The Witcher: Elder Blood

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***

One thing is for sure, I was hasty in my assurances about my alchemy training. Not only did I spend a week trying to find a place to live, but I decided to go ahead and buy a two-story building from one of the nobles. I had cheated a little, influencing the man's mind, only slightly directing his thoughts in the direction of a discount, and still two thirds of my money turned into a quite good quality building with two floors, an attic and a basement.

The house was not particularly different in its colour palette from the others adjacent to the property. Greyish bricks surrounded the ground floor, acting as a foundation for the first floor, which was made entirely of quality wood. To the left of the entrance was a side door leading to the basement. On the roof, covered with dark tiles, two chimneys could be seen, connected to each of the two floors.

But the building was in need of repair, or, to be more precise: it needed a light remodelling of the ground floor; furnishing of the ground floor; and it was not yet clear what to do with the cellar and attic. The basement is likely to become a storage space, and the attic .... into storage? I'll think about that later.

Oh, that's right, I'll have to buy all the furniture: the nobleman had enough brains to take everything before selling it... and I didn't have enough brains to put into his head the impracticality of such an idea with the help of mental magic. Now it's too late.

Why the hell did I buy a two-storey house in the first place? It's hard to say for sure, because I wanted to have my own place, so I wouldn't have to go to taverns, and in a way, I wanted to save money, because I wouldn't have to spend on taverns. But the reasons didn't end there...

- It's spacious, you can fit a work area on the ground floor,' Jennyfer looked round the ground floor with vigour. - A potion cabinet here, and a brewing table there...' she glanced at the far corner opposite the staircase to the first floor. - You could fence off the area for healing or birthing there....

She walked around the floor for a long time, muttering ideas to herself about the layout of the ground floor, where she expected, as she had managed to say, a work area. That was the ultimate reason to buy a house like this. True, it would soon become a mixture of an alchemy shop, a small maternity ward, and a healing centre - Jennyfer had recently begun to practice private healing, including providing medical assistance to women in fertility treatments or helping them terminate unwanted pregnancies. She took on a variety of treatments after our last visit to Wengerberg. Until then, she mostly sold potions and other alchemical stuff.

When I mentioned to her my thoughts on housing, Jennyfer was excited about the idea of having a shop like this so that she wouldn't have to do her healing in a separate room in her parents' house. And she was able to talk me into it, citing my desire to learn..... The more I learned about her progress in magic, alchemy, and now the practice of healing, the more I began to feel embarrassed that the young sorceress was ahead of me in magic. I was only ahead in mental magic because of my constant use in trade, and a couple of orders of magnitude ahead in spatial magic, but that was clearly the role of the Elder Blood, not my own merit.

I definitely need to do something about this...

- Eren! - irritated violet eyes stared back at me. I was leaning against the wall with my arms crossed, and since I was a head taller than Yennifer, she was looking down at me with her arms crossed over her chest. - Why aren't you listening to me?

- Oh, what again? I was just brooding.

- I'll have to move everything out of my room and into here. And it's time to order furniture.

- We haven't figured out what we're going to need yet,' I looked around the ground floor, trying to imagine what it would look like once it was converted into an alchemy shop.

- Bedroom furniture and- - she pressed her lips together, glancing at the staircase where Galanthea was beginning to descend. - ...For her room.

How did it get to the point where she started to think of us as a full-fledged couple? I don't know. Okay, maybe I overdid it the last time I met her, when I couldn't help myself and started hitting on a young sorceress who, as it turned out, was just waiting for me to act. But then we didn't stay in town long, and I only spent two days with her. Now I had decided to stay in Wengerberg indefinitely. So I asked her to help me with my studies. I guess that's what it looked like in her eyes. Why am I complaining? It's like I was against it.

- Okay, then, next stop is the crafts quarter,' I turn Jennyfer's attention - previously fixed on Galanthea walking towards us - to myself. - Come with us Snowdrop, you'll need to furnish the room anyway.

- You know, when you talked about a house of your own, I had in mind a small shack where you could sleep, eat and wash, and a small corner with herbs and alchemical jars, not this,' she waved her hand indefinitely from side to side.

- Hey, I'm not that minimalist. I was originally saving up for an entire gambling house with an inn on the ground floor, a place to play cards on the second floor, and living quarters on the third floor or in a separate annex. Anyway, I slightly overestimated the supposed 'mountains of gold' from the trade.

- I remember you telling me about it. I didn't expect it, that's all.

