The flimsy wooden box rattled and creaked under Eik’s weight as he gazed out over the crowd.

“What the hell is this guy doing now?” Heath groaned from his place in line at a stall that sold grilled skewers of meat.

Eik stood in the middle of the busiest street of Forest’s largest marketplace so people were forced to walk around him as they passed. He dug around the rucksack of holding and pulled out two vials.

“Does he always have to be so conspicuous?” Sonja agreed. Atla and Mikla had exchanged alliance credits for enough money to enjoy a whole day out and then some. Even though they had come along to Earth for safety Eik had asked them to stay back for this. Their presence could undermine what he had planned.

“Gather around, everybody! Gather around to witness the next, great step for mankind in our fiery battle for survival!” Eik shouted and shook the potion bottles. People barely deigned to offer him a glance. Nonplussed he kept talking. “My name is Eik Magnasen, and this potion will show you horizons you didn’t even know existed! One small step for man, one giant leap for you, as they say. Your power will surge to unimaginable heights!”

“I mean, he’s not even a particularly good salesman…” Heath said. “He sounds like a shady ol’ swindler selling snake oil at the side of the road. He’s got passion though, I’ll give him that.”

“Go home, guy!” an unseen voice yelled from the crowd.

“Yeah, you’re embarrassing yourself,” added another.

“Oh yeah?” Eik challenged the voices. “What rank are you then?”

A third voice joined in. “I’m F-rank! What about it?”

“Ah, okay, that’s actually a little…” Eik conceded. “Any E-ranks in?”

A small group had stopped at this point, if simply to watch the strangeness unfolding. A few begrudgingly raised hands.

“Alright, perfect! Any of you ever wish to instantly become, oh, I don’t know, D-rank? Drink this and that’s exactly what’s going to happen!”

“Okay, maybe he’s a little better than I thought…” Heath acknowledged begrudgingly.

Murmurs ran through the crowd, like a “yeah, obviously”, but nobody offered themselves to test the suspicious, dark liquid.

“I see your hesitation. It’s understandable,” Eik said as he massaged his brow theatrically before snapping a finger at Heath. “Luckily, my trusty assistant here is willing to show you just how amazing this groundbreaking product truly is! Please offer a round of applause to my friend, Heath! And my name was Eik Magnasen!”

The crowd, which had now grown to twice its size, turned in sync to stare at the tank, freshly grilled skewer halfway into his mouth.

“Come on up, my friend!” Eik called, smiling like a sleazy salesman.

“I take it all back. The guy sucks hard,” Heath grumbled. “And come up where? He’s standing on a crate of vegetables.” He made his way to Eik nonetheless.

“Heath, everybody!” Eik the showman shouted. “Now, Heath, can you tell us your power rank, please?”

“Uh, yeah, it’s E-rank.”

“And if I told you I could get you to perform on a level that could almost be called D-rank, would you believe me?”

“Yeah, of course. I’ve already tried i—”

“Well, you better start believing because it really is true! Crush this brick with your bare hands.” Eik gave him a brick that had suddenly appeared in his hand. Heath sighed, held it firmly and punched, splitting it in two.

“Now, why don’t you take this and show us what you can do then?” Eik said and offered one of the vials to Heath. The tank pulled the cork and downed the elixir and practically glowed with new strength. A second brick was already in the alchemist’s hand and Heath took it. He held it up high and shattered it into pieces with a crack that echoed across the heads of everyone present.

“Amazing!” Eik shouted, clapping vigorously. “Now that is what you can expect from Eik Magnasen’s Potion of Mighty Strength as well as any other elixir I offer!”

A voice called out. “The guy was just holding back on the first one! You’re a fraud!” Some others seemed to agree.

“You saw him drink it. Why don’t you come up at try it yourself, friend? You’re E-rank, right?”

The man hesitated, but people quickly started to egg him on to step up. “It’s free,” Eik sang and shook the vial. Eventually he gave in and snatched it out of Eik’s hand with a scowl and upended it with little hesitation.

“Ergh, that’s disgusting!” he spat but then his eyes widened. “What’s—…” He jumped, flapping and kicking as the unexpected explosive power threw him off balance and delivered him ass first to the ground where people had to leap out of the way. “That’s… Give me- Give me one of those bricks,” he said and Eik tossed him the one he’d already been holding.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

The man repeated Heath’s feat of strength and destroyed the block thoroughly. “Holy sh— Holy shit!” he yelled. “I’ll buy it! I’ll buy your whole inventory!”

“Now, now,” Eik chuckled. “You did help with my demonstration, so as a gesture of good faith I’ll sell you one vial of Potion of Mighty Strength. Unfortunately, I’ve sold almost everything I had to Mission Central, so any doubters of the efficacy of my wares can keep an ear out in the coming days.”

“So what was the point of this whole spiel then?” a woman asked.

Eik gazed calmly around the throng that had brought traffic almost to a complete halt. “It just so happens that I make these potions myself. While I will do my best to make supply available, please make sure to keep an eye out as I expect them to disappear like farts through a hemp pyjamas. And my name was Eik Magnasen.”

He stepped off the crate and made his way through the mass of people which parted in front of him. A few tried to get him to sell to them but most still seemed doubtful of the truth of his claims.

