Chapter 277: Paired Doses
"The first store is at the end of the central passage," the clerk said. "Keep the tokens visible. The shop alchemists will record each serving and direct you to the next stop."
Rias thanked her and immediately slipped her arm through Martin’s. She leaned into his side and started toward the passage before he had decided how a fake boyfriend was supposed to stand.
He made it three steps with his arm held stiffly between them before Rias stopped and unhooked their elbows. She stepped close again, looked pointedly at his hand, and then glanced at the empty space around her waist.
"Put your arm around me. The clerk can still see us, and leaving that much space isn’t helping the cover."
Martin glanced back toward the desk, then held one hand beside her waist without touching her. "Here?"
Rias caught his wrist and guided it a little higher before settling his palm against her fitted coat just above the curve of her hip. "There. If I want more space, I’ll take it."
Her coat felt warm beneath Martin’s palm as Rias slid her arm across his back.
"Now try to walk normally."
Martin closed the lineage notice and brought up the route map, silently repeating the account-bound warning. He had to restart it twice before they reached the central passage, both times after Rias shifted against his side.
Their linked tokens cast a thin red glow across the gap between their wrists. Shopkeepers noticed the passes immediately and called out tasting offers from both sides of the passage. Rias ignored the sales pitches and followed the route the clerk had given them.
Deepwell Restoratives stood beneath a sign carved with two climbers sharing one rope. Behind the glass counter, rows of narrow flasks rested in grooved stone racks that kept them level.
A broad-shouldered alchemist scanned their tokens and waved them inside. "First time on the circuit?"
"Yes," Rias said.
His gaze moved from Martin’s hand around her waist to the names on their paired pass. "How did you two meet?"
Rias’s arm pressed more firmly against Martin’s back. "Through my best friend. Emperoar mistook me for a man, called me his bro, and spent half the day checking over his shoulder because he thought I was getting too close to her."
The alchemist’s eyebrows rose, and Martin hurried to explain. "I was used to being the only guy in our party, and I got weird when I thought another guy had joined. She knew exactly what I was thinking and let me embarrass myself."
"He helped me reach Level Sixty that day," Rias added. "By the time we finished, I knew I could trust him in a fight."
The alchemist bought their story without another question. He smiled and headed toward the shelves behind the counter.
Martin looked down at Rias. "You made me sound better than you had to."
"A cover is easier to remember when most of it actually happened." She waited until the alchemist turned his back. "You kept giving me clean openings that day. I didn’t have to lie about trusting you."
The alchemist returned with a pale-gold potion in a single wide flask. He fitted it into a forked glass measure, then pulled the stopper. The liquid flowed through two narrow channels without spilling a drop and filled a pair of identical stone cups at the same time.
He placed one cup before Martin and the other before Rias. "One potion, two matched doses. Keep your tokens linked, take a cup each, and drink together."
Martin lifted his stone cup when Rias raised hers. The pale-gold brew smelled faintly of salt and burnt orange peel.
They drank at the same time, and bitterness coated his tongue before warmth spread down his throat. The brass face of his visitor token heated against his wrist. The thin red line continued pointing toward Rias while a second, paler light circled their registered names on the display.
[Twinmend Recovery]
[Registered Mana Signatures: Emperoar / Flash Fang]
[Duration: 24 seconds]
The alchemist slid two black testing plates across the counter. "Palms down. Hers will take two percent of her maximum HP, and yours will take six."
Martin pressed his hand to the plate. A dull pull traveled up his arm as his HP bar dropped, though the plate left no wound behind. Rias lost a much smaller amount.
Pale-gold light gathered beneath their palms, and Rias recovered first. As soon as her HP bar filled, the glow around her token narrowed into a band and crossed the link into Martin’s wrist. His recovery immediately sped up, filling the rest of his bar.
Rias compared their status windows. "The potion transferred whatever I didn’t need to you as soon as my Health was full."
Martin turned his wrist, watching the pale band fade. "So it knew where both doses ended up."
"The tokens registered our mana signatures before we drank." Rias tapped the paired names. "The formula followed those instead of the cups."
Martin opened a circuit record and entered the duration. He also noted the dry, rough feeling at the back of his throat. By the time the last of the warmth faded, each swallow made the irritation worse.
Rias turned her cup over to inspect the stamp beneath it, then checked the batch mark, ingredient list, and price against the tooltip. Diluted Sea Dragon blood appeared near the bottom of the list, below three ordinary restorative herbs. So far, Twinmend had behaved exactly as Deepwell Restoratives claimed it would.
The alchemist gave them water and warned them to wait for the aftertaste to clear before drinking another recovery mixture.
Their first sample was solid alchemy wrapped in ridiculous couple branding.
The linked tokens sent them to Highstep Brews next. The shop had been built around a steep testing ramp whose upper end vanished into manufactured mist. Pairs of customers climbed through it while attendants adjusted both the slope and the simulated altitude.
Near the top, one pair disappeared from view, leaving only the red glow between their visitor tokens visible as it swayed higher with each step.