What witch? The Deadly Pharmacist!

“Melissa, you’ve suffered so much these past few days…” Sally sighed, reaching out a trembling hand to gently stroke Melissa’s temples, where her sideburns had been shaved off.

Melissa's nose tingled, and tears welled up in her eyes again, but she managed to smile through her tears and shake her head at her mother.

Seeing my mother getting better makes all the hardship she went through finally pay off.

After a while, Melissa calmed down, wiped her eyes, and turned to Lena: "Your Excellency, even if I can recover to the point where I can walk, is there still no chance of a complete cure?"

She still remembered what Lena had said: that the medicine couldn't completely cure her mother's condition at the moment, but seeing her mother's condition improve so significantly, she couldn't help but begin to feel a greater hope.

“Unfortunately, the current medication can indeed significantly restore a person’s motor abilities, but it can only slightly slow down the erosion of internal organs. Although it can extend lifespan a little, in the end… you should still be prepared.” Lena lowered her gaze, avoiding Melissa’s eyes.

“Thank you, Your Excellency Bishop. I’ve already come to terms with it. I’m probably destined not to live much longer,” Sally said with a magnanimous expression, reaching out to embrace Melissa beside her. “To be able to live like a human being again in these last moments, to have the chance to hug my Melissa one more time, I have no more desires!”

Lena looked at Selena and Melissa and suddenly remembered that her grandmother had once gently stroked her hair and held her by her bedside, saying similar things.

After a long pause, she spoke softly, "I will continue to have Judge Seth bring the medicine over. Since the drug trials here have been effective, I will stay for a while longer. This result is of great significance to my research, and I will continue to conduct research on it."

"Thank you, Your Excellency, we will never forget your kindness."

Amidst the profuse thanks from Sally and Melissa, Lena rose to take her leave, and Melissa then escorted Lena downstairs.

Leon was still waiting downstairs. Hearing the diagnosis, he breathed a sigh of relief: "It's good that she's getting better. Melissa looked so scary. I thought something had happened to Mrs. Hershey."

Although he had already mentally prepared himself, he would definitely not feel good if Lena's medicine caused any accidents to Selena.

"I was just too excited. I suddenly saw my mom get up all by herself..." Melissa said, a little embarrassed.

"In short, as long as the medicine is effective, I will continue to follow up. I will need your continued cooperation in my research in the future." Lena turned to Leon, "Judge Seth, I'd appreciate it if you could give me a ride."

She herself wasn't very good at riding horses, so Leon borrowed a horse to take her all the way here.

Sharing a horse with Leon was a little awkward, but it was better than her walking alone out of town at night as a girl.

Leon smiled slightly upon hearing this: "Your Excellency, have you had dinner? If you don't mind, would you like to stay and have some with us?"

"I'll just..."

Just as Lena was about to decline, Leon continued, "I just received a bonus today and bought a roast suckling pig, along with some buttered potatoes... Although it's definitely a bit cold now, it should still taste good if we reheat it. There's also a bottle of our decent cider. It's rare that I can barely afford to entertain you. I hope you won't find it offensive."

Melissa glanced at Leon in surprise; she had no idea that Leon had brought back such a lavish meal.

"Roast suckling pig..." Lena stared blankly at Leon, subconsciously swallowing.

She usually lives a very frugal life, so she rarely has the opportunity to eat so well.

"Would you like to?" Leon winked at Lena.

Fortunately, Melissa was also surprised and didn't notice the pathetic state of this "Bishop Leona".

"Ah..." Rena snapped out of her daze, quickly composed herself, and replied in a nonchalant tone, "How could I possibly refuse such hospitality from Your Excellency the Judge? Very well, then please forgive me for disturbing you tonight."

"I...I'll go tidy up first!" Melissa realized what was happening and hurriedly ran towards the hall.

“By the way, now that Mrs. Hershey can sit up, could we let her come down to eat with us? If possible, I’ll carry her down,” Leon suddenly suggested.

"Well, given her current condition, if she can get up without any problems, it's not impossible, but you have to be careful not to let her fall," Lena replied after careful consideration.

"Brother Leon, you don't need to go to so much trouble. I'll just take the food upstairs later," Melissa said.

"I'll go ask Mrs. Hersh if she'd be willing," Leon said with a smile as he went upstairs. "It's more fun to have dinner together."

Chapter 22 Grandma Hannah's Intentions

"Alright, shall we stop here?" Lena suddenly said as she sat on horseback.

Upon hearing this, Leon, who was sitting behind him, pulled on the reins to bring the horse to a slow stop: "Is this all the way?"

You can already see the village entrance from here, but it's still quite a distance from Lena's house in the mountains.

"There are still quite a few people in the village who recognize me. Wearing this outfit is inappropriate, and it's best not to let anyone see me with you."

Lena was helped off her horse by Leon, and she immediately took off and put away the nun's robe that was covering her body.

“That’s true.” Leon agreed with this statement.

They were, after all, running an illegal business together, and it would be somewhat risky for someone who knew Lena to witness them acting together near the village.

When they work