AN: Let's keep it going. If anyone prefers my QQ (QuestionableQuesting) account, I'll add pictures when I can to it for the story. Same author name 'Curiosity44'.
To the early reviewers. Thanks as always guys. Enjoy.
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Disclaimer: I own no source material.
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Chapter 2: Setting Up.
A pounding head, parched lips, bright sunlight, and a full bladder greeted Leon when he next woke.
"Urrhh." An unintelligible groan left his lips as he rolled out of bed and hit the hardwood flooring with a thud. "Ow."
Crusty-eyed and nauseous, he pushed himself up and managed to crawl to what he identified as the bathroom to release liquid from two different ends.
Minutes later, he groaned and sat back against the wall until the world stopped spinning. An odd memory coming to the forefront of an old Two and a Half Men episode with Charlie Sheen. The man was in quite the similar position as Leon, getting a question from his young nephew.
"Alcohol is poison."
"Then why do you drink it?"
"Because there are things inside me that need I need to kill."
The memory brought a chuckle to his lips. 'Been a while since I even tasted liquor. You know what they say. You can't get hungover if you don't stop drinking. Although, that's pretty much how I died so maybe it isn't the wisest solution.'
He chuckled harder and pushed himself to his feet. 'Come on, you're not an invalid Leon. Not yet at least.' He gripped the sink's edge and hauled himself up with a groan, only to blink at the face that looked back at him in the mirror.
"Is that….me?"
Cracked skin, hollow cheeks, deep eye bags, oily hair, thick with ungroomed facial hair, and with some kind of dirt or soot covering his…everywhere.
"No wonder no one would look at me." He was in NYC, and adult homeless were treated like rats and shooed away from everything not homeless. Hell, even the homeless were ready to mug you for the clothes on your back.
Leon's stormy blue eyes focused on his torn, disgusting rags. 'I don't even remember who I beat up to get these things. I doubt they were washed when I found them.' He sighed and raised a shaky hand to turn on the water. 'Stop that. Stop shaking, damn it.' He growled at his hand, and it slowly stabilized. He was only twenty-four, not eighty.
He splashed his face with the warm water while his mind pierced together the shit show of his last two weeks of life.
Getting dropped into the city, nude, homeless, paperless, and broke, with all the damage from drugs, liquor, nicotine, and self-induced harm coming with him.
The water peeled away at crusty dirt and blood as he thought back. 'I went into withdrawal in less than twenty four hours, could barely fucking walk, and had to stick to the back alleys and dumpsters just to find clothes. Sleeping in the subways and Central Park until a cop came along and kicked me out. Fuck, that wasn't fun.'
His fist tightened as it all flashed by his pounding head while the water did its work. He looked back at his disastrous, yet slightly cleaner, face and sighed in defeat. 'What does it matter.'
He shut off the water and looked around. 'Where am I anyway?' The bathroom he was in was quite luxurious with tiles and a glass walled shower, although it was missing everything from towels to hand soap.
Leon pushed his way back out of the bathroom and paused as he looked around in confusion.
Sunlight poured in from large windows, illuminating an ample space of around 1,500 to 2,000 square feet. Brick lined the walls, hardwood flooring with a smooth polish lay beneath his feet, a high ceiling, and a metallic staircase led to a raised platform where someone would likely sleep.
It was….peaceful.
Except, it was empty.
No decorations, no furniture, no boxes.
All it had was a sole six-inch thick mattress on the ground in the center of the space where he had woken up. Leon grew worried as he took it all in. 'Did I…break into an unoccupied place while drunk? Where the fuck did I get the mattress then? It even has sheets.'
He slowly made his way back to the mattress and found something else he missed. Previously hidden behind the pillow, he found a letter and lifted it with dread, carefully reading the front and hoping he didn't steal someone's mail. 'That's up to five years of jail time unless I can pay the fine, and I doubt someone would be willing to buy my shitty liver.'
Thankfully, the letter was addressed to him, and the sender caused a burst of memories to return from the night before.
[To Leon Volk. From Mr. H.]
Last night. The strange bar. The kind bartender. Telling his tale.
Leon groaned and rubbed his forehead as he dropped onto the mattress. 'What the fuck did I do.'
He was delirious, starving, and half-crazed as he shuffled down the city's streets in the biting chill of late December. His thirst for liquor drove him to every bar he could find, only to get promptly kicked out, beaten up, or not even allowed entry.
And then, almost like a siren's call, he passed by a small bar tucked away between two more significant buildings, requiring people to walk down a short flight of stairs just to reach the door.
"Where Roads Mead." He remembered the name in passing, somehow sticking in his mind and drawing him in. He shuffled in to escape the cold and sat down at the bar, just waiting to be kicked out.
But the bartender said nothing for a long minute before asking him if he wanted a drink.
Leon was sure that was the night someone finally drugged him and took his organs, or perhaps he was finally at death's door and he was hallucinating, but whatever it was, he didn't care and ordered a drink.
One drink became three, and then the story began. Progressively pouring out more of his soul the more he drank.
Leon groaned even louder and plopped down on the mattress. 'I just told a random stranger my insane life story. What the fuck is wrong with me?' He sighed and ran a hand over his face. 'Whatever. What does it matter anyway? What else do I have to lose at this point?'
His hand idly pressed against his forehead and he flinched slightly at the odd feeling of the tattoo branded on him. 'Oh, right, this useless thing.'
He remembered that insane trip in the void, the floating words, the choice, and the branding that followed before he got thrown into the new world.
[Four Paths Knowledge Tree Implanted. Enjoy your second chance, Leon Volk. We hope you find the {Freedom} you seek.]
