Voices echoed energetically through the air as Blackthorne and Argent's pre-eminent alchemist discussed the terms of a new contract. Who else would buy various chunks of a dead man in this town? Upon his return from the graveyard he'd gone straight to the old curmudgeonly man to see if his items were worth anything.

"So, we're agreed then?" asked the alchemist. His bushy eyebrows were arched in a slightly predatory manner. At the corner of his lips a slight hint of drool slipped out at the very idea of what he would gain from his new commission.

Blackthorne nodded to him then said, "Agreed. I'll exclusively sell any body parts from the graveyard to you that I don't use myself, and you'll pay me half value plus a permanent twenty percent discount on raw materials sold here provided I can come up with at least one hundred items of note over the course of three months."

"You forgot the part where you lose the discount if you don't deliver the goods," said the old alchemist. There was a nigh-feral gleam in his eyes at that point. Clearly he believed himself to be getting the better end of the bargain.

"Sounds fair," said Blackthorne. He kept his other thoughts to himself, but did not mind that the old man thought he was getting one over on him. He needed money and materials. Where else would he sell things like a dead man's finger if he did not use it himself? One alchemist was as good as another, and there were precious few of them in town at any rate. Out of all of the ones that he'd seen, the crusty old fart that he spoke with now seemed to have the best overall set-up.

"Good. Good," said the old man. "Remember to check for that potion I mentioned. It should be in the book that you got from me."

"I'll certainly do that," agreed Blackthorne.

The two businessmen said their goodbyes, and parted ways. Blackthorne mentally reminded himself that he'd earned over two hundred jerin in that encounter. The body parts that had dropped on their own were worth a reasonably amount, but the parts that he'd cut off were worth only a scant few coins by weight. Such material was only useful for the lowest order of certain mixtures.

"I learned a little more about the world, and secured a temporary job," said Blackthorne. "Not bad..."

Until he'd discussed the matter with the old man, he had never guessed the truth of how items dropped in this world. While sometimes things would just appear at random, most items dropped due to the way the life's essence of an organism left its body upon death. That life force would converge at various points and those points would become drop items that fell cleanly from the corpse for reasons that still baffled the minds of the world's greatest academic scholars. There would be so little of the essence left in the rest of the corpse that it usually was not worth bothering with outside of food preparation for basic meals.

Shards, crystals, various items, and body parts all appeared due to this phenomenon. Most of the time the essence flowed in a similar manner and produced what might be considered, common drops. At other times a rare event would occur and a rarer item would drop. It was seemingly randomized, though certain items and skills might change the outcome.

His next stop was the blacksmith. Not a regular customer in the establishment by a long shot, he had still stopped by often enough that the man in the leather apron called him by name. "Blackthorne, come to spend all your money today?"

"Maybe! Anything here worth it?" he called back.

"Come and see," said the blacksmith amicably. He gestured toward his wares then offered a crooked grin.

"Actually, I came to see about repairs," said Blackthorne with a chuckle.

"Of course you did. What else do you come in for?" asked the blacksmith lightly. "Well, let me see that gear of yours..."

As Blackthorne came closer the apron-clad man wrinkled his nose and stepped back a little. "What in the gods' name is that unholy stench!"

"Probably me... Was playing in the graveyard..." said Blackthorne.

The blacksmith grunted, some of his good nature vanishing. "Next time wash your gear before you come into my store!"

"My apologies..." said Blackthorne as sincerely as he could. The man did have a point, after all. Though, the alchemist did not seem to care in the slightest.

"Whatever, just show me what you want me to work on..." replied the man. His face took on a slightly green color just before he tossed his hand to his mouth in a bid to fight down his desire to retch on the spot.

Blackthorne pulled out his two swords, and the decaying armor he'd acquired. The blacksmith took one look at them then snorted. "That armor is hopeless. You'd be better off buying a new set."

The man's eyes roved over the copper sword. "No problem. I can fix that easily enough."

The iron sword, however, was deemed unworthy. "I can repair that, but it will never be as good as it once was. The cost to do so will be pretty high as well."

"How much for everything?" asked Blackthorne as he reclaimed his decrepit armor.

"Two hundred jerin," said the man without batting an eyelash.

"Two hundred..." Blackthorne's eyes widened. "It usually costs twenty or thirty..."

The blacksmith snorted at him. "You usually don't come in smelling like you rolled around in an open sewer, or bring me equipment on the verge of breaking."

