Marseille Harbor Labyrinth Mystery

Don't Even Try

The metallic pipe struck empty air. The slender silhouette, composed of algae, salt, and mercury, vanished, dissolving into the night fog as quickly as it had manifested.

Jean stumbled back, the metal pipe feeling heavy in his grip. It was not a physical entity. It was a sensory manifestation of the ship's extreme contamination, an illusion triggered by the intense pollution he was currently inhaling.

"Damn it," Jean hissed, controlling his breathing. The Instant Purification Potion had rendered his senses far too acute.

Before he could refocus on his concoction, however, he heard a distinctly human sound. The scraping of boots on the rusted deck, followed by a low grunt.

"Who was that? I heard a yell," a rough voice whispered.

"Just a goddamn wharf rat, Rico. This ship’s crawling with big ones," answered another, more nervous voice.

Jean immediately dropped the metal pipe and slipped back into the shadows beside the cabin. So, this perfect wreck already had occupants. Not alchemical ghosts, but petty criminals who believed they were safe in this blind spot.

Three men emerged from behind a pile of sodden straw near the bow. They were wearing heavy jackets, looking exhausted and alert. The one in the center, Rico, had a rough, scarred face and gripped a long screwdriver wrapped with black electrical tape.

"Hey, look," Rico said, gesturing toward the captain's cabin, the door already kicked open by Jean. "We got an intruder. Must be that rat Damien, trying to lift our stuff again."

Jean stepped out of the shadows. "I'm not Damien."

The three men recoiled, screwdrivers and folding knives immediately aimed at Jean's chest.

"Who the hell are you?" Rico snarled, his eyes narrowing in threat. "You picked the wrong spot, pal. This ship is our territory. Can't you smell it? You think this is a scenic overlook?"

Jean sighed, his demeanor cool and composed. "This ship is a lab. And I need this lab right now."

"A lab?" The second man guffawed. "You planning on cooking meth crystals out here? You're too late, Bro. We beat you to it. Get moving now, before I make you taste the bilge water we use to wash our gear."

"I'm not interested in your narcotics," Jean said, his voice soft, yet every word carried a sharp resonance. "I am interested in the water. And this location has the current I require."

Rico stepped forward, looking Jean up and down. "Oh, so you're the lunatic talking about water down at the harbor? There's a rumor about some new criminal who's high on salt. That's you, then."

"I am not drunk," Jean countered. "I am pure. You are the filthy ones."

"Listen up, Pure," Rico interrupted, growing annoyed. "We just want you gone. We don't want a fight. We've got business to handle. You leave, you live. You stay, I guarantee you're fish food."

The third man, the leanest, attempted to sneak around behind Jean.

"Don't even try," Jean warned without looking back. "I can sense every molecule in this vicinity."

The thin man froze, stunned that Jean had tracked his movement without seeing him.

"Fine, you asked for this," Rico said, swinging his screwdriver. "Hit him! Let's teach him a lesson about trespassing!"

The two men lunged at Jean, Rico attacking head-on while the other circled from the flank.

Jean stood still. He closed his eyes for a moment, channeling the newly purified energy into the surrounding air. The air aboard the *Triton* was humid, thick with pollution and trapped brine vapor.

Transmutation. Water vapor into salt. Salt into solidification.

Instantly, the vapor between Jean and his attackers transformed. Not into liquid, but into an ultra-fine salt powder that immediately began drawing the moisture from their clothes and skin.

As Rico tried to thrust the screwdriver forward, he felt his leather jacket suddenly turn rigid, as though it had been dipped in fast-setting cement.

"What the hell is this?" Rico roared, trying to retract his arm, his muscles feeling taut and heavy.

"Condensed Salt Potion, natural version," Jean clarified, his eyes open and radiating a cold light from the shadows of the cabin. "I manipulated the humidity. It's binding you to the spot where you stand."

The second man had closed the distance and managed a kick. His heavy boot connected with Jean’s shin, but Jean didn’t flinch. Instead, the man’s leg felt instantly glued down.

"Move! Why can't I move?" the man whimpered, starting to panic.

"Because the water in the fibers of your clothing has been forced into dense salt crystals," Jean stated. "You are frozen. Not dead. Merely chemically immobilized."

Rico struggled against the force, moving his screwdriver violently, but every shift only drove the salt crystals deeper into the layers of his jacket.

"I don't know what kind of freak you are, but let me go!" Rico roared, his face flushed with anger and frustration.

Jean walked toward them, stepping over the salt powder scattered across the deck. He didn't touch the men, but he tapped the powder with the toe of his boot.

"I am not a witch," Jean corrected. "I am an Alchemist. And you are trespassers occupying a critical location. You will remain here until I am finished. You will be my ship guards."

"You can't lock us up like this!"

"Oh, I can," Jean replied. "This formula will hold for about twelve hours, or until rainwater dissolves it. I suggest you remain perfectly still. Every twitch will fracture the crystals, and those fractures will attract more humidity, hardening you further."