Leon grunted in annoyance. 'What knowledge? What second chance? This is bullshit. People in those stories I used to read get new bodies, fancy powers, or powerful systems. And what did I get?'
With a casual thought, his tattoo glowed in an eerie light as the sight before his eyes vanished. Like a screen pulling over his eyes, he found himself standing in a dark void, appearing in the sole illuminated circular patch of land about ten feet in diameter with cracked earth beneath his feet. Almost everything else was part of the inky black void.
Four glowing spectral arrows appeared around him at head height, pointing off into the void with words floating above each one.
[Path of Body 0] [Path of Magic 0] [Path of Craft 1] [?]
Leon sighed at the same sight he had seen a dozen times now.
Looking up, a lone star twinkled far above in the dark sky, shining light down onto the Path of Craft, giving him about ten feet of sight down a road that ended in the same inky blackness as the other paths which only extended a bare foot away from his central circle.
None of them would tell him anything. He couldn't click on them. There was no help option.
Only the Crafting path had something else floating above it, midway through the illuminated path.
[Novice Potion Recipes]
It just floated there innocently five feet into the Crafter Path. Leon walked up to it, and like so many times before, he poked it, and a book appeared before him. Made of some kind of dark grey leather, the book floated in front of him, ethereal and ghostly in a way. The words 'Crafter Path Recipes'appeared on the cover in cursive as he idly swiped it open, revealing pages full of instructions to craft ten potions he vaguely recalled from Harry Potter.
Leon's eyes skimmed over them dully, recalling the pure excitement he felt the first hour of his arrival into the new world. Looking at everything with hopeful eyes and an excited smile, feeling like it was all up from there.
He recalled the choice he made after being presented with three options. One from each path of 'Magic' 'Body' and 'Craft' before putting his one available 'Path Point' into Crafting when he saw the available options he was presented with, thinking he needed money to buy clothes at the very least so he wouldn't lose his balls to frostbite.
The idea of making potions sounded grand just then as he was shivering from the cold.
Plans had formed in his drug-abused mind when he saw the recipes, only for him to stop short when he realized he needed ingredients to make potions.
Albeit, all the ingredients were modern-day stuff rather than magical shit like powdered Unicorn horn, but that still didn't change the fact that he couldn't buy those ingredients without money.
His choice had slowly settled in with the dawning realization of how fucked he was.
He panicked, raged, shouted, demanded a refund, and broke down. Initially, he tried to remain on his own to take advantage of his new ability, but within hours his withdrawal symptoms kicked in, and he lost most of his thought processes to his suffering. Especially with the cold settling in.
He wasn't exactly in great shape when he first arrived as it was, having spent years drinking with the months just before gradually losing it. By the time he could even work up the thought to seek help, he looked deranged, and the cops on the streets threatened to jail him if he didn't go away. Typical for NYC.
Leon sighed as he waved his hand, making the grimoire shut on its own. 'You need money to make money, that's fundamental in the modern day world.'
He turned away from the Crafting path and returned to the circle, where a few extra things appeared in the corner of his sight.
A blue colored bar with the number [100] under it. His mana as he came to understand from the little information it gave him when he stared at it.
Next to it was a mark showing [1%/s], telling him that he recovered mana at a rate of 1% a second.
That was the second thing he had focused on after realizing he fucked up with potions. He had mana, and that meant magic. He tried everything he could to find it inside him, to access it, to do anything with it.
And he got nothing. There was no manual or anything to tell him right from wrong.
Next to those two markers, two final features appeared. Focusing on them brought them to the front of Leon's vision, enlarged so he could read them without squinting.
[Perks:
(Unique) Four Paths of Freedom: Thy Fate is Thy Own – Immune to the strings of Fate. Mental affects are unable to reach/touch your mind unless you will it.
(Novice) Path of Craft: Recipe Grimoire – An ethereal grimoire that can be summoned at any time, holding all recipes unlocked for easy reading. It can be controlled with thought to move. Unable to be read, touched, or touch others.
]
Leon lazily swiped a hand, not that he needed to, but the motion seemed more natural to him and made the text shrink back to the corner of his vision. 'Fate and Mental immunity is great and all. And the Grimoire is cool, but ultimately neither is useful to put food in my stomach. I can't even hit anyone with the damn book.'
His gaze traveled to the final list of text.
[Quests:
Path of Craft: Novice Potions.
Sell 500 potions.
Reward: 1 Path Point.
Time Limit: None.
]
His fists tightened in a white knuckle grip at the familiar words. 'I can't sell a potion if I can't make one!' Another defeated sigh left his lips as he released his grip. 'At least there's no time limit or penalty shit.'
The text shrunk with a gesture of his finger, returning the void back to the simple layout. 'And that's all she wrote.'
The screen pulled over his eyes rose back up in a bare second, returning him to where he sat on his mattress. 'I thought maybe I could get some time ratio benefit from that thing, but time still moves on as normal. It's like I have a second body in there or some shit. A spirit body? Fuck, who knows.'
He was given the so-called 'Four Paths' ability on his second chance, and it barely told him anything. He had no context. No one even told him why it was happening. Just woke up in a void, asked a couple questions, and shat out with a fancy brand to show for it.
No one gave him any answers.
He didn't even know what kind of world he was in. 'What the hell am I supposed to do? I can't just go around saying I have weird powers. I have no idea where I am. It's December 2004 in NYC. A couple decades in the past from when I died, but that void thing said I was going to a new world. If I have a supernatural power, its logical to assume other things are around. Or maybe it's just a basic world like where I came from. Fuck, how the hell am I supposed to know?'
