Potion

Careful, and careful again.

I moved my fingertips with every nerve in my body focused.

But 10 minutes, 20 minutes...

It was about the size of a chicken egg. By the time it took over 30 minutes just to peel the tiny shell, my concentration began to waver.

Right at that moment.

“Ah!”

It was a tiny mistake. A mistake of less than 1 mm.

But the price was steep.

Boom-!

Poison splattered everywhere at the same time as the explosion.

The paint on the wall melted away, and noxious smoke rose.

Fortunately, my body was protected by the automatic sand barrier, but even that blackened from the heat.

Beside me, the black mage screamed.

[You idiot! You'll break the fishbowl!]

Fortunately, the fishbowl was fine, but the basement was a complete mess.

“….”

As I stood there quietly looking at the scene of the disaster, the black mage laughed, spinning around in the water like a fish.

[Serves you right, arrogant fool. Didn't I tell you? You think alchemy looks easy? Even I only got my start in alchemy after spending over five years in training just prepping materials.]

“Phew...”

I roughly patched the burned parts with sand and aired out the room with my newly acquired staff.

In no time at all, the basement had returned to its original state.

The traces of the accident from just moments ago had vanished completely.

I reached for the anemone eggs again.

[Wait! What are you trying to do? You just blew them up and you're going to do it again?]

“Blow them up? What? Nothing happened here.”

[Get a grip!]

I let out a long sigh.

I hated to admit it, but this was beyond me.

Even though this was only basic material prep, I was failing at that.

“I admit it. I definitely need help.”

[Heh heh heh... So you finally understand your place. Now, bring me the sacrifice.]

“Ugh.”

Plop!

With no other choice, I dropped a few gems into the fishbowl.

The black mage swallowed the gems like a white blood cell.

[Ooooh! My strength is returning!]

Shrrk!

The lump of black dust wriggled, and something long and slender sprouted out of it.

A feeler that looked more like a tentacle than an arm.

It was disgustingly repulsive. So much that I wanted to beat it senseless on the spot.

“Wow... Still, when it was a sea urchin, it was kind of cute. This is just...”

[This is the most efficient form.]

The black mage smoothly extended a tentacle from the fishbowl and picked up an egg that was still intact.

[Watch closely. This is how you prep the shell.]

The tip of the tentacle, now sharp, reflected the light.

Flash!

One single motion.

The shell fell to the floor. There was no explosion.

It was a truly overwhelming difference.

[How long are you going to stand there gawking? Move! Put it in the beaker and add mana!]

“Grr...”

Though my hands trembled with some inexplicable frustration, I did as he said.

Before long, we were able to refine all the anemone eggs.

A sinister purple solution.

It seemed his claim of deep knowledge of alchemy wasn't a lie.

The black mage grinned slyly and said,

[If there's someone you don't like, just put three drops of this into their meal.]

“I don't think that'll ever happen... For now, I want to use it as medicine.”

[In that case, combining it with phoenix fruit is probably best. Harvest that first.]

I cautiously approached Chohogi, whom I'd moved to safety beforehand.

The idiot was, as always, watching those brain-rotting shorts.

A tempting fruit hung above its head.

Pop!

The fruit dropped lightly when I touched it.

[?]

Chohogi looked dazed, perhaps because its head had suddenly gotten lighter, and grabbed at its head.

Fortunately, it didn't seem to be in any pain.

It didn't seem like taking this off would make its intelligence drop either.

Then again, there wasn't much intelligence left to drop.

I placed the fruit on the black mage's slender tentacle.

“So, what are you planning to make with this?”

[A healing potion, of course. I think it'll turn out to be top-grade.]

Saying that, the black mage set to work crafting the item with its lone tentacle.

From the outside, the process was so complex that it was impossible to tell whether it was doing anything beyond turning and mixing.

Just sitting there quietly beside it made me yawn.

“Can I sleep first? It looks like you can handle it on your own.”

[Do you get sleepy at a historic moment like this?]

“It's boring. I don't have anything to do.”

[J-just a moment...]

It was just then that I tried to stand up from my seat.

Pfft-.

A hissing sound came from the black mage's side.

When I turned to look, its body had suddenly flattened.

It looked like a soccer ball with a hole punched in it.

“What?”

[… M-mana's running low. I got too excited. I forgot my body had gotten weaker.]

“… What a mess.”

I wordlessly tossed it a pebble. That had to be what it wanted.

Sure enough, the black mage swallowed it whole without hesitation.

Its body puffed back up again.

[Good. Refill me every 30 minutes from now on.]

“I can't even tell who's the boss here.”

In the end, I had to stay up and keep supplying mana beside it.

Almost half a day passed.

[… It's complete. That was hard.]

The black mage wiped its forehead with a tentacle.

Five red potion bottles were lined up on the workbench.

“Not just one?”

[Normally, one bottle would be the most I could make, but I showed off a little after a long time. I combined it with deadly poison to improve both its performance and quantity.]

“Ooh...”

[You little brat, do you know how amazing this is? Show more gratitude. I said be more amazed!]

“Ooh-. Amazing-.”

[Hmph, what a fool, not even knowing its value...]

