Potions for the Summer Banquet [Crafting / Solo]

[Icyferno]

Status: Healthy / Rested

~

It was a usual morning when a Person of the Land caught up to him to pass him some random envelope while he was doing his usual run to resupply. It was a strange event, for he was not exactly an outstanding person in any aspect, so the prospect of the envelope intrigued him. When he returned and read the letter, he found himself asked to prepare some supplies for a banquet to be held fairly soon. Ah, this was the invitation some others have received. He had seen some ads floating around town as well, requesting for essentially everything you would need for a banquet to be prepared and sent for some, uh, banquet.

What does one think of when a grand banquet is involved? Great food, formal attire, proper dinner etiquette, and the list goes on. It is only when one decides to start a banquet from scratch, with nothing but a pile of gold coins and rewards yet unknown to the populace, that one is forced to think of every single thing that goes into planning a banquet: From the tables and chairs to the cutlery to the napkins, this man, Executive Chef Van Rouge, either had too much money on his hands, or decided that every piece of existing furniture and ingredients available to him was unsuitable for the banquet he had in mind, and he scrapped them mindlessly regardless of their historic value. In what seemed like the most unorthodox move a Chef could make, the man invited many to prepare the various odds and ends required for this banquet, and it seemed that every industry was mobilized to meet his needs. Even Pharmacists, despite seeming to have nearly zero relation to a banquet, were asked to prepare [Antacid Elixir] and [Appetite Inducer], with properties that made sense but the ingredients he had never heard of. It would probably be because he was too lazy to check on ingredients with such properties.

Anyway, the lack of knowledge on the topic could be solved by a quick trip to his usual library followed by a brief visit to some of the nearby Pharmaceutical shops to check for the required ingredients. Why would he need to look up the ingredients, when the recipe and all was provided by the Chef? Well, each ingredient has specific properties, some of which could prove fatal should a mistake be made. As the person handling the ingredients, it was his duty to make sure he did not kill himself over something silly like ensuring the ingredient doesn’t come into contact with water lest he wanted white fumes of acid to burst forth. Even if the recipe provided came with a list of precautions, he would still check anyway. Doesn’t hurt to keep himself safe. His fears proving unfounded, he then proceeded to gather the ingredients, which were fairly different from the ones he was used to. At least, that was the case for the [Antacid Elixir]. Since the elixir’s purpose was to directly neutralize the stomach’s acidity which could be due to many reasons he was too lazy to think of or to fix heartburn, most of the ingredients were alkaline compounds which was something he had not really handled in his time here. Fortunately, the ingredients were mostly in aqueous form except for one grinded into fine powder, so in the end it seems like he had to do some solution mixing. In the real world, they were compounds dissociated into a solvent due to the energy released in bond formation being more than the energy absorbed in bond breaking or something, but over here, they were just “mysterious substances that could calm the pained eater”.

~

Word count: 616
Total word count (Pharmacist): 616 x 1.25 = 770
Note: Post 1 of 2 for [Antacid Elixir]

[Icyferno]

Status: Healthy / Rested

~

In the case of the [Antacid Elixir], it was basically just mix, heat, mix, heat, mix, done. Nothing too hard, so when he got back, he started on that one first. Actually, the [Appetite Inducer] was not much different, except a bit more hard work. For his part, he was just going to send a sample of each in, and if the Chef wanted more, he was going to have to ask for them. No point working his butt off if he’s not getting paid. Starting with one solution in a volumetric flask, he heated it over his makeshift bunsen burner which totally didn’t run like a regular bunsen burner, then toppled some powder in, stirred it for a bit, thought about what to eat later, got some other solutions in, and mixed till he got the color right.

He held the [Antacid Elixir] up to the light streaming in from his windows, making sure that the color fit the description required by the client. Nodding to himself, he carefully poured the solution into a glass flask and sealed it shut with a cork stopper thingy. One done, one more to go.

~

Word count: 192
Total word count (Pharmacist): ( 616 + 192 ) x 1.25 = 1010
Note: Post 2 of 2 for [Antacid Elixir]

[Icyferno]

Status: Healthy / Rested

~

The next potion of the list to be crafted was something known as an [Appetite Inducer]. Thankfully, he remembered to collect those ingredients on the side while collecting ingredients for the [Antacid Elixir] – They were all sold in the same stall anyway, and with a Magic Bag by his side, as in, literally hanging on a single strap which placed the Magic bag at his side, the extra ingredients did not even increase the weight. You could say he was not fazed by the ingredient collection, but when his thoughts went to the amount of Gold in his wallet growing smaller with every purchase, he could almost feel his pockets getting lighter even though his Gold was kept in his system inventory.

The potion known as [Appetite Inducer] did exactly what an average person would think it will do – make you hungry for more. A hungry person obviously eats more than a person whose stomach is filled to the point of bursting, and a huge swell in said person's stomach will make the person look pregnant regardless of gender, so people who have eaten their fill would naturally tend to lay off on the food. Deciding that the food should not enter their mouth, letting their tongues explode with taste as the food does its job of both nourishing and letting people revel in the sense of overload that comes with eating tasty food, would be an insult to the Chef. No doubt this was what Chef Van Rouge though, for that was probably the reason why such a potion recipe was prepared for mass production. “What is the point in coming for my banquet,” he might have thought, “if all you're going to do is eat a few dishes and spend most of the time socializing?” Granted, socializing was an important aspect of formal banquets, but a Chef of a high calibre would probably want people to try ALL of his dishes. Chef Van Rouge likely falls into this category, and using wealth from an unknown source, splurges to make sure that people gain at least twenty kilograms by the end of the banquet.

