Chapter 26: Whoops, my hand slipped. What do I do now?

<Curse Fragment>

-A piece of a curse forged from deep resentment.

■■ ■■ Dear ■■ Despair’s ■ ■■ ■■ ■■■■■ ■ ■■ ■■ ■■■ ■■■!

It looks sticky and nasty, the kind of thing you absolutely don’t want to touch.

I’ve never eaten anything like this before.

What’s with this ‘Dear Despair’? I don’t want to like despair or anything like that.

Seriously, what do I do?

I can’t just leave it alone. I don’t think I can just throw it away either.

Wait a second.

What about my [Special Divide]? What about Gongsooni?

What if I feed Gongsooni to Gongdori?

…Huh? Gongdori’s condition is…!

What…? Gongdori’s transformation has stopped!

Gongdori has an egg from who-knows-where!

Huh…?

The egg hatched, and Gongsooni was born!

So, Gongdori laid the egg.

I didn’t just create a new artificial lifeform, did I?

What about my plan to deceive like this?

Was that just now [Special Divide] in action?

Should I send it off? I don’t think the production volume will increase much.

“Status window!”

[Trait: Slime☆ Lv. 1

+Courage

Skills:

Decompose Lv. 1.

Absorb Lv. 1.

Analyze Lv. 1.

Divide Lv. 1.

Control Lv. 1.

Transform Lv. 1.

Store Lv. 1.

Convert Lv. 1.]

Wow. There’s a star I’ve never seen before. Did I just go from 0 stars to 1 star?

I’ve grown infinitely!

[+Courage]

There’s a skill I’ve never seen before. Or is it not a skill?

It has no level, and there’s a + attached. Is it a Courage buff?

Unlike [Skill+], there’s no reaction when I press it.

Even the [Analyze] skill can’t analyze it.

I don’t even know how to use it. With other skills, I instinctively knew how to use them when I got them.

Seeing as there’s no [Skill+] indicator, it’s clear that [Special Divide] is gone for good.

I’ve lost the way to increase production volume.

What do I do now?

I crossed my arms and thought for a moment.

I kneaded my squishy head with both hands.

Well, what can I do?

If it’s a failure, it’s a failure.

If developing new products succeeded 100% of the time, who would struggle?

It’s natural for the success rate to be less than half.

Failure is inevitable, and even the Alchemy Center knows this.

If they didn’t account for such risks, the Alchemy Center would be a delivery company, not a logistics agency.

Now that I think about it, it’s pretty strange.

Why was I so obsessed with the idea that I had to do something, no matter what?

I said with my mouth that failure was possible, yet I desperately tried to succeed no matter what.

Why?

Doing my best on a commissioned task is important.

It’s important, but why did I struggle as if failing once would end my contract, like some subcontractor company?

I’m not a subcontractor company.

There’s the product manufacturing company and the logistics agency.

Which one is the superior party?

The one supplying the items is the superior party.

Of course, if there’s a contract specifying how much of an item to supply by a certain time, that’s a different story. But the contract between the Alchemy Center and me isn’t like that.

In the past, I heard contracts were made to deliver a set quantity or more within a specific period, but it’s different now.

Ordinary alchemists can’t consistently produce a fixed amount every time.

Back then, they didn’t consider that reality and made contracts like regular companies.

And the alchemists all fled overseas.

Now, it’s more like a separate contract each time.

Alchemists send the items they’ve made, and the Alchemy Center deals with the headache of handling them.

It’s closer to the relationship between a freelance artist and an art dealer.

The Alchemy Center can’t pressure me to produce items.

So why am I working like a slave?

Huh???

Is this a world where the superior-subordinate dynamic is reversed?

I sat cross-legged and reflected on myself.

“My perspective had become incredibly narrow.”

The larger the share of my income the Alchemy Center represented, the more I clung to it.

If I wasn’t afraid of people’s reactions, would I have read those comments so obsessively?

If I truly didn’t care if sales dropped, would I have searched for news so diligently?

Even when new Shorts were uploaded.

Even when someone wrote a review.

Even when news came out.

I figured it all out in an instant because I obsessively searched for it.

Whenever an incident occurred that could negatively affect the Alchemy Slime, I racked my brain to solve it somehow.

As if my life would collapse if the Alchemy Slime failed.

I also recklessly increased the variety of products.

I didn’t believe in my own success.

