"Ha ha, I am joking. Check your status and clean up your room. It is morning already. I will make you breakfast before I leave." Katherine gets up, stretches, and leaves the room with a yawn.

I feel sore and exhausted. I get up to collect my clothes that is now scattered like a trail and I bump into a glass vial. I look down and I see a full crate of empty glass vials. Did all that get evaporated overnight? I should ask her later.

I try to collect my clothes with mana to save myself from any physical labor. The mana bubble bursts upon summon and fizz out of existence. I feel...dizzy. I crash back to the bed face up at the ceiling. What happened? I open my status screen.

Status:

• Strength: 20
• Agility: 20
• Intelligence: 20
• Endurance: 20
• Vitality: 190/1200
• Mana: 0/1200
• Soul: 1 / 1 (bonded)

Skill:

• Vocabulary (Basic)
• Crystallization (Advanced)
• Demonic Ritual (Sealed)

Effect:

• Buff: A small favor (favor of King Domnall)
• Buff: Children of Lilith
• Debuff: Exhausted mind
• Debuff: Exhausted body

Class:

• Scholar <Maxed>
• Alchemist <level 20>
• Spirit Bond <level 10>

I gained some serious power upgrade from the Spirit Bond, but I am almost fully drained. Is it from last night? I did not think we had anything crazy enough to justify the change. Demonic Ritual? When did I gain that skill?

"Here breakfast is ready, you haven't dressed yet? Eat now." Katherine walks in with a tray with 3 plates and some cutlery. "Pancakes spiced with Maca powder, crushed pistachio, and honey; scrambled eggs with nuts and herbs; the last plate is a fruit plate with candied figs."

I am starving. I dig in and ask at the same time. "I feel terribly drained. What happened last night? I see empty vials under the bed, and my stats have drastically increased."

"Nothing much. I just wanted to power up you enough so that your stats are on par or better than the rest of the group in expedition." Katherine sits beside me. "How is the food?"

"It is good! I would have never imagined that you know how to cook. What is this demonic ritual skill?"

"I must be a terrible cook." Katherine replies.

Huh. "What do you mean?"

"Do you feel anything at all?" 

"???"

"According to the recipe, this dish should boost libido" Katherine points to the empty plates, "candied figs should help to restore libido, and the herbs should have an aphrodisiac effect."

I don't know how I should reply to this.

"Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeek” a scream pierces the room from outside.

I look towards the door. I see Roisin in casual dress holding a broom and my clothes. I presume she must have followed the trail.

"S-sorry for interrupting. " She runs out, runs back a few second later, drops my clothes and slams the door shut.

Katherine pats me on the back, "don't worry, guild master is a little shy. She won't hold you on this when you are together on expedition. Speaking of expedition, do you have all your equipment and supplies ready? Adventurers would usually place orders with artisans first thing in the week."

I spent rest of the day placing last minute orders with artisans and merchants. Most of the ingredients that I need for potions are in stock. However, I have a problem with armor.

"Sorry mate, I have armor refitting orders packed this week. I have quality helmets for sale, but no customized armor. You can try to create your own using the extra forge and any of the steel scraps. These are high quality pieces that I trimmed off from chest plates on fitting orders. Custom armor from scratch takes weeks to build, and that is when I don't have a backlog of orders." Bo shrugs.

I really need better armor. I have no idea what kind of danger I might face outside the town walls. I will be damned if I get killed by a poison arrow that pierces through armor. If full plate is not possible, my best bet is brigandine. I don't think it is used in this world, so I will have to create one myself. I visit the tailor shop and buys an expensive gambeson that is slightly larger fit and rush back to the blacksmith shop. The gambeson has a fancy shiny red velvet finish. The tailor mention that it is the most durable one in his shop. I hope it is up to the job.

"That is a nice-looking dress clothes. I hope you are not thinking some flimsy fabric will protect you? I got extra chainmail if you can't get anything else." Bo looks up, and snorts.

"I am going to rivet the steel plates to the back of this gambeson and pray that it holds."

"Interesting idea, I don't fancy clothes armor myself, but I can see where you are going with this. My steel is all top quality. Grab any you need and pay me back after you are done."

Bo isn't lying about his steel being the top quality. Each piece is cut from existing steel plate armor, all of which are properly tempered steel reinforced with mana. Good thing that my crystallize skill is high enough level to create a diamond coated drill bits, otherwise I would probably have given up the attempt all together.

In two days time, I manage to assemble the first ever brigandine in this world. I show off to Bo while wearing a full set of brigandines over chain mail.

"It is deceptively sturdy." He gives the armor a few heavy smacks. "When looking at it from outside, it looks like just some clothes armor over chainmail. But when I hit it, it holds firm like a full piece of plate. It will give your opponent some nasty surprises if they ever try to stab you with sharp swords."

With armor preparation complete, I start practicing brewing the advance potions described in the alchemy books.

• Greater Potion of Kratos - temporarily boost strength stat by 10
• Greater Potion of Hermes - temporarily boost agility stat by 10
• Greater Potion of Ares - temporarily boost coordination and reflex
• Greater Potion of Hercules - temporarily boosts endurance stat by 10
• Minor Blessing of Gaia - triples natural regeneration of vitality and reduces all vitality drain by half for 24 hours 
• Greater Restoration Potion - regenerates 100 vitality per second for 10 seconds.

I can only produce a couple vials of each greater potions. The ingredients for the greater potions are much more expensive compared to the lesser versions, but more so because of the variety rather than rarity. The price for the raw material is not prohibitive to me. The main constraint is the amount of mana that is required for creating them. Lesser potions require no mana at all. However, A greater potion requires approximately 500 mana per vial. I would only be able to create a max of 2 vials per day. The most mana intensive potion is the Minor Blessing of Gaia. It is an alchemical potion that is inspired by prayers used by priests from Church of Gaia.

It has only one ingredient - offer 1,000 unit of mana in name of Gaia. What a demanding goddess. It has a powerful damage mitigation effect on wounds and anything that damages vitality over time. I create a vial for emergency use.

The bell sounds again. It must be the signal for gathering. I check my equipment one last time and head my way to the guild.