Jean retrieved the screwdriver from Rico's frozen grasp. He sniffed the tip of the tool.

"Mercury," Jean murmured. "You used this contamination to mask the scent of your product."

"Hell yes! It’s the perfect spot!" Rico managed, his voice muffled by the stiffness in his jaw. "Everyone’s terrified of the mercury! But you, you walk right in!"

"Mercury is an interesting catalyst," Jean mused, ignoring Rico's shouting. "I can use it to stabilize the Salt Fog Potion. Thank you for the raw materials."

Jean turned and proceeded toward the captain's cabin. The three petty criminals, now nothing more than salt statues, were left immobilized on the deck.

He entered the cabin, retrieved a dented soda can, and continued the interrupted creation of the Salt Fog Potion.

With the mercury catalyst inadvertently supplied by Rico, the process was significantly faster. The brine he filtered from a puddle on the cabin floor began to hiss as he mixed in rust powder and a dash of diluted mercury fluid.

The resulting liquid was a smoky gray, smelled of an oncoming storm, and vibrated with unstable energy.

"Salt Fog Potion," Jean murmured. "Large-scale. Enough to blind Le Requin and his logistics team, both digitally and mentally."

He poured the Potion into a large spray bottle he’d found in the cabin. It wasn't meant for direct application, but for tossing into the ice warehouse's ventilation system.

Jean glanced at Anton's tablet. 1:30 AM. Thirty minutes until Le Requin's point of maximum vulnerability.

Jean took Rico's screwdriver and touched the handle. He channeled cold, pure alchemical energy into it. The iron hissed, the rust dissolving, and the tool transformed into a silver metal alloy that emitted a faint glow—a crude yet effective alchemical implement.

"Time to go," Jean whispered, slipping the silver screwdriver into his belt.

He stepped back out, passing the silent salt statues.

"Enjoy the cold night," he told Rico.

He leaped from the *Triton* onto the pier, ignoring the rickety wooden plank he had used before.

The moment his feet hit the ground, he felt a vibration. This time, it wasn't the Neptune mining rigs, but a distinct tremor originating from the land.

At the end of the pier, a black, unmarked van was speeding toward him. It was moving fast, lights off, and its destination was clearly the *Triton*.

Jean realized Rico might not have been the ship's only crew. They likely had a delivery or pickup team inbound.

The van neared, and Jean made out two silhouettes in the front seats. These were not petty criminals. The one in the passenger seat was holding a massive assault rifle.

Jean didn't have time to retreat to the ship. He had to stop the van before they spotted the salt statues on the deck.

He knelt, touching the asphalt of the pier. He channeled pure energy into the water trapped beneath the pavement, forcing it upward, forcing it to solidify.

The van was only fifty meters away.

Transmutation! Solid salt. Anchor.

The asphalt in front of the van began to shudder and crack, and in a fraction of a second, the brine underneath crystallized, forcing the pavement upward, creating a two-meter-high salt wall that instantly solidified in the middle of the roadway.

The van couldn't brake in time. It slammed into the salt wall at full speed.

CRASH!

A sickening sound of colliding metal followed. The windshield shattered, and the van’s engine screamed in distress.

Jean stood, ready to face the assailants, who were undoubtedly now severely injured.

The driver’s door swung open violently. A large man stumbled out of the wreckage, blood running from his forehead. He carried a pistol.

"Who the hell are you?" the man roared, his voice thick with rage and pain.

"I am the new owner," Jean answered, his voice icy, the Salt Fog Potion clutched in his hand.

The rifle-wielding man in the passenger seat didn't emerge. Jean saw him fumbling for something in the van’s center console.

"Don't move!" Jean warned, taking a step forward.

The large man fired his pistol. BANG! The round missed widely, slamming into a container behind Jean.

"I don't intend to kill you," Jean said. "But I will immobilize you."

Jean channeled energy into the air again. Salt solidification.

Suddenly, from inside the van, there was a deep, audible click.

The passenger had managed to activate something.

The driver broke into a wide, horrible grin. "You can have the ship, but you can't have our product!"

As the man spoke, Jean saw thick green liquid jetting out from the crushed underside of the van—not oil, but a viscous fluid that smelled like rocket fuel mixed with sulfur.

The liquid spread rapidly across the asphalt, heading toward the harbor water.

"Sea-Burning Potion," Jean muttered, horror dawning on him. The liquid was designed to incinerate everything organic in the water, neutralizing both alchemy and the local ecosystem.

"Now we'll see who can transmute fire on water, Alchemist!" the man yelled, just before firing his final round into the spreading green liquid—

FWOOOSH!

The harbor water exploded into hot, blue-green fire, an alchemical flame devouring the brine. Jean stood between the advancing inferno and his crystallized barricade, the Salt Fog Potion in hand, forced to choose: fight the approaching blaze, or flee toward the ice warehouse—