Chapter 256 Visitor
A gentle knock on the door to Alzara's lab and Zach's training room startled the master and his familiars out of their activities.
"Zach, you have a visitor." Nessa entered the room. Alzara bent over her desk and the materials on it, trying to find the secrets of the universe. Zach and Yanael lay entwined on the floor like a pair of wriggling worms. Soara watched them with a composed demeanor.
"...I'm practicing grappling."
"Sure. You still have a visitor. You going to see them or maybe take a shower first?"
"Who is it?" He asked. The expression on Nessa's face, the way the corner of her lips rose slightly and how her eyes glimmered faintly, told him it was someone he knew.
"You'll see it when you meet them." Nessa shrugged casually, feigning disinterest.
Zach's eyebrows rose in anticipation.
"No shower it is. I can just conceal my smell with a barrier." Zach promptly put up an air-tight barrier around his body that covered everything except his mouth and nose so that he could breathe freely.
"...Nice." Nessa stopped for a moment and stared at Zach. As he walked past her, she followed him with her gaze. She hadn't smelled a thing. She tilted her head slightly. How many times had he skipped out on showers and just relied on his barriers to hide his stench? And how bad was it now?
Nessa frowned as she caught herself wanting to know. She told herself it was just out of curiosity.n/ô/vel/b//jn dot c//om
Zach almost skipped through the halls until he realized that he didn't know where his visitor was waiting for him, so he froze until Nessa caught up to him and led the way. Whoever it was, it was most likely a happy visit.
Lexi had said she was going to stop by last year, but she never showed up. Zach hadn't returned to the family estate during the last break, so maybe the family had sent her to check up on him.
'Aww…' Zach pouted when Nessa brought him out of the Academy and toward the city. Lexi wouldn't have waited for him there. She would have barged into his dorm if no one stopped her.
Then, it was most likely someone else. Zach could guess who. The only person who would visit him at this time and place was someone he had asked to visit. But arriving only a month after the start of the school year was at the quickest.
It meant they were eager to get started and worked fast.
Zach increased his pace, making Nessa do the same. She glanced at him before shaking her head. Just based on his happy face, she could tell that he had figured it out.
It didn't take long for them to arrive at the city, and even before they stepped onto the same street as the alchemist guild's building, the hustle and bustle of a caravan reached their ears. Several carriages had parked in front of the alchemist guild. The merchants and their workers had even started unloading their goods.
Zach's face lit up as he saw it.
"Derot!" He greeted the young man leading the operation with a smile. Derot looked up from his clipboard with a concentrated look that soon turned into a polite smile.
"Mister Evandiel. As you can see, I got started while waiting for you. I hope you don't mind."
"Of course not. You ready?"
"Ready as can be."
"Perfect." Zach turned to one of the workers they had hired for the guild.
"Start bringing them out," he ordered.
"Them?" Derot asked. Zach gestured for him to wait.
The worker Zach gave his order to and several others started carrying out crates from the adjoining storage building. All but one entered an empty carriage. The last one ended up in front of Zach and Derot. Zach popped it open and showed Derot its contents with a smile.
Derot Gaville's face slowly lit up from the sheen of the rows of glass bottles in the crate. Rows and rows upon layers of layers of potions, all exactly the same color.
Color alone couldn't tell even a relatively experienced merchant like Derot anything worthwhile. But when all the potions were the same color, it was clear that they were the same quality. And any alchemist who could produce that many potions of similar quality could produce potions of high quality consistently.
Zach had fulfilled his end of the deal he proposed in the Labyrinth of Syst shortly before Derot failed to complete a Trial.
Derot had been apprehensive at first, especially when the boats left without waiting for Zach to rise to the surface. If the others were to be believed, Zach had chosen to do the twelfth Trial. That meant he had chosen death.
But only a few days later, there was word about a young man from Evandiel staying at the Systine's estate. Derot didn't even verify those rumors before he got started.
He did some market research before setting upon a quest to gather a variety of alchemical ingredients. As many and as diverse as possible.
If Zach was alive, it meant he had survived the twelfth Trial. It didn't matter whether he had cleared it or not. What mattered was that he had shattered history and expectations.
While doing his market research, Derot also took the opportunity to investigate Zach some more.
Zach was a wildcard. He had an extensive history of causing trouble wherever he went to the point that his first few years as a teen were spent locked up in a mansion. Even after entering the Academy, Zach's presence did not go ignored. He summoned the first S-rank in years. He almost died during the entrance ceremony. He picked a fight with the Underworld.
On all accounts, there was trouble to be found wherever Zach went.
That was why betting on a business plan with him was risky.
But it wasn't just risky.
It was profitable.
Derot didn't just see all the trouble that danced in Zach's wake. He saw how few casualties there were, how often Zach survived what could have been a fatal encounter, and how at least someone always walked out in a better position after Zach's troublemaking events.
If he played his cards right, Derot could make sure to be that person.
His instincts screamed at him that partnering with Zach for his alchemist business was his way in.
If it worked–If Zach could back up his arrogant words of taking over the world of alchemy in a matter of years, Derot and the Gaville House could rise to the top of the Empire's merchants. If it didn't work, they would have learned a lesson. Both Zach and Derot were wealthy enough to make a mistake or place a bad bet.