Merchant Of Yliaster

Maxwell looked up from his meal, glancing at the nest with a thoughtful expression. On the exclusive floor, there were many new faces now, but Maxwell was still a bit puzzled about something.

While the average level of the elites has increased over the recent days, he could also see that people were slowly hitting a plateau. The only person he saw with a level above 40 was the space mage he killed, and he was starting to realize that his level was an anomaly.

Even Devon, who apparently was a greatly feared figure, was just level 35, making his level respectable, but far away from the level limit.

Any time now, the nobility ranks would be dealt out, and Maxwell was quite curious about what they would entail. There wasn't exactly an accurate counter that would tell him when it would happen, though, so he was a bit lost about what to do.

After seeing Mary, the girl went to the school, and he was left alone. Any big magic project would need his full attention, and he didn't want something like that to be interrupted by the event.

He got up after finishing his meal and nodded to Nesha before leaving The Nest. He walked through the crowded streets with his stealth on, and soon reached the little shop Gendor bought.

It's been some time since he saw his "friends" so it would be good to see them. He was also quite curious about Gendor's situation. The man purged all darkness from his body when Maxwell restricted him, and that was something you just couldn't do without some kind of a backlash.

He entered the shop and felt a brief wave pass over him. A detection spell? He was not very experienced with complex spells, but the feeling he got from it was similar to Blueberry's mental waves.

So this is how Gendor's skill works… He thought. Either the man managed to make the skill a passive one, or Maxwell entered at a fortunate time to experience it. Either way, he was not surprised to see Gendor come out of the back room, his hands covered with some kind of muck.

"Oh, Maxwell? How good of you to grace us with your presence. Bob's unfortunately not here; he is tending to his animal kingdom," he said. Maxwell couldn't really understand what the man was talking about.

"Animal kingdom?" he said, his senses analyzing the sludge on the man's hand. It was an intriguing mixture, and Maxwell could actually detect almost five different mana types from it. Beyond the types, the mixture gave him a feeling of life, and for some reason, a slight feeling of revulsion. His new senses were a lot more intuitive than he would like, but he figured that this was because he didn't have enough knowledge and skills mixed in. It was great for the skill to still be able to discern things. At some point, he realized that he was ignoring Gendor, though, so he quickly rewinded the conversation in his mind, trying to recall what the man had been saying as he glanced at the abomination.

"Oh yeah, I brought him to a rift, and I would have taken you too, but you were missing without a trace. The thing was that the rift opened to a world filled to the brim with beasts, and Bob really has a knack when it comes to hitting them really hard, you know? Anyways, he managed to carve a small territory there. I'm not even sure what level he would be, but I will know if anything happens to him." The man said, Maxwell catching up to him in real time as he spoke.

"Huh, I don't find that hard to believe," Maxwell answered, entering the backroom in his search for the rest of the interesting stuff. "Are you trying to make a potion or something?" he asked, getting a weird glance as an answer.

"It's a bit complicated…" Gender said with a sour face, but seeing Maxwell's expectant look as the young man fingered his mixture with a look of interest, he sighed before continuing.

"As you know, I'm an assassin, and I thought that this whole merchant business could be a lot more useful if I learned how to make poisons. It was going fine for a while, there are some very basic associations people are starting to form about things like this, but turns out, poison is not something they advocate. So, I'm here, trying to come up with magical poisons, but my attempts have been.. Lacking," the man explained, giving the mixture an unenthusiastic nudge.

Maxwell held back a laugh as he glanced at the mixture, which didn't have a single trace of anything malicious in it. If the person in question was not Gendor, Maxwell wouldn't even believe that the mixture was prepared with the intention of it turning up as a poison.

If anything, this mixture would probably manage to treat some poisons. "Did you ever try to make something beneficial for real? He asked, his voice tinged with amusement. Was that some color on the man's cheeks?

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Gender sighed and pulled out a jar of clear blue liquid. To be fair, the liquid didn't really look like it was consumable, but Maxwell's eyes widened as his senses immediately screamed at him that the thing he was seeing was beneficial. He triggered the observation aspect of the skill, and a window popped up.

