When Tori entered deep meditation, she knew she’d be able to make this Potion. And when she finally drank it during the last stage of her transformation—

She exploded!

She felt her body explode. It was as if fuel had been poured into her body as it leaped toward a higher stage, triggering a violent blast inside her. For a moment, she thought she’d died. She seemed to glimpse the vast Starry Sky, and countless dreamlike shadows drifting by like bubbles.

The process went on for a long time. Amid the shifting scenes, she felt a little at peace, as if she’d returned to her mother’s embrace. Nothing seemed to matter anymore.

Until, at last, a gold coin appeared in her consciousness.

Her consciousness snapped back!

She opened her eyes in an instant and suddenly realized she was still alive. She hadn’t exploded or returned to that warm embrace. She’d simply drunk the Mobius Potion she’d brewed—the Potion of Infinite Light—as she crossed into the ranks of The Weak.

She could feel the elements and magic power within her.

This really was different. She didn’t have to enter a meditative state; she could feel the elements and magic power just as clearly now. With hardly any effort, she made an ice spike—the kind that had once taken all her strength to conjure. Then she used magic power to drive it into the wooden table, leaving a shallow dent.

“It can actually do some damage now. It’s not much different from holding a sharp weapon myself.” She assessed her current state. “So this is The Weak.”

She thought for a moment, then used light magic.

She knew what this spell was. Her figure gradually grew harder to make out.

The front and back as one, symbolizing infinity: the Mobius Ring. The magic tied to this pattern made her approach colorlessness. Put more simply, Tori seemed able to adjust her own contrast a little.

It made her less conspicuous. And if she combined it with dark magic, she might be able to reach a state where she was very difficult to spot.

Something like camouflage.

A survival skill—well, actually, having a survival skill was pretty great for a Potion Maker. If she had to give it a name, she’d call it “Glimmer.” Light at the level of The Weak, and light that made her seem smaller, too.

Still, that wasn’t important. Her breakthrough had been inevitable, and she really could make an all-attribute Potion. She now understood Potions in a completely different way. Magic was an art—

But then again, that state had been terrifying. It was as if she’d lost all desire, wanting only to lose herself in the beautiful world of magic.

“Was that the Demon Realm?”

Tori wasn’t sure, but she was certain that Potions were indeed part of the study of magic. How well you understood magic determined how well you understood Potions, and her understanding of magic was still far from sufficient. The Potions she’d managed to make were less the result of understanding Potions and more the product of brute-force trial and error. Of course, as a modern person, she had no particular objection to trial and error.

Besides, she doubted she was the first to make Potions like her Agility Potion or Defense Potion. Perhaps other Potion Makers had made them before, but they weren’t trying to create that kind of thing, so they didn’t consider them finished products. Or maybe she just hadn’t seen them.

In any case, she should get herself cleaned up.

She headed to the bathroom again.

Standing in front of the vanity mirror, she realized she’d grown taller. That was easy enough to notice, after all. Her point of view had changed.

But Miss Tori had been so absorbed in the art of magic that she hadn’t noticed until now.

Before, she’d looked no different from an ordinary eight-year-old girl. Though she had been a little chubby. She’d drunk plenty of Potions and hadn’t exactly watched what she ate.

But that little bit of extra weight seemed to have been just right. After this breakthrough, her figure looked as though it had filled out a little in all the right places. Now she looked at least ten, maybe even older.

Girls tended to develop earlier than boys—but none of that mattered. She was still a child.

She thought about it, then decided not to dwell on the matter. Come to think of it, was a fantasy world really that different from a cultivation world? In a cultivation world, the description would surely be “covered in filth” and “so grimy you’d want to scrub off a whole layer of skin.”

She took a bath, but didn’t seem to wash anything off. Her skin did look a little better, for instance. That was probably because her life level had truly risen a little, and she could sense the Demon Realm more strongly now.

After her bath, she combined fire magic with wind magic to dry her hair like a hair dryer.

This was The Weak! The magic of a Mage at The Weak level could often be useful in everyday life. Before, Tori’s magic had been practically useless. But now, she could genuinely affect the world around her.

What about her mana bar? It must’ve gotten a lot bigger, though she had no idea by how much.

Perfect.

An all-purpose Potion. It wasn’t especially powerful, but it was absolutely the kind of magic that suited Tori best. Usually, Potion Makers made advancement Potions by “playing to their strengths.” Tori’s goal, though, was to “make up for her weaknesses.”