Leon ran a hand through his filthy hair in frustration, only to pause as he felt the odd touch of paper against his skin. "Oh, right, the letter."
He brought it back into his view with a contemplative look. "The bill I guess?"
A black cracked nail fit under the seam and pushed it open as he pulled out the letter inside and read.
{Dear Leon,
I hope you slept well. I wouldn't want to be you right now with how much you drank. There's a freshwater tap in the kitchen, and no, it's self-contained and not connected to the public water. No need to worry about mutating.}
Leon shivered at the thought. Even homeless, he still didn't drink the city's water. It might not have been much better with the toxic stuff in the air, but he ate the freshest snow he could find for water. The city water is the stuff you drank if you wanted to wake up with a third leg, growing from your shoulder.
{You are currently in the loft above the bar. It was never used, so you're welcome to customize it as you wish. The kitchen is at the bottom of the stairs between the loft and the bar; I took the liberty of leaving the fridge stocked for you.}
Leon blinked. 'Customize? Leaving?'
{Yes, as you may have just surmised, I'm leaving the bar to you.}
Leon stood up in a flash with anger burning to the surface as he felt insulted by the man's pity. But before he could truly get worked up, the next line cooled him like a bucket of ice water.
{No, I am not pitying you, Leon. I am not giving you free charity.}
Leon's anger cooled, and he quickly realized the price of his rapid movement as his stomach churned, and he fell back to the mattress with a groan. 'Right, still hungover.' He distracted himself by continuing to read.
{I thought it was time to take a little vacation for myself, and I'm leaving the bar in your capable hands.}
'Capable? What about me is in any way capable?'
{You have potential but have yet to truly live without chains. You are suffering under the weight of your failures and self-induced scars.}
Those words hit close to home, and he couldn't stop his fingers from gripping the page.
{Life is not black and white, young Leon. There is so much more for you to experience. You are no longer tied down by familial chains. No one knows you. You are a ghost.
Embrace that. You had strings, but now you're free. Only your own chains remain.}
Leon choked back a pressure in the back of his throat as he felt like a gentle hand patted him on the shoulder.
{I leave my bar to you. Do with it what you will. Although, I would appreciate it if you kept it in one piece. Renovate it to your heart's content, but leave it standing, will you?}
A choked laugh burst out as he read that line, unable to believe what he was really reading.
{Jokes aside, I'm giving you a job, Leon. Your job is thus: Run my bar. Serve the customers who come in. And live your life as you please. I'll take 10% of your profits at the end of the following year, so do your best.}
Leon brushed a stray tear from his eye and sat up. 'I don't need pity old man.'
The older and wiser man must have predicted his thoughts as he read along.
{I repeat this, this is not pity. I'm simply taking a vacation. These old bones need a rest once in a while.}
Leon scoffed in amusement at the blatant lie, the guy was packing serious muscle beneath that suit.
{Besides, you'll have your work cut out for you. Aside from everything you see on the shelves down at the bar, the storage is empty. Find a supplier on your own time.}
The extra work didn't put Leon off; rather, it made him more willing to accept.
{You're on your own now. I'll stop by occasionally between flights; otherwise, I'm hands-off. Drink all the liquor yourself, take it and run, sell it, or do something else; the choice is yours. I care not.
You've been lost for a long while, Leon, but you're free now. I'd challenge you to see how far you could go on your own two feet, but I fear that will only be counterproductive.}
Leon sniffed with a chuckle. 'Damn straight.'
{If you genuinely choose to refuse my job offer, leave the keys on the counter as you go. I won't force you to stay. But if you do, you might just find who you always could have been.
Try listening to others. You never know what you might learn by listening to another's tale. Take it from me.
Best of luck,
Mr. H.}
Leon silently stared at the words on the page as a mess of emotions roiled inside him, but his eyes kept returning to the words, 'You're free now.'
'I'm free? Yeah, I guess I am.' All the insanity of everything since he died finally calmed down enough for him to truly process that. "I'm free."
A laugh bubbled up in the back of his throat as he pressed his head to the letter, slowly wetting it with his tears unintentionally.
"Shit." He pushed it away from himself in a rush only to drop it and catch sight of a line of writing on the back.
{P.S. A bartender does not look nor smell like a hobo. I left you forty dollars. Clean yourself up, ya filthy animal. ;) }
Leon's eyes grew wet as he laughed and teared up at the same time. 'I really do look like shit, don't I?'
He took a few minutes to gather himself, trying to organize his emotions into coherent thoughts. He put the letter back in the envelope, idly seeing the few bills and set of keys inside it that he would have sworn weren't there before if he were clear of mind.
Options appeared in his mind one after another, but a feeling he hadn't felt in a long time pushed itself to the surface from somewhere deep inside.
A feeling of wanting to be better.
He pushed himself to his feet with a groan, smiling softly for the first time while sober in weeks, or perhaps months. He couldn't even remember.
His feet carried him toward the staircase leading downward at the far end of the loft as his gait slowly steadied and his back straightened from over a decade of etiquette courses.
Mr. H was right. He looked like shit. And he had had enough of it. It was time to start thinking differently.
0000
A short trip to a nearby small general store, with Leon waving his bills of cash at the guy behind the register to show he had money, and he was able to gather a bounty of basic toiletries for just under twenty dollars. Leon was thankful it was 2004, where the value of the dollar was worth more than two decades later.
A second trip to a nearby thrift shop solved his immediate clothing issues. He grabbed a single set of discounted working clothes he could find with his available funds. The employee working there that had kicked him out the first time he arrived a week before moved out of his way with the new look in his eyes. Or it could have been the money clearly seen in his hand.
