Chapter 3 Episode 3: Poison and Medicine
When I woke up the next morning and got my slimes together, I noticed one I had never seen before, yet it was one I had a contract with. I used Monster Appraisal on it.
Medicine Slime
SKILLS: Medicine Production 3, Poison Resistance 3, Disease Resistance 5, Physical Attack Resistance 1, Jump 3, Consume 3, Absorb 3, Split 3, Spear Mastery 1
I didn’t remember any medicine slimes, so this must have evolved from something else. Considering the Spear Master skill, I suspected it was a poison slime. Much like some medicines could act as poison in certain circumstances, so too could poison work as medicine if used correctly. Never before had a slime that evolved once evolved again, however. It could have achieved the conditions for evolution by consuming the medicine I spilled a couple nights ago, but I thought the cleaners did that. If so, this may have once been a cleaner.
To check, I had all my poison slimes gather around, then filled a stone container with leftover antidote that the slimes began to drink on their own, additional evidence that it may have been a poison slime that evolved. I spilled one bottle of antidote and ended up with one evolved poison slime, so I added enough antidote to the container to fill five bottles.
While they drank, I made many more containers and commanded the medicine slime to show me what it could create. The medicine slime spat up fluid in each container, some thick and some thin. I appraised them all.
Ointment
Styptic
Antidote
Poison (Fast-Acting)
Poison (Slow-Acting)
Paralytic (Fast-Acting)
Paralytic (Slow-Acting)
Bactericide
Curious about the bactericide, I appraised it for more detail.
Bactericide
Created by a medicine slime. Possesses powerful sterilizing effects. Kills bacteria and viruses on the applied area. Must be stored in a sealed container, or else the moisture will instantly evaporate. Harmless to humans.
It sounded like an antiseptic, which I couldn’t have been happier about. I was worried to go anywhere outside Jamil territory, from a health perspective. But not wanting to spend too much longer at the mine, I decided to head to the store.
■ ■ ■
I collected all my slimes and headed to town, arriving after my store had opened. I entered through the employee entrance and found Carme.
“Good morning, Boss.”
“Good morning, Carme.”
“Boss, did something happen to you?”
“Why do you ask?”
“You always arrived before opening time, but today and yesterday you arrived after, so I was wondering why.”
“Oh, I’m fine, just a bit of a kerfuffle the last couple mornings.”
“That’s good to hear, but if anything does happen, please tell me.”
“Thank you.”
“Actually, this is a good time to ask that you come to work around this time from now on.”
“Why?”
“You always end up doing all the pre-opening work yourself, so we don’t have any work to do. It would help to train newer employees if you could get used to letting them do their jobs.”
“I never thought about how I was stealing all the work. I guess you’re right. By the way, Carme, are Fay or Lilyn available at the moment?”
“Fay is out front, and Lilyn should be in the break room. Why?”
“I actually had a suggestion regarding store security, so I wanted to ask for their opinions.”
“I see. Then wait in the office. I’ll come get you in a moment.”
I did as asked, and a moment later, Carme and Lilyn came to see me. She was in the room directly across from this one, so Carme’s request didn’t seem all that necessary.
“Good morning, Boss. I hear you wanted to ask me something.”
“Good morning, Lilyn. I actually wanted to talk about the windows. If someone wanted to break in through those, it’d be pretty easy, right?”
“Yes, a hammer or an axe would do the trick. We’ve been watching them closely.”
“Thank you for all your hard work. So, if I made the windows unbreakable, would that reduce your workload?”
“Obviously, but how would you do that?”
I took a condensed hardening fluid board out of my Dimension Home. Carme looked at it and raised an eyebrow.
“Is this window glass?”
“Not exactly.”
“But judging by the shape and transparency, I don’t see what else it could be. Even if it’s not, this could be used as window glass! Did you make this?”
“Yes, but I don’t plan to put it on sale, if that’s what you’re thinking. They’d be too laborious to mass-produce.”
“I see. Forgive my excitement.”
“Don’t worry about it. Like you said, though, we can use these as window glass. Unlike glass, though, these are plenty durable.” I punched the glass a few times with my unenhanced hand. Lilyn squinted at the sight of it.
“Boss, may I try?”
“Of course, Lilyn. I have extras, so you’re free to break it if you can.”
We gave Lilyn some space, and she punched the board a few times, but it didn’t leave a dent. Next she tried it with what seemed to be enhancement magic, but only managed to crack it a bit.
“It’s certainly sturdy,” she said. “Replacing all the windows on the first floor with these would make it harder for criminals to break in, no doubt about that. But if we were cornered, we wouldn’t be able to escape through the windows. That’s something we’ll have to be wary of.”
“I never considered that. Maybe if there was a way to easily open them from the inside. I might need to think about this.”
“But this will be great for keeping the enemy out. Installing a few to reduce the avenues they can sneak in from would be a good idea. Besides, as long as we know the windows aren’t an escape route, we can plan alternatives.”