While part of him wanted to haggle with the man, Blackthorne realized that it would be a losing proposition. The man seemed to be on the verge of vomiting even as he spoke his terms. "Fair deal," he said. "I'd shake your hand on it, but I think at the moment you would prefer that I did not."

"Oh, you got that right..." said the Blacksmith, a slight hint of his good humor returning, "Leave your gear with me and come back tomorrow. It'll be ready."

"Tomorrow...?" asked Blackthorne.

"Of course, this isn't a simple repair job. Your copper sword would have been easy enough, but I can't use a repair hammer on that iron blade. I'll have to actually treat it like it's broken in order to regain even a semblance of its actual ability," said the Blacksmith. "You're not my only customer, either."

"I see," said Blackthorne. "I'll be back in the morning. Thanks again."

He reached into his bag to get the money then offered to hand it to the man. The blacksmith stepped back with a cough and waved frantically at the far end of his counter. "Just set it down there... I'll get you a receipt."

Business complete, Blackthorne returned to the Screaming onion with nothing to show for his efforts but the armor that he'd grabbed, the shard of death essence, and the overwhelming stench of victory.

Several people who were attempting to enjoy a good meal began to gag as a powerful scent wafted through the area. Blackthorne never stopped long enough for the patrons to realize what the source might be, and he headed directly to the bathing area.

"Scrub, scrub, scrub," he said as he did his best to scrub the scent of his glorious victory away from his equipment. Despite the foulness of it, the scent came away quite easily. Not long afterward, he also took a quick bath then returned to his room.

Roughly an hour later, Scraggles appeared at his door. Blackthorne looked askance at the man for a moment before the tavern owner asked, "Have you seen it?"

"Seen what?" asked Blackthorne.

"The dead hog that people are complaining about..." said Scraggles.

"Dead... Hog?" asked Blackthorne, confused.

"People have been complaining about it for a while now. Some sort of foul odor that smells like a hog had crawled into a sewer and died before it rose again to visit my tavern," said Scraggles with a straight face.

"I haven't seen a hog..." said Blackthorne.

Scraggles squinted at him. "You know nothing about this?"

"Not about a hog, no.... But I was playing at the graveyard earlier, so the smell was probably from me..." said Blackthorne. He might get kicked out for it, but he did not want to lie to the man.

"Glad you admitted to it..." said Scraggles, "Nothing wrong with stinking to high-heaven after a hard day's work. I've come home smelling of all manner of things... But you do know we have a place near the stable where you can wash your gear without causing my paying customers to vomit into their soup?"

"I... did not know that," said Blackthorne slowly.

"Well. Now you do," said Scraggles. "Just go round behind the stables and you'll see the washing station I set up a while back."

"Sorry about this," said Blackthorne. "I didn't mean to cause you any trouble."

Scraggles chuckled slightly. "It's fine if it only happens once."

Blackthorne watched the tavern owner leave then withdrew back into his room. That could have gone worse, but thankfully he managed to find a means of avoiding becoming homeless.

He stared blankly at the wall for a moment then blinked. "Ah, right! That's right, I was looking for that potion."

Curious to see if it existed or not, Blackthorne went back to his alchemy guidebook and started his search anew. He skipped past the remained of the alchemy and correspondences lessons in the front half of the book and sought out the actual recipes. It did not take long to find what he sought.

"Taelmir's Aromatic Denial," said Blackthorne. "An easy to concoct potion made from common materials. It will change any unpleasant aroma into the scent of fresh green grass and roses, for a time."

He happily read through the ingredient list then grunted. "I'll have to take the crusty old fart up on his discount. I don't know what half of these things are. Need a mortar and pestle, and a few other things as well."

Blackthorne spent the rest of the afternoon planning his potion list. While he did want to craft new grass leaves and other items, the lure of alchemy was too strong. If he were brutally honest, so long as he could come up with the funds to purchase the tools and materials it would be a lot simpler to just buy what he needed in order to make potions. Synergy was a great tool, but it required a lot of time and resources to turn basic things into truly splendid items.

Even so, he would need to spend his night gathering grass and other things to try and make a few leaves. It was his only free option at the moment. His funds once again at rock bottom, he could not even afford to stock up properly on fruit.

"I'll come back smelling like death's asshole after a holiday in Mexico for a while, but this is my way forward..." said Blackthorne. If he could just get through the first few days of tomb raiding and the stench of such work, he would be able to drastically improve his circumstances. Everything seemed to be falling into place.