Either way worked.
He wasn't the withdrawal symptom-induced half-insane, semi-nude hobo he was a week before. He was the semi-nude, emancipated looking hobo with a job now, and he wasn't taking shit from her attitude.
Thrift shops sold used and discounted clothes, but that didn't make them bad. A single set of boxers, socks, cheap black slacks, and a decent button-down shirt with a pair of worn-out sneakers ran him only twenty dollars. Whatever its source, it was better than the dirty rags sticking to his skin.
Some might say being homeless would teach one to value what little you have, and Leon fully agreed with those people, but agree or not, he blew through half a bottle of shampoo and two bars of soap in a single sitting with an exfoliating glove in how thoroughly he scrubbed his body raw under the hot water of the loft's shower.
The water dripped off him, brown and red from all the crap stuck to him, and he shivered as he felt he saw something move in the muck before it was flushed down the drain.
Only after that did he open the one item he splurged on. An electric razor. Cheap and probably only able to last a few uses, but it would do the trick as Leon didn't trust himself with scissors to save his life. The one time he tried giving himself a haircut with one, he ended up shaving his head in a military cut to recover from it.
Years of grooming experience came in handy as he fixed up his face and hair, trimming where necessary and cleaning himself up to leave himself with well cut lines along his sideburns. 'I never did enjoy shaving. A shadow is the way to go.'
His stormy blue eyes stared into the mirror as he looked back at himself, seeing…him…for the first time in however long.
Midnight black hair fell from his head with the bangs falling in front in spikes down to his cheeks, splitting around the center of his forehead and leaving his eyes undisturbed as his new forehead tattoo stood prominently on display.
He hummed at the tattoo, really studying it for the first time. 'Will take some time to get used to, but it's not too bad all things considered. I always did want a more visible tat anyway. My old man almost had an aneurysm seeing my back and shoulders.'
He sighed thinking about his father and put down the razor. 'I won't curse him. I don't hate him. He loved me. He just didn't show it so well.' His eyes looked back into the mirror, seeing his pale, gaunt cheeks and deep eye bags. 'I didn't live the life you wanted from me, dad, but I'm going to live my own life now and become my own man. Outside your reach to control me. I hope you treated my death the same way you treated moms.'
He splashed cool water over his face and got back to work. Nail clippers and tweezers were cheap, and they had wonderous uses.
It wasn't just the last two weeks he was fixing, but months before that as he had slowly stopped caring for himself in his caged cabin in the woods.
Close to five hours after waking up, Leon looked like a new man.
"Hm… I lost some weight and my muscles are atrophied, but it's nothing some decent food and exercise can't fix. The damage to my organs, however, that's going to be a bitch."
Even in his damaged state, he was still just over six feet tall and had an inch or two to regain with his recovery. The years of dedicated physical training in his youth and teenage years from Gymnastics, Martial arts, and Calisthenics during his adult years had set his body shape into a type that was difficult to change even with all the damage he put himself through.
He had a swimmer's physique, with muscles still pushing through despite their emancipated states.
His old rags were put in the shopping bags he brought from the store, and he was set to burn them somewhere the second he got the chance. Now wearing cheap but still practical black slacks with a dark blue button down shirt, he didn't only look like a new man, but felt like one.
The wonders of self-grooming knew no bounds.
A soft clapping sound rang out as he walked down the stairs from the loft. 'I need to get briefs next time. Cleanly shaved acorns and boxers are not friends.'
He shook off his inner amusement and stepped off the stairs into the shared kitchen between the bar and the stairs leading upstairs.
It was a small space but big enough for a few people to work simultaneously. Leon's tongue clicked as he checked out the cabinets. "A single pan, one pot, one spatula, one set of utensils. Damn old man, you really went all out with telling me to start from the bottom, huh?"
He looked around with a pondering gaze now that he finally had a moment. "How did he do this in a single night anyway? Was it all like this before I even arrived?" Leon had seen the date had only changed a single day as people celebrated Christmas day, meaning he didn't sleep for a week or something. Hell, it was only because he was in Manhattan NY, that shops were open. The city that never slept truly never slept.
"He gave me the bar as well and just ditched. Was he just waiting for some poor shmuck to walk through his door or something?" There was a lot of weird stuff surrounding his current situation, but Leon decided not to focus too much on it at the moment. "I can think about it later; I think my stomach finally got tired of trying to eat my spine, and it's considering my organs now."
The kitchen thankfully had a fridge and gas stove, along with the filtered water tap Mr. H had spoken of in his letter.
Golden light shined from inside the fridge as he pulled on the handle, and Leon would deny it till he died, but he could swear a church choir echo rang in his ears as he beheld the fully stocked fridge.
A tear grew at the edge of his eye, but Leon glared at it. "Get back in there soldier. It's not time for that yet." The tear dutifully re-entered his eye duct as Leon leaped at the food like a starved animal.
Thankfully, living alone for years plus time on the road before that had taught him how to cook.
Nothing noteworthy to speak of, but to a man who hadn't eaten a decent meal in weeks, it was as if heaven had graced him with its light. He was feeling like Gordon Ramsey on steroids, ready to roast an idiot sandwich for being an idiot.
Only after consuming what he felt was his weight in eggs, greasy bacon, stir-fried veggies, and chugging orange juice did Leon truly realize his mistake.
Trails of manly tears rolling down his cheeks sounded the alarm as his stomach rumbled, and Leon recalled that he was hungover, as well as emancipated.