Medicine - Tier 2

A medicine crafted by an illogically talented newbie alchemist in his quest to see how wrong things could go if he really tried.

No particular target was set for the medicine as it was created, so the effects are limited, but it works in all conditions in its tier.

Maxwell laughed, seeing the explanation. It was just too funny that the cold-blooded assassin would be talented in something like this. The liquid in his hand brimmed with life mana, and Maxwell could feel that the mana was a lot more docile than it had any right to be.

Anyone consuming this medicine would be able to absorb it without problem. While Maxwell had no idea how magical medicine worked, he guessed that the reason why the medicine was deemed too general by the system was the fact that it only had life mana in it. It probably treated diseases by making people's bodies stronger.

Seeing the liquid, though, he gave him an idea. "Do you have more of this?" He asked, and Gendor just helplessly nodded. It was apparent that the man had been trying himself on this for some time.

He smiled and focused on the life mana in the liquid. If things went the way he intended, Gendor would have his poison with some help. He could see that the mana inside lacked a will, making it easier to absorb, and he wanted to make a small change to it.

He slowly sent the mana a single concept. It was the concept of wholeness, the concept of inseparability. This would cause the mana inside to actually move as a whole and not spread in someone's body; he had a good idea what doing that would cause.

He felt a mental click as his command settled, and he observed the liquid once more. It still had the same color, but the feeling of the mana inside was just a bit different.

Proliferation Poison - Tier 2

A creation twisted so subtly by a curious experimenter. Consuming the poison will heal any injuries the body sustains, but the excess life energy will refuse to leave, causing cancerous growths to form, leading to disease.

The growths are supercharged with life mana, making them malignant beyond natural tumors.

Due to the subtleness of the manipulation, the details of the poison will not be seen through by usual observation.

Did I make cancer poison? Maxwell looked at the creation he ruined with interest. This was actually ridiculous, as discerning this from normal medicine would be impossible before it was too late. After all, cancer had been a pain in the ass even after the greatly enhanced field of surgery came to be in Zephyr.

In a world like this, any kind of advanced cancer would mean certain death, making this poison immensely potent but maybe a bit slow-acting.

"Can your observation see anything different?" He pushed the bottle towards Gendor, who was watching him in curiosity. Gendor was used to Maxwell randomly doing outrageous things from their time in the forest, but Maxwell had a feeling that the man would need an update on his capabilities soon.

The seasoned assassin glanced at the liquid with furrowed brows, but after a few moments, he shook his head. "I don't see anything different, but a skill of mine uses poison I crafted, and this actually counts as poison now," the man said, certainly waiting for Maxwell to explain what the deal was.

Maxwell just formed a construct of mana in the shape of a system window and showed the man the true explanation. With his mind capacity, the visualization of this degree was nothing but attainable.

Gendor, while he was surprised by the skillful use of magic, immediately forgot about it after seeing the description. His face immediately morphed into an emotionless one, and Maxwell could almost hear the gears inside the man's mind turning. After around half a minute of silence, the man spoke with a solemn tone.

"You know what you created, right?" he said, looking at Maxwell.

"A pretty covert and strong poison?" Maxwell asked, knowing that that was not the answer Gendor wanted.

"This is not a covert poison; this is basically untraceable if it's truly slow-acting, as it sounds from the description. How much time would it take for someone to realize they had cancer? One month? Two? They would die without even remembering they drank a medicine, who knows when. This leaves no window for detection, as it takes the place of something completely mundane," Gendor said in a single breath, his voice getting more and more excited.

"You would still need to popularize your medicine for it to work, though. Also, people can think this is just a side effect of the medicine itself, as they can't discern the poison," Maxwell answered.

"Come on, I might not be delighted about turning into a pharmacist out of the blue, but even I can see that this shit is pretty good. It wouldn't be hard to flood the market anonymously before poisoning your target, even if the medicine is not known locally. The system made people lazy, so they trust their observation way too much," Gender explained, carefully putting away the bottle.

"I see. So, can I watch you make one?" Maxwell asked with a strange glint in his eyes.