D.E.M.O.N.S: Getting Summoned Weekly isn't so Bad - Chapter 2075 Flight of the Lost Part 2

Chapter 2075: Chapter 2075 Flight of the Lost Part 2

— Kat —

Appoline decided to meet with LIN. Kat was genuinely surprised at the decision, having thought that Appoline would’ve preferred to go Steel. Kat was somewhat correct in that guess, as if it was simply a matter of preference Appoline was quite sure that Steel would be less of a pain to work with… but not safer. Steel wasn’t going to personally guard her for weeks at a time. Instead he’d give that job to someone else he trusted and Appoline knew that the guards were fairly infiltrated.

According to what she knew, it wasn’t really a matter of them being disloyal so much as it was a matter of small things. Guards liked to talk, and being a good friend to one guard, or a group of them, meant just hanging out would get you a lot of information that you probably shouldn’t have. There were exceptions, but if Appoline wasn’t shuffled around constantly then someone would leak her location…

And once her family had proven they were willing to go after her, then there was nothing stopping them from trying again. It’s not like her opinion of the Fleurs could go much lower at the current point in time. Though Kat did find that part interesting… “What about the half of the family that didn’t go after you? I was told it was a pretty major split.”

“Fuck ’em,” spat Appoline. “It’s not like I was hidden in some obscure spot in the town. I was in the compound and they didn’t exactly hide where I was. Oh I’m sure that whoever was responsible for imprisoning me had a bunch of redundancies around and the guard schedule was likely carefully curated… but I was RIGHT THERE. I know the family has four Rank 2’s at most and if one of them had decided to come and help me? There wouldn’t be much the rest could do.

“Especially if they simply told the guards. Like, don’t get me wrong I do at least understand why they might not want to do that. Not airing our internal issues has been policy for a long time… but with the poisoning it would’ve been easy for that half to come out smelling like roses if they teamed up with the guards, and if Steel found out that I was locked up in the compound? I’d bet that he’d have come and rescued me even if it was just to get my help cleaning up the mess. Considering he let you come and help me? I’d say it’s a solid guess.”

Kat nodded, “Right… so basically, they had options, didn’t take them and you’re not happy because of it?”

“It goes a bit beyond ’not happy’ with them. I’ve sort of been on the outs with the family for years because of some… mistakes I made in my youth. Nothing I consider too serious but it was a big scandal at the time. I just ruined a few greenhouses worth of plants but it wasn’t even anything particularly rare or valuable. Rebuilding the greenhouses probably cost more then the plants inside…

“But they made a big deal about it as if I’d completely killed off one of our rare plants species, and this was decades ago now. Still, it’s one of the reasons I got into the thieves guild. They were pretty willing to let me make… just about whatever as long as I paid for ingredients and made the occasional potion for them,” explained Appoline.

[Didn’t she say earlier that she didn’t sell potions for anything illegal?]

Kat decided that was a good question, and asked, “Didn’t you say you avoided potential legal complications with selling potions?”

“I did,” countered Appoline. “You’re forgetting that I am THE single best alchemist in the city. They never forced me to teach classes, but if I did I got a huge payout for it which helped a lot. On the questionably legal side of things though? There are plenty of difficult to brew non-poison potions that the guild wanted. I actually make a good percentage of the fertilizer potions the Fleurs and, to a lesser extent Haleblooms like to use.

“Health potions are also pretty unregulated. Well, in some ways. If you fuck up a clearly labelled health potion everyone will be on your ass but as long as they fix someone up and are clearly ladled you can sell them to basically anyone because they count as a medical necessity. I also helped make a few obscure potions, mostly beauty stuff because even if we can’t all be Lin, I can help them get closer to that ideal. Not that I think she looks all that good, but eh, if they’re paying me who cares,” shrugged Appoline.

“Wait… you make potions to help people look like Lin? Is she… ok with that?” asked Kat.

“They’re nothing like those disguise potions I recently got my hands on,” Appoline cut in. “That’s some serious stuff I didn’t really want to play around with too much. I barely mentioned them to anyway… so I’m going to have to comb through my memory to work out how they knew what it was. As for Lin? I’ve never seen her mind and its mostly anti-wrinkle stuff that Lin can manage better on herself anyway,” explained Appoline.

“You’d think people would just try to rank up,” muttered Kat.

“I know right!” agreed Appoline.

[Kat you do realise that we’re massive outliers in this case and that ranking up is hard right?]

*Yeah but if craftsmen and women can do it then surely everyone can?*

[Maybe it’s a matter of genetics or… like soul genetics? Remember, multiple people have said Nondems like you tend to rank up faster.]

*Hmm… then why does Appoline seem to agree it’s reasonable.*

[I don’t think anything Appoline says is reasonable.]

*Fine… you make a good point. It just doesn’t feel like there should be an excuse but I guess I know nothing about it.*

“So… what you just make the occasional useful potion and research?” asked Kat.

Appoline sighed, “Truthfully, I spend a lot of time making batch healing potions. For all that I’d love to claim I make good money from my fancier potions… and I do… I probably make better money from just pumping out healing potions. Certainly compared to the effort put in.”

“Really? I would’ve assumed that healing potions would’ve been hard to make considering how complicated healing someone is,” pondered Kat.

Appoline shook her head, “You’re looking at it the wrong way. Plants all naturally heal themselves and for a lot of plants it’s ALL they can do. Sure for the higher end potions that can return lost limbs or something like an eye? That’d be difficult… but just encouraging the body to heal a recent wound? There are plenty of plants that work for it and we’ve grown them for years.

“Everyone always wants healing potions, so we grow what crops we can, which get better at healing, and easier to make into potions. I can literally just dump a bunch of ingredients into my cauldron and then blast them with mana and I’d still get a useful healing potion. I put a little more effort in, but really for someone such as myself that little bit of extra effort is something close to twice as efficient.

“Plus, the opposite applies in this case too. A lot of the more complicated potions require ingredients that are only grown in small amounts if they’re even plant based. Finding monster stuff if it’s not from pests is nearly impossible. That sort of thing cuts into the margins. Sure I could theoretically charge more for this sort of thing… but after a certain point nobody could afford to buy them so I can’t make things too high. Plus, a lot of them are from a family that grows the damned ingredients so they know what it costs. Unlike healing potions where the ingredients are cheap and everyone always wants more,”

“So… on a yearly basis what makes more money?” asked Kat, genuinely curious.

“Depends on the year,” answered Appoline easily. “The fancy stuff that’s really expensive is more of a ’once a decade’ purchase for most people because they’re that expensive, keep for a long time, and you only need to use a bit every month or so. A bottle lasts about two years and then you seem to ’age’ normally after that. Doesn’t actually make you younger, it’s all appearance but it does mean that as long as you’re willing to put up with a few more years of natural aging you don’t need them constantly. I also find that people only go crazy for them at the beginning. As they age further it becomes less of a worry,”

“Ah… I guess that makes sense. I didn’t realise they lasted so long. How do you manage that?” asked Kat.

“I’ve got a special top for them to allow one drop at a time out. You then add that drop to a bathtub and allow yourself to soak in it for at LEAST an hour, preferrable two before getting out. You need the extra time to make sure it properly sinks into your face. The potion can sort of… migrate to all of your skin but its better to just soak it directly as best you can,” explained Appoline.

“Fascinating,” mumbled Kat. Even without Lily nodding along in the back of her head it really was interesting to hear about.