Bro, I'm not an Undead!

Apparently, there were two stores within the Association building. One reserved for exclusive mercenaries because frankly, no one else could afford the stuff there, and the other for the general majority.

Silrat, who had been worming his way cleanly into the structure of this Guilds Association had informed Skullius of his discoveries – the store in express detail – as he then warned Skullius about how this store could suck him dry of Plasma coin.

He was right.

Skullius stood, looking with his blank eyes dumbfounded at the items being sold by a warm and kind storekeeper who had asked to see Skullius' identification, seemingly noting him down before he answered a question of his.

"What would you like to buy, sir?" the man asked.

The items here were vastly different from the ones in the treasury. They were mostly for day to day usages and utilitarian purposes.

While sensing over the various items here, Skullius came across some unique ones for the first time.

Potions.

These were items that offered temporarily boosts simply by consuming them.

They had a wide range of uses, ranging from increasing attack potency, defence, clarity, precision, healing factor, dexterity, agility, strength, endurance and so on.

The branch of alchemy was usually reserved for Energy Formers and was particularly hard to master.

Mages were the primary practitioners and few of them could produce large amounts of even the most basic of potions. As a result, potions were very expensive and valuable, different from the products of an art like blacksmithing. Alchemy didn't leave room for subpar quality. It was strictly potion, no potion.

This was why Skullius hadn't encountered a single potion so far.

Potions were ranked in a familiar manner to skills – Normal, Special, Super and Supreme.

This ranking however, was the source of headaches for most purchasers of potions because...

"Can you please repeat what you said about the prices?" Skullius responded with a question to the store keeper's own.

"Sure. Normal potions cost 1 Plasma coin. Special potions cost 10 Plasma coins. Super potions cost 100 and Supreme potions cost 10,000 Plasma coins per bottle," the store keeper said with cheery smile that made Skullius gnash his teeth.

"Wait. Don't you mean 1000 for Supreme potions?" he asked with a frown.

"I'm afraid not."

For real?!

With his current fortune – which wasn't really impressive - he couldn't even afford ONE Supreme potion?!

What did these things do? No, what did the Supreme potion do? Make you a god?!

"Can I see a bottle of each please?" Skullius asked in a humble tone.

"Sure."

Before long, four bottles were placed before him on the counter, each being of the same aspect - healing.

The Normal potion was of a twilight fog colour within the bottle, the liquid's motion looking to be much like water in thickness. The Special one had a slightly thicker liquid, its colour being a pretty sky blue while for the Super, it was a sweet violet hue with a thickness akin to pus.

The Supreme potion had a golden colour which was mesmerising to look at. Its texture was like a sludge. Refined sludge one would say, like gel.

As for the effects of each, Skullius muttered 'Screw it' before igniting his eyes with a subdued darkness as he appraised the potions. The store keeper probably wouldn't understand what was going on with his eyes anyway.

"I... see. No wonder," Skullius said as he broke into a cold sweat.

No wonder they were so expensive.

This particular formula of potion was called 'Healing Bloom.'

Naturally, its purpose was to heal, with the differences between the grades affecting its effects not purpose.

Apparently, the Normal potion could heal minor injuries – slightly fractured bones, superficial lacerations and even common diseases. The effect after consuming the potion lasted 10 minutes, meaning all damage accrued within that time frame would be healed according to the potion's limits.

Special potions could deal with broken bones, torn muscles, dismembered limbs and even viruses, the effect lasting for an 1 hour.

Super potions, well...

They could save someone who had half their entire body ground to dust – before they died at least, reforming limbs instantly while also having the capacity to heal, to some degree, recent damage to the soul!

The effect lasted a whooping 24 hours!

A step further in absurdity was the Supreme potion.

Honestly, Skullius couldn't believe his own guidance field as he saw the description and effects.

Wasn't this a bit...?

Apparently, as long as the potion was used within a minute of a target's death, they could be brought to life without any complications!

The soul and body would be mended to perfection and with this, came absolute immunity to most diseases and viruses as well as a perfect physical modelling - vague as that was.

The effects lasted for 10 days as within that period...

It was impossible to kill an individual with normal means. Only extreme forms of power such as beyond Legendary weapons and other sources of power could have a higher chance at dealing fatal damage.

The effect of resurrection came with the first use after all and the effects after that would dwindle over time.

But still...

Skullius was dumbfounded.

The effects and descriptions mentioned here weren't all that the Super and Supreme could do, as the list was extremely long and specific but...

This...

'Healing the soul? Bringing back people from death? Who made these portions?!' Skullius thought. 'The Deities?!'

The Hybrid Luman couldn't believe it!

This was ridiculous!

The storekeeper, after seeing Skullius frozen for a while was about to ask if he anything was wrong, but he caught himself.

He let Skullius continue to wonder about whatever he was digesting while internally pondering over what the dark glow in the Hybrid Luman's eyes was.

Soon, Skullius, with a dark expression dropped a couple hundred Plasma coins on the counter.

"Give me a 100 Normal potions, 10 Special potions and three Super potions," he declared.

The store keeper was surprised at first but he wore an apologetic smile before speaking.

"Unfortunately, these portions are rare and we buy them at exorbitant prices from the Mages, which means our stock is not as good as it should be. The limit of what I can offer, is 25 Normal potions, 5 Special potions and 1 Super potion. This is purchase limit for all mercenaries over a month."

"Oh..." Skullius said disappointedly with his <CURSED HEART> beating like drum. "What about the Supreme potions?"

"Those are extremely rare. Sometimes we can't even purchase them because the success rate of forging one is apparently extraordinarily low."

Skullius pondered for a while.

"Alright. I'll settle for all I can buy right now then."

Skullius was given the 31 promised potions which he analysed for a bit before storing them in his spatial storage ring.

After getting lost in thought for a few more seconds, he calmed himself and checked the other items in the store – spatial storage rings, Enriching gems, horse cards, chariot privilege cards and so on.

The Insurgent Magnus' gaze fell on the Enriching gems from purple all the way to green that were in stock. The path of Enriching gems had gotten him far and it was still viable. The prices of these gems here were also pretty high as the higher quality Enriching gems grew few in more dangerous Clusters but Skullius didn't sweat on these.

Raising his stats wasn't something urgent. Besides, there were many untouched Enriching gems in Fortune that he intended to use. They could be beneficial for Yuyui as well if she took her growth seriously.

'There's so much to the Association. I'll figure it all out and take advantage of it all after dealing with incoming bad luck. Now, let's get to the Isise,' Skullius said as he began what would be a rather exciting, surprisingly quick and highly beneficial mission in the troubled lands outside the harsh cold of this region.