Eating a massive meal with grease wasn't in his best interest at the moment.
"Oh shit, oh shit, OHHHH shit." He ran to the bathroom with things wanting to explode from all his exits.
Minutes later, he stumbled back into the kitchen, groaning as he wiped his mouth. "Not my best moment, but far from my worst."
He sat down on the kitchen stool and stared at the dirty dishes in the sink with a sigh. "Right. Chores. Been a while. I'll get to you in a minute."
His gaze traveled over his kitchen as he stopped to think. 'If I'm seriously considering this whole thing, taking this job and running a bar, then I need a game plan here. I'm good at those. Following through with them is a different story, but making them, I can do that.' He chuckled self-deprecatingly and focused himself. 'The bar's sign is set to closed, so I don't have to worry about customers, but I'm going to have to open up soon. I've got less than two dollars left from the forty Mr. H gave me, and while I have no refills, the stock of liquor on the shelves will be worth enough for me to get going.'
Leon passed by the bar on his way out the first time and had to resist the allure of reaching for one of the many bottles lining those shelves. He wasn't quitting drinking anytime soon but he needed those to make money so he didn't starve.
'The fridge is full but that will only last me a week or two at best. Plus, who knows what else I'll need. No, I need to focus here. What else do I have?'
His mind flashed to his supernatural ability and scoffed. 'Yeah, because an ethereal book of potion recipes will be so….' He blinked and turned back to the fridge. 'Oh.'
He stood up in a rush. "Oh!"
With a bare thought, the Grimoire appeared in front of him in all its ghostly glory, hovering within arm's reach in front of him. He swiped a hand, and the pages turned to the first potion recipe in the list.
[(Novice – Converted to modern day ingredients).
Antidote to Common Poisons – An all-purpose antidote that counteracts common poisons.
Ingredients: Honey Water, Mint Sprigs, Lavender, Grapefruit, Avocado, Kale, Artichoke, Beets, Spinach….
Step 1: Grind down the…..]
Leon scratched his head as he read over the ingredients. 'It's just as I remember it the first time I read it. What the hell is with these ingredients? Am I making a potion or a protein smoothie? Bah, it's not like I could get the ingredients before to try it out without robbing someone, and well, fighting a couple homeless guys for a jacket full of holes wasn't my best moment. So much for martial training when you're seeing double and severely impaired. I'm glad I didn't resort to robbing a store before now. Jail doesn't sound fun.'
He reached into the fridge and found everything he needed. "I really hope this works, or I'm going to be so fucking done with this ability."
His finger trailed over the lines of the pages, but the recipe was relatively simple. Break apart some of the greens, grind down the softs into a paste, split the stems of the hard parts, add them in portions to a pot with boiling water over varying heat, and stir at specific intervals.
The trickiest part seemed to be that he needed to stir in specific directions, either clockwise or counterclockwise, at various sets while the heat was adjusted. Sometimes three one way, sometimes five the other. Sometimes high heat, occasionally low.
And it had to be heated up and allowed to cool at intervals as well.
He kept reading as he worked and paused toward the bottom of the recipe. "It takes 12 hours for a single batch?! How the hell won't the liquid just evaporate by then?"
The following line answered that question.
[Make sure to pour in mana through your stirring spoon and coat the surface of the liquid with a thin layer to contain the moisture. The process needs to be repeated every time you stir, as the mana will seep into the mixture and add the energy required for the mystical properties to take hold.]
Leon's brow twitched at the line. 'Why do I feel like I got duped with a cheap book from a sleazy old Chinese man at an antique store?' He sighed and looked at the bubbling water, ready to begin.
"How the hell do I coat anything with mana? I've never even used it before."
After a few embarrassing moments of random activation word and hand gesture experimentation later, with said memories firmly being taken to the grave, Leon decided to just get to work and see what happens.
"I have enough ingredients here for about three attempts, so hopefully I don't fuck this up."
Standing in front of the stove with bowls of the prepped ingredients according to the instructions, he began adding in measurements of it, eyeballing it for the most part as he didn't have accurate measuring spoons. 'A normal big spoon is a tablespoon, and a normal drinking cup is usually around eight ounces.'
Unsure if he was using too much or too little, Leon pushed on and followed the directions. 'If I completed step three right, then the water should turn…..pink. Huh, ok, that worked. Next I need to mix it clockwise till it turns yellow, and then three times counterclockwise and apply the mana film. Great.'
The mixture changed as said, and Leon approached the critical step. 'Come on, I just need to...' His thoughts froze as a strange sensation came over him.
Still holding the stirring spoon, his forehead heated up. It felt as if something warm and thick like honey was dripping down his shoulder and through it his arm, leaving the pores on his hands, and extending to the spoon and flowing down it to the pot's contents.
A neon blue glow emanated from it, radiating with a soothing aura around the pot. The mana dripped down the spoon and spread over the liquid's surface, creating the needed film.
Leon pulled back the spoon in a trance that only ended when the mana receded.
"Wo." He shook his head and looked at his hand. "The process is automatic? Is that why I couldn't ever figure out how to use my mana before? Or is it because this is a Crafter Path ability?"
He eyeballed the pot and saw the film of mana containing the mixture like a lid. "I should probably try that again a few times to be sure."
He looked back at his floating grimoire to read the next step and hummed. "Huh, guess I have to wait two hours before the next step."
Thankfully, the stove had a digital timer for him to set an alarm.
With that done, he looked around thoughtfully. "So what now?"
He only had one pot, so he couldn't make two potions at once. He had no money to spend. He already ate. He was clean, groomed, and clothed.
