System Change

Derek gazed at the brown potion on the table. Inwardly, he wanted to grab Brandi and Mal and leave the shop. However, he had made a trade, and he planned on sticking to his word.

“How about we wait until the affects of the previous potion wear off? We wouldn’t want them to interfere with the new potion, would we?” Derek said to buy himself some time. He seriously doubted that any part of the Potion of Mind Destruction would cause any interaction.

“Hmm…” Roman touched his hand to his chin before nodding. “Yes, I suppose we should.” He said. “I’m going to check on the girl, make sure she hasn’t blown herself up.”

With that, Roman disappeared from the room. Derek let out a deep breath and sat down at the table. He was free to recover his mindset for 30 minutes. He closed his eyes and meditated. Occasionally opening them and stealing a glance at Freia, who was madly writing notes in her notebook. It seemed like nothing else in the world mattered to the woman.

30 minutes passed much more quickly than Derek would have liked. Exactly 30 minutes after Roman left, down to the second, the door swung open and the halfling entered. “It’s time!” He announced.

“How’s Brandi doing?” Derek changed the subject.

Roman waved Derek off. “Plenty of time to talk about her later. Now it’s time for the next potion.” He put his hand on the vial and slid it to where Derek was sitting.

Derek sighed. “Fine.” He picked up the nasty looking brown potion. If the last one was supposed to increase Intelligence and willpower, yet made my brain explode, I wonder if this Endurance one is going to cause my bones to break. The memory of his bones cracking and his skin itching from making a breakthrough in his Endurance was still at the front of his mind. He could handle the breaking bones, but the itching…

“Do you have another one of those Healing Potions? It doesn’t have to be as strong as the one you gave me earlier, but I wouldn’t mind some increased regeneration at the beginning after that last potion.” Derek realized that potion testing was the most dangerous thing he had signed up for since arriving at this new world.

Roman pulled another red vial out of his storage ring and handed it to Derek. However, before Derek was able to drink it, the halfling stopped him. “Wait until side effects from the potion kick in before you take the Regeneration Potion. We wouldn’t want the potions to mix, now would we?”

He’s evil! The halfling Alchemist used Derek’s reasoning against him. Derek squinted at the Alchemist. “You’re lucky I like you.” Then, before saying anything else, he tilted the vial back, and the potion flooded his mouth.

If the previous potion was like a light refreshing drink, then the current one was like drinking mud. It was thick and slimy, and very hard to swallow. As it went down, it scratched the roof of his mouth and throat. It was like a blend of sandpaper and water.

“Ugh.” Derek said.

“What is it? What did it do?” Roman excitedly asked.

Freia, on the other hand, was standing close to Derek, staring deeply at him with her notebook at the ready.

“It’s nasty.” Derek commented.

“That’s it?” Roman was disappointed.

“Not all potions have immediate effects.” Freia pointed out.

Still, the three waited. The previous potion worked quite quickly after Derek drunk it, but the new one was going on 30 seconds with no apparent changes to Derek.

Derek shrugged. “I don’t know what to tell you.” He said, but realized that his shoulders felt weird when he shrugged.

He stood from his chair and moved his body around. “Actually, I’m feeling pretty stiff.” He continued stretching, his movements became slower and slower. His eyes widened. “What the hell?”

“What is it?” Roman asked.

“I’m not sure.” Derek frowned. “It’s like there’s another layer under my skin, but it’s less flexible and doesn’t account for my joints. And it’s getting less and less flexible as time goes by.” He moved his arms in a circular motion.

He hadn’t gotten any notifications yet, but he also hadn’t received any from the last potion until he survived the mind destruction part of it. He figured that was because the system wasn’t in the charity business of notifying people that they had been poisoned. After taking regular potions, he didn’t receive notifications, either. Maybe it’s a onetime thing with new potions. He thought.

Derek waited for the process to continue within his body. None of his stats were changed during the process, and he wasn’t losing any health, so he was more than willing to ride the effects of the potion out.

Finally, after a few minutes of stiffening, a weird substance began to form on top of his skin, forming a layer over the top. The layer was a pale gray color. Derek’s best guess was that the same substance was covering his muscles and bones, as well as organs other than his skin. Before long, he realized what the potion was causing.

