After he finished boiling the bones, getting everything he’d needed out of them, he left them to the side to dry out as he admired what he’d collected. Having it well boiled down, there was a bit less than fifty litres in the caldron, and of it, he would be getting ten.

No good greedy gods talking my pay down to a fifth.

And yet, I will.

At the very least it wasn’t all bad. He’d made sure to capture and save all of the steam as it boiled off and he doubted the gods would care too much about that, especially when it likely wouldn't work for anything, at least not to the scale of what he currently had would. He would boil all of that down further, but for the time being he focused on making the potions, only doing minor modifications along the way.

From what his god had taught him, they were shockingly simple to put together in the end, only needing a few rarer components to make them as efficient as possible, letting the drinker get as much benefit as they could. Even if it wasn’t refined, it was likely to yield a benefit for the consumer anyway, that was how valuable the body a god died in was.

Which makes this almost certain to work.

With that he got to work, continuing to use the cauldron as he did, adding the ingredients Falk had prepared and placed to the side. The first of which being mythril, his teacher using his earth magic to force it into a solution to let it be added to the broth, followed by the main replacement he’d needed to make.

Back when he’d succeeded in making Thera a staff that wouldn’t break from a dryad’s tree, at least before he’d disappeared for months, he’d hollowed out its core in the process, saving the shavings from that in a box with all of his other odds and ends he’d been unwilling to part with, and they’d finally be playing a part in his work.

Having been boiled almost as long as the bones, the wood fibers broke down, letting all of it be blended into a paste before it was mixed in as well. Given just how inherently magical the trees it came from were, there was a good chance it would have actually been more useful than the original plants he was recommended, but if he was wrong it wasn’t the end of the world.

It was after that the ingredients became significantly more common, changing from materials that were meant to hold some inherent magical effect to match the bones to ingredients to improve the body’s ability to absorb the effects of the potion to the fullest extent, ingredients that were admittedly on the higher end of the spectrum in potion making, but still things they had on hand.

He stirred it all, each of his minds focused on every variable. When each ingredient went in, working the temperature of the mixture, making sure it was always at its most optimal, mixing speed and more. Everything was for the good of making the greatest potion he could with the skills he had, and once he was sure it was done, all that there was left was testing if it worked.

Taking more care than he ever had before, he carefully filled bottles one by one, making sure not to spill a single drop of the liquid as he went until he had forty identical ones.

“So that means we get to keep eight. Okay, that works. Falk, I’m going to see how it works out for the liquid we collected in the other pot, wanna hide the rest away somewhere nobody will find it till the church representative gets here to collect it all?”

He couldn’t help but be a little worried about it, each bottle was invaluable if it would work. How could anyone put a price on pure power? Not to mention that if one of them broke there was a non-zero chance one of the grumpier gods up there would call foul play and try to use it as an excuse to throw him into the infinite hells.

No use worrying about that, let’s just finish this up and head back.

He wanted to see if his idea would pay off more than anyone after all.

“Welcome home Ben,” Sonya called from the kitchen where she and Thera were preparing dinner. “I wasn’t expecting you so early.”

“I was feeling impatient to test something since I knew you were planning on being home early. Also, I brought a guest.”

“Hope you don’t mind the intrusion,” Falk said, giving his old friend a wide smile that she returned.

“Never. I'll make an extra side, join us for dinner.”

“Er, might not be super necessary Sonya, you probably won’t be the most hungry after this,” Ben said, lifting his crate full of potions that she completely lacked the context for.

She shot him a questioning look, not understanding just where he was going with it. “Did you pick something up on the way?”

Yeah, there’s no easy way to explain this so I think I’m just going to rip the bandaid off.

“So long story short, I made some potions from the bones of some gods and need you to drink them. It will probably be fine.”

“Uh, what?” She asked, no idea how she was supposed to even begin reacting to that.

“I’m basically certain it will be fine, don’t worry,” He reassured. “I had to modify the recipe a bit, but considering what it is it’s actually shockingly flexible.”

“Pretty sure that wasn’t the part aunty had an issue with Ben,” Thera said, far from surprised by the turn of events since she walked in on him making them earlier. “What do they even do?”

“Oh, an excellent question. Everything.”

He let that hang for just a second, enjoying the shocked looks the statement got as he went on to explain in greater detail. “I’m told they’ll permanently raise your attributes, as well as help with your growth rates in all areas. If there was anything wrong with you I’m under the impression they’d help with healing too, but that’s more of a side effect than a goal. Anyway, drink up,” He said, taking out the first bottle and trying to force it into her hand.

“No, not anyway,” She said, stepping away from his hand. “Ben, that would be so clearly wasted on me. If you’re not using them yourself then give them to Thera.”

“Aunty, I agree with Ben here, you should take them.”

“No, why?”

