I Became a Plague Doctor in a Romance Fantasy Novel

Episode 83. Eloquence Over Medicine (3)

Episode 83. Eloquence Over Medicine (3)

Mint was gazing out the window. One hand held a cold lemonade. I was sitting beside her again.

Since we were at the palace, they’d said, let’s have tea before we go. No special schedule or anything.

“It’ll be hot outside, right?”

“It does look a bit hot.”

The inside was relatively comfortable, though. Beside Mint, a fan was blowing a breeze just for her. Mint looked at me.

“I was going to ask you about that.”

“Ah. What were you curious about?”

She didn’t look upset or sulky. Just a truly curious expression.

“I still don’t get it. Why didn’t you tell me first? I could have helped.”

“Are you talking about the company matter?”

“Yeah.”

Asking Mint first would have been the easiest route. I hadn’t taken that path. For various reasons.

It just… it wasn’t a good direction, you know?

To persuade Mint, who didn’t know much and was so much younger than me, to get money also felt wrong. There’s also the issue of feeling like I’m exploiting our friendship.

“Using your connections with powerful people to push things through isn’t necessarily the best approach. Persuading the bureaucratic structure is necessary too. If we’d gone through the Princess first, could we have gone through that process?”

“Hmm. Because you didn’t want to rely on me?”

“I didn’t want to be a burden.”

“That’s hardly a burden.”

Mint shook her head.

“Actually, more than that. I never planned to make medicine like this. Originally, I wanted to release my research for free, help as many people as possible….”

“But that’s not gonna happen?”

“Yeah.”

Even Istina, who I trusted, couldn’t understand the refinement process at all, and the alchemy professor I went to see was completely lukewarm.

I think I did my part just by sharing the blue mold strain.

Mint fiddled with her hair for a long while. Like she was deep in thought.

“Was there even a reason to help others by giving away the medicine-making strain for free? I would have stopped you.”

She’s talking about the one we got at the conference.

“That’s what it turned out to be. I figured no one else would make progress if I released it….”

“Then you should just work hard and make it yourself.”

I learned that you can’t rely on other people, other academics. They were all idiots, surprisingly. Turns out, the important thing is to do it yourself.

Outside the window, the sun was blazing.

“Medicine sellers, they’re like the poster children for con artists. There’s skepticism about it.”

“Yeah…. The world’s full of strange people. People I used to think were crazy now look normal.”

Like Violet, for example. Usually just doesn’t work, gambles, tries to siphon money from work. But there are way more useless and weird people than Violet out there.

“See. You’re finally seeing the world the way I do.”

A small, dry laugh.

“No. Like you saw at the meeting earlier. Everyone was ignoring the drug talk, and just kept going on about money and the power structure, you know?”

The presentation they prepared, the grad student—all useless. Mint smiled softly, then shook her head.

“Whatever. What’s the point of talking about drugs there? Can they know better than a doctor? I guess you just roll with it.”

“I guess so…”

“The bank dude only knows money, so he only talks money, and the family leach only cares about the power structure, so he only talks about the power structure.”

I think I said something similar.

“Mmm.”

“People like you, the job of administration and bureaucrats is to let you focus on your work. Don’t worry about it too much.”

“Okay.”

Mint tilted her head.

“It’s the first time I’ve seen you complain.”

“It didn’t go as planned this time.”

“Well. Maybe this way is better in a lot of ways?”

I did get more money, for sure.

If everything had gone according to the original plan, I wouldn’t have seen the big bucks. I thought about it a bit, and Mint put a hand on my shoulder.

“What you did wrong, doc, wasn’t anything else. You should have planned it that way from the start, idiot.”

In hindsight, she might be right. I let out a small sigh.

“So that’s how it looks?”

“You thought if you released the drug research to the academic world, other people would find the answer, right? Then you’d be remembered as the person who wrote the paper that saved the world. But seeing how things are playing out, it wasn’t like that.”

“Yeah. That’s pretty much it.”

“I’m not as smart as you, teacher. But it’s best not to expect anything from people you don’t know. Whether it’s ability, or consideration. You’re lucky if a stranger doesn’t just cause trouble.”

