Back to his room in the hotel, laying on the bed, Mack fidgeted with the two serums in his right hand while the left arm stood behind his head.

By his side, the naked body of a girl, the same from two days ago.

The girl slept so cute that Mack could not muster mental strength enough to wake her, so he just let her sleep. She had worked hard today. It was a deserving sleep.

.

Mack raised himself from the bed, put on his clothes, and walked outside the room.

A few minutes later, he was on the training floor again.

The training floor had all kinds of things for people to be completely focused on training and one of those was a small kitchen, where people could prepare a quick meal before training or take water or prepare any special kind of beverage used during trainings.

Mack took a few flowers out of his backpack and started preparing a tea with them.

A few minutes later, the tea was ready and Mack took the serums again and pressed them over his own left arm. Mack could feel very small needles touching his skin and half a second later, there was no more liquid inside them.

Mack’s body suddenly became hotter, and his skin started to become more reddish, as if he was in some kind of steam room.

After a two minutes, everything cames back to normal as if never happened and Mack started to drink the tea that now was in perfect temperature to drink.

“bitter”

Said Mack aloud before taking a sip of tea. He was not a big fan of tea, and the ones he liked more were the sweet ones. His father used to drink a lot of tea, but this taste, Mack didn’t inherit.

After drinking the first cup of tea Mack could feel something inside his body moving, it was not his bowels, more like something moving to his pores, the sensation was hard to catch because almost felt like it was not there, but Mack was sure, something was moving inside his body and going to his pores.

“Ok, let’s take another cup of tea and see what happens”

Said Mack, preparing another one, this time with five petals of the flower.

A few minutes later, the same feeling came again, but more strong now.

‘Maybe doing some exercises will help.’

Thought Mack, already moving in the puppet’s direction to train more.

In front of the puppet, Mack punched him, and then, moved to the side and gave another punch, took a step to the side and gave a round kick.

Today, Mack thought, would be good to train his punches and kicks while moving and using the techniques the old man passed to him.

Mack had his swords, but he could not always depend on them. It was better to be prepared for everything.

A few hours later, the old man came, and seeing Mack punching and kicking the puppet like an amateur, could not avoid but shake his head.

But the old man also saw that some black liquid was all over the floor around the puppet.

[I see that those flowers are working on you. How many petals did you consume?]

Hearing the old man’s voice in his head, Mack stopped punching the puppet and turned around.

“Until now, 12 petals.”

[Good, from now on, consume 20 petals each hour, until your body no more produces this black liquid]

“hmm”

Said Mack, giving a small nod and turning back to keep punching the puppet.

He knew this black liquid was the impurities that the herbologist talked about. It was not the first time that black stuff came out of his body, too. Even not knowing what those impurities were or how they formed, Mack knew that was better to have less, because every time those things left his body, he felt lighter, as if an invisible boulder was lifted from his shoulder.

Seeing Mack was back to training, the old man gave tips again on what he should improve.

And just like this, minutes turned to hours, and hours into days, while Mack followed the same routine every day.

During daytime he would train and by night he would take the serums that the herbologist made on the previous day and leave blood for him to make new ones.

The old man made every arrangement possible to ensure that Mack would be fully focused on training for those hundred days, and as he expected, nothing major happened in the city or in the planet that could cause trouble for them.

[Rest well today, tomorrow we are leaving this planet, and don’t forget to deal with the pending issues]

Said Harlack, using the mind link.

“Its already been a hundred days? Damm I feel like I still can improve a lot.”

Said Mack, giving one last sword strike at the puppet neck and turning around.

“Where are we going?”

[Planet Zamith, it’s a planet with no intelligent species, your test will be there]

Said Harlack, already vanishing from the spot as usual.

Hearing that, Mack put his two swords back to his belt and entered the elevator. He pressed a button, and the doors closed, and at the same moment the puppet head slipped from his neck and felt to the floor.

But no one was there to see it.

The doors of the elevator opened and Mack left, but what was in front of him was not his room, but the lobby.

Mack walked outside and activated his cape, becoming fully invisible.

Walking a few meters, Mack appeared at the place he had been a lot for last days.

~knock knock~

“Coming”

Said the already familiar herbologist voice coming from inside.

“I was not expecting you today. The last batch is not ready yet.”

Said the herbologist opening the door, but when opening, he saw no one there, not even the guy he expected to see.

“Weird…. Was this a prank by the kids?”

Said the man, walking outside to see if someone was running away from the place.

Seeing no one, he walked inside again and closed the door but when turning around to go his lab again; he saw a very familiar face.

“Mack?”

Asked the herbologist, not sure what was happening.

“You knew how this is ‘deal’ was going to end from the start, didn’t you? If so, why did you keep doing the serums for me?”

Asked Mack, already removing the hood from his head and showing his red eyes.

“So you are going to kill me in the end, no matter what…..”

Mack kept looking at him without moving. He just wished to know why the man didn’t left the city days ago or just rated Mack or even plotted against him, he was not dumb enough to not see this coming, and yet, here they are.

“…..Do you think you are the only one running from mages? Why do you think that someone capable of doing serums is here? In this small town on a forgot planet?”

Said the herbologist, clicking by the side of his neck.

To Mack’s surprise, he saw the man’s face changing from a horse to the face of a man in his forties.

‘Did you knew about this old man?’

Asked Mack to the old man through his thoughts.

[Yes. I checked on him, and he was indeed a wanted man by the mage alliance. Those masks can’t trick me. His true name is Arthonesis]

“And why did you think I’m running from the mages?”

Asked Mack, still not moving an inch from the place.

“Someone capable of bringing so much warlock blood, or he robbed a mage family, or… he is a warlock himself.”

Said the herbologist called Arthonesis.

“I see, so you figured this out in the end….. One more reason to kill you…..”

Said Mack, already touching his two swords.

“Look inside the box by your side….”

Said Arthonesis, pointing to a box.

Mack took one of his swords, and open the lid of the box using the tip of the sword, and with the corner of his eyes, saw what was inside.

Almost fifty fire serums.

“So you kept them…. I was already expecting it.”

Said Mack, closing the lid of the box.

“I will do as much serums as you can drink in your life, and all that’s mine is yours for take, even my life if you want. I just want you to take revenge in my place, the mages took all I had and I cant do anything about this… but you….. you can make that happen.”

‘What do you think, old man? You checked on him. Is he worth the trust?’

[That is for you to decide, but remember, a man can’t only leave bodies behind, but that is for you to decide. This is your life, not mine]

Mack kept looking at the man in front of him, while he pondered what he should do.

“Indeed, a life is easy to take, but an ally is hard to make.”