'I do want to start working out again, but I'll need a bit more time to recover.' With atrophied muscles and recovering organs, he would need to be gradual. The trick to mostly anything physical when it came to training was to be gradual. A marathon, not a sprint.
'Hm, I guess I'll check out the bar.' He only really gave it a curious glance earlier.
Passing through the kitchen, he noticed a side door he had missed earlier and glanced inside.
An empty space with simple shelves greeted him. 'Storage. Mr. H did say there was no stock. How the hell was he planning on making a profit?'
Leon scratched his head at the strange old man as he closed the door and continued. The only other door in the small hallway was for a one-person bathroom for customers. 'Hopefully, that won't ever be an issue with too many customers at once. Cleaning a bar bathroom doesn't sound fun, but at least it's clean for now.' It was simple and practical, with enough space to not feel cramped even with two people inside it.
He pushed through a swinging door past the bathroom and came back into the fancy bar.
Contrary to how it was when he first entered, the picture frames on the walls were empty. Leon squinted at them, trying to recall what he had seen the night before but couldn't remember a thing. 'Guess I was too drunk to remember an odd detail like that.'
Shrugging that off, he stepped behind the counter and got a feel for it. It all looked the same as he remembered it from his talk with Mr. H.
The smooth L-shaped dark wood bar top. The blue barrel bar chairs, the booths against the wall, the dark red carpeting, the wooden and red wallpaper walls, the light blue painted ceiling, and the hanging lights provided a relaxing ambiance as the tinted windows filtered the sunlight from outside.
The only change he noticed was that behind the bar, instead of red carpeting, the floor had a comfortable black mat covering it. 'Probably in case of spills, makes sense.'
The inside of the bar had a workstation counter beneath the bar top, open cabinets beneath the counter, a cash register equipped with a landline phone, an ice box on the ground filled with sizeable square ice cubes, and a stereo system connected to a wire that went into the wall. 'Still can't tell where that leads.'
His finger hit the power button as smooth jazz piano echoed in the background, and he sighed in pleasure. 'It's easy to forget the beauty of music.' His mind flashed back to when he was four years old, and his mother sat with him in her lap at a piano, putting his smaller hands on the keys and showing him how to play.
'Just like that Zaychik, you're a natural.' She would kiss his head with a smile and sing along as he slowly followed her instruction. 'When I find myself in times of trouble~, Mother Mary comes to me~, speaking words of wisdom~, Let it be~, And in my hour of darkness, she is standing right in front of me~, Speaking words of wisdom~, Let it be~….'
"Let it be…." The words left his lips in a whisper as his chest tightened in a stifling grip, his mother's smile lighting up his mind as her voice echoed in his ear.
"She always loved the Beetles. I wonder if she would be happy, seeing me like this…." He shook his head gently and turned away from the stereo to look at the shelves filled with bottles to distract himself from those distant memories.
"Hm…around a hundred bottles all told. Mr. H didn't stuff the shelves, but this is more than enough really." He traced his eyes over the bottles and saw how they were organized. "Five sets of four shelves, three of them with alcohol, and a fourth for syrups, bitters, and liqueurs, not to be confused with liquors. Seems he organized them by type. Vodka, Gin, Rum, Tequila, Brandy, Whiskey, hm….good brands, he knew his stuff." The shelves of Whiskey were well organized between Scotch, Irish, Bourbon, and the scotch was further separated by single malt, blended malt, single grain, blended grain, and blended. Brandy also had a section for Cognac.
There was no wine, but that didn't bother him.
Leon whistled lowly, looking it all over as his gaze moved to the middle set of shelves.
The fifth set of shelves in the middle didn't have bottles, but glasses twinkling in the dim lighting. Around fifty glasses in rows for Cocktail, Highball, Lowball, and shot shapes. Leon gently lifted a cocktail glass and held it up to the light to inspect it. "Good quality."
One of the benefits of a life like his was having experience with high-end products, although just the thought of the last time he held a wine glass when he still worked for his father had him snorting. 'I hated those company dinners. Waste of my damn time is what they were.'
He put the glass back with a chuckle and leaned against the counter. 'Well, not like that matters anymore. I guess I can take solace in my drinking problem benefiting me for once.'
Some YouTube videos, the lessons he learned in bars during his Backpacking adventure, a mixer set, money, and he had been messing around with mixology for years. 'Been a good while since I actually served anyone a drink, maybe I should practice a bit.' The last few years were anything but healthy for him but being trapped alone in a cabin in the woods with a constant flow of alcohol made one feel like experimenting now and then.
His finger tapped his bicep as an urge he had been ignoring for hours hit him. 'I really need a smoke.' It had been itching at him since he woke up, but he pushed it away with a will as he had other things to do.
A slight glare of light caught his eye as he turned with a curious look to find its source, finding a small fancy silver case resting innocently on the far corner. 'Is that from last night?' He clicked it open, and his breathe caught at the sight of a dozen death sticks and some matches. 'Mr. H, I'm gonna make you the best damn drink you've ever had the next time you stop by.'
He smirked and lit one up as he got to work.
'I'm literally pouring away my money here, so let's keep it simple. I'll start with a margarita.'
He grabbed a bottle of tequila from the middle shelf. 'A margarita is simple. No need for all that orange juice or sugary crap. Just lime, curaçao, and tequila. But without those additions, a bottom shelf tequila won't cut it. I'll need something with a more distinct flavor. Something like this should do it.' He eyed the bottle of Fortaleza in his hand with a smile.
