girl and forgot your teacher, huh?

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Source: Webnovel.com, updated by Aunomay