Drying tobacco & nicotine effect

Hi all!
I have been experimenting with drying my flake tobacco for an extra long time to see what effect it would have on the taste, Peterson's University flake to be more precise. I have been drying it, or air curing it, all together for like 12 hours or so. So yes, the moisture level is very low. But I think this definitely had a positive effect on the taste; making the smoke more mellow, and more complex in taste.
But I do think that the effect of the nicotine has also changed. Because it seems that the nicotine hits me much stronger. I only had a couple of bowls before drying it out so it is hard to make a desicive comparison. But University flake is not supposed to be super strong, and I am not overly sensitive to N. But now I tend to get overwhelmed by N only after a few puffs, not being able to smoke a full bowl.



So, the question for my post is: Does the nicotine hit tend to get stronger when tobacco is dryed out?
If I think about it, it kind of makes sense. Because when the tobacco is dry, it burns more easily thus producing a thicker smoke, and therefore the concentration of smoke should be thicker on each puff. Consequently, the nicotine content would also be more concentrated with each puff, thus creating a stronger nicotine hit while smoking. So basically, the more you dry the tobacco the stronger nicotine hit you would get. But probably this ratio is more valid with tobaccos that are already potentially strong in nicotine (flakes more so than english).
What do you think? Anyone with more pipe smoking wisdom than I who might be able either to confirm or disagree with my hypothetical ratio between dryness and nicotine hit?

I never meant to suggest that drying would raise the nicotine level in the tobacco itself. So yes, it would be a question of absorption. And the reason why the absorption would be affected, that would be explained, according to my thinking, by the burning chemistry. But, I guess you would need to know a lot about chemistry to be able to go into details. Perhaps more nicotine can be produced in the smoke if the burning temperature is higher?, I have no clue and can only speculate.
But it is nice to hear that a few more people can confirm a higher nicotine effect with dry tobacco. It would be interesting to get more responses from pipe smokers who are used to drying tobacco.