Adam finished the sleeping potion with putting the mint leaves, chopped, and then he stirred clockwise until the potion became a silvery color.

"Did I manage it?" Adam looked to Beth, who took a ladle and scooped some of the potion up. She licked the potion and yawned.

"Good. It has a good concentration," Adam grinned. He went back to the beginning potion book and flipped it on a random page. On there it said burn healing balm.

"Can we try this next?" Adam picked up the book and showed it to Beth.

"I was thinking I could try my fire in a bottle potion now, Adam. You don't mind me using your laboratory, do you?" Beth sent Adam her best puppy eyes, and Adam relented.

"Ok. Can I watch?" Beth nodded.

"Now, if my memory serves me correctly, we will need water, some black mamba venom and, oh, snails," Adam pulled out his menu and went to Onyx's tab. He called the snake to him and waited until he heard the rattling of her tail.

Onyx slithered between Beth's legs and went and slithered up Adam's tail until she was perched on Adam's shoulder.

"You have her so well-trained," gushed Beth. To be perfectly honest, the sight of the man before her and the snake had an edge to it. But, Beth, just like most girls, liked the danger.

"Onyx is a mob. They obey on instinct," supplied Adam, and he placed a bowl under Onyx's jaw. "Onyx, fill this with as much as you can spare."

Rays of clear liquid began gushing out of the snake's poison sacks and into the bowl. After a while, Onyx shut her jaw closed and looked at Adam for further instructions.

"That would be all, Onyx. Go hunt a mouse or something," Onyx nuzzled Adam's face and then slithered away. But, just before she exited, she turned around and took a look at Beth. Beth waved, and the snake turned around and left.

"I think she likes me," said Beth, and she went to see how much poison was there in the bowl. It wasn't much, but it would be enough for a single vial of fire in a bottle potion.

"Onyx likes everyone. She plays with buddy too," the first time Adam had seen the snake and beetle play, he had thought that they were in a fight. He had taken the dung beetle and held him up, only to be stared at with confused looks by both animals.

  "Who is Buddy?" Beth went and filled a much smaller cauldron with water, and she brought it to the weak fire.

"Buddy is a dung beetle. He doesn't have a name, really. I have just been calling him that since I gave him my mana," but, now that Adam thought on it. Buddy was not a bad name at all. The beetle could use it.

"What do you need a dung beetle for?" Beth took some snails from a jar and crashed their shells, getting the animals from inside. She threw them alive in the water, and went to stir counterclockwise.

"Well, Buddy is good for carting the fertilizer where it should go. I mean, I used to spread it around, but, for the price of a single dung ball per task, Buddy can do it for me," Adam watched as the snails floated on the surface of the water, not yet feeling the danger. "Can't you cut them up, beforehand?"

"Well, no. Certain toxins are released when something is boiled alive. And I need them to increase the potency of the leaves. Alchemy is not for the squeamish, just so you know," Adam nodded. He decided to just observe.  Well, maybe not look in the cauldron. Because he didn't want to see the snails wiggling around, trying to get out of the water.

Beth worked in silence and Adam observed. She chopped the leaves of the dragon cluster quickly and soaked them in Onyx's poison. Then, she went back to stirring the potion. The leaves turned a purple color after an hour, and Beth dumped them in the cauldron. Immediately, the water turned purple.

Adam watched as Beth placed a lid on the cauldron and stepped aside.

"Won't you stir it anymore?" Adam was looking at the smoke that was coming out of the cauldron and wondered if the potion should be doing something like that.

"Oh, no. It has to thicken, and the snails need to become nice and crispy," Beth went to the potion's book and began flipping through it. She stopped at an easy potion and lifted the book, so she could show Adam.

"Pimple removal?" Adam had never had such things on his face, but he had heard that the mortals were plagued with the stuff during their teenage years.

"Yes, I do need a dose for myself. After that, we can make a black spot cleaning potion. Have you ever cleaned your black spots, Adam?" Adam shook his head. He wasn't sure that he even had any.

"Oh, you poor thing. Didn't the necromancer in the cottage take care of you?" Adam sighed. Why did everyone assume that Constantine was his nanny? He was his partner and protector and, if Adam had his way, his future lover. 

"Look, Beth, Tine already did a lot for me by protecting me these past ten years," Beth became thoughtful and then sighed.

"So, I don't have a chance," she murmured more to herself than to Adam, but shook her head. With a smile, she looked Adam in the eyes.

"I will teach you how to make all the necessary cosmetic potions. And then you will land your Tine for sure," Adam grinned. Now this was more like it.

They waited until the fire in a bottle potion was complete and Beth took it off the fire. She helped herself to some of the vials and began filling them up with sludge. As soon as she would cork a vial, the liquid would turn a bright red color with orange undertones. There was a snail in each vial, and Adam wondered how this potion was useful.

"They are good for starting fires," supplied Beth when she saw his questioning look. "If someone drinks this, they will get burned from the inside out."

Adam decided that he would only use this potion for starting fires. Having your insides burned was not something he would wish on anyone. Even to the adventurers who had come to him and tried to destroy him, in the past.