Kill The Old Ones!

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’The recipes for potions in this world are truly bizarre.’

Ren had this to say when he first read the story and found the list of ingredients for the common health potions, and he said it again when he started learning about potion making from the clan.

The common herbs and spices such as rosemary, thyme, fennel seeds, coriander, star anise, cinnamon sticks, hell, even salt and pepper are used. The same herbs and spices that could often be seen in earthly cuisine were also available in this world. However, in this world, they’re not just used to add more flavor profile in a dish; they’re also commonly used for potion making.

Of course, these common things alone aren’t enough. If you boil a handful of them, all you’d get at most is a flavorful soup, not much more. The real essence that put magic in potions was monster parts.

In dungeons, killing monsters drops loot. Not full-on and ready to equip gear like the ones on games, not gold, silver, copper, or any currencies either. They drop things that would make sense, something that people would most likely gather from a monster corpse anyway.

Blood, flesh, bones, teeth, fur, claws, specific organs, even monster cores. These are the drops of monsters.

When monsters are killed in a dungeon, they dissipate into dust particles the moment they die, not giving people enough time to harvest them properly. Instead, they explode with loot, monster parts that would be harvested from them anyway.

However, because of this mechanic, the loot isn’t guaranteed to be the same even if you hunt the same monster type. One might drop a valuable part, like a monster core or something similar, while the next kill hardly drops anything.

This is where monster hunting could become a long and grueling experience. It could turn rather frustrating too since it usually depends on luck for monster loot.

Monster parts could be used in many ways.

In the oldest records of dungeon exploring, martial artists of the old era used to craft armors, weapons, and artifacts from monster parts, and they proved rather useful.

Some of the more powerful weapons and artifacts that race now has were only ever crafted after farming tons of monsters for their parts. Of course, the skills of an excellent craftsman were needed too, but without the supply, what would a craftsman use?

As time went on and the human civilization advanced, more and more uses were discovered for monster parts.

Take [Slimes] as an example.

These semi-sentient blobs of gloop, although considered the weakest monster out there, drop slime clumps, one of the main ingredients in creating health potions.

Back in the day, when health potions weren’t discovered yet, slime clumps were seen as useless loot. Some wouldn’t even pick it up even if it were dropped right in front of them.

It became slightly more valuable after health potions were discovered, though, but even then, still not that much.

A stack of slime clumps, which is about 100, sells for 100 credits each. So, about a credit for each clump. However, slime clumps are designed to be sold in bulk. The lowest stack that could be sold was a stack of 25 clumps, and the maximum is 100 clumps.

It was designed like this for the sake of securing a decent profit. Slime clumps were considered common loot, after all. Killing a slime almost guarantees at least one or two will drop.

Selling them by piece is inefficient simply because shops usually only have limited slots for items they could sell. Putting a single piece of slime clump that costs a single credit to occupy a valuable store shop was a very inefficient thing to do. Especially since most of the common shops are rented out instead of being owned.

Yes, trading in this world, especially for dungeon resources, was weird too.

Slimes aren’t the only creatures valuable for potion-making, too. Believe it or not, goblin ears were one of the most common potion ingredients out there too.

Goblin ears could be used to brew a small chakra potion. They could be mixed with other ingredients to create insect repellent pastes, make ointments that soothe muscle and joint pain, and so on.

There are many more such common monster part ingredients out there, some of which Ren already worked with even before he started his official potion brewing practice.

Speaking of practice...

Raymond decided to stop testing Ren’s limits after discovering that it’s just a waste of time. Instead, he began slowly but surely guiding Ren in areas that he tends to ignore in order to perfect his skills even more.

He had a plan, and that is, when teaching Ren about potions, he’d do it one by one. He’d start with the simplest potions out there first, and he won’t allow Ren to move on to the next potion recipe unless Ren’s skill stabilizes at a level where every brew he makes produces a perfect-quality potion.

Raymond couldn’t teach others this way, not even his own children. But Ren was obviously different. Ren is smart, sharp, and thrives in repetition. He doesn’t repeat mistakes, and his composure is truly admirable, qualities that are incredibly valuable for potion making.

This was the only way for him to make use of Ren’s talents to benefit him and the clan at the same time.

Ren gets to learn how to create perfect-quality potions each time, and the clan gets to sell some of the perfect-quality potions he made.

Yes, Ren could brew potions in bulk. Be it a single batch or a whole cauldron for an entire crate of potions, it doesn’t make a difference to him. In Ren’s eyes, the only difference was the amount of ingredients he had to use. Other than that, he had no worries.

Once he learned how to create the perfect quality of a certain kind of potion, he wouldn’t forget how to do it again. He’d be able to make a single dose or an entire crate’s worth at once.

Raymond was starting to learn about this fact, but right now, they’re focused on polishing Ren’s skills.

’At this rate, he’d learn everything I could teach him within a year. How scary.’

This is what Raymond thought when he calculated how fast Ren was learning the skill.

If only he knew that this was actually slow for Ren.

Ren goes to the apothecary hall in the afternoons to learn from Raymond. As for what he does with the rest of his day? That’s up to him. But Ren was obviously prioritizing his martial practice above all.

This meant that Ren was only learning and practicing potion making a few hours each day. This speed of learning was him not prioritizing it.

If Ren pivoted and decided to focus on potion-making, he’d be way faster than this. At most, he’d squeeze Raymond dry within six months, probably less, even.

But Ren wasn’t in a hurry. Actually, he’s quite satisfied with how Raymond was teaching him. The idea of him mastering a potion before moving on to the next recipe felt novel to him for some reason. He’s quite fond of it.

Ren’s true priority was his martial practice, not potion making. Raymond said so, Grandma Allen said so, his uncle also agreed, and Ren himself thought so too.

But with Ren’s current skills, it’s all fine.

He initially wanted to learn potion making because he wants to contribute to the clan. He wants to earn his keep since he’s at the age where it’s already expected out of him.

Sure, neither Mikel, Raymond, nor anybody else in the clan forced him to. It was Ren’s own choice. He’s only answering his deep sense of responsibility as a member of the clan.

With Ren’s current mastery of small, medium, and large health potions, he had already achieved this goal.

Ren just made two crates worth of small, medium, and large health potions for the clan just yesterday. He kept some of it, but the majority was submitted to the clan to be sold.

He gets a cut of the profits, and the rest is taken by the clan, just as intended. This earned him credits but also clan merit points. He doesn’t have much need for credits, especially not for clan merit points since the clan barely has anything that he’s interested in, and he already has the clan leader’s badge, which gives him unrestricted access to the clan’s martial hall.

All he gets from this is a sense of satisfaction that he contributed to the clan in a more direct way. That’s the most important part for him.

Just mastering the brewing method for health potions could already secure him a comfortable future, should he consider focusing on potion making alone.

But that’s a huge waste of Ren’s gifts and talents, and he never intended to focus on it. He just really wanted to help with the clan’s situation.

As for learning healing from Venina, that will also start soon. Once Raymond teaches him a few more recipes, he’ll transition to that part eventually.