“I see. Then you don’t mind if I replace the windows with these?”
“Please do.”
I began work on replacing the store’s wooden windows with my condensed hardening fluid boards. I started from the back of the store, where no customers were. Next I did the side of the store facing our neighboring store, then the side facing the road. I was going to end with the front, which faced the residential district, but then I heard shouts from inside the store.
“What’d you do to my laundry?! Is this place supposed to wreck its customers’ clothes?!” someone growled. I rushed to the entrance and saw a seedy man picking a fight with Fina, with Fay trying to intervene. On the counter sat clothes that were torn from the collar to the hem, something that our cleaning process could never produce. The bag it came in was unharmed, so it couldn’t have gotten caught on something and damaged when it was being carried. I knew the man was creating an excuse to complain, but it was still vexing. Sincere complaints were one thing, but I couldn’t accept these lies. At times like these, firmly objecting to the malicious customer was of the utmost importance. That didn’t apply when there were actual problems, but you must never answer to ludicrous demands.
“What’s the problem, Sir?” I said to the whining man.
“Boss?” Fay responded before the man did. I shot a look at the man to signal that I would take care of this. Fay understood and made space for whatever action was necessary.
“Who the hell are you, shrimp?! Piss off!”
“I’m afraid I can’t do that. I’m the manager. Has my store done something to offend you?”
The man’s eyebrow twitched. “Yeah, you bet it has! Your dump of a store ruined my best clothes! You’d best pay up for the damages, you scammer!”
“May I see that for a moment?” I asked and took the clothes in question to investigate. I had to make it look like I took the complaints seriously. If I decided that his complaints were false before properly checking the clothes, it would harm my reputation. Not that I cared what this ruffian thought, but ordinary customers were watching.
The collar had clearly been sliced with a blade, and it appeared that the clothes were torn apart from there. They could have been damaged during cleaning if they were washed by hand, but the cleaner slimes lacked the power to rip this cloth. The customer’s dishonesty was plain to see. My slimes could never have done what he claimed, so he didn’t even do enough research to make a valid complaint. I had been public about the use of slimes at my laundromat since we first opened, so he would have been better off bringing melted clothes.
“You can’t lie about my business like this, Sir,” I said, looking the man right in the eye.
“You calling me a liar?! You telling me those clothes ain’t ripped?! Not only do you not say sorry, but you say I’m wrong?! What kind of place is this?! You’re all corrupt!” the man yelled so all the other customers could hear.
“Then I’ll prove it,” I declared. The man looked confused, and all the other customers turned to look at me. “One moment, please. I’ll demonstrate how we wash clothes at this establishment. I’m sure you see why this couldn’t have happened.”
I had Fay handle the crowd, then grabbed a cleaner slime from the back of the store and brought it to the customers. “Now, I’ll need some clothes to wash. Would someone like to lend me their laundry? I’ll wash it for you, on the house.” A few of the customers spoke up. “You there, then. Thank you.” I took a bag of clothes from a man in the crowd and dumped it out on the counter. It contained a shirt and pants that were thoroughly covered in blood. His clothes were normal, but he was brawny enough that I took him to be an adventurer.
“Watch this,” I said and ordered the cleaner slime to begin its ordinary laundry process. It wasn’t long before the blood began to disappear from the clothes. Customers gasped with surprise from all around, and less than twenty seconds later, the shirt and pants were all clean. “See? There you have it. There’s no way anyone’s clothes could end up like yours did.”
“B-But—”
“If you think this is a fluke, I can keep going until you change your mind.”
After I washed clothes for another ten customers, the man had nothing more to say. “Slimes don’t have the ability to do this kind of damage to begin with,” I said, ready to finish him off with a reasoned argument. “They don’t have claws or fangs to slice cloth, nor do they have the strength to tear it. Our slimes take the clothes into their bodies and consume the filth in the stains. No physical strength is exerted as it would be during normal handwashing. Not only do we never tear clothes, but the slimes do little damage any sort to cloth. I’ve been washing my clothes with this method for close to three years, and not once has it ever ruined clothes. I can confidently say that this damage wasn’t caused by my laundromat.”
Everyone but the troublemaker seemed to be convinced. This wasn’t a problem we caused, so the other customers wouldn’t come away with a bad impression. Now I didn’t need to be generous to the ruffian.
“Now, you’re obstructing business, so I’m going to turn you over to the guards. I hope you’re willing to cooperate.”
“Like hell I am!” The man howled and swung his arm at me. It was a reflexive attack without much weight behind it. I twisted out of the way, grabbed the arm, and threw the man over my shoulder. The crowd didn’t want to be anywhere near him, so I made sure he landed away from anyone. He fell on his behind and his leg hit the counter, making a dull sound. The pain from the fall made him cry out and writhe.
“I believe this is justifiable self-defense.”
Not everyone watching was an adventurer, so I decided to leave it at that.
“Fay, can you take care of this?”
