It was crazy what a man could get used to or, in my case, a human elder blood hybrid. Every morning, noon, and night, I took a health potion to recover from the wear on my tendons and ligaments. My body grew stronger every day from the cursed gear Red forced me to wear. There was more and better food than I experienced before and I managed to grow a few centimeters because of it. Joining the goblins was the best thing that could have happened to me. I was growing stronger with no end in sight.
My time making potions gave me time to think about the adventurers I spoke to and the accuracy of their words. Adventurers were known for being insane, and articles from my system searches backed that up. Some claimed humans weren’t meant to live for tens of thousands of years, and there were consequences for it. Memories could ensnare adventurers and trap them in a different time and place, possessing their bodies for unknown amounts of time. So, I started to question the accuracy of Red’s claims about my sister’s soul.
True word, I didn’t know if the King in Yellow had my sister’s soul. What did the King in Yellow gain from taking it? I didn’t know, and the articles pertaining to that were locked behind a level wall.
A knock at my door took me out of my inner thoughts. I listened to make sure it was the correct pattern before turning the lock.
The anticipated group of goblins picked up a caldron full of healing potions, not the lesser variety, thanks to my skill.
Heavenly Tribulation destroyed what I didn’t need from ingredients, allowing me to refine them to only the components I needed. It helped big time especially when I had to buy my own ingredients. As it turned out, my quest didn’t specify who supplied the ingredients. So long as they paid me, I owed 100 vials of lesser healing potion a week. A vial of healing potion was worth 10 lesser healing potions, so I made sure to overstock them.
My inventory still had armor and healing scrolls for when they would be most useful to reveal. I felt content to wait; there was no end of term for the quest. So long as the quest giver lived, I was expected to make potions in exchange for the payment.
On an unrelated note, every day, I check the map, and the yellow line moves closer. Soon enough, Sky Spear, the capital of the Gob republic and its only city, would be hit. Once that happened, the goblins could resist or succumb. I would be here to renegotiate and supply them with potions every step of the way.
Mos came into my workshop carrying a bag of subs and tossed me one while I reclined on the floor. “Your bed would be more comfortable,” Mos said.
The straw mattress looked comfortable enough far more than anything I laid on.
“It would break if I laid in it,” I said.
The weights that were helping me get stronger made life difficult.
Mos fell into gossip immediately when the door closed behind the gobs running off with my healing potion. “Luff and his boys hunted a bear that had yellow worms in the meat. You were out in the wilderness; do you know anything about that?”
Lightning crackled as I struggled to get control of myself. She wasn’t accusing me, or at least I hoped she wasn’t. Mos was a good girl who liked to bump into me a little too much.
“Do you think that zap spell of yours could do something about your cursed gear?” Mos asked.
It was a hell of a good idea. My Heavenly Tribulation skill could separate properties in herbs why couldn’t it do the same with my gear.
“That was the first thing I tried after meeting my quota,” I said.
Mos’s ears drooped, and I knew I had to soften the blow, or she might spit in my food as revenge. Goblins didn’t really react the same way as humans did to emotional pain.
“You’re the brilliant alchemist. I guess it was a no-brainer; you would have thought of that first.” Mos said.
“It was a good idea; great minds think alike.” A crack of a smile appeared on her fanged face. “You wanted to know more about the outside world and the yellow worms,” I said.
The goblin girl perked up, flashing her bat wing-like ears, looking all cute with her big yellow eyes and thick rear. It was hard not checking her out. Unfortunately, my cursed gear wouldn’t let me even touch my dick. There was no zipper. Mos perked up, twitching her cute button nose.
“The yellow worms mean the bear came from behind the yellow line. It’s a bad sign; people will start getting sick soon. Don’t eat any of that bear if you can help it.” A knock at my door took me out of my train of thought.
I opened it to see a group of gobs carrying a pallet of some of the herbs I ordered. Disease cure wasn’t hard to make, thanks to the system and some pricey recipe guides from Blanca. I went to work preparing the ingredients and hitting them with tiny strikes of Heavenly Tribulation. Purple lightning burst from my fingers, removing the parts of the ingredients I didn’t need. At that point I was able to make student and above or tier 3 as far as my Alchemy profession is concerned. Skill synergy was incredibly useful.
There was a skill that alchemists normally needed to learn called Catalyze that would prepare ingredients but no one knew how to gain the skill. Gaining that skill would practically increase the tier of potions I could make by multiple levels up to another tier. Dungeons were needed to drop skills but profession skills only dropped on prime numbered floors.
Alchemy lvl4/9 Tier 1
Four weeks of potion-making hadn’t taken me out of the beginner stage or tier 1. That was ok. I had other ways of improving rapidly.
Heavenly Tribulation lvl5/9 Tier 1
Using a skill continuously in my everyday life increased its experience as I learned more about the skill and its properties. Repetition was the mother of learning, after all.
Tactile Telekinesis lvl9/9 Tier 1
There was still the need to perform a feat to upgrade the tier of my first skill. I worked quickly preparing my ingredients, hoping against hope that an alchemy-based skill would be unlocked. The fire from my caldron burned hot in the room as the ground ingredients melded together under the care of my mana control.
That was another potential skill that I hadn’t figured out how to unlock. My level might not have increased, by my stats and skills have grown by leaps and bounds. I’ve also petitioned to go with a team of goblin soldiers to a nearby dungeon that had been discovered. The ghosts under the kobold levels inside were giving the gobs trouble. Since there weren’t that many enchanted weapons or mages to go around, I was hoping they would take me up on my offer.
I stirred the potion as it went through a series of stages controlled by my mana. First, the ingredients yellowed and then blackened. The bolts of my tribulation lightning burned off more impurities, driving it into a white color. White flecks of waste peeled away from my potion until a red glowing mass of disease cure sat on the bottom of my cauldron. A few minutes later, the mixture turned a healthy shade of green.
“Why aren’t you making a potion?” Mos asked.
I put the mixture into a machine and cranked an iron bar. Solid green pills fell out of the other end of the machine. After giving the pills a look over, they glowed faintly red for a moment before returning to their green appearance.
“These are disease cure pills. While they aren’t perfect, they will keep without rotting longer than potions. They can be given to cattle and other livestock anally.” I said.
“Gross,” Mos said.
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