Ignoring the creature as it kept grumbling, I checked the bottles.

“So how effective is it?”

[It can save you as long as you're not dead. Even severed limbs can be reattached. Well, it can't recreate parts that are already gone.]

“I thought maybe it could mass-produce pinkie fingers endlessly, but I guess that's too hard.”

[… Only you would imagine something like that.]

Still, the performance was more than satisfying enough.

“Thanks for your hard work. Here's a bonus.”

[Hm, I suppose you're not entirely without manners.]

As thanks for the trouble, I tossed the black mage another fish jewel.

The creature snatched it up with a tentacle in a flash.

I used to stay on guard, thinking it might regain its power and escape, but so far it had only managed to make a single tentacle.

I didn't think there was any need to waste more mental energy on it.

[There's something strange about your world. Until I satisfy that curiosity, even if I gain a body, I have no intention of running away, so rest easy.]

“That's a relief, then.”

More than anything, the black mage didn't seem to have any real desire to escape either.

After leaving the one happily eating gems alone, I fell into thought for a moment.

How should I use this potion?

There wasn't a single potion on the market with effects like this.

A miracle only a high-level healer can perform.

If something like this were released in bulk, the healers would all come swarming out and stage a protest, saying they'd starve to death.

Of course, it wasn't something that could be mass-produced.

“The fruit will keep growing back, but...”

But its explosive performance was also due to another ingredient.

Namely, the anemone venom I'd just completely used up.

In other words, these five bottles were a limited edition even I would have trouble making again.

“Is there any immediate use for it...?”

It was too precious to sell.

Better for me to keep it in case something happened.

Of course, I could reattach severed limbs just fine even without a potion.

The enemies I'd face from here on out would only keep getting stronger, and some of them might even be able to counter my sand form.

I'd already run into an out-of-spec freak like Makkakno.

And I'd even lost an arm temporarily during the fight with the whale.

“I need to think about when people around me get hurt too.”

I have a lot of people to look after now.

Of course I'd use it if they were standing at death's door.

But there were too few bottles to hand them out in advance.

I carefully stored the five potion bottles in my concealment pouch.

“For now, it's better if I keep them.”

It would be safer and more certain if I went and used it myself when an emergency arose.

That required one condition.

Even if I had a good item, it meant nothing if I didn't know they'd been hurt.

“I should tell them to contact me.”

For now, start with the people whose contact information I already had.

I sent Broker a text: contact me immediately if you ever get hurt badly enough to be at death's door.

Next was the Mage Gallery.

I logged into the gallery and wrote a post.

[Title: Guys, I got hold of a healing potion?]

[Author: ㅇㅇ(33R.3R3)]

[It can save you as long as you're not dead.]

[If you're literally on death's doorstep, contact me right away. I'll save you.]

ㄴMagic Is Firepower: With half the tower-climbing youth on hiatus, I wonder if there'll even be any use for it.

ㄴFridge: Since you can't just jump into a tower raid halfway through, you'll actually have more chances to use it outside.

ㄴPkkatju: Please give me your phone number so I can reach you in an emergency.

ㄴㅇㅇ(33R.3R3): Ah, I'll think about it...

ㄴBeetle: Now you're thinking about it. If this were before, you'd have shut it down the moment you saw it.

ㄴBeetle: I don't think I'll ever have a chance to use it either, but thanks just for the thought.

Beetle's comment kept nagging at me.

It was certainly true.

If this had been when I first came to the gallery, I'd probably have ignored the request to share contact info.

But I didn't really want to go through the experience of someone I knew dying somewhere I didn't know about.

Especially if it was someone I could have saved.

I needed this much of a safety net to feel at ease.

Then a new post went up on the gallery.

[Title: Finished testing the swimsuit you sent last time.]

It was from Fridge.

A prototype model made by dwarves out of whale hide.

A high-leg swimsuit with a fully open back.

I had no intention of ever wearing it, so I had sent a sample to Fridge and asked for a test run.

Looks like the results were in.

ㄴㅇㅇ(33R.3R3): But can you actually wear that?

A dwarf-certified unisex high-leg swimsuit.

Since it was sized to fit my body, it must've been small for Eun Mirae in more ways than one.

ㄴFridge: It was pretty tight. Still, it wasn't to the point of being unwearable, was it? The stretch is good.

ㄴㅇㅇ(33R.3R3): Where's the proof shot?

ㄴFridge: If you post first, I'll post mine too.

ㄴPkkatju: (Fridge high-leg proof shot, instantly deleted one second later.)

ㄴFridge: Anyway, I'm done analyzing its performance. The effects were pretty interesting.

I slowly read through the long comment Fridge had left.

The effects could largely be divided into two.

One was a fairly significant level of physical defense.

It wasn't enough to rely on this alone and ditch all other armor, but apparently it was good as a secondary piece of gear.

ㄴFridge: More than anything, with a design like this you can wear it instead of underwear. There's nothing wrong with that.

ㄴFridge: Though I still have absolutely no idea why they cut out the back on armor of all things.

And the second.

The option that could be called this item's signature feature.

It was a function that helped with underwater combat.