Thankfully, the hand mixers on the counter came with a jigger, an hourglass-shaped metal ounce measuring cup. 'Hm, the old man was nice enough to leave me a basic knife, bar spoon, and hand juicer.' None of them were anything special, but they were practical enough.
He split the lime, squeezed out an ounce, and poured it into the shaker.
An ounce of dry curacao followed.
The sound of a cork popping out as he removed the lid from the tequila rang out, and Leon couldn't help but take a whiff. 'Ah~, that's good stuff.'
Two ounces of tequila were measured and dropped in.
Grabbing a cocktail glass from the shelf, he used the cut lime to rub along the rim of the glass. 'Just like that Argentinian bartender told me years ago, never rim the inside, just the outside. If you get salt in the liquid, you fucked up.'
Leon sprinkled the counter with salt and slowly rolled the rim of the glass along the salt, covering just the outside.
Next, he opened the ice box under the counter and reached for two sizeable square ice cubes, dropping one into the shaker and cracking the second into chunks.
It was a cool story about how Leon learned the trick to the ice. He was looking through a magazine in a doctor's office when he came across an article about a man named Dave Arnold, a food and drink specialist. The guy did a study trying to prove that the kind of ice you used in a shaker didn't matter, and Dave proved himself wrong on a live recording. He took his defeat gracefully and found out that the best way to mix up the contents of your shaker was to drop one big ice cube in as a big heavy object that displaces a lot of liquid, and around it, smaller cubes from a broken ice cube to provide the dilution.
Leon popped on the lid and shook it briefly before slapping on the strainer and pouring the contents into his cocktail glass. Filling the salt-rimmed glass with the rich light yellow liquid close to the brim.
"Finish it with a slice of lime to garnish it annnnddd I made a margarita." The cup glittered under the lighting as he lifted it and took a sip. "Mn….ah yeah, I needed this."
He savored the drink and focused on the flavor. 'The salt enhances the drink's flavor without compromising the delicate balance in the liquid. It's citrussy, bright, fresh, and you can really taste the tequila. That's why you need good tequila for this. The tequila should be in the front of the drink. Adding orange juice or syrups to this would only detract from that key factor.' He drank half the glass before putting it aside. 'Yeah, that's good stuff. More of a dinner cocktail though, a palate cleanser, or really just a beach drink, but I haven't really been to the beach in years.'
The fact that he was technically still hungover didn't really get in the way of him drinking. A bright smile lit up his face as he felt a spark igniting.
"Damn, been a while since I had some fun. Whats next?" He cranked up the music and turned back to the shelves before stopping on a bottle of Cana Brava 3-year. "How about a Daiquiri? That's basically just rum, sugar, and lime."
He threw an ice cube in a cloth bag and smashed it against the counter before pouring the ice chips into a highball glass.
"Sugar, spice, and everything nice, that's the secret to a good Daiquiri."
A few teaspoons of sugar, a whole squeezed lime, and two ounces of Cana Brava 3-year topped off the glass. Stirred gently with a bar spoon rather than shaken, and it was good to go.
"Ah, that's wonderful. Limy with an amazing tart, refreshing, citrus flavored drink. Kind of like a magical lemonade in a way."
Leon downed half of it as well in moments, taking a few seconds between sips to really enjoy that flavor.
"Heh, Mr. H was right. How longs it been since I actually stopped to taste instead of drink to get drunk?" He shook his head with a chuckle and pushed the glass aside. "How about a shaken Daiquiri next? A real Daiquiri instead of the fizzy lemonade Daiquiri."
His eyes trailed over the bottles and landed on a bottle of Havana Club 7-year. 'That's the one.' He grabbed it along with a bottle of demerara syrup.
'Sometimes a cocktail needs just a little something extra, and when using sweeteners, demerara syrup can be a tasty way to add another hint of flavor.' Demerara Syrup is a regular 1:1 simple syrup of half water and half sugar that uses demerara sugar instead of the usual white sugar. The result is a caramel quality syrup.
Leon grabbed another shaker and poured in his mixture. 'Just a tad under an ounce of demerara, a full ounce of lime juice, and two ounces of Cuban rum.' He grabbed another two ice blocks, dropped one in, and broke the second before shaking it all up for a few moments.
The result was an orangish yellow liquid with a creamy sort of texture. Another slice of lime to garnish the rim, and the drink was complete.
Leon momentarily played with the liquid under the light before taking a sip and sinking in pleasure. "Mn…yeah, that's a real daquiri right there. Sweet and sour, tart and light, but also with that undertone of toasted demerara." He savored the flavor and finished off half of it in only a few moments. "God, that's good. This is the perfect summer afternoon drink on a hot day. Although, its technically mid-winter right now but who cares, it's a good drink."
A beeping noise rang out, and Leon was glad he didn't scare easily as he didn't flinch before he put down his glass. "Oh yeah, the potion."
He walked back to the kitchen and idly summoned his grimoire to float before him to continue following the steps. 'Stir seven times counter, nine clockwise, and another four counter before applying another film and turning up the heat for an hour.'
The steps were easily followed, and the mana process repeated itself when he got to applying the second film. Leon stared at the pot more closely that time. 'It's definitely automatic here, but it feels like….maybe I could adjust it? Maybe its just trying to get me used to how its supposed to feel? I'll try and keep an open mind on it. Wonder if the old man left some paper around.'
His gaze dropped to his floating grimoire while turning away to return to the bar. 'You able to take notes my floating friend?' The book seemed to respond to his will and flip pages toward the end where a blank page sat. Leon blinked at it. 'Huh, that's pretty cool, I was just kidding. Um…log book day 1?' He jokingly thought to himself as he turned to head back to the bar, only to almost trip when the words appeared at the top of the page.
