A couple hours later, Torq's eyelids shot open the moment a unit of Prana gathered in his Spirit Container. Promptly, he kept the Prana sealed in the Spirit Container, inhibiting its natural function of healing his injuries.
He arrived before the vats one after another and picked up dozens of vegetables. They were all plump, having been immersed in water for so long. The last of the list was a Pranic Beast's egg.
Advanced Iron Grade Pranic Beast–Melcarp!
With a Prana capacity of 880 and a lifespan of 20 years, the Melcarp was a Pranic Beast stumbling at the bottommost of the food chain. It was an irreplaceable part of the food chain, however.
With a maturity time of fourteen months since birth, the Melcarp was easy to raise. And when it mated, a single session released about two thousand eggs. The greatest thing about Melcarp eggs was the fact that when released, they were tiny dots.
However, the shells were capable of absorbing sunlight and nutrients from the water, using which they grow in size. They were highly nutritious and could easily be farmed with the least effort.
Once the Cooter Clan discovered the Melcarp race, they promptly adopted it to their diets. Melcarp eggs were a staple food served to the students at the Academy of Accumulation. Also, though they were rich in nutrition, they had a horrible taste when consumed raw. Moreover, the eggs reached the peak of their growth size in a matter of hours.
And then, once they became as big as thrice the size of a human fist, they hatched. The Cooter Clan collected the hatched Melcarp and took them to the farms, to breed in fourteen months and produce a new generation.
The bowl supplied by the Canteen was carved out of a soft rock, weighing about two kilograms. Once Torq added all the ingredients, the weight reached a whopping eight kilograms. This was mostly thanks to the water in the ingredients.
Having been immersed in water for too long, most of the ingredients had bloated. This was done to assist the students in using Mystic Mist Arts for cooking.
"Urgh," Letting out a mild grunt, Torq lifted the bowl and walked down the stage. He didn't move too far and instead camped right below the stage. Students were forbidden from eating only on the stage. So, anywhere else was fair game, especially since they were also taught to clean any spills on the floor during their cooking and eating process.
Torq climbed the stage and returned soon with a second bowl, meant to carry the cooking waste. He first focused on the vegetable resembling a radish and made contact with his index finger. "Phew!"
Cultivation Technique–Mystic Mist Art!
A tinge of Prana flowed out of his index finger and entered the vegetable, fuelling his psychokinesis, using which he took control of the water content in the vegetable. The water churned through the vegetable at the cellular scale, absorbing most of its nutrients.
A few seconds later, he pulled out a stream of water dissolved with the vegetable's essence. It formed a small wave before him while the vegetable now resembled a dried husk. Casually chucking it into the waste bin, Torq seeped the water into another vegetable.
A few seconds later, he extracted it out. Now, the water had the essence of two vegetables. He repeated the process, until the water had become a thick broth. Lastly, the water congealed around the egg, which cracked in response.
The Melcarp had mostly finished forming within the egg. Now, it had died, as all the fluids from its body had been extracted.
A lot of waste products had accumulated within the sphere of broth hovering before Torq. Employing Mystic Mist Art, he began to steadily filter out anything unnecessary. He wasn't doing anything revolutionary.
Boiboi already had the respective skill level to do so. Torq was merely employing the same, with the only difference being–he knew plenty about the Cooter Clan's recipes, most of which weren't taught to the students.
Only after graduation, and in the case the Cooter Clansman had contributed to the Clan heavily in the field of medicine refinement, would such recipes become accessible to them.
While making it seem like an accident, Torq wore a permanent frown on his face, clicking his tongue from time to time. And suddenly, his mistake didn't result in a failure. His refinement process was a success, having elevated a soup into a medicine instead.
The soup, at a litre worth, upon consumption, would have generated anywhere between 5-6 units of Prana. The medicine, around a couple hundred millilitres in volume, could grant up to 10 units of Prana. He had maximised the ingredient value.
Any other student, upon reaching this point, would simply consume the medicine. The medicine would be digested within an hour, thanks to the aid of their cultivation technique. It was already significantly faster than consuming solid food.
'This would have been enough, had I had more time.' He placed his index and middle finger in his mouth and gagged himself. Soon, he spewed out some bile and applied Mystic Mist Art on it to filter out most of the contents from the bile.
He mixed the extract into the medicine and watched the fluid substance steadily change colours in response, 'This is better.'
Using psychokinesis, he manually started the digestion process in the medicine itself. Since it was under his control, he could crank up the speed to the limit. And a few minutes later, a slightly muddy-looking fluid was flushed down his throat.
The moment the fluid landed in his stomach, it automatically got sent to the intestines, from where it was absorbed into the bloodstream. It had already been transformed into a form his body could absorb, without much digestion involved.
In under ten minutes, Torq noticed his Prana capacity had risen by ten units. Best of all, his stomach was mostly empty, as he had only filled it with the essentials, having filtered out everything his body would have considered as waste products.
"Now I can keep eating like this for a few more times." Revealing a mild grin, he gathered ingredients once again. The Academy Canteen granted the students as much food as they wanted, without limits, so long as they didn't waste any.
Torq capitalised on this and kept making medicines. One unit of Prana was enough for the cooking process, so long as he was wise about his psychokinesis usage and kept the process minimally efficient.
Now that he had ten units of Prana, he didn't have to stress too much about the consumption. He prioritised speed instead of precision and ended up consuming two units of Prana for the food preparation. The remaining eight units were used to heal his injuries.
Burp!
A bit over an hour later, his stomach felt bloated. Now, he hadn't just completed his recovery process, but also refilled his Prana capacity of 18 units.
Carrying a large bowl filled with husks of the ingredients, Torq arrived at a corner in the Canteen, which was the waste disposal area. An instructor stood there, eyes closed, seemingly meditating. His eyes shot open upon sensing Torq hadn't left the place even after a minute had passed.
"You need something?" He asked while fluttering his eyes open, his tone turning rude the moment he noticed it was Boiboi, asking respectfully as he rubbed his palms together, "I knew you wouldn't disappoint my caring for you all these years."
"I thank the Deities that you've given me the honour of severing your filthy head." He slowly turned to face the direction where the Empyrean Snapper had emerged out of the water a few hours ago and performed a happy bow.
'Fuckass,' Torq clicked his tongue, 'I didn't even start talking!'
'There's still a month left. Don't sign my death prematurely.'