Air-Filtration Device of Antitoxin

Air-Filtration Device of Antitoxin rests upright on a battered leather belt, brass housing etched with wheel-and-rune patterns, a small glass canister within that holds a pale, churning blue liquid. The surface is pocked with micro-scratches; a fine copper mesh coils around its tubing, and a stubby nozzle glares forward like an exhausted eye. A slim tag of leather bears a stag crest and a ledger-thin serial, as if the thing had learned to survive by countermarching through time. When you angle it toward the light, faint vapors gather and vanish, and you almost hear a quiet hum, as if the device keeps its own breath steady while guarding yours. Months ago, I found it in a vendor stall behind a ruined gasworks, its case smeared with soot and a careful note about it: 'for the lungs when the air turns venomous.' The seller told me it once belonged to a field alchemist who mapped gas pockets in the Shattered River district, stitching hope into metal. The device wore its scars with stubborn dignity, as if conquering a thousand stale hours. Its leather strap had been replaced once, twice, and each stitch seemed to carry a small story: the buyer who wore it into the Fungus Vale, the crew that trusted it beneath sheltering canopies of pollen and poison. Back in the present, the device has a practical gravity in the world of exploration and siege. When strapped to a simple respirator or tucked under a hood, it powers a micro-filter that feeds purer air to the lungs, letting explorers press deeper into tainted zones without surrendering their nerve. In daylight or damp nights, it buys seconds of clarity during gas-cloud skirmishes, letting a scout set a route, check a sigil, or issue a warning before the fog reveals its teeth. Its lore is stubborn too: some say it was forged by a courier guild that learned to outrun plague ships, others swear it was engineered by a field squad that turned an ordinary filtration device into a lifeline. Prices drift in the tendrils of a market that never sleeps, and Saddlebag Exchange is where I watch the asking prices settle into reality. One vendor might name a modest sum in silver and copper, another might push for a higher price if the etchings catch the light just right, and a careful bargainer might trade a recipe or a rare salvaged part to seal a deal. I’ve seen the device pass through hands with a quiet ceremony, its blister of glass catching the lanterns as if to say: I’ve kept people alive in a gas chamber and I can do it again. It’s not a magic talisman, but it feels almost like one, a practical relic that continues to tell the same human story: we endure, one breath at a time. Perhaps that is why collectors guard it, and field crews still reach for it when the air itself seems to resist them. It never feels obsolete to this day.