“It’s like petrification.” He spoke, even though it was a task to even move his jaw.

“That’s not good.” Roman said. “But I guess it makes sense.”

“Why does it make sense?” Derek asked.

Roman shrugged. “Some of the ingredients came from a beast that causes petrification, but nothing like this. It’s definitely a mutated version. My hypothesis was that the material would provide some hardening to the skin, not unlike what happens when you breakthrough in Endurance.”

Derek nodded. “Look like it’s a failure, though.” He flexed his arms and some of the substance crumbled from them. “I can’t think of any scenarios where this would be convenient. I would guess that the process would even shut down the organs of a person with less Endurance or Vitality. I’m sure Shae could handle it, but I don’t know about others.”

Freia scribbled some notes in her book. “A failure, but not without information gained.”

“Indeed.” Roman agreed.

Derek waited for the potion to wear off. The substance disappeared just as it had appeared. It was like everything was reabsorbed back into Derek’s body. The system didn’t even give a notification about the potion once everything was complete.

Roman chuckled. “I just got a notification about an ‘Incomplete Potion of Petrification.’”

Derek nodded. “Well, at least that one wasn’t too bad.”

“That’s usually how the testing ends up. The last potion was a rare occurrence.” Freia replied.

“How much experience did you get for that potion?” Derek asked Roman.

Roman shook his head. “Maybe one percent of my bar. Incomplete potions don’t do much. If it wasn’t one that used such high-level ingredients, I wouldn’t have even gotten that much.”

“I’m going to wait 30 minutes just to make sure everything from that potion is out of my system before I take this rainbow potion.” Derek said. He felt like 30 minutes was a good window between testing. Most potions and meals gave buffs that lasted around 30 minutes on average.

Roman nodded. “I’ll go see if the little Alchemist improved in her next batch after I pointed out a few things.”

Derek was glad that it seemed like Roman was taking his mentorship with Brandi seriously.

As if reading his mind, Freia spoke. “You don’t have to worry about that girl. One thing Roman doesn’t joke about is teaching Alchemy. If he agreed to it, then he will give his all. He taught me, so I would know.”

Derek nodded. “Thanks.”

Freia put her head back in her notebook without replying.

30 minutes quickly passed and Roman reappeared in the room. He clapped his hands. “I’ve been waiting for a long time to have someone test that potion.”

Derek smiled. “Well, let’s get to it then.”

He still gripped the red potion in his left hand, just in case. Roman gingerly picked up the rainbow colored potion and handed it to Derek. Derek took it and uncorked the vial.

“Here’s to not dying.” He said as he turned the vial up and poured it into his mouth.

The flavor was… nothing. It had less of a taste than water. It was just… wet. How weird. He thought as he swallowed it. Not even a few seconds after drinking the potion, he felt something. It seems like this is one of the potions that activates instantly.

Derek braced himself for the pain. He slipped into Greater Meditation to prepare for the worst. But, no pain came. Instead, he felt a slight buzzing throughout his entire body. It was almost like the feeling of his arm waking up after having fallen asleep, except it was happening everywhere.

Derek kept an eye on his health to make sure it wasn’t decreasing without him feeling it. Instead, he was stunned by what he found. His HP had actually increased by 75 points. He looked down at his Vitality stat only to see that it had gone up by five points. Finally, he looked at his other stats. Strength, Dexterity, Endurance, and Vitality had all increased by five points.

Derek frowned. Such a small increase in my stats… that wouldn’t help me at all in a battle. He couldn’t help but think about how useless the potion was. Then again, I’m spoiled when it comes to stats. It is 20 points… that’s two entire levels for some people.

Soon, though, all of his disappointment in the potion disappeared when he focused on a notification that had appeared.

Unknown Potion Ingested

+5 Points to Strength

+5 Points to Dexterity

+5 Points to Endurance

+5 Points to Vitality

There’s no time limit. He realized that the stat increases from the potion were permanent. His eyes darted to Roman, who just happened to let out what Derek could only describe as a squeal of joy.

“What!” Freia couldn’t contain herself as her gaze rapidly flickered between Roman and Derek while waiting for an answer.

Derek smiled. “Did you use parts of a Void Beast in this potion?”

Roman looked up until his eyes met Derek’s before his face shifted into a giant grin. “May….be.”