The Breaker’s Banner disappeared, immediately followed by another. The green glow washed over the fresh snow, bathing everything in the tint. Loch felt his Spirit reserves draining as he kept the Banner going and adding Offensive Stance and Aura Of Attack. If he’d had anything to attack, he would have used Onyx’s Abilities and all his others. Anything to drain his Spirit quicker.

  The problem was his natural regeneration was high, especially out of combat.

  He wanted to drain his Spirit as low as possible, as quickly as possible. It was cold outside just standing there, doing nothing. Not just for him, but the people with him. It was a small group, but they were all clapping hands together, stomping on the ground, anything to keep circulation going as they just stood there, watching. Waiting on him.

  Loch Activated Windstep, dashing from the front of the school to in front of the Dungeon building, then another Windstep around to the backside. He felt bad at the loose snow he’d kicked up when he left, but it was burning through his Spirit faster. Loch dashed around the school, kicking up snow whenever he stopped and started. He felt the Spirit draining, satisfied it was low enough. Two more Windsteps brought him back to the small group.

  Coming to a stop, Loch held out a hand, toward Leah Smithfield, the Clan’s first and so far only Alchemist. She’d been one of the last arrivals before the snow fell. A former high school Chemistry teacher. With the aid of Amelia Elmore, a Gardener Class, and Cheryl Green, an Herbalist, the three had been busy trying to figure out how to make potions.

  They had finally succeeded. They hoped.

  The three women crowded in close to Loch, Ed Turner, Kristin Conway and Piper staying back. Julia Montgomery and Susan Turner were both on opposite sides of Loch, ready to leap in if needed. Leah handed Loch a corked test tube filled with a light blue liquid. Holding it up, Loch looked at the liquid. It didn’t bubble or hiss, just looked like juice.

  “Are you sure this is safe?” Ed asked.

  “That’s why I’m testing it,” Loch said.

  “It should be,” Leah said, a little unsure. She glanced back at Piper, who looked very nervous. She turned back to Loch. “Yeah, it’s safe.”

  He pulled the cork out, handing it back to Leah. No need to waste it.

  “Here goes,” he said, already noticing his Spirit starting to regenerate.

  He Activated Breaker’s Banner, Aura Of Attack and Offensive Stance just to drain it of the bit that had regenerated.

  Tipping the test tube up over his mouth, he felt like he was back in his early-20s doing the special test tube shots at the clubs. The first drops hit his tongue, moving down his throat. It was thick like cough syrup, but didn’t have the medicinal taste. He’d expected it to taste bad. Every potion in every book, movie or video game all tasted bad. But this wasn’t bad at all. It had a cherry taste, which was strange with the blue color.

  It tingled as it flowed down, more of it falling into his mouth. He felt the last drop hit his tongue as the tingling spread throughout his body, most moving toward his Core. He felt the potion hit his Core, which awakened. Normally he could feel the slow pull of Spirit from the air around them, a tiny bit at a time. This was like the floodgates opened. His Core sucked in more and more, the air around him wavering a little as the Spirit was dragged into his Core. He felt the rush of energy as the mental bar didn’t just tick up, but shot up, instantly filling about half way back to full.

  The rush left him as the last of the liquid was used up, his Core returning to the normal pull. The total the potion had replenished wasn’t much compared to the overall length of his bar, but for someone lower Leveled and with less Spirit Reserves, the potion could have filled them all the way up.

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  “Wow,” Loch said, handing the test tube back. “That was a rush.”

  “And?” Leah asked.

  “It worked,” Loch smiled. “You made a Spirit Regeneration Potion. Good job.”

  Cheers erupted from everyone around him, people leaning in to congratulate Leah. The woman was beaming, but looked embarrassed at the accolades.

  “Tell me everything,” she said.

  “Inside,” Loch answered. “It’s cold out.”

  ***

  “Judging from where my Reserves were to where they ended up,” Loch said, taking a sip of the hot chocolate. “I’d say it’s maybe 30-40% replenishment.”

  “Oh,” Leah said, jotting down notes in a book. She looked a little crestfallen, had probably been hoping for more.

  “Keep in mind that I have a lot of Spirit Reserves,” Loch said. “That’s 30-40% of my bar. Someone lower Leveled, it could be more like 75% or even completely refilling their Reserves.”

  Leah smiled, brightening up again.

  “That’s true,” she said. “I wish there was a way to get a real number attached, but with some more experimentation, I think we can nail something down.” She looked up at Loch. “No side effects?”

  “None,” he answered, holding out his arms to show he was fine. “Nothing yet.”

  “I think if there were going to be, it would have happened by now,” Amelia said, from where she sat next to Leah.

  The whole group sat at one of the tables in the cafeteria, each with a mug of the process hot chocolate. Loch hadn’t wanted to get some, they didn’t have that many packets, but this was a cause for celebration. Piper sat close to him on his left. She hadn’t left his side since he’d tried the potion. He had told her he was fine and there was nothing to worry about, but she was still concerned.

  “And it didn’t taste bad?”

  “Nope, kind of like cherry.”

  “Weird,” Amelia said. “I had really expected it to taste bad.”

  “Me too,” Loch said with a chuckle. “Was more like juice, not thick and syrupy.”

  Leah made more notes.

  “Just finishing that pushed me up a whole Level,” Leah said. “I can’t wait to see what happens when I make more. Now I need to try a Stamina.”

  “Health would really be useful,” Julia said from where she sat a couple people down.

  “Yeah, but I think that will be the hardest,” Leah answered. “It’s tough to know, since I’m really just experimenting and throwing things together and seeing what the results are. Some of the herbs are easier to tell what they can do. Like the ones I used for the Spirit Potion. Those gave off a lot of Spirit for something so small and I could feel how they pulled in the ambient Spirit from around them. So seemed natural that they’d be for a Spirit Regen potion. But I haven’t found anything that works that way for Health. For Stamina, there’s a plant from that Dungeon at the end of Harvey Lake Road that has some weird properties. It doesn’t seem to tire, which is an odd thing to say about a plant.”

  “What does that mean?” Piper asked.

  “Plants don’t really move,” Cheryl answered. “But these do. Some plants will react to noise or other stimuli, but these just react to something only they can sense. They are constantly moving, even if it’s silent or dark. We’ve been theorizing that they have an abundance of stamina energy and never settle down.”

  “That’s neat,” Piper said.

  “I have never heard of that,” Cerie said, as her eyes lit up. “But my data is incomplete when it comes to Alchemy.”

  “Did the Silver Bark not like alchemy?,” Leah asked.

  “They enjoyed the potions and such, but just never got that deeply involved with the creation. At least those that were responsible for my data were not interested.”

  “How long do you think it’ll take to make up a Stamina potion?” Loch asked.

  Leah shrugged.

  “Lots of trial and error. It could be a couple days or a couple weeks. We’ll make some more Spirit Regeneration Potions first.”

  “How many do you think you can make?”

  “I think we have enough material for two dozen potions.”

  “Let’s see what we can do about getting you more,” Loch said, thinking about prioritizing the herb resource dungeon off Harvey Lake Road and the Blighted Grotto.