Abe the Wizard

The life tree wanted green top-level gemstones.
Abel just noticed that after the fair trade, he had last time.
Of course, he didn’t know about that before, but it was becoming more evident now.
As he took two steps forward, he placed his hand on the bark and activated his soulspeaker’s ability.

Abel made his intentions, “I’ve come to trade today, tree of life.
This big druid has already fulfilled the requirement for promotion.
Please help him as he’s not been making much progress at all.”

Joseph, the big druid, was standing right in the range of the tree.
All the information on him was being scanned at this very moment.
Needless to say, the tree of life understood all there was about him.
It quickly sent out a message to offer him a chance for promotion in exchange for five green top-level gemstones.
Abel smiled at this.
He couldn’t read the mind of this particular, but now he knew that it had a very big demand for green top-level gemstones.
He could come here anytime to trade, and there wouldn’t be a problem of him being rejected.

Abel turned his head around, “Ready yourself, Druid Joseph!”

Having said that, he reached out for five green top-level gemstones at the bottom of the tree.
Very quickly, a root reached out to take five gemstones to the underground.
From then on, green light emitted and shot right into Druid Joseph.
Very quickly, Druid Joseph’s facial expression relaxed as he laid unconsciously underneath the tree.
Knowledge regarding the force of nature started forming in his mind, and while they were still vague, he seemed to have understood everything there was now that he was here, bathed in the light that was putting him in control.
He had been stuck at rank 21 for too long.
He almost gave up on making any further progress, but now, like a student receiving guidance from his teacher, he started to get the hang of what he needed to do.

As precious as the energy inside the tree of life was, he needed to first start learning about how to save it wisely.
Take Druid Poly, for instance.
She needed quite some for her own training, so it’s no wonder how much energy Joseph would need to make his progress.
Very quickly, a promotion started rising out of him, causing a chain reaction that he’s been waiting for more than what he could remember.
This same promotion qi started injecting life force inside his body.
His body was quickly filled with vitality energy that eliminated everything old about him.

Abel was starting to understand why Druid Joseph was promoted to rank 22 now.
Five top-level gemstones were not that much, but the tree of life could still gain a whole heap of energy from its inside, which indicated that the cost for this promotion was just not as high as he expected.
Still, it was quite shocking for the two big druids to realize how quickly it was for this one rank promotion.
From this, they pretty much knew that Master Bennett knew exactly how to use the tree of life to the benefits of the druids.

21 was usually the level that big druids remained stuck at.
The whole reason that there hadn’t been one legendary druid had to do with genetic factors.
The elves were not known to have a high population density, whereas the humans had enough in numbers to make up for the extremely low proportion of law-defying wizards.
It also had to do with the resourcefulness of those two races as well.
For the elves, as long as they could keep a stable number of big druids of at least 25 in rankings, it’d be much more likely for there to be a legendary druid every once in a while.
And when that happened, the safety of the entire race would pretty much be secured.

With all that in mind, the two big druids looked enthusiastically towards Druid Joseph, then to the tree of life, and finally towards Abel.
They were guarding the tree of life, and they knew how precious it was.
That being said, Master Bennett was the only one who held the keys to actually make it do work.
If it wasn’t for him, Druid Joseph would’ve never had this rebirth.

Druid Joseph stood respectfully towards the tree, “You have my utmost gratitude.”

But the tree of life didn’t respond in any way.
What happened was a trade, and now that the trade was finished, this elf in front of it had no longer anything to do with it.

Druid Joseph turned towards Abel, “Thank you so much for the help, Master Bennett.”

Abel smiled and spoke, “You are my follower now, Druid Joseph, and it is only right for me to do what I can to help.
From here, if you keep up your good work, you should receive the same amount of monthly tribute as Poly.”

Having said that, Abel threw a portal bag right towards Druid Joseph.
Druid Joseph was rank 25 now, and there was probably a lot of time for him to do things.
He was most likely to receive his tribute immediately, so he would probably just get to training very quickly.
Anyways, Abel was already giving him five “strength potions,” twenty “light recovery potions,” and twenty “mana potions.” It should be more than enough to help him get by.

If there was something Druid Joseph would like to say, it’d be that he was very surprised that the potions he got were, supposedly, a mere monthly payment for Master Bennett’s followers.
If he were to sell all these potions to the black market, they would actually just cost more than tributes sold at the palace—the strength potion, especially.
Anyone could tell that it was more effective than the light recovery potion, and that’s already something that was sold out a while ago.
No wonder Druid Poly became a big druid in just a few months.

Abel spoke again, “Anyways, if you need other types of potion, make sure to register for the light recovery potion.
Same for the mana potion.
Just contact me through the spirits in my residence.”

As plentiful as these potions seem, all it took for him was two successful brews.
He really had more than enough to just give them away.

Druid Joseph bowed once more, “Thank you so much, Master Bennett!”

Abel spoke to him again, “Also, if you can, please go negotiate with Wizard Brem on my behalf.
I need a complete set of the fire element wizard heritage.
I don’t need the items, but I must do all I can to get my hands on their system of techniques.”

Abel just implied that he already had the fire element wizard heritage items.
Druid Joseph wasn’t going to the point that out, but he sure was impressed by how ridiculously resourceful the man in front of him was.
By the way, it wasn’t like Abel needed to hide anything from him.
They were already master and servant under the oath of Moon Goddess.
Nothing was to be kept confidential between them.

Druid Joseph bowed, “Rest assured, Master Bennett.
I’ll make sure to take care of this for you.”

Abel threw a bottle of the golden “life-prolonging potion” to Druid Joseph, “Here, trade this with Wizard Brem if you need to.”

Druid Joseph put the potion carefully away.
He knew how precious the potion was, as it could only be found from the Ancient Ruins.
Collecting all the necessary ingredients from the store would make anyone go bankrupt, and it wasn’t like the main material was for sale anyways.
That being said, it was definitely a very shocking thing to hear that Master Bennett had a potion that, apparently, could extend a person’s life by sixty years.

On the second day of returning to his own residence, Abel heard the news of how Druid Joseph just became Master Bennett’s third follower.
Not only that, this new follower apparently became rank 22 big druid in the Tree of Life Valley.
The words got out a lot quicker than he would think, but this was record-breaking progress even by the standards of one of the most affluent races.

The Potionmaster Union was of a much higher status now, needless to say.
They were originally thought of as this unconventional group that wasn’t very often recognized.
Still, now, they were known to be the main suppliers of the resources that enhanced the fighting capabilities of all occupation holders.
Now, even the big druids had to be very humble if they wanted something from them.

On just the third day, Druid Joseph headed back as he was granted permission to access inside Abel’s current residence.
He was now allowed to be inside the steel fort.

Druid Joseph bowed immediately as he went in, “I’ve already completely the deal with Wizard Brem.”

That was surprisingly fast, given how this was the very first mission that was assigned to him.
He really pulled himself off for this one.
Again, it would make sense he wanted to earn the trust of the best potion master on the continent—that, and the fact that he wanted to work to earn the opportunity to extend his lifespan.

The deal went very smoothly.
While the fire element wizard heritage was not supposed to be moved to a spot other than its original locations, it was agreed that they would keep it inside the Flowing Fire Castle.
The ownership would still be to Master Bennett, but it was agreed that it would open for all to use.