“Yeah.”

“There’s no need to do good deeds that others wouldn’t. There’s a saying in… what was it… royal studies, something like: A good deed that isn’t acknowledged with gratitude isn’t a good deed at all…!”

That’s a statement that splits into two meanings.

Literally, good deeds done without the other person’s consent can be harmful. If you’re cynical, it means don’t do good deeds if you’re not going to get thanks.

“That’s surprisingly insightful.”

“Right?”

Mint leaned her face in close to me, and I recoiled a little. Mint went back to her spot with an awkward expression.

What kind of reaction is she expecting?

“But, teacher. Are you really thinking of quitting your academy professorship? Or were you just saying it to try and persuade me? I didn’t think I’d agree.”

“Well, given the current situation, once I’ve said all that needs to be said, I have thoughts of moving on to bigger things.”

“That’s really unexpected. Okay, I understand for now.”

Mint was pondering something again.

“How about just returning to the imperial family?”

“I’d rather not.”

“Aww, didn’t fall for it.”

It’s a problem that’s still a few years off, so it’s something I can think about slowly. Mint, though, doesn’t seem to have any plans of doing anything until graduation.

The method of producing penicillin.

The first step is obviously cultivating the *Penicillium* mold. If you can just grow it well in a big tank, that’s basically it. But, it’s easier said than done. You have to carefully regulate the temperature and nutrients going in.

The next step is refining.

Refining is also divided into several stages.

We need to filter out the non-soluble substances from the soup-like culture broth, and then change the filtered solution into a slightly acidic one.

Finally, there’s the process of mixing in ammonium sulfate to extract the penicillin in a precipitate state.

Technically possible in this world, broadly speaking, it’s a three-stage process. By adjusting this process, we can improve the amount extracted.

The last step is packaging. Reforming the penicillin into pill form, which shouldn’t be difficult. The technology already exists.

It’ll be a lot of hard work, but if we try, mass-producing penicillin isn’t impossible. Once the system is established.

There’s still work to do today. The person who can process things fastest is the prince, Manfred, who’s actually working in the government now.

I looked at the prince, Manfred.

“Thank you for granting me a private audience.”

“Unnecessary. Time is precious when working.”

Manfred brushed off the greeting casually. He was annoyed, good, I nodded.

“How long will it take?”

“I don’t know. The goal is to do it within the year, but I also need your help, teacher. It won’t be easy.”

“Yes.”

“First, teacher, write up the method of making the drug in very specific detail. And detail what you need.”

“Understood.”

“Is the manufacturing process very complicated?”

“It is complicated.”

It’s a process you’d never reach by chance, or by trial and error. From the preparation of the buffer solution to the process of creating and separating the precipitate.

Manfred scanned the distant mountains.

“We need to settle on a site first.”

“It doesn’t need to be a big facility. Though we’ll need a fair number of people to work it.”

Right, I hadn’t thought of that. Last time we used goldfish to test the acidity, but we can’t do that every time.

If we need specific numbers, not just whether it’s acidic or alkaline, blue and red litmus paper isn’t going to cut it.

We need that yellow testing paper. I can’t remember what it’s called, but whatever.

The easiest way to make an acidity testing solution would probably be with cabbage. You can make an acidity test liquid with that purple cabbage water.

I thought about it a bit more.

“I’d like you to find me an alchemist team.”

“Okay. Do they need to be smart?”

“Um, no. Moderately smart is fine. You could even hire students.”

It’s already been proven that getting people from the academy’s alchemy department isn’t a good idea. Using Manfred’s influence to hire them would be much better.

This is what the alchemists need to do:

Find a way to make ammonium sulfate, and a way to make acetic acid and sodium acetate.

It’s a little unsettling to have our production limited by something other than blue mold.

“Anything else you need in particular?”

“Not right now. Let’s focus on making the medicine, we’ll think about the rest later.”

It’s been a long and winding road, but we’ve collected everything we need to solve the problem! Now, we just need to push all the way to success.