novelraw Chapter 55
Chapter 55
Chapter 55. West Medical and the Uninvited Guests
The Lower District of Winter City.
This place was synonymous with poverty and filth. The air was always filled with the mixed smell of coal dust, cheap alcohol, and despair.
But today, a brand-new building has broken the gloom of this area.
The headquarters of West Medical, the first pilot pharmacy in Winter City, had risen here.
Driven by Golden Lion Coins, the construction-site mages responsible for the building had completed the pharmacy in just a few days.
The building was entirely white, its windows bright. The signboard at the entrance seemed almost sacred beneath the gray sky.
Logaris stepped down from the carriage, the headache from his hangover making him frown deeply.
Last night’s absurd drinking contest and the mortifying scene of waking up in the same bed as Sylvia made him want to find a hole and bury himself.
Work. Only work could make him forget those memories so embarrassing they made his toes curl.
Financial Director Grayson hurried forward to greet him. The middle-aged man’s face could barely contain his excitement.
“Mr. Logaris, you are here! Everything is ready!”
Logaris said nothing and walked straight into the pharmacy hall.
The interior space was larger than it looked from the outside. Rows of neatly arranged shelves were filled with potion bottles bearing uniform labels.
He casually picked up a bottle of pale red “Basic Recovery Potion.”
“What is the price?”
Grayson quickly handed over a list.
“My lord, as you instructed, the price is one Silver Stag Coin. Only one-third the price of similar products from the alchemy workshops currently on the market.”
He paused, then could not help adding, “At this price, we are barely making any profit. It is only slightly above cost.”
What Grayson did not understand was that these seemingly ordinary potions were not painstakingly brewed bottle by bottle by alchemists.
Instead, they were mass-produced through a magitech mechanical assembly line designed by Logaris.
This complex alchemical matrix automated the tedious procedures, greatly reducing both labor costs and failure rates.
As a result, West Medical could supply an entire pharmacy’s potion stock with only ten workers who had undergone simple training.
Opening this pharmacy was precisely meant to test how these inexpensive potions produced by the assembly line would be received by the public.
“That does not matter.”
Logaris set the potion down and glanced at another brown bottle labeled “Disease-Cleansing Mixture.”
“I only want those alchemy workshops and black-hearted merchants who hoard goods and treat human lives as business to go bankrupt.”
His tone was calm, but Grayson felt his heart jump. That kind of resentment sounded intense. Had the professor once had some conflict with medicine sellers?
“Also,” Grayson continued, even more excited, “there is news from Her Highness. The first phase of the Northern Territory Welfare Proposal has been passed by the council. It includes issuing three free medical vouchers each month to registered poor families. And West Medical is the exclusive partner for the policy!”
Logaris nodded. This was exactly what he had expected.
“How is the publicity going?” Logaris asked.
“The effect is astonishing!” Grayson said with shining eyes. “Affordable potions personally created by the maker of Fleeting Youth. That reputation is simply too powerful! When we opened this morning, the line outside nearly stretched across two streets!”
He lowered his voice and pointed toward a specially established luxury counter.
“Especially those ‘special potions’ you designed. They are… pure genius!”
Logaris followed his gesture.
Several beautifully packaged potions gleamed beneath the lights.
“The ‘Heartthrob Perfume,’ priced at ten Golden Lion Coins. The description says it temporarily enhances personal charm, making you the center of attention.”
Logaris’s expression became slightly strange. He remembered that when he designed it, he had added a small line in the corner of the instructions purely out of mischief.
“Side effect: May produce unpredictable attraction from people of the same gender.”
Next to it was the “Inspiration Burst Potion.”
“Side effect: A very small chance of causing the user to begin referring to themselves in the third person and firmly believe they are the chosen one.”
And then the “One-Night Sweet Dreams Elixir.”
“Side effect: Dreams may become overly realistic, causing confusion between reality and dreams upon waking.”
These things were originally nothing more than experimental by-products he had created during his research.
They worked, but the side effects were just as noticeable. Unexpectedly, once packaged properly, they had become eye-catching attractions.
“Just these few potions alone have sold several hundred bottles today. Those wealthy young nobles and noblewomen do not care about the side effects at all. They are competing to buy them,” Grayson said with emotion.
Logaris neither confirmed nor denied it. Yet for some reason, he suspected that some people were actually buying them precisely because of those side effects.
Use luxury goods to drive the sales of necessities. Use the money of the rich to subsidize the poor.
After a full day of inspection, the bustling success of the pharmacy left Logaris fairly satisfied.
At last, he had recovered a small sense of control after the humiliating disaster of the previous night.
Night fell.
The top floor of West Medical’s headquarters had become Logaris’s new private laboratory.
He had arranged dozens of defensive and warning magic arrays here. The security level was comparable to the core areas of the Duke’s Manor.
At this moment, he was sitting at the control console, adjusting the final anti-detection rune.
On the screen, images transmitted by monitoring crystals were divided into dozens of small frames, covering every corner of the entire building.
Suddenly, his finger stopped.
In one corner of the display, two sneaky figures appeared outside the corridor leading to the temperature-controlled vault.
Inside that vault were the finished products of Fleeting Youth.
Logaris narrowed his eyes.
One was a man dressed in extremely flamboyant clothing, carrying a lute on his back. He looked like a traveling bard.
The other was a small boy who appeared to be only about ten years old.
“Interesting.”
Logaris watched as the bard pulled something resembling a tuning fork from his clothes. With a light flick, an invisible soundwave spread outward.
The first layer of warning runes surrounding the corridor actually flickered into brief disorder.
It was sound magic.
A rather obscure and difficult magical discipline to master.
Logaris did not trigger the alarm immediately. Instead, he watched the performance with interest.
He picked up the communicator on the table.
“Lilith.”
“I am here, boss! What are your orders!” Lilith’s voice came from the device.
“Come to the top floor. Two rats have crawled in.”
“Alive or dead?”
“Alive. Do not damage them. I want to see where they got the courage to come here.”
“Understood!”
Logaris hung up immediately.
His finger tapped lightly on the console. An invisible magical barrier rose silently, sealing off the entire floor.
Like catching turtles in a jar.
Now he wanted to see what tricks these two rats could perform.
In the corridor, the bard Iowen wiped the sweat from his forehead. He felt as though he were about to collapse.
The magical traps in this cursed place were more complex and deadly than any royal treasury he had ever seen.
If he had not possessed an innate sensitivity to sound and vibration, any ordinary thief would have already turned into charcoal.
“Almost done, little one. Just hold on a bit longer,” Iowen said to the boy behind him.
Carefully, he dismantled the final rune lock. The heavy metal door of the vault finally opened a narrow gap.
Success!
Iowen’s heart filled with excitement. He could almost see countless Golden Lion Coins waving at him.
He pushed the door open with effort.
Behind the door was not a storage room filled with precious potions.
Instead, it was a spacious, brightly lit laboratory.
A black-haired man wearing rimless glasses sat calmly in a chair, holding a cup of red tea while watching them.
“Welcome.” Logaris said with a smile. “Are the two of you satisfied with my security system?”
Iowen’s smile froze on his face.
In the next moment, a dark figure dropped from the shadows of the ceiling so quickly that he had no time to react.
Lilith struck the back of his neck with a single chop. Iowen’s vision filled with stars as he collapsed instantly.
With a swift twist, she bound him tightly with a specially made chain.
The entire process was smooth and fluid, taking no more than three seconds.