A Hospital in Another World?

Garrett regretted his decision within half an hour.

Why did he buy so much?

Had he lost his mind to purchase an entire cart of oranges?

He could have just bought a few pounds; it would have been enough for his experiment. If it wasn’t enough, there were plenty available in the market!

In addition to oranges, he also bought lemons, cabbage, cauliflower, lettuce, celery, peas, radishes...

"Susan, Aunt Susan!" Garrett had to apologize to the cook with a smile:

"Could you do me a favor? Peel the skins of these things, slice them, remove the seeds—just prepare them as you normally would before cooking. It doesn’t have to be a lot, just a pound or so!"

"Sure thing, Master Garrett." The cook readily agreed. Soon, the kitchen was filled with the sound of chopping boards clattering, accompanied by Aunt Susan’s sighs:

"Young people these days..."

Garrett shrugged. He had to admit, Aunt Susan was much more efficient at these tasks than they were. In the blink of an eye, a plate of sliced fruits and vegetables was ready. Garrett smiled and thanked Aunt Susan, then called out loudly:

"Aurora! Come over and help!"

Aurora rushed over. Following Garrett’s instructions, he diligently cast ice spells on the lemons, cabbage, and cauliflower, freezing them quickly. Once all the fruits and vegetables were frozen solid, he directed Aurora to put them into a thick-walled iron bottle and vacuum out the air.

As the air pressure decreased, the moisture in the fruit and vegetable slices began to evaporate rapidly. While the fruits and vegetables still retained their fresh and vibrant colors, they had become dry and brittle, crumbling at a touch.

"Alright! Thanks, Aurora! Take this to Aunt Susan to grind into powder, mix thoroughly, and put it in a bottle!"

Freeze-dried mixed fruit and vegetable slices!

Grinding into powder!

A mixture of seven or eight kinds of fruits and vegetables!

Garrett attempted to cast an identification spell, but the information was too chaotic to provide feedback. Aurora tried as well, but likewise couldn’t produce a result. Well, he would take it to the Tower of Heaven tomorrow and ask a master appraiser for help...

The anti-scurvy potion, basic version, completed! If even the master appraiser couldn’t identify it, then he would just turn it in for the task!

With a backup plan in place, Garrett focused his attention on the vitamin tablets. Chemical synthesis was out of the question, so extracting vitamin C from natural sources was the way to go...

"Bang, bang, bang—"

Bernard, holding a pestle half his height, pounded it down with force. The enormous pestle seemed weightless in his hands, as juice splattered out in all directions, swirling and sinking to the bottom of the mortar. In no time, Bernard leaned the pestle against the side and poured out the freshly squeezed orange juice.

Extraction.

Squeezing through cheesecloth, filtering, filtering again, and once more. Obtaining a clear—or at least, relatively clear—liquid. The barbarian’s task was complete, and now it was Garrett’s turn to struggle!

"Boss, all done! Anything else you need help with?"

The barbarian wiped his hands, which were covered in orange juice, and grinned. Garrett waved to him: "That’s all! Thanks for your hard work! Oh, and try not to eat too many oranges these days; look at how yellow your hands have become!"

Then, how to make solid vitamin C...

Garrett glanced at the paper on the side. Before conducting the experiment, he had written down several technical routes: evaporation method, cooling method, vacuum cooling method, salting-out method, reaction crystallization method. Next, he would try them one by one...

Take 100 milliliters, heat, evaporate the water.

Take the dried residue of orange juice, dissolve it again, use starch indicator and iodine solution—thanks to his previous efforts with bacterial staining, he had iodine on hand—determine the content of vitamin C. Unfortunately, the residue after heating, the content of vitamin C...

Was tragically low.

Garrett scratched his head. He suddenly remembered that vitamin C would quickly oxidize and lose its efficacy when heated. Alright, scratch the evaporation method.

Cooling method...

Obviously, the concentration of vitamin C in orange juice was insufficient; even when frozen into a popsicle, no solid substance was formed.

Vacuum cooling method...

The result was the same as above.

Salting-out method...

After adding a bunch of sodium chloride, continuing to add until the liquid was saturated, the final product was still just table salt...

Failure.

Reaction crystallization method...

The essence of the reaction crystallization method was to add a reagent to the solution to produce a new substance. When the solubility of this new substance exceeded the saturation solubility, crystals would precipitate. So, what could vitamin C react with to produce insoluble substances?

Calcium?

Potassium?

Sodium?

Garrett suddenly leaped up. Yes, that’s it, sodium ascorbate! It had the same therapeutic effect for scurvy as vitamin C, but sodium ascorbate was a more stable compound!

It was also a common drug in clinical practice!

He should have thought of it earlier!

Garrett held his breath, diluted a milliliter of sodium hydroxide solution, and slowly dripped it into the orange juice. With his left hand stirring continuously with a glass rod, he dripped, stirred, and then tested the acidity with litmus paper. Drip, stir...

When the pink color of the litmus paper almost faded away, Garrett finally stopped. Filter again, heat, evaporate, crystallize. Then, dissolve the crystals again, test...

Failure.

He didn’t make it.

Undeterred, Garrett persisted. Since the barbarian had squeezed plenty of orange juice, he could afford to experiment slowly. If sodium hydroxide didn’t work, he would try baking soda!

If baking soda didn’t work, he would try sodium carbonate...

Time passed by minute by minute. Weighing, dissolving, titrating, heating, crystallizing. Dissolving again, reacting, measuring. Recording the mass of reactants, recording the reaction temperature, recording the reaction time—

Failure after failure, yet another failure. From noon to night, from night to midnight. The experimental notebook flipped through page after page, and the large pot of orange juice was consumed cup by cup. Aurora remained by his side, helping with weighing, heating, recording, and various other tasks, but as Garrett announced failure after failure, he gradually fell silent, no longer in the mood for jokes or laughter.

But Garrett’s expression remained steady.

What was this? What were these failures?

Fundamental research was always a lonely and difficult path. To produce a single substance, the raw materials, concentration, temperature, reaction time, catalyst—endless combinations needed to be tried.

Thousands, tens of thousands of possibilities; sometimes, just a 0.1 degree difference could lead to failure.

Even if he was only conducting the simplest experiments, walking on paths paved by predecessors without falling flat on his face, was that still called research?

This time, as droplets of crystalline solution fell, the blue solution produced by the reaction between

iodine and starch visibly faded!

"Yes!!!"

Garrett raised both hands and waved them vigorously.

Success!

Sodium ascorbate—even if it was impure, he had made it!

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