Chapter 186 - Meeting

The little girl looked conflicted for a moment but quickly accepted before leading nick away from the market and towards the part of the city where the poor lived. they walked slowly since the little girl was weak from lack of proper food and nick saw many more people in similar situations but he did not help them. after walking for about an hour the two arrived at a small church like building that was in disrepair. "is this were you live?" nick asked while frowning. the little girl nodded before opening one of the front doors which squealed from the rust on its hinges. as the door opened nick saw the inside of the building had a hard stone floor and broken pews that had been repurposed as beds while most of the windows had been boarded shut. in the center of the stone stage at the end of the building a fire was going with a large pot placed above it with a young man with a dirty face stood hunched over stirring occasionally. nick smelled the air and immediately identified at least four things wrong with the potion based on that alone.

Nick kept his side of the bargain and gave the little girl some more food before walking towards the young man stirring the pot. "you should have cleaned the pot before you added the plant in." he said startling the young man. "who are you and why are you here?" the young man stared at nick while guarding the pot asked cautiously. nick chuckled "i am called mark and as for why i am here its so i can give an aspiring alchemist a bit of a push in the right direction." he said calmly. the young man looked confused " whats an alchemist?" he asked curious. nick grinned "you see that brew you have boiling behind you?" he asked calmly. the young man nodded "an alchemist is someone who creates various types of medicines using different ingredients , very much like what you are attempting to do but correctly rather than making bad medicine like whats in that pot." nick explained patiently. the young mans eyes widened when he heard what nick said. "how is it bad medicine if it works?" the young man asked frantically.

"Most ingredients have what are know as impurities in them that have no medicinal properties and in fact can prove quite harmful to the body , if a am correct you simply put the entire plant into water to boil before bottling the reduction right?" nick asked to which the young man nodded. "in doing so you have created a substance that contains all the impurities that exist in the plant rather than removing them meaning while whoever drinks this stuff may have a small immediate benefit they are harming themselves in the long run." nick explained seriously. the young man looked horrified when he heard what nick said this . "can the impurities be removed from people?" he asked nick anxiously. nick nodded "of course they can , though the process can be a bit of a pain in the a.s.s." he said chuckling at his inside joke.