Limits

Nick didn't tell me which recipe I was supposed to create. 'He probably wants me to figure out which recipe from the herbs he gave me' I thought to myself. I looked at the herbs and there were two kinds. The first kind was Seedless Plain, it was a very common herb used mostly as a catalyst in basic recipes. It contained loads of sweet juices. It looked like a thin stalk with the middle hollowed out. The juices were contained inside the hollow part of the stalk.

The other herb was called Vital Grass and it was brown in colour. It could be easily mistaken with hay or yellow grass while it grew in small patches on fields and in forests. It had healing properties but not great healing properties. If consumed in huge quantities it would speed up the regenerative processes inside the body.

I searched through my mind for recipes that would use those two ingredients and after some thinking there was one which would fit the herbs provided. It was called Vital Liquid and it was used to treat small wounds externally. It could be ingested and help speed up regenerative processes inside the body but it was quite weak in that regard. Mostly it was used for external wounds.

I said to Nick "I know which recipe I need to make. Shall I start now?". Nick said "Go ahead, whenever you are ready". I noticed that the pot is clean and ready for my attempt at medicine making but before I started, I asked Nick "How do I clean this pot, after creating a poison?". Nick was stunned for a while and said "Right, I forgot to tell you that. Yes, I have an item which will help you touch some poisons and not get infected but at the same time with this Cloud Haze Poison it's not that difficult actually. What you have to do is burn the leftovers and then you can safely open the lid, the poison will no longer affect you".

I nodded my head and prepared to create the medicine from the recipe and herbs I had. The first step was to pour in clear water inside the pot and boil it. I poured in about 300 milliliters and sealed the pot with the lid to make the water boil faster. When the water was boiling, the next step was to first throw in the catalyst which was Seedless Plain and wait for the juices to mix with the boiling water.

After a while I could see the water inside the pot becoming misty in colour, meaning that the juices from the herb have been extracted. The next step was to take out the dregs from the Seedless Plain and throw them away. After doing this, I needed to add the other herb which was Vitality Grass.

The recipe didn't state the exact amount of vitality grass I would have to throw in, it just said proportions. The proportions were 3:1, which would mean if I threw in 100 grams of Seedless Plain, I would need to throw in about 33 grams of Vitality Grass.

Because I threw in about 200 grams of Seedless Plain, I needed to now throw about 66 grams of Vitality Grass into the pot. I measured the weight a bit and was quite confident it would be between 60-70 grams so I threw that inside the pot. The recipe said not to close the lid and wait for the Vitality Grass' healing properties to be extracted. After waiting for about 5 minutes, the water became slightly greener. This indicated that all the healing properties of the Vitality grass were extracted and I could now remove the dregs.

After removing the dregs, the last step was to cook it under the lid for another 5 minutes. I did just that and covered the pot with the lid. After 5 minutes, I opened the pot and the smell of medicine rose to the air. The medicine seemed to be made correctly because otherwise the smell would be bad as described in the recipe.

I then heard Nick saying "Good job Nex. You've created your first medicine and as I said, this will belong to you. It will come in handy to you, I'm sure. Here, take those vials and fill them with the medicine. The cork this time does not have hole in it".

Nick handed to me two vials that I used to pour in the Vital Liquid. Nick then said "We will do the Cloud Haze Poison tomorrow, I need to rest a bit and also, I want you to focus on other arts as well". I nodded my head in understanding and asked before Nick left "Will you leave the tools for medicine making here?" to which Nick replied "Of course, I don't want to carry them around with me all the time. Although this bag will fit couple of bigger items, it will not magically make the bag less heavy. So if you put in there couple of hundreds kilograms, the bag may be small but it will still weight the same amount".

I nodded my head and thought to myself 'So there are limitations to the use of this bag. It shouldn't be a problem as long as I don't put too much heavy stuff when traveling'. I bid goodbye to Nick and wanted to start my training when Shelly came over with pleading eyes as to mean it wanted something badly.

I looked at Shelly and said "Are you hungry?" but this time Shelly shook its head in denial. I was confused and asked "So what is it then?". Shelly came closer and tugged on my pants then pointed on my shirt. I was even more confused now and said "What is it? You want a dagger, I have nothing else" but Shelly again shook its head in denial and pointed at my shirt.

Suddenly a thought hit me 'Does Shelly want the medicine that I made?' so I asked Shelly "Do you want the medicine I just made?" to which this time Shelly nodded its head in confirmation. I was baffled 'Why would Shelly want the medicine, does it have some kind of injuries?' and so I asked Shelly "Are you feeling unwell? Or maybe you have some injuries?" to which Shelly again shook its head.

I was completely lost at this point. 'Why the hell does it want that medicine!?' I said to Shelly "I don't know why you want it so much but here, you can have it" and I placed the vials in front of Shelly. Shelly got excited and happy but also angry a bit because I left the corks on. Shelly pointed towards the corks with its mouth a bit frustrated, conveying a clear message.

I laughed a bit and undid the corks. Shelly gulped down the medicine from both vials and went back to its bed. I didn't know whenever I should laugh or cry and just went straight to my training with the puppets.