Chapter 50: Potion Brewing

Thwack! Thwack! Thwack!

Gima, wielding a comically large kitchen knife, brought it down with rhythmic precision, turning the shriveled tapir’s nose on the cutting board into a pile of thin, leathery slices.

The charcoal in the crude stove sputtered, not yet fully lit, puffing out lazy wisps of green smoke. Gima coughed, pointedly averting her gaze from the potent dream grass as she picked it up. She carefully folded the herb into thirds and tied it securely with a bit of twine.

Timing was everything in alchemy, but this glorified hovel lacked so much as a mechanical clock. She grabbed the hourglass, flipped it, and placed a hand over her heart, silently counting along with the falling sand. A minute, give or take. As for how much give or take, who the hell knew?

“This is less alchemy and more home economics,” Gima grumbled to herself. “The sheer primitiveness of this world is an insult to my craft.”

She prodded the coals with a fire tong. Once they were glowing a satisfying cherry-red, she uncorked a bottle of dwarven spirit—the kind that could strip paint—and poured a generous glug into a ceramic bowl. The recipe offered no measurements, so she went with the alchemical principle of ‘that looks about right.’ She set the bowl on the fire and waited for the potent liquor to boil.

Gima tossed in the slices of tapir’s nose, watching the dry, jerky-like pieces dance and tumble in the bubbling spirit.

She flipped the hourglass. The recipe, in a rare moment of clarity, suggested boiling for about a quarter of an hour, until the nose was soft.

How delightfully vague, she thought with a sneer, staring at the concoction with a growing sense of unease. The margin for error is big enough to fly a dragon through.

The whole process was a joke. Potions were supposed to be the precise science of extracting and concentrating supernatural power. This was just… stew. First, no two tapir noses were the same, and the recipe didn’t bother with trivialities like weight or potency. The dream grass was a similar mystery box. Second, the timing was a suggestion, the temperature a wild guess, and the alcohol content—well, Gima had slept through most of her middle school chemistry, but she was pretty sure that mattered.

Even if she magically produced a thermometer, the recipe lacked any useful data to apply it to.

Theoretically, every potion was a unique, unpredictable snowflake. And when you introduced that snowflake to the equally unique and unpredictable snowflake of a person’s body… well, that’s when things got dangerously fun.

In her past life, as a proper Demon Lord, she’d had labs, assistants, and rituals. Advancements were a production. Sometimes they went smoothly. Other times, they were… exciting.

Now, she had a dirt-floor kitchen and an hourglass. She was flying blind.

After the fifteenth flip of the hourglass, the meat had softened and the liquor had turned an ominous, inky black. Gima carefully lifted the hot bowl from the fire, the room now thick with the smell of cheap booze.

She set a second bowl on the fire, poured in the rest of the spirit, and brought it to a boil before dropping in the entire bundle of dream grass. The recipe demanded a “fierce, high heat.” Gima got on her tiptoes, yanked a lever connected to a set of leather bellows, and pumped a gust of air into the fire, making the coals roar.

The liquor frothed, the dream grass went limp, and a cloud of white steam billowed out. Gima took a whiff and recoiled. Cilantro. It smelled strongly of cilantro.

Ten hourglass-flips later, she removed the second bowl. She then took the first bowl—the one with the inky black tapir-nose tea—and poured its contents into the cilantro-scented dream grass brew.

The reaction was instantaneous. The mixture erupted, boiling violently as a cascade of iridescent bubbles frothed to the surface. Each shimmering sphere reflected a fragment of her life: the roaring traffic of Earth, the skyscraper she’d leaped from, the tantalizingly bare thighs of her maids…

Wait a minute.

Those were her dreams. From the past few nights.

Snapping back to the present, she flattened her palm over the bubbling bowl. She focused, feeling her “energy” flow down her arm and into her hand, channeling it into the chaotic, dream-filled bubbles.

Pop! Pop! Pop!

They all burst at once, and the potion settled.

The liquid was now a deep, purplish-black, with the spent jerky floating on top. She fished out the pieces; they were soft and spongy, like waterlogged bread. The dream grass was now a sickly yellow, its soporific magic completely drained.

She carefully funneled the remaining liquid into a glass test tube, filling it about four-fifths of the way before stoppering it with a cork to cool.

Next, she brewed the ginger oil and fresh chilies, bottling the fiery concoction. This was her escape hatch, the auxiliary potion to jolt her out of the nightmare if things went south. She examined it. No magic, just pure, unadulterated chemical warfare. The instructions were simple: drink it, or smear it on your philtrum.