Ben was happy to answer it, having put in plenty of thought before he’d decided he’d be giving them all to her. “Sonya, you’re important to me and the fact that you’re planning on fighting on the front line scares me. Thera has as much mana as a town of people and I’m sure you know how powerful Falk is. Meanwhile, I have twenty job bonuses and frankly don’t really need most of my attributes to grow more for my work. The only thing I really want to improve is my mana and vitality and I have other ways to do it,” He explained, showing off his new bracelets. “You don’t have any awakened skills, I want to give you whatever edge you can get.”

She wanted to keep arguing. Using anything like that would have been a huge waste for her when it could go towards someone who could put it to better use, but she could see that she’d be getting none in the room on her side as she gave in, staring at just how much he had there for her to drink.

“Fine,” She said in defeat, even if she did feel it was a terrible idea. “But do I need to drink all of those tonight? I don’t think I can.”

“No, only eight of these are yours and just drink two a day for the best results, the last two probably won’t actually work since they were made from collecting the water that boiled off but one for Falk and Thera each. Oh, but if you could all make a note of your status before you drink them and compare them again in the morning and at least let me know how much your attributes have changed I’d appreciate it so I can keep whatever gods want to know happy.”

Sonya took the first bottle, giving it a hesitant smell. Ben was right that she likely wouldn’t be hungry after, it was a lot. At the very least, it didn’t smell bad though and she took her first hesitant sip, pulling back in surprise as she did. “Is this soup?”

“Technically. Don’t worry about it too much, if it doesn’t taste bad then that’s all the better.”

While it wasn’t great, she’d been expecting far worse from a potion and continued to drink away as Ben put the rest of the potions to the side, trying to hand the two he didn’t have much faith in to Falk and Thera, being rejected on both sides.

“Ben, if you don’t drink that I’m pouring it down your throat.”

“And I’m holding you down for it.”

“Guys, come on, I don’t need them.”

“Boy, you just told me you’re joining us during the invasion. Even if we won’t be as in the thick of it as others, we’ll be on the front line. You need any strength you can get.”

“Wait, what?” Thera asked, her eyes widening to hear such a major choice spoken so casually. She’d fully expected he would at most be off preparing and maintaining weapons, there was no reason for him to be anywhere near that level of danger.

He was able to pick up on her feelings easily enough but decided to talk about it later. He wasn’t any happier that she was planning on being so close to that sort of danger either but it was something they’d need to talk about eventually, so for the time being he gave in to their demands, opening the first potion and began drinking.

After they downed the potions and all of them enjoyed what they could of dinner, Falk went home while Sonya went to sleep early, exhausted from using the extra hours she’d had from her shift ending early to exercise, and Ben took the time to do the dishes since he hadn’t helped prepare dinner, right up until he felt arms and tail hugging him from behind.

“Hey,” He said warmly, having a good idea where this was going.

“Hey,” Thera said back, her face pressed into his back. “You know, I’d be a lot happier if you stayed in Stonewall when everything begins. Or maybe Anailia? That would be a lot safer even with an invasion point on its doorstep and mom would look after you.”

“And I’d be a lot happier if you would too. Same with Sonya, same with Falk. I can’t do nothing when everyone I love is planning on walking into danger Thera.”

“You could though. Ben, whenever anyone’s born on this world one of the first things they're taught is that there’ll come a day when we need to fight. You were just selfishly dragged into it and basically abandoned when you weren’t immediately useful. You shouldn’t die for this world.”

“Hey now, don’t go killing me off yet,” He told her gently, a light chuckle in his voice before he took a more serious tone. “Thera, no matter how I ended up here, what matters is this is my home now. There’s so many people who’ve helped me, even if I did have a rocky start, and so many people I care about. I won’t just do nothing when you all insist on fighting, I want to do what I can.”

“Mmh.”

She held him tighter, not letting go as they stood there in silence until she changed the topic, at least as far as he could figure.

“Would you mind if I started practicing my magic on you?”

“Oh, yeah sure, go for it.”

“...You should probably ask what I’m planning on doing, you know.”

“Why? I trust you, and you’ve already practiced plenty of life magic while healing me in the past. Is this something I should be worried about?”

“No… I don’t think so… I hope not. Lifespan enhancement, it sounds like it can potentially add a few years to a life if it keeps getting cast and it’s a complex spell to use so it’s good practice for me. Also, I just want to.”

Ah, that tracks.

He knew Thera worried about dealing with loss, and this was a request with no downsides for him. It would make his girlfriend happy and it would give him a few extra years.

“Cast away, as a huge fan of being alive I’ve got zero issues with it.”

She loosened her grip and let him turn to face her, her hands gently cupping his face as she carefully cast her spell, feeling a little more relaxed as she did.

Once done she leaned up and gently kissed him before they both parted for the night.