Being well-rounded often meant having no particular specialty, but it also meant being able to adapt to all kinds of situations. And adaptability was exactly what Tori needed.

“I feel pretty good. This is the time to press my advantage,” she said to herself. “If I wait too long, I might not be able to make the Potion Ethan needs. So what I need to do is…”

Tori returned to her laboratory. Several different elements gathered in her hands. She combined them in a chaotic arrangement, then “ignited” them with magic power.

It blew up.

Tori’s laboratory blew up.

Once again, she emerged from the laboratory covered in soot. “Devastated” was the only way to describe her. “I… I failed. I didn’t do it… The breakthrough failed, too…”

Breakthroughs could fail.

Some people failed to break through to The Weak, too. Quite a few people in town had gone through it. But that only showed that Potion Maker Tori’s talent was limited, and that she’d likely struggle to surpass the Mediocre and become Extraordinary in her lifetime.

For some reason, quite a few people felt a little more at ease even as they sympathized with her.

“Watch the shop for me, Lydia. I’m going out to clear my head.”

The girl forced a faint smile, then went into the washroom.

She did her best to clean herself up, then left the Witch’s House.

She gradually blurred until, by the time anyone might have noticed, she was almost invisible. Of course, anyone who looked closely could still spot her. But at the busy entrance to the Witch’s House, that was unlikely.

She disappeared into the crowd.

The moment Tori stepped into Ethan’s room, a long sword pointed at her.

“Hey, hey! Young Master Ethan, turning on me already?” Tori said, sounding a little annoyed. As she spoke, she dispelled the magic surrounding her.

Ethan stepped out from the shadows behind the door. “You succeeded? You can call yourself a real Potion Maker now. That’s incredible, Tori. You’ve exceeded my expectations again.”

“What do you mean, ‘your expectations’?”

Ice armor covered Tori’s hand. She pushed Ethan’s sword aside and saw that it had left a deep mark in the ice covering her hand.

“Tsk, tsk! That sword’s sharp! You’re pointing something that sharp at me? And after I worked for days without sleep just for you!”

Ethan lowered his long sword. “Well, you know. Better safe than sorry.”

He looked a little embarrassed, too.

“But I don’t think I’ve ever bragged to you, have I? I always have a basis for what I say. I hope you’ll have a little more faith in me as my boss and investor.”

Tori held out her hand and looked at Ethan. “Bring out your materials. I’ll brew your Potion for you. Light Armor, right? I understand the general idea now. If we wait any longer, I can’t promise I’ll be able to make it.”

She felt that way because she’d just had her breakthrough. She could still faintly grasp the feeling from that state, and that was why she was a hundred percent certain she could brew the Potion Ethan needed. If she waited, that feeling would slip completely out of reach, and she’d have to rely on luck.

“All right!”

Ethan took out the materials one by one.

“Oh! These are the hairs of a light spirit! They barely seem to have a physical form. So this is what an Extraordinary is like. If you break through, could parts of your body be used as materials, too?”

Ethan spread his hands. “That’s a Potion Maker’s business. If you insist on using other Mages as ingredients, there’s not much anyone can do about it. Just don’t get caught.”

“Heh!”

Tori chuckled. “By the way, Young Master Ethan, you haven’t left this room at all these past few days, have you?”

“That’s called being cautious.” Ethan didn’t think there was anything shameful about it. “They probably think I’ve already gone back to Dais City. If you weren’t here, I definitely would’ve run back there first. From their point of view, it seems they didn’t think you were valuable enough, and they didn’t expect me to stay here, break through, and then strike back at them.”

His words still carried the confidence of someone who had everything under control. He’d acted on that confidence, too, and the result had proved him right.

That was the thing about men like him—his confidence made you want to rely on him. It felt as if, with him around, there was nothing to worry about.

But if you really thought that, your part in the story would end right there.

“I’m saying this upfront: if you want to hunt someone down, do it yourself. And try not to reveal your identity, or doing business will become a real pain. I won’t help you. That’s not part of our contract.”

Ethan smiled. “Of course.”

Tori looked over the materials covering the table and took a deep breath. These materials were hard to come by. She couldn’t afford to brew other Potions first and then make an advancement Potion.

She took a deep breath. “If I get caught in that strange pull of the Demon Realm, you have to wake me up. I need to rely on that state.”

Then she entered deep meditation.