“Leave it to me,” he said, and in due time, he had restrained the man and dragged him outside. Now I only needed someone to go call a guard.
I looked at the counter and saw the cleaner slime wiping up the counter. When I threw the man, some mud fell from his shoe. Watching the slime work was somehow soothing. After that, the store returned to regular business and a guard took the man away, quelling the commotion.
“Lunch is ready!” I heard from the kitchen, not realizing it was noon already. When we went to the back of the store, Fina approached.
“Boss, Fay, thank you so much.”
“It’s part of the job,” Fay said. “Besides, I didn’t do much this time. It was all him.”
“I’m the boss, after all. If people like this are coming to my store, I have to do something about it.”
“You sure are strong, Boss!”
“But are you sure you should have done so much laundry for free?”
“It won’t have that great an effect on our sales. The important thing was to show the customers that the man was lying. If they thought we made such a big mistake, we could have lost customers and sales.”
“That’s true,” Carla agreed.
I never believed I could convince all people that my work was perfect. Someone was always going to be dissatisfied, and that was their right. I couldn’t change everyone’s mind, and I didn’t plan on trying. But if they spread their frustration to other customers, that was a problem.
“Next time you’re going to deal with a troublemaker yourself, Boss, please tell us first. I was scared stiff.”
“We didn’t know you were so strong.”
I forgot that I looked like an eleven-year-old from time to time. I never had a chance to display my strength to my employees before this, either. “I’m sorry, I forgot to tell you,” I said. Communication was important.
Despite all that transpired, I managed to replace all the windows in the store with my condensed hardening fluid boards after lunch. A bit before night, I visited Serge’s store on the way home. Now that I had a medicine slime, I wanted to buy bottles to contain the medicine from the medicine slime, in addition to other items.
“Welcome, Master Ryoma.”
“Hello, Serge. I’m here for some personal shopping today.”
“What do you need?”
“I’d like to buy tons of bottles that I could put medicine in.”
“Tons of them?”
“Yes. I learned to mix medicine from my grandmother, and now that I have some time available, I’d like to make some. There’s always the threat of injury on an adventuring job, so I’d like to prepare for that eventuality.”
“But if you want to buy that many bottles, it would be cheaper to register as a drug store with the merchant’s guild and have them buy the bottles through a wholesaler for you.”
He had a point, so I followed Serge’s advice and decided not to buy bottles at his store. Instead I took more cloth to produce waterproof cloth with, then left.
■ ■ ■
When I got to the merchant’s guild, I was of course let into the reception room.
“What is it today? Need more employees?”
“No, it’s something else this time.” I explained what I came here for.
“So you want to buy medicine bottles, you say? Just how many talents do you have?” she asked, so I took some antidote out of my Item Box to present as a sample. The guildmaster appraised the bottle and grinned. “Not bad, boy. That’s more than good enough to put on sale. You could run a drug store if you wanted.”
“I’m not planning to for the time being.”
“You’ll be doing well enough for yourself just opening branches for your current business, I’m sure. You can just keep that option in mind, in case you ever need to take it. Maybe if you don’t have the money to open a branch store, you could sell medicine as a side job. I’d buy it all off you, at least.”
“You would?”
“I have a lot of faith in you. Besides, before I got the position I have today, I specialized in medicine. This is a quality product you have here, and with my connections, I’d have any number of places to sell it.”
“I never knew you specialized in medicine. Thank you, I’ll remember your offer.”
I thanked the guildmaster and bought bottles, pots, and funnels for medicine production. On the way to the gate, I also purchased some food before I headed to the mine. The sun still hadn’t set, so I didn’t need to use any magic as I ran back, and I ran into many adventurers on the way. They were coming back from a grell frog hunt. They smelled of the swamp, so it was easy to tell. When I was cleaning the pit toilets, I used deodorizing fluid to wash my hands and remove the stench. Maybe that was something I could put up for sale. Earth had deodorizing products too, so I decided that I would go to the store early tomorrow to discuss it with Carme and Carla.
■ ■ ■
I had dinner early, then spent the rest of the night researching my medicine slime. I lost track of the time and went to sleep late, but it was worth it, as I got the chance to watch my five poison slimes evolve into medicine slimes. My hypothesis was correct, and this confirmed that my other slimes may also have additional evolutionary possibles. Slimes were deep.
After they evolved, I called it a night and took a drink from Tekun’s goblet. I did have one problem with it. While I hated to complain about something I got for free, the energy cost was a bit much. A cup of wine required close to thirty-thousand points of magical energy, according to my status board. Even if my energy were full, I could only produce six cups. But six cups was probably an excessive amount of wine for one night, so for a magical goblet that generated wine from out of nowhere, maybe the high cost was to be expected. It served as a good reminder not to drink too much. I only ever drank socially and never tested my limits, so I stopped after two drinks, then got in bed. The wine was delicious, but I regretted not having any snacks to eat with it. I hoped to rectify that going forward.
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