“Crude, but effective, I suppose,” she mused, bottling the ‘ginger-and-pepper hell-brew.’ “Then again, couldn’t I just have someone slap me silly? How reliable is this system, anyway?”

It occurred to her that the ‘system’ was just her inherited succubus memories, which were notoriously out of date. She’d known ancient black dragons who, thanks to their inherited memories, insisted on eating green-skinned creatures because “green meat is healthy.” Turns out, it was just because one of their ancestors had a weird fetish for green food.

So, is this really a good idea?

She stared at the Nightmare Potion. It looked like a vial of potassium permanganate, fading from a deep purple at the bottom to a lighter shade at the top. Suspended in the liquid was a swirling nebula of tiny, glittering, rainbow bubbles.

Should I just drink it? Or… should I tell George?

The thought was so foreign it startled her.

But the logic was sound. He wouldn’t betray her. He wouldn’t let her die. If she started to lose control, he could knock her out. He even had healing magic. As for the mental assault, please. This body might be small, but it housed the soul of a Demon Lord. She could take it.

“You can always trust me,” she remembered him saying.

But what happens after?

Yes, George was a paladin. A good person. He wouldn’t stab her in the back. But his goodness wasn’t for her; it was for everyone. She was just a project, a way for him to prove his convictions. He was “redeeming” her because he could control her. The second that control vanished—and with her growing power, it would—he wouldn’t hesitate. He would never allow a powerful, evil succubus to run free. He’d lock her away to “protect” others. She was absolutely certain of it.

If I confess, I have two options: become a goody-two-shoes for the rest of my life, or get locked in a holy dungeon for the rest of my life.

Both were utterly unacceptable.

A deal, maybe? The Demon Lord’s treasury contains clues to the Crown fragments. The other Demon Lords, those bastards would kill for that information.

She shook her head. A man like George wouldn’t make a deal. And she, in turn, would never walk the path of righteousness.

She looked at the potion, at the galaxy of power swirling within it. This was her path. Without power, there was no revenge, no harem. What was the point of living?

Besides, her soul was strong. A piddling little advancement from Black Iron to Bronze? She could handle the side effects. Probably. The main thing was to keep her secret.

Decision made. She packed the potions carefully in a cotton-lined box, slipped it into her backpack, and began to meticulously erase any trace of her work.

As she stepped out of the back room, she found the shop had acquired some new customers. Several women, draped in cloaks, their faces pretty but painted with garish red lipstick.

A fiery redhead with a cascade of curls was leaning on the counter. “Baldy, my sweet brother,” she cooed. “I brought my sisters to come play.”

Gima recognized her. It was the same woman who’d been shaking down the alchemist the other day.

At her words, the other three women giggled, letting their cloaks fall open to reveal scandalously skimpy outfits. Tight leather, bare thighs, and chests that defied both gravity and decency. They were, without a doubt, professionals from Salem City’s most prominent service industry.

“Ladies, please compose yourselves,” the alchemist said, his voice flat.

A chorus of giggles answered him.

“Oh, good brother~” The redhead propped a boot on the counter, hiking up her cloak to give him an eyeful. She wore black stockings and thigh-high boots, and absolutely nothing in between. “We just want to have some fun with you. Help your poor sisters with a little… problem.”

The alchemist remained impassive. “No. I’m not selling those potions anymore.”

“What?” The women erupted in another wave of laughter.

“He doesn’t want you.”

“How tragic.”

A dark-haired woman stepped forward, shrugging off her cloak and giving the alchemist a pouty, wounded look. “Don’t you miss our drums, sweetie? You were beating them so enthusiastically last time.”

Gima felt a sudden, powerful urge to shout, “Take me with you, sisters!”

“Boring,” the alchemist stated, his face a mask of zen-like calm. “I’ve had an epiphany. I have wasted my precious time on meaningless copulation and the concoction of lewd, useless aphrodisiacs. I am returning to my true calling. I will become a great alchemist.”

The women stared, dumbfounded. He seemed serious. Utterly devoid of emotion. They’d never seen anything like it.

“What are you talking about?”

“I’m not selling the medicine,” he repeated. “I poured the divine potion down the toilet.”

“WHAT?! Are you insane?” Their faces fell in unison.

Gima slipped out the door unnoticed, the sound of their furious curses following her. The alchemist’s firm voice cut through the din.

“My mind is made up! If you continue to cause a disturbance, I will summon the guards.”

Having helped a bald man find his true calling, Gima felt the scout’s neckerchief around her neck shine a little brighter. She pulled the door shut and walked away with a self-satisfied smile.