He quickly asked for it to be deleted and got the hang of how it worked. 'Mental note taking, I can rock this.' He titled a page for potion creation brainstorming and wrote down his observations. 'Good to remind myself what to focus on.'
Thankfully, he didn't need notes to remember how to make various drinks, but if he started experimenting, the note pages would come in handy real quick.
Back at the bar, he looked at the mess he made alongside the three half-filled glasses and smiled. "Feels kinda good to shake off the rust. I guess I'll keep going."
Leon hummed to the tune of the smooth jazz as he kept up his practice, keeping things simple so as not to waste too much.
Whiskey Sour, Sidecar, Manhattan, Negroni, Martini, and his personal favorite, a good Old-Fashioned.
The hours passed as he played. Mixing various drinks, spinning the shakers in his palm like he'd seen many bartenders do in movies, and juggling limes as he opened up more and more in the privacy of the bar. The more he went along, the more he seemed to open the floodgates to the joys of something he actually loved doing.
And when half the day passed, and he cleaned up after himself, a stumbling, well and truly drunk Leon pulled the pot off the stove as the last step of his potion brew was completed.
The mixture turned a deep rich green color and, oddly enough, didn't have a scent.
Leon squinted hard at the book from a few inches away, attempting to read the last few lines that seemed to be jumping around to his drunken gaze. 'I need to…..bottle? Bottle. Bottle it! That's it. Bottle it? Why bottle it? Its made to be drunk, so I'll drink it!'
His thought process made perfect sense to himself as he poked in a straw and sucked up the, thankfully, warm brew seeing as the last step had him leaving it to cool for a half hour.
The green liquid went down his throat, and he pulled back while smacking his lips with an odd expression. "Hm…kinda tangy? Tang…tan…" The word rolled off his tongue playfully until his train of thought slowly died as his world seemed to pulse and rapidly come into focus.
Leon blinked and looked around as the world stopped spinning, and his foggy mind retreated like a strong breeze blowing through him. "Did I just cure my drunkenness?" His head didn't even pound like it did before he started drinking. "Did I just cure my hangover?"
He blinked like a fish out of water at the pot of green liquid. "…..I think I'm in love." The pot was firmly embraced and kept safe in his arms to shield it from the world as he tracked back to his grimoire and read the final lines. "Wait, I have to bottle it within 30 minutes or risk it losing its effect?! I don't have a bottle!"
He looked around for anything to use and rushed back to the bar to grab the empty bottle of cheap rum he used while messing around. Most of the middle-shelf bottles only had a bit used, but he was more careless with the bottom shelf of more inexpensive bottles. He didn't dare touch the top-shelf ones; for the time being, those were for when he had money to throw around.
Leon quickly rinsed out the empty bottle in the sink and shook it to dry it out before carefully pouring in his potion brew. "I need to get a funnel." At least an eighth of the pot spilled as he tried to get it in the narrow opening.
He sighed in relief the second he capped it. "Damn, that was startling." He flexed his hands and stretched out his arms. "Also, what a weird feeling. I went from pissed drunk to sober in seconds. Did it expel the liquor from me? Or just remove the effects?" He hopped up and down a few times and felt the liquid sloshing in his stomach. "Just the effect then? It cured my hangover too, so does that mean it cures all recent toxins? I probably have plenty of toxins in my body, but I think it only considered the alcohol toxins in me to be a poison. I guess I need to test it more to figure out."
He considered it for a minute and wrote down his thoughts before ultimately shrugging in ignorance and looking back at the book. There was one more paragraph at the bottom of the page.
[The success or failure of your final brew depends on how many servings you end up with. For a novice potion, twelve vials worth is a perfect brew. Four is breaking even. Less than four is a failure and should not be drunk or risk being poisoned by toxins from the ingredients breaking down and rotting. Continue to strive for perfection.]
"Huh, twelve vials?" He looked back at the booze bottle in curiosity. "A vial is….four ounces I think? Yeah, I'm pretty sure. That rum bottle is for 750ml, or about 25 ounces, and including what I spilled, it would have been filled to the top. So I got a good six vials worth. Include what I drank and I guess that's closer to seven vials worth. Well, seven isn't bad for my first try. Sure beats failure."
The joy and confidence that came from twelve hours of having fun behind a bar infected his mood as he started to feel better about his Path choice. 'Sure, it's not a novice fire spell, or enhanced eyesight, but its got its own pro's.' His gaze traveled over the grimoire and the nine other potion recipes inside. 'I think I know what I'll be doing tomorrow.'
A yawn escaped his lips as he put the empty pot in the sink. 'I'll take care of it in the morning.' He hit the light switch and aimed for the stairs to the loft upstairs but paused as he reached the first step. 'I finally got access to the potions after two weeks of suffering. Do I really want to start taking it easy now?'
A conflicted look crossed his face before he sighed and turned around. 'Whats an all-nighter or two in the face of progress? Besides, I'm making potions, that's pretty cool.'
He clicked on the stove and turned to the next potion in his list. 'Cure for Boils, huh? Let's see what you do for me.'
And so, the first of many long nights began, with Leon hovering a stove humming the lyrics to Let It Be and making potions that would change his life, for good or worse.
End.
AN: Thoughts?
Response to Reviews:
/: Hadi – I got you bro. Fighter of the depression right here lol.
/: 50 – Ikr? I love Bar and Café stories (without Slash preferably) but they are so rare to find. I've wanted to write them for a while. My story 'Blue Jay Café' is more on the 'Café' side while this one is strongly a 'Bar' side.