Heart and Blood

Taking out a glass bottle from her storage ring, Astur places the bottle with a strange liquid in it on the table. This liquid at first glance appeared to be a light blue, but after a few seconds, the colour shifted to a one resembling that of shining gold and then just moments later it changed into a dark brown.

"I made this the other day after some experiments with the potion that Elizabeth brought back the other day, the one she borrowed money to buy from you, Taurion," Astur says.

"The Strengthening Potion, it was only yesterday when we bought it, just what could you have done with it over such a short period of time?" Taurion asks, looking over the bottle on the table.

"Heh, don't underestimate my genius. I've made twenty-two different variations, I was a bit unlucky and instead of diminishing returns for multiple consumptions, each can only be used once, and some can't be taken together. But the reward for taking these potions are far greater than that poorly made one that you originally bought," Astur says, crossing her arms and holding her head up high.

"Perhaps this is a pointless question, but have these been tested?" Heinrich asks.

"Of course, and the test subject is sitting right before you and she's fine," Astur says as she looks for another blunt, only to shake her head as she realises that she just smoked the last one.

"Oh, you tested them on yourself? I wouldn't have thought that you'd test an unknown product on yourself," Heinrich says.

"Huh? What are you talking about, I tested them on Elizabeth," Astur says, pointing at Elizabeth who just started coughing up the water she was drinking. Seeing the dark looks on everyone's face, Astur continues, "what? It's not like I can test them on myself."

Catching her breath, Elizabeth yells, "just when did you do this!? And why wasn't I aware until now!?"

"This morning before you left for the town," Astur says, with her focus on her storage ring, "damn, out of alcohol too."

"Forget about the alcohol! Nothing bad is gonna happen to me right?" Elizabeth asks, grabbing tightly onto Astur's tail.

"Of course not, if anything, had you been a bit luckier it could have strengthened you, but in the end, it didn't seem like you got much out of it. But I can guarantee that nothing bad would happen," Astur says with absolute certainty, "now let go of my tail or the next thing I feed you will be bad for you," causing Elizabeth to waste no time in releasing Astur's tail.

While others would need to do testing to find out the exact effects of the potions, Astur has the benefit of the System. With the help of the System, Astur can immediately ascertain the details of each potion and find out the limitations of them.

"Regardless of whether or not it's harmful, you shouldn't test such things on someone without their consent," Taurion says as he frowns and gives Astur a disapproving look.

"Taurion's right, you should have at least asked me first. Why couldn't you have at least tried them on yourself at first? And where did you even get all the materials to make twenty-two different variations from?" Elizabeth asks, having noticed something odd.

"The answer to both of your questions is because I've replaced several of the core ingredients, and I've got to say, it hurt like hell to do it! Now that I'm starting to sober up, even I think that was a crazy thing to do. Ugh… my head hurts," Astur says, holding her head while lamenting her lack of intoxicating substances.

"One of the people who make the strengthening potion is an acquaintance of my father and I've had the luxury of speaking with them before, and they said that the ingredients couldn't be substituted with anything else, claiming the brewing process to be too volatile and that the specific ingredients are necessary without exception," Lester says.

"You wouldn't happen to know what those ingredients are, do you?" Astur asks.

"I only know about three, the Blood of a Silver Serpent, the Heart of a Pakopako, and a Hermit Flower Root. I was told that these three are the most important," Lester says.

"So those are the ingredients of the Strengthening Potion," Taurion says before looking towards Astur with a curious gaze and asks, "I'm not too surprised you got hold of a Hermit Flower since they grow in the depths of the Sea of Trees, but where did you get hold of the heart of a Pakopako and the Blood of a Silver Serpent? The Pakopako is an incredibly sly and elusive creature. Capturing them is nearly impossible since they have shown to be expert escape artists. And Silver Serpents are massive monsters that live in underground tunnels, it takes an entire platoon just to fell a single one."

"Did you not pay attention when I said I replaced the ingredients? I naturally found a suitable replacement and it's the reason why I can't use them on myself. The Blood of a Silver Serpent was replaced with my own blood. As for the heart of a Pakopako, I cut open my chest and carved out a portion of my own heart. If not for having access to one of my authorities at the time, I probably wouldn't have survived, although I probably wouldn't have tried if I wasn't high off drugs."

All at the same time, the jaws of everyone in the room is left wide open as they all stare at Astur in silence while she herself is enjoying their reactions.

"I'm sorry what?" Heinrich asks, being the first to come out from their stupor.

"Exactly as I said, I used my own heart and blood as ingredients," Astur says, snatching the cup of water out of Elizabeth's hands for herself.

"You're insane," Heinrich says, throwing up his hands in defeat, giving up on trying to figure out how Astur thinks.

"Thank you, I do try my best," Astur says.

After a few seconds, the others regain their bearings as Taurion asks, "how are you even alive?"

"Don't worry about it, I'm very difficult to kill, especially when my abilities aren't being restricted. But moving back to what I said previously, I have a proposal for you, this bottle here is an improved version of the original potion, unlike the others, this uses the same core ingredients, but it uses a few drops of my blood that has been heavily diluted as a supplement ingredient," Astur says, bringing everyone's focus back onto the bottle with the strange colour shifting liquid. "Its effects are basically the same, with the main difference being a higher boost in strength and people should be able to consume a few more than what they could for the original before the effects are rendered null. What's more is that since it is effectively a different potion, the number of times the original has been consumed won't impact this in any way," Astur explains.

"You said this was a proposal, so what do you want from telling us this?" Taurion says, sitting up to match Astur's stature.

"I want you to help me gather the blood of a Silver Serpent, the Heart of a Pakopako, and a Pair of Eyes from a Wisdom Owl, these are the core ingredients of the potion that I can't get on my own or from anywhere nearby. If you can't do that, then bring me the original potion and I can extract the ingredients from them instead. In return, I'll allow you to buy any of the things I sell either from the stall that I've been making Elizabeth run at a discounted price as well as some of the other things I've made that aren't available on the market, but at their full price. Additionally, I'll give you a choice, one of the potions made from my heart or a full set of these potions made from the original ingredients."

Taurion, Heinrich, and Lester don't immediately answer. Although they've been offered a great reward for agreeing, the cost for doing so isn't low, be it procuring the ingredients or just buying the original potion. The original potion isn't something that can easily be bought in bulk, the three of them don't have access to their family's entire budget and while they do get a rather generous allowance, it isn't enough to buy more than a couple of these potions every month. Taurion and Heinrich each have their own small business they run, while Lester partakes in adventuring, so they all have more than just their allowance, but even that isn't enough to cover the cost of buying the potions while still having enough money to survive on their own.

As for simply gathering the required ingredients themselves or buying them individually, the thought never even crossed the mind of the three young men. Lester, the strongest of the three, has no hopes of trying to contend with even a newborn Silver Serpent, not without having a decently sized team of people with him. As for the other two, while not weak, they don't have much combat experience, spending most of their time working a desk job rather than training. None of them has much hope at trying to find a Pakopako, though they might be able to secure the Wisdom Owl, but at that point, it'd be more cost-efficient to just buy the original potion.

Seeing the clear struggle on their face over their personal desire for benefits vs the cost of obtaining them, Astur says, "I understand this isn't something to be taken lightly. You should return home for now and discuss it with your families. Take that bottle with you as well, I don't need it anymore."