The Overlord Potion, as Commandant Drath had called it, was hand-delivered by a Royal Rank Bishop of the church, along with twenty Elite Church Guard and a pair of Inquisitors.
“First-General, I have brought the potion as you requested. Who might the blessed one be?” The Bishop asked.
Overlord Drath looked a little sheepish and rubbed the back of his neck.
“Bishop, my apologies, but there has been a misunderstanding. You see, Monarch Karl wanted a sample to study.
His team managed to come up with a potion that immediately advanced these five cadets to Awakened Rank only two days after they gained their system.
However, we learned a troubling fact during the process, and I believe his skill can shed some light on why the Overlord Potion malfunctions.”
All of the cadets and Acolytes stopped what they were doing when they heard that. They didn’t know what sort of super powerful potion warranted this sort of escort, but it had to be something incredible.
“May I touch the potion, Bishop? It is necessary for the skill to function.” Karl asked.
He would only see the odds once he had it in his hands and at least considered using it.
The Bishop passed Karl the potion, and the guards moved to surround him, protecting the potion, as they were facing away from him.
As Karl focused with [Identify] on the potion, a few things became clear. First, this was a much better thing than he had expected. Second, altering the ingredients probably wouldn’t help much.
{Overlord Potion}
{Grade} Totem
[Immediately upgrades the power level of the imbiber by a set range of levels. Maximum Rank of Overlord may be achieved.]
{Warning: Experience increase effects have a cumulative detriment modifier.
Chance of Success 0.3%
Chance of Partial Success 10%
Chance of Failure 2%
Chance of Critical Failure 87.7%
Modifier 0%}
{Success Grants 3 Ranks of advancement}
{Partial Success Grants 1 Rank of advancement}
{Failure Causes 1 Random Permanent Debuff}
{Critical Failure will result in death with no resurrection possible}
[Warning: Full Success Not Possible] Maximum Rank of user exceeded.
Now Karl understood why the potion had to be taken by a Commander. Nobody else could get the full use of the effect, as it was either one or three Ranks of advancement. But those odds were dismal. Surely, there wasn’t a ninety percent chance of death for the regular users, or they wouldn’t have started using it on Commanders at all.
So, Karl inspected the potion more closely, trying to find the default values.
{Overlord Potion}
{Grade} Totem freewebnoveℓ.com
[Immediately upgrades the power level of the imbiber to a set range. Maximum Rank of Overlord may be achieved.]
Chance of Success 4%
Chance of Partial Success 40%
Chance of Failure 54%
Chance of Critical Failure 2%
{Success Grants 3 Ranks of advancement}
{Partial Success Grants 1 Rank of advancement}
{Failure Causes 1 Random Permanent Debuff}
{Critical Failure will result in death with no resurrection possible}
That made more sense. The people using it were already at the limits of their potential, so they would have a heavy modifier, but if the chance of actually dying from it was only two percent, and failure was a permanent debuff, many would be willing to risk it when they didn’t know their personal odds.
The Bishop cleared his throat. “What do you see with your System Skill, Monarch?”
“The system calls it an Overlord Potion, with a four percent chance to take a Commander to Overlord, or a forty percent chance to take one to Royal Rank. However, other resources you’ve used in the past will modify that.
For me, it is impossible, as I’m already a Monarch, and the potion doesn’t grant a linear amount of power, but a set effect instead.
However, you could theoretically use it on Elites below Commander Rank to grant them the same four percent chance of gaining three Ranks. About half would end up with a one Rank advancement, and half would take permanent injury, according to the potion’s description.”
The wince that the Bishop made when Karl mentioned giving it to people below the Commander Rank said that this was not a cheap or easy potion to make. But that should be expected from a Totem Rank potion of any sort.
“Is that all you can learn about it with your skill? Not that I’m complaining, knowing the odds and exact effect is incredibly valuable.” The Bishop asked.
“Give me a while and I might be able to discover how to tweak it for more success, but I wasn’t expecting it to be Totem Ranked. One Rank over myself isn’t too difficult, but two is pushing my luck.” Karl explained.
That made sense to the Bishop. Many had tried in the past to improve the formula, and just as many had failed.
Karl tried to look deeper into the potion’s construction when a notification caught his attention.
{Skill Master 4 Activation: [Identification] has improved by 1 Tier. Skill [Analysis] gained.}
That was the first time that the Skill Master Ability had advanced one of his own skills by a Tier, and Karl was startled that it was a utility skill and not one of the ones that he used constantly.
Perhaps he simply wasn’t pushing hard enough to force the evolution of the others? Or he might just need inspiration to cause them to evolve.
With Analysis, both Karl and Remi could tell much more about the potion. First, the primary ingredient was Totem Rank Holy Power, in liquid form. So, these potions were personally made by the Archbishop, or another nation’s strongest cleric.
There was a list of plant names there as well, none of which Karl had ever heard of. Then he noticed something floating in the potion that he hadn’t seen before.
It was glowing, and Karl couldn’t seem to figure out what it was. The system wasn’t being any help at first, but after a few seconds, Karl realized that it was a rune. There were solidified magic runes in the potion.
[Runecrafting Compound Sigil Recorded] Power Surge
Remi’s excitement filled Karl’s mind, but it was Rae’s mental laughter that caught his attention.
[That one really will make them explode.] The spider cheered.
She was right. The rune was nothing but a pure power transfer, as much as the user wished to imbue into it, but without form unless it was combined with others into a proper sigil or phrase.
If Karl used it alone on anyone but the Overlord, it would just drain every bit of his energy and overload the target. That much raw mana would literally make them explode.
Fortunately, with Runecrafting, Karl should be able to combine that compound rune into a sentence to empower a runic inscription that would otherwise have little to no effect. In a way, it was a new word. A more precise way of describing what he wanted to happen when writing with runes. It would take work, but he had been planning to practice his Runecrafting anyhow.
But the fact that there was no other sigil with Power Surge in the potion was a clue on its own. The flow of power was uncontrolled, which was what was likely damaging the users. If he modified that, it could improve the success of the potion.
“How mad would you be if I modified this potion?” Karl asked the Bishop.
“It takes the Archbishop sixty hours to make one.” He replied simply.
Well, that changed the risk to reward calculation.