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A pandemic that has taken many lives was a crucial and urgent problem, but even though Emery would love to help, he was no longer the innocent and naive kid who would do anything just out of the goodness in his heart. From the looks of it, he knew there would be a lot of coins involved in it.

"How much would these be worth?"

At this moment, though Emery looked like he was dressed to the nines, he didn't carry too many coins with him. Luna had offered him some, but he rejected it. The Quintins had provided a lot of things for him in return for him becoming their benefactor and Emery didn't want Luna to start giving him pocket money as well.

For his current quest, Emery didn't think he would need a lot of coins, but he was sure he would need some money for future problems.

Emery discussed payment with the owner and got to know more about him. The owner was named Allistair, while the young protégé and son was Allistair Jr. Due to their past encounter, the discussion proceeded quickly and smoothly and Emery assured him the newly-developed cleansing potions he brought here were of much higher quality than the ones before.

Emery took the half a dozen bottles of cleansing potion he was carrying in his pouch at the moment.

As for the price, Emery decided to settle with a similar deal to last time. In return for the bottles of cleansing potion, he wanted the permission to go through the owner's storage collection for study purposes. But this time, he didn't want to just analyze them. He would walk around the shop and grab a little piece of the things he needed to study.

At first, Allistair was reluctant to give access, knowing the room housed many exotic ingredients. But they had met each other once and Merlin had proven his capabilities, so he decided to put his faith in Merlin. Allistair hoped they would have a better relationship in the future.

[Unidentified herb rank 2 data received – you are awarded with 100 contribution points!]

[Unidentified herb rank 2 data received – incomplete – you are awarded with 30 contribution points!]

[Unidentified herb rank 1 data received – you are awarded with 30 contribution points!]

Emery took a little bit on the ingredients that said 'incomplete' in order to use the [Fragmentation] spell later. For the others, he decided to just save its information in his database in case he needed them for further advancing his potions and making new recipes.

After thoroughly checking all the items in the back room, Emery found 62 kinds of unidentified tier 1 plants and 14 tier 2 plants, but sadly, he found no tier 3 ingredients at all. Was Earth really that low in the scope of the galaxy at large, to the point a rank 3 plant would be too much to ask?

He obtained 2000 contribution points to show for his time there.

Emery looked at the symbol on his palm and willed the system to show his current amount of contribution points.

[Contribution points : 90.670]

Emery had no idea whether he would be fortunate enough to come across the means to obtain so many contribution points for such little effort. For now, as he had no steady way to obtain contribution points, it would be better for him to save as much as he could.

After making sure he had obtained everything he could here, the owner asked about making a fixed schedule for the delivery of Emery's cleansing potions. They talked about the current demand for the item and Emery tried to negotiate a decent enough profit in return for his time.

It was lucky the shop was otherwise empty at the moment, as it allowed Allistair and Emery ample time to talk about business and its intricacies.

Emery settled to promise a few dozens potions in a few days' time, but he did not say anything when Allistair asked about more definite supplies. The nature of the vital ingredient made him unable to promise such a thing at the moment.

The vital ingredient he was talking about was of course the blue flower required to make the blue powder. In order to ensure stable supplies, Emery had to make sure how much he could take at a given period of time.

Luckily, thanks to Killgragah's assistance, Emery had learned the [Spatial Gate] skill, and now he could just visit the cave whenever he had free time.

He thanked the shop owner before leaving outside to the busy streets. The thought of asking the Quintins for more information about the apothecary association had crossed his mind, but for now, he had a lot on his plate, the most important one being the knighthood.

The streets were still packed even as the sun started to descend and the blue, starry sky took over the beautiful twilight above. Doors started to close and torches were lit along the more busy roads, bathing everything in flickering colors of orange and red.

The hustle and bustle of the day started to wane as the night went on. As if a veil had been lifted, Emery started to notice what lied behind the facade of the city full of happiness and business – the people left behind.

It was such a surprising revelation. At night, the majestic Lionarch City transformed and was still swarmed by the poor.

Tap, tap, tap.

A pitter-patter of little footsteps could be heard right behind Emery and he followed the noise to see a little boy no more than 6 running as fast as he could while clutching a brown paper bag close to his chest. The boy looked left and right to make sure no one was following him before ducking into one of the dark alleys.

Curious, Emery followed the kid inside, while keeping his distance. He saw the boy running towards a group of other little kids. The boy smiled at them and opened the bag, revealing a loaf of bread they ate together.

The sight touched his heart and Emery walked closer. At first, the kids were afraid and the boy tried to protect them as best as he could, but Emery only smiled at them and opened his bag.

He took out the sumptuous food prepared by the Quintins for his dinner and shared them with the kids.

While the kids enjoyed the fresh bread and meat, Emery talked with them and realized the kids were orphans left alive after their family were drafted for the war up north and never came back, or after they were killed by bandits in this time of increased strife.

The sincere smiles of the children being happy from such a simple deed made Emery a little bit sad and irritated for the state of the kingdom. The difference between those who were poor and those who were rich seemed to be too great and from the looks of it, those in power would not do anything.

They finished eating and Emery gave the kids some coins before bidding his farewell.

As he turned around, one of the little girls tugged on Emery's tunic and said. "Thank you, kind mister. You're just as kind as our fair princess, Gwenneth."

Emery went silent. He merely smiled and swallowed the memories of his childhood adventures before wishing them a safe journey.

After a leisurely walk, Emery returned back to his inn, walked upstairs to his assigned room and locked the door behind him. Emery cast the [Spatial Gate] to open his storage space. He took out a handful of blue stones and created a small, circular formation on the room's wooden floor before casting his [Spatial Gate] spell again, this time to return to the stone formation at the Forbidden forest.

Emery made sure he would return to the Khaos space whenever he had some time to spare. He used the time to cultivate in order to make up for his low aptitude. Besides, he didn't need as much sleep due to his increased strength.

The next morning, Emery returned back to the inn, put the rock inside his storage space and walked outside in full spirit. After all, today was the day of the squire assessment.

To be continued