Chapter 308: Poison

Perseus POV

I was planning to go convince the 2 gods with Maple to convince them of the plan of not attacking my village while I'm away in the future and eliminate the homunculus as security calmed down and let down their guard, but...it seems that there's an easier way to do things.

The poison used on the heroes...the antidote for it is known only amongst some people from my village specifically, I know it of course since the chief drilled the mixture into my head in case I got poisoned by it since he wants me to be the next chief.

The poison recipe was gifted by Jerah to a hero in the past, apparently, the hero wanted to use poison to kill heroes who fell to the demon lord's side, since no poison strong enough to harm heroes existed then, the moon god created one. The antidote, however, was given to Paradis, the leader of a 3rd great power.

The poison was passed down among the heroes, while the antidote was passed down from one generation to the other in my village. The demon got nothing and was only informed of the poison's existence.

It seems that the anti-magic cult found out about the poison's recipe and tried to use it to frame the village, but Zoris investigated it quickly and found that we got nothing to do with it.

Though now they need the recipe for the antidote, we aren't willing to give it up of course since it's to keep them in check, if they got the recipe for the antidote, it'll lessen their need for our alchemists and their use for us in general.

Back to the current poisoned heroes, they now need someone to heal them, and it seems that the popes for the gods of summer and winter got poisoned in the process as well...I can use this to get the 2 gods to swear an oath.

A lot of new things come up, but...to think that Phineas managed to find out about the poison means that they got an insider among the heroes somehow because there are less than 6 people who know about it outside them on a rough estimate, I might be wrong since the Chief's info may be outdated, nevertheless, they are currently requesting help.

Do they know the antidote too? I m curious, but I'm too lazy to find out, I want a sample of the poisoned blood, we can reverse engineer it somehow t know the recipe of the poison since it's the strongest poison we got.

I then wrote a letter of acceptance to go do it and gave the letter to Buddy to take it to the chief.

"Maple, can you like project my voice to Saber and Isfrid? I just want them to hear a message."

"I can, why?" Maple asked

"Just give me a couple of seconds."

She then gave me this envelope where she instructed me to just say anything and the same message or what I say will reappear in the other letters held by the other 3 seasonal gods, sort of a magic email.

"I'll heal the heroes, if you want your popes and priests to be healed, I'll need an oath."

"Shouldn't you be nicer?" Maple asked.

"You want me to be nice to Saber?"

"...What about Isfrid? He faced unfortunate circumstances to be like that, you should treat him with care. Maybe Ivy was right, you are just contradictory when it comes to people who are just as insecure as you."

"...She's not wrong. But that didn't excuse all his actions toward demons due to his anger toward one demon."

"Aren't you the same right now? You shouldn't involve the innocents in this, can't you save them out of the goodness in your heart?" she asked

"..."

"Right...your heart is sort of empty, but just do it for me, because I'll try to be the angel on your shoulder while Lilith can be the demon."

"That's sort of...racist?"

"You get the point." she groaned while rolling her eyes.

"This is why you're going to need me by your side in the future."

"You're offering?"

"Yes, just not yet, but help the innocents and I'll help you get the oath of ceasefire or whatever through other methods, I'll even give you a kiss." Maple offered.

"I can ask for a kiss any time though, but fine, I'll just heal them anyway, I just wanted an upper hand when it comes to the time for negotiation."

"Wait, that's it?" Maple looked puzzled there.

"What do you mean?"

"I thought that you'll be more stubborn about it."

"I may be somewhat heartless, but not completely, I'm a protagonist, I got some good qualities about me."

"Apart from your good looks and cheesy pickup lines?"

"You've gotten less meek as of late."

"Ruka helped a lot, she's the only one who can toughen me up when it comes to resisting you."

*****

"Ah, Trevor, my favorite hero, you're not poisoned."

"Are you wishing that I was?" he asked.

"A bit, because if I saved you, you'll feel more favorable and indebted to me, it'll be beneficial to have a hero back me up if you heroes turn your swords to my neck."

"I now use a gun, and some of us use spears and daggers."

"Alright, where's the patients? I brought the premixed ingredients with me."

They then brought me to the patients' area, I did not receive friendly stares, there are a lot of people who are injured and needed to be tended to with strong healing magic, but it seems that there were not a lot of healers to go around in times of war.

I was brought into the priorities tent and it was guarded, to say the least, there's like enough 8 stars and 9 stars mages to fund a whole country.

"Uh, I'm gonna need everyone other than the patients to leave."

"Why?" a nobleman asked.

"Duh, the antidote is a secret."

"What's wrong with you people?" he exclaimed in frustration, "Are you scared of us finding out the recipe or something?"

Well, if that's the first thought that came into your head, that means that you have that goal somewhere inside you, but let's see where this go.