- Because I would have had to pull carts for two more years, and that's with Detmold's help, and so ... - I shake my head negatively. - Never mind, let's get the furniture.

- A gambling house with an inn? - Jennyfer asked, as we headed for the exit, following Galanthea, who had run out first. - You didn't tell me about it.

- I've changed my plans a bit, so no gambling house anytime soon. What are you sulking about? We haven't talked enough for me to tell you,' she jerked her chin up at my words, lips pressed together in a line, and pointed her head toward the door.

- You tell your Snowdrop everything. Why are you taking care of her and giving her a room? - either she's really interested or jealous. That's the best I can think of.

- She's like a little sister to me, I don't know. - I shrug my shoulders, before finally heading out. - ...Just wanted to help her, and she's fun, good at playing and singing on the lute.

- Well, well, well, I hope the day doesn't come when I catch you and your 'little sister' in our bed? - Jennyfer grumbled irritably before she took a quick stride towards the crafts district, which knocked me out of the loop for ten seconds, long enough for me to have to catch up with the two of them.

It was getting chilly outside, the wind whipping through me, signalling the imminent approach of winter. I had to put warming charms on my clothes.

It would have been easier to put on a warm cloak, as Jennyfer and Galanthea had done, but I saw my action as a training exercise, keeping me in suspense and allowing me to learn how to keep the magical effects on myself in semi-passive mode.

It wasn't that the enchantments fell quickly without support, they held exactly how much energy was put into them. I purposely put in small amounts so that I would have to refresh the effects more often.

Hela Gedimdeit recommended that I practice maintaining enchantments in this way, as well as keeping active spells active for as long as possible.

Spells and charms were used by means of verbal activation - mainly for ease of use - as if a key-activator, allowing you to specify your miraculous wish. One could do without the verbal formula, but in that case one had to somehow get one's mind to adjust at a rapid pace to transform the Chaos energy into a spell or enchantment.

Spell work was different from enchantments. Their final effect had a difference. While spells had a fleeting value, such as simply creating a blob of flame - a fireball to put it simply - and then launching it at an opponent before the spell dissipated, enchantments were created over a long period of time, often fuelled by some source of power or artefact to maintain the effect.

You could say that the terms themselves simply divided energy manipulation into classes. Charms and spells were the most common, especially among spellcasters. There were also rituals, curses and spells, witch sigils, necromancy, chimerology, the same alchemy, and even invocations - getting energy from deities or beings believed to be deities, and from natural sources. The latter is often used by druids and priests.

The types of interaction with Chaos energy are too numerous to learn even a tenth of them during the academy. Sorcerers who have chosen to devote their lives to exploring all scales of magic are still breaking new ground, though some of them are over four hundred years old...

- Eren! How long have you been waiting? - I was shouted at by Yennifer, who had managed to get a couple of dozen metres away while I slowly followed them in my thoughts. Apparently, she had decided to stop for a while, rather than rush forward like a steam engine with resentment, so that I could catch up with her. Galanthea was nowhere to be seen, she'd probably made her way to the craft quarter.

- I'm coming, don't worry about it,' I got close to her and she came closer, wrapping her left arm sharply around my left arm with hers and snuggling closer only to be impatiently dragged further towards her destination.

The first thing we did was head to the carpenters, where we just met up with Galantea who had run off ahead. We would have to buy too much furniture, so this time we ordered only the essentials. They had simple drawings to choose from, among which you could choose the most attractive, I wouldn't say that I chose anything in particular, rather I just walked along immersed in my thoughts.

And worth adding, I wasn't being exploited..... not as much as it might seem at first glance. Jennyfer would contribute to the future arrangement of the ground floor. Her parents' house had everything she needed to practice alchemy and spell curing. And it's worth realising that enough time had passed since Yennifer had graduated from Arethusa and moved back to her parents' house that she had managed to earn a satisfactory amount of money - in the case of setting up an alchemy shop - from curing and selling all sorts of simple potions to the locals. Otherwise, I certainly wouldn't want to bother with the whole business.... when the bank was empty after buying the two-storey building. And the spending is just beginning. Sure, Jennyfer assured me that she'd take over the ground floor, but the first floor living quarters were waiting until I'd spent more of my savings on furnishings.

I'll need to spend more on learning alchemy, rare ingredients are painfully expensive, some so much so that they're ready to bite off your hand, or the hand of another person who decides to get them. But that's a problem for the future, for now it was a matter of setting up the house and the healing alchemy shop, something we would be doing throughout the next week.