Chapter 290: She’s Trouble
I wiped a sheen of sweat from my forehead with the back of my forearm, my back letting out a dull, aching groan as I finally stood up straight.
We had been hunched over the main cauldron for hours, carefully adjusting the mana flow and precise heat levels to match the exact specifications from The Celestial Nectar.
Sitting in the glass rack on the central workbench was a single, newly brewed vial.
The liquid inside was a brilliant, iridescent silver-blue that spun with liquid-light swirls, humming with a soft, perfectly stable mana frequency.
It was light-years ahead of our original formula, denser, vastly more potent, and completely impossible to copy without the stabilizing parameters I had retrieved from the Raith archives.
A tired, entirely satisfied grin broke across my face as I looked down at the finished product.
"Well?" I turned around, resting my hands on my hips as I looked at the two alchemists in training standing beside me.
"Did you both manage to learn the sequence, or do I need to run through the base steps again?"
Tessa leaned against the edge of the workbench, her cheeks still slightly flushed from the steam and the long hours. She twirled a lock of her hair around her finger, a sharp, incredibly alluring smirk curving her lips as her eyes locked onto the glowing glass.
"Please, handsome. Who do you think you’re talking to?" She purred, reaching out to lightly trace the edge of the vial with her fingernail.
"The heat control for that secondary moon-grass extraction was tricky, sure, but my hands don’t slip. Give me three days and a proper supply of ingredients, and I’ll have a full batch ready to shatter those little merchant guilds."
Zen, on the other hand, was practically pressing his nose against the glass, his eyebrows knit tightly together in pure, unadulterated awe. He crossed his arms, letting out a low, gravelly hrumph as he straightened his back, trying—and failing—to maintain his stern grandfather persona.
"Hmph! Don’t get arrogant, brat!" Zen huffed, though he couldn’t hide the genuine, fiery excitement burning in his eyes.
"The mana integration step is absurdly volatile, one wrong degree of flame and the whole cauldron would have blown us into the upper atmosphere! But... tch. It’s brilliant. Absolute genius. I’ve already memorized the core formula. No cheap counterfeiter in the capital is ever going to replicate this level of purity."
I nodded, thoroughly satisfied with their responses.
With Tessa’s sharp adaptability and Zen’s deep foundational mastery, the production of the upgraded elixir was in more than capable hands.
I picked up the vial, gently placing it into a protective padded velvet pouch inside my coat. As I looked around the sprawling workshop, though, I realized something was missing. The usual background noise of the village’s main defense squad was completely absent.
"By the way..." I asked, turning back to face them. "Where are Scarlet, Yenna, and Mira? I haven’t seen any of them since I got here."
Tessa blinked, adjusting her leather apron before wiping a smudge of soot from her cheek.
"Oh, those three? They headed out into the northern forest earlier this morning. Said something about hunting a few high-grade magic beasts for extra hide and mana cores. They’ll probably be back by tonight."
I raised a single eyebrow, crossing my arms.
"They all went at once? Then what about the security of the village? Leaving Oak Haven without its main combat force while we’re dealing with black-market syndicates isn’t exactly ideal."
Before Tessa could answer, Chief Zen slammed his heavy wooden stirring paddle onto the stone table with a loud THUD.
He puffed out his massive chest, aggressively flexing his boulder-like biceps until the sleeves of his robe looked ready to tear at the seams.
"Oi, you brat! Did you just say something about our security?!" Zen roared, his gray beard twitching with indignant rage.
"Are you implying this old man can’t protect his own village without a couple of young girls hovering around?! I was breaking monster skulls with my bare fists before your father was even wearing diapers!"
Tessa rolled her eyes so hard it looked painful, leaning over to whisper audibly to me, "Ignore him, Jin. His lower back went out twice last week just lifting a sack of moon-grass."
"I HEARD THAT, YOU UNGRATEFUL BRAT!" Zen yelled, pointing a thick, calloused finger at her while Tessa just stuck her tongue out in reply.
I couldn’t help but let out a small chuckle, shaking my head at the absolute circus in front of me. After the cold, calculated madness of the Raith manor, this chaotic banter was oddly refreshing.
"Alright, alright, I get it," I said, raising my hands in surrender. "I’ll leave the perimeter in your very capable, back-strained hands, Chief."
"Get out of my workshop, you smart-mouthed runt!" Zen huffed, though a fond, gruff grin cracked through his stern expression as he turned back to clean the cauldron.
Before stepping out toward the exit, I turned back to the workbench, my expression shifting back into serious business.
"One more thing before I go," I said, leaning against the wooden table. "I’ve officially made a deal with Matthew Vance, the head of the Imperial Merchant Guild."
Zen stopped scrubbing the bronze cauldron, and Tessa’s eyes instantly sharpened.
"Vance?" Zen rumbled, crossing his thick arms. "The big merchant titan from the capital?"
"The very same," I nodded. "The Guild is going to actively hunt down the counterfeiters, expose the traitors who broke our original contracts, and clean up our trade routes. In exchange, they get exclusive distribution rights to this new, upgraded batch once you start producing it."
Tessa let out a low, appreciative whistle. "Exclusive capital distribution through the Vance network... That doesn’t just fix our sales bottleneck, Jin. That completely multiplies our profit margins by tenfold."
"Exactly," I said, looking between the two of them. "We handle the brewing here, and Vance handles the muscle and logistics in the capital. The thieves who stole our work are about to get completely squeezed out."
Zen nodded approvingly, a rare look of deep respect in his weathered eyes. "A sharp move, brat. We’ll handle our end of the bargain. You just keep your head clear."
Satisfied that everything was locked into place, I said my final goodbyes and headed up the stone stairwell out of the workshop.
As I pushed through the rear door of the estate, the crisp evening air hit my face. The sun was dipping low below the horizon, painting the sky in deep shades of crimson, violet, and burning gold.
I took a deep breath, about to turn down the path toward Agnes’s house, when a soft, sudden tug on my sleeve pulled me backward into the shadow of the doorway.
I spun around, but before I could react, Tessa grabbed my hand, her fingers tight against mine. A wicked, playful grin flashed across her face in the fading twilight.
"Tessa, what—"
She didn’t give me a chance to finish. Tessa pulled me down by my lapels and locked her lips straight onto mine.
This wasn’t like her quick, teasing greeting from earlier. This time, she kissed me thoroughly, deep and possessive, completely consuming my senses until my head swam. Her fingers tangled into the hair at the back of my neck, holding me right where she wanted me.
Just as I felt my body completely give in to the heat, she subtly tilted her head. Her sharp teeth pressed against the side of my neck, nipping down firmly enough to leave a small, lingering sting and a very visible red bite mark right above my collar.
Slowly, Tessa pulled back, her chest heaving slightly as her eyes looked up into mine with pure, triumphant satisfaction. She ran her thumb gently over my bruised neck, her smirk widening.
"Just a little souvenir so you don’t forget who’s waiting for you back here, handsome," she purred softly, giving my hand one last, lingering squeeze before stepping back into the shadows.
I stood there in the quiet twilight for a second, rubbing my neck with a exasperated, half-amused shake of my head.
She’s absolute trouble, I thought, pulling up my collar just enough to hide the mark before turning back toward the path leading to Agnes’s place.