Hopefully he would not have the misfortune of being invited, or even worse, coerced into going. It would not be an exaggeration to say that he did not like social gathering events such as a banquet. With his poor social skills, he would much prefer to be elsewhere, be it slacking off or grinding for gold and other stuff. Judging from the scale of the crafting personnel involved, he cannot dismiss the possibility that Executive Chef Van Rouge was planning to invite at least half of Londinium to the halls of his banquet. If he wanted to thank the hired contractors by welcoming them into his hallowed passages, he was going to be out of Londinium for a while. And Avon, since the dinner party will be held there.

That said, what the purpose of such a banquet? The only thing mentioned was that Van Rouge wanted to 'serve a grand dinner party in Avon'. Who were the participants? How were these participants selected? Why were they chosen? The banquet itself was shrouded in mystery, with little details provided in the request letters except 'to craft XXX items and have it delivered to the residence of Van Rouge'. The more he thought about it, the stranger the whoe thing seemed, making him drop his null hypothesis that Van Rouge either really had a lot of money to spend or did not like historically important furniture or something. At second glance, it seemed like there was more to this banquet that meets the eye, but he was unable to discern any clues or hidden messages which point to the answer which he sought.

His hands paused, then rested on the table as his mind swirled with thoughts, taking apart the information he had on hand and trying to assemble it in some meaningful way. Firstly, he had never even heard of this 'Executive Chef Van Rouge' before this whole thing about needing a lot of crafted stuff, and not just speed crafted stuff, but hand crafted ones, which are more expensive on the market. The fact that there was a totally unknown wealthy Person of the Land was intriguing as there was no interaction with Adventurers on his part until now. But perhaps there was, and he had just missed it. After all, you tend to miss things when you're cooped up in your apartment. Money would most likely come from a noble, or nobles, pulling his strings, or from deep personal reserves, which leads to the question of why. Nobody just throws a massive party, just because. Even in the days of old, banquets and dinner parties were often used to début young children into the world of political strife, with the scale depending on the wealth of the family. Perhaps this was something similar? It would still not explain the crafted stuff though. If he were going by that assumption though, it would then become logical as to why he wanted items personally crafted. Rich people could afford to do so for their child's once in a lifetime event (apart from marriage, of course). But why would EVERYTHING have to crafted from scratch?

~

Word count: 879
Total word count (Pharmacist): ( 616 + 192 + 879 ) x 1.25 = 2108.75
Note: Post 1 of 2 for [Appetite Inducer]

[Icyferno]

Status: Healthy / Rested

~

He spent the next few minutes mulling over what seemed like an impossible solution as there was too little data on hand; and even now, he was tethering on a bunch of hypothesis which may not even hold true in the end. He decided that in the end, he should not worry too much about it. As long as it did not affect him, and he was getting paid, there should be little reason to turn down the job, although it seemed shady.

Snatching the base solution off of the table, he emptied the contents into the reaction chamber, also known as a volumetric flask in this case. He then proceeded to add another solvent, did some shaking, add a third one, shook the flask more, then heated it with the remains of his fire.

In a process that took ten gruelling minutes, most of which was staring at the solution while it heated, he was done! He transferred the solution into a conical flask after checking the potion for colour consistency and stuff, then packaged them up by shoving both into the dark recesses of his Magic Bag. Picking up his things and cleaning up after himself, he was out in another five minutes, his feet taking him to a place where he could have his goods delivered with the rest of the goods that the Adventurers stationed in Londinium were sending over to Avon.

Upon his arrival, he was greeted with the sight of a medium sized carriage loaded with furniture, dull, silver metal boxes of various sizes which probably held potions like the ones he made, cutlery, napkins and the like. Obviously, some things such as food were prepared and delivered to Van Rouge all in Avon, unless people could transport themselves over from the comfort of their kitchens in the blink of an eye. Invitation letters and such were probably on the wagon, though. For a brief moment, he wondered how they stored the mana ice clusters, considering metal was a good conductor of heat and would thus conduct away the chill to the surroundings due to temperature difference, but that was their own problem to solve. Also, he DID see a few wooden crates, so maybe that was it. How many people were even involved in this? With this amount of things, assume the volume of stuff remained constant throughout the crafting period, it would amount to a massive stockpile of goods on Van Rouge's end. What kind of scale was this banquet on? How much expenses would the man have incurred? The Swashbuckler doubted this man even had trouble purchasing a few mansions in Londinium if he so wished. Guess that was the rich and influential for you.

The carriage was guarded by half a dozen Lander guards of about level fifteen, each wearing an undecorated chainmail shirt with no helmet, a shield on their backs and a sword in the scabbard resting at their waist. Typical guard stuff. They were not important to him, though. The one he sought after was a portly man probably in his forties dressed in maroon merchant clothes, complete with a cap on top and pointy brown shoes. The man carried with him a stack of papers which recorded the items the Adventurers sent, and took down contact details so that their rewards could be sent should the ingredients be found acceptable. Batches of goods were being sent everyday till the day of the banquet, but he was glad he made it in time since it saves him a trip.

While he was reluctant to part with his contact details despite it literally being only his name, he did so anyway as a bunch of conspiracy theories sprung up in his mind, each one fighting to press its case in a situation of seemingly endless solutions. He really ought to stop thinking so much. Anyway, he handed over his things, and the man looked it over, took down the necessary details at great pains to his mental health, then boxed it with the rest of the potions after labelling them. After thanking him, the man went on to attend to the next Adventurer looking to make a quick buck.

Well, at least the man was nice about it. Could be worst. At least the man wasn't a douchebag.

~

Word count: 721
Total word count (Pharmacist): ( 616 + 192 + 879 + 721 ) x 1.25 = 3010
Note: Post 2 of 2 for [Appetite Inducer]