Chapter 39: Jiang Cha’s First Potion

As a teacher, Mottel didn’t force Jiang Cha to follow a specific path or stick to a rigid study schedule.

Not because she was irresponsible—but because that’s simply how the witch-apprentice relationship works.

It’s a good thing for disciples to have their own ideas.
The realms of Omniscience and Omnipotence can’t be reached by blindly following others.
Even the predecessors—the big shots of the Council of Sages—are still figuring things out themselves!

The unique nature of each witch’s innate magic means no two paths are exactly the same. So witches don’t really care about passing down the same old teachings or “lineage.”

All Mottel would do is hand Jiang Cha a massive reading list, provide the necessary resources—and that’s it.
How Jiang Cha walks her path is her own business. If this disciple ends up useless?
Well, she can always find another one.

To a regular witch with an average lifespan of 500 years—or a Great Witch who easily lives a thousand—and with all the magical means to prolong life, living tens of thousands of years is nothing unusual.

Some witches even practice necromancy to alter their essence and become truly immortal.

So, the growth period of a young witch—just a few decades—is really nothing. It’s like working on a long-term research project.

No big deal.

As for Jiang Cha’s current “path selection dilemma”… it wasn’t really a dilemma at all.
Her issue was just a lack of time—specifically, a lack of mental recovery speed, which slowed her reading capacity.

The solution?
Pay to win.

“So… this is why you’re brewing potions in the Alchemy Club room?”

Shi Lan had rushed over when the alarm sounded from the lab, thinking Jiang Cha was messing with some dangerous experiment.

But when she arrived, she realized—

It was just an equipment misuse alarm, triggered by Jiang Cha trying to force alchemy equipment to brew potions improperly.

“I mean, it’s not like I’m a member of the Potions Club…”
The girl lowered her head, lips pursed in a pitiful expression that tugged at your heart.

“…Sigh. Fine.”

Shi Lan let out a long sigh.
She knew full well that Jiang Cha was faking the pitiful look just to soften her up… but dang it, she was cute.

Whatever. The Alchemy Club already had enough troublemakers—one more or less didn’t make a difference.

She walked to the corner of the room and picked up a small silver box. With a spark of mana from her fingertip, the flashing red light blinked off, and the alarm shut down.

“This thing’s just the alarm system. It detects risk levels in the lab.”
She tossed the box to Jiang Cha without turning back.
“Only the detection system is complicated—the alarm circuit is so basic a child could disable it.”

“…”

‘Senior, you do know you’re enabling bad behavior, right?’
‘But I love it!’

Jiang Cha kept her head bowed.
As soon as Shi Lan stepped out of the lab, she immediately locked the door.

Then, without hesitation, she took apart the alarm box and removed the equipment misuse trigger from the alert system.

Now she could brew potions in peace.

Though potion-making and alchemy look similar—sometimes even sharing material prep techniques—there’s a key difference between them:

Potions are meant to be consumed.
They need to work with the witch’s physiology.

For alchemical devices, the mana output just needs to not explode or malfunction.
But potions are different.

Witches, as apex beings among the supernatural, possess countless biological mysteries.
Still, some logic is universal.

Just like human pharmacology requires deep understanding of the body, long research, and extensive clinical trials—witch potions follow a similar path.

That’s why, unlike alchemy—where even a novice can make quirky gadgets—potions are almost exclusively crafted by true experts.

If one day, a half-baked witch pulls a mysterious potion out of her skirt pocket and says,

“This is my brand-new, self-developed miracle elixir! Drink it and you’ll last three days and nights in bed without tiring!”

Don’t hesitate. RUN.

As far and as fast as you can.

Because nine times out of ten, that shady witch is looking for a test subject.

The “miraculous effect” she promises?
If you’re lucky, maybe you’ll just enter some emotionless sage-like state.
If not… you’ll be making Niagara Falls in the toilet.

“The girl’s clinging to the bathroom wall—how can she be in the mood for anything else?”

On the other hand, potion-making follows a clear, textbook-style process, which made Jiang Cha’s learning curve far smoother than with alchemy.

Right now, she only urgently needed a mental recovery potion.
So after learning the basic theory and prep methods, she just had to follow the recipe step-by-step.

In the past, things like “a pinch” or “moderate amount” would’ve required a lot of trial and error.
But in the 22nd century, potion tutorials had advanced to VR-based immersive experiences.

Through spirit magic, learners could mentally inhabit the perspective of the recipe’s author, and experience the whole process first-hand.

If one try wasn’t enough? No problem. It was pay-per-use.
As long as you had the money, even a total novice could learn potion-making.

(Of course, that only applied to low-tier potions. Mid-tier potions? Totally different story.)

Because mid-tier potions are meant for high-level witches, they require customization—tailored to specific traits and mana attributes.

Otherwise, you’d risk mana rejection.
At best, the potion would fail.
At worst, it’s back to Yellow River waterfall in the toilet.

Just imagine: a witch on the battlefield drinks your potion… and immediately has a bathroom emergency.
That’s why every senior potion-maker says:

“If your skills aren’t solid, either be ready to fight, or don’t call yourself a potion-maker.”

Potion-making is an odd mix of easy to pick up but hellishly hard to master.

“I’ve got to say—potion-making is a subject that’s both mind-bogglingly complex and ridiculously straightforward at the same time.”

It took her just ten minutes to brew her very first potion.

The liquid was clear and pure.

The color was sky-blue, the mana stable.

Signs of a successful brew.

Truth be told, Jiang Cha had no idea how it actually worked.

Anything involving the mind or spirit was always the most complicated part of any field.

She recognized every ingredient in the recipe.
But combine them, and it turned into something she couldn’t comprehend.

Why was it sky-blue?
Was it because of the colorless reaction of Sea Blue Ore?
Or was it the mana blending from bat brains?

Why was it liquid?
Was it the extraction technique, or simply the use of a liquid base?

She had no clue.

But she did know two things:

It was drinkable.
And it worked.