I thought one day the bubble for <Insole Slime> and <Pack Slime> would burst.

If I had a lot of products, even if the bubble for <Insole Slime> and <Pack Slime> burst and sales plummeted, something else would still sell.

And yet, I didn’t even check the sales for the <Mosquito> series.

The money I make daily from the <Mosquito> series exceeds 30 million won.

It’s not an amount I can ignore.

Yet I only obsessively checked news about <Insole> and <Pack> Slime, trembling in fear.

I only deceived myself into thinking I had confidence.

I had no confidence at all.

And until now, I wasn’t even aware that I was acting this way.

I did become more passive in relationships after a big mistake in the past.

But I don’t think my confidence ever hit rock bottom like this before.

Is it because of the curse?

Ah, I don’t know. Let’s just blame it on the curse.

I was too distracted earlier to notice properly, but a notification had popped up.

I remember up to [You have overcome Despair once.]

What was the other one? Was it [Your Temper has been Revived.]?

Alright.

Let’s declare it confidently with my revived temper.

Enhancement failure! Dehet.

I have to let the client know that it’s a failure.

And sort out the hierarchy a bit.

***

-Whoops, my hand slipped. Oh no, what a disaster! The ingredients got decomposed. Sob, sob. If only I had more time and budget….

“Did you actually fail?”

-Yes. A complete failure.

Park Taeyang’s mind went blank for a moment.

“Did you really fail?”

-Yes. Something indescribable has been created.

“Can you send a photo of it?”

-I’m not sure if the horror of this thing can be fully conveyed through a screen. A video might be better than a photo, so I’ll record one and send it over.

The moment Park Taeyang played the received video, the few remaining hairs on his head stood on end.

“Wha-what is that!”

-I don’t know either. Looking at it feels like my mental strength is being drained. Want to roll the dice to see how much gets shaved off?

“This is no time to speak so casually!”

He didn’t know exactly what it was, but it felt extremely ominous.

-Is that so?

“Do not touch it under any circumstances!”

-Yes, yes. I don’t want to touch it either, so I’m keeping my distance.

“I’ll report this to the team leader right now!”

Park Taeyang ran off, his few remaining hairs fluttering in the wind.

“Team leader! Alchemy Slime has had a major failure!”

“We’re already swamped, so why on earth did they fail?”

“Take a look at this!”

The team leader’s eyes widened upon seeing the video Park Taeyang showed, and he jumped up from his seat.

He immediately picked up the receiver.

“Address!”

Park Taeyang quickly found and relayed the address.

“This is an emergency! Deploy to the address I’m giving you right now!”

After dispatching the curse response team, the team leader slumped into his chair.

He exhaled heavily, holding his forehead.

A major incident had occurred.

Occasionally, there are materials imbued with a curse. Usually, they’re filtered out as much as possible, but this time, it seems one slipped through due to the rush in sending the items. It likely caused a negative synergy with the other ingredients, leading to this accident.

“Is Alchemy Slime safe?”

“From the sound of their voice, there didn’t seem to be any major issues, but I’ll check again now.”

Park Taeyang made the call, and the team leader anxiously waited for the conversation to end.

“The curse response team is heading your way now. Stay as far away from that ominous object as possible and follow the team’s instructions. Yes? Yes…. No…. Yes…. Understood. Evacuate.”

Park Taeyang lowered his smartphone and reported Alchemy Slime’s current condition.

“They say they’re fine.”

“That’s a relief.”

They nearly lost a genius, the kind that might appear once in a hundred years across the entire world.

“But they absolutely refuse to meet the response team. They say they’re fine, and if forced to meet, they’ll eat that fallen thing on the ground and drop dead.”

“No way….”

The team leader closed his eyes and pressed his temples.

He had forgotten.

Exceptional alchemists are extremely difficult to deal with.

They might be doing fine, then suddenly claim to be in a slump and go overseas to find inspiration, cutting off all contact.

They blame their failures on materials brought by others and try to enter dungeons themselves.

Sometimes, they lose their form and mass-produce defective products.

Alchemy Slime was different. When problems arose, they immediately provided solutions and increased production volume with just a little persuasion.

Unlike ordinary alchemists who produce at most two-digit quantities per day, they produce four-digit quantities of products in a single day.

Moreover, they even created artificial lifeforms, establishing a factory that consistently produces five-digit quantities of products.

An alchemist specialized in mass production, a rare type even on a global scale.

They gave off more of a worker vibe than an artisan.

Perhaps that’s why. He had taken them for granted. Treated them like a machine.

He shouldn’t have done that.

He should have cherished them like a rare orchid.

“I’ll go apologize in person, so please arrange a meeting.”

“Team leader, I’m sorry, but that’s not a good idea.”

He raised his head, signaling for an explanation.

“When I visited before, they warned me. They have severe social anxiety, so if I come again, they won’t open the door. And back then, they offered me troll blood and giant grub fluid.”

Offering troll blood and giant grub fluid? Isn’t that just a way of telling someone to get lost?

“They even refused to take the Grade C alchemist exam because they didn’t want to do a face-to-face exam.”

“That’s right.”

Social anxiety? For an alchemist, that’s pretty mild.

“I’ll apologize over the phone later, so please arrange a meeting. Also, send materials imbued with holy properties and curse-related items.”

After Officer Park Taeyang left, the team leader closed his eyes and pondered.

They sent a huge batch of materials, and it was all wasted.

The sudden hole in the budget is a real headache, but if Alchemy Slime performs properly, it can be filled quickly.

The problem is Alchemy Slime’s mental state.

It’s not uncommon for alchemists to fall into a slump after a major failure.

Like sensitive artists, some stop working for years.

If this triggers a slump, exports won’t even be the issue.

There might even be a hearing on alchemist labor exploitation.

‘Let’s give up on exports.’

They insisted on exports to improve the image of Korean alchemy. But with this level of overseas promotion, pushing it as a Korean specialty product, available only in Korea, would be better for image improvement.

If production volume can’t be increased, exports are impossible anyway.

‘There’s one more thing to be mindful of.’

After the failure, Alchemy Slime didn’t shrink back and instead strongly pushed their own opinion.

It might be an attempt to downplay the failure by acting tough, but it could also indicate a change of heart.

The most common reason for an alchemist’s change of heart is contact with foreign influences.

What if the sudden promotion by a 30 million won W-tuber was orchestrated by some external force?

After all the effort to promote it as a Korean specialty product, if production suddenly stops and it starts being sold as a specialty of America or China, it won’t be a laughing matter.

Alchemy Technology Leak Prevention Act?

If it’s America or China, their army of dispatched lawyers will get them off with a not-guilty verdict or, at most, a small fine.

It’s not the time to be complacent just because the artificial lifeform is in our hands. If the opponent is an individual, they can drag out time by claiming rights and demanding a return.

But if the opponent is a country like America or China, there’s a time limit. Can we figure out the manufacturing method within that time frame?

The team leader reopened a report he had seen before.

[-It is highly likely that Alchemy Slime has acquired a special skill, and without that skill, the method to manufacture <Slime> could not be found.]

There have been many attempts to uncover the manufacturing method.

It’s already been established that artificial lifeforms create <Slime> by transforming and separating parts of their bodies. The conclusion that this cannot be replicated was reached long ago.

But if it’s Alchemy Slime themselves making <Slime>, they thought there might be a replicable method.

Surely, they wouldn’t cut off their own flesh to make it like an artificial lifeform, right?

Judging from the fact that a rookie alchemist produced large quantities of products in a short time, the manufacturing process is definitely not complicated. From the inconsistency of the ingredients ordered by Alchemy Slime, it can be inferred that the necessary ingredients for production are also easy to substitute with other materials. Based on this idea, many attempts were made, but not even similar items could be created.

Attempts were also made to process <Pack Slime> to increase its quantity.

This too ended in failure. <Slime> lost its effectiveness, as if choosing death over being modified by others.

‘Alchemy Slime is irreplaceable.’

Alchemy Slime is a talent that must never be taken away.

We should stop the power struggle, give what needs to be given, and keep them tied to Korea.

We must also find ways to inspire motivation so that a slump does not occur.

‘Alright. Let’s promote them to Grade C Alchemist.’

If they refuse to take the face-to-face exam, then we can arrange for them not to take it.

First, we’ll add a clause to the current alchemy law revision stating that a medal can substitute for the exam. After that, we can award the 5th Grade Alchemy Technology Medal for their contribution to greatly improving the image of alchemy in Korea.

This is a way to boost patriotism through honor while also providing practical benefits.

This is not something that can be handled at the team leader level.

The team leader began writing a report and proposal.