Well, that wasn’t really a problem. They would learn once Travis started handing out the potions to his subordinates. All Eik had to worry about for now was the creation of more product.

Heath and Sonja caught up with him. He maintained a fast pace. “Leaving so quickly? Most people didn’t buy it.” the tank asked as he finished the last of the skewers.

“Just a bit of insurance is all. I want the rumors to spread and get out of here before they can ask too many questions,” Eik said. “That’s the most important thing right now.”

“Rumors?”

“There’s no way I’m going to let anyone block the spread of information about the potions, nor my involvement in its production. I know Travis said that the leaders are starting to come around to our point of view since Atla grated up Boulder Fist Gary like a block of cheese, but at this point I just can’t trust that they won’t try to get in my way.” He scowled as he spoke.

Heath and Sonja said nothing.

“I need everyone in this damned city to know that I’m the origin of these potions. That working with us instead of against us is in their best interest. The way the old guard at the debrief dismissed Bart’s assault on you, Heath… I want them afraid of doing dumb shit like that again.”

“You want to lead the city?”

Eik snorted. “Not even a little bit. I just don’t want to be treated like some kind of misbehaving underling. I want enough power and influence to help our people. To help Olivia.”

“That… kinda sounds like what a leader is, mate,” Heath grinned.

“And you kind of sound like someone who should shut up.” Eik punched a laughing Heath in the shoulder.

“But now you can help Olivia, right?” Sonja added. “Isn’t that why you made killing that B-rank monster a part of your price to Travis?”

Eik’s jaw tightened as he stared at the ground. “Yeah…”

“When?”

“He already dispatched a B-rank scouting expert to find it. Once they do, Travis is leading a team of two other B-rankers to hunt it down.”

“I suppose that isn’t terribly expensive for the right to buy a portion of your supply,” Heath said.

“Nobody wanted to help me go after it until I could offer something they wanted… But at least three B-rankers will definitely get the job done.”

“Why did you insist on coming along when they go after it then?”

He glowered. “I want to make sure it’s harvested correctly, and… I’m angry, Heath. I want to extract the venom from that vile fucker with my own two hands.”

***

The next day Mikla brought Eik back to headquarters for a short visit so he could buy more ingredients for Potions of Mighty Strength class 1. More than anything he wanted try out more of the recipes from the alchemy book but diversifying too much too early was probably not going to be the best way to go about establishing himself. He needed large quantities of something people knew.

Spending a good chunk of his remaining funds, he bought enough ingredients for three hundred more potions. He’d have to find a way to get his hands on more credits to keep everything running smoothly. Money was becoming a bigger issue than ability now that he had hit Instinct of Toxin.

Mikla’s best advice for quick cash was to hit the challenges in the Crucible both for E-rank as well as D-rank, where, if he could shatter more records, he would be able to make a lot more credits than F-rank had given.

Another option was paid gigs. Much like Forest, the alliance also offered paid missions for Awakened to kill monsters or handle otherwise dangerous situations. Monsters and Awakened wildlife was simply a part of the world and had to be managed. Such missions were also used as opportunities for the Awakened to grow stronger and as incentive for budding combat specialists.

And finally, he could simply sell some of his supply in Gimleh, the host city of the Nidafjeld Alliance headquarters. With the countless number of Awakened looking for potions as well as professional retailers willing to buy large quantities, he could probably find buyers and make a healthy profit, even if the potions wouldn’t be deemed quite as rare and valuable there as they currently were on Earth.

Eik almost felt a little overwhelmed by the rapid progress of his abilities as he measured enough ingredients for a single batch to fill the cauldron up to its maximum capacity.

Even the amount of purple miasma from this many magical plants and other alchemical components, such as the bone marrow of the horned bulkbeast, failed to offer any meaningful resistance against the terrifying destructive power of Profound Toxin.

He still hadn’t succeeded in unifying the opposing forces of Profound Toxin and the internal Ak’ki beyond the shallow overlap he’d managed back in the other world. But at this rate it was only a matter of time before he did.

The most time consuming part of the process ended up being draining the liquid from the mixture. At the end he had managed to make enough for more than three hundred vials. Lacking empty potion bottles, he stored the product in a much larger sealable glass container, save for an amount equal to about fifty vials which he saved for Earth.

He’d have to find out how to correctly make them into pills. Vials were a total storage nightmare.

After testing a spoonful of the product, a potion seller bought the entire container worth two hundred and fifty doses. The guy tried to get him to part with it for thirty percent above the price of the ingredients themselves.

Eik had had the forethought to ask both Mikla and Wanji about approximate pricing standards ahead of time and managed to pump the deal up to double the ingredient price. The retailer also said he would buy more of similar quality at a similar price point.

Mikla took him back to Forest in the evening of the same day. Heath, Sonja, and Michael had moved in with Eik until the situation with the unfriendly faction in the settlement became clearer. They thought Michael’s F-rank mother would be safer staying at home.

Atla and Mikla had duties back at the headquarters but tried to take turns to stay on Earth to the extend they were able. With the political developments in their favor and Eik’s new role as the invaluable potion pusher, they had decided to make Forest their base again.

That night Eik went to bed early. In the morning he would check out the site for the second part of Travis’ payment. The site where Eik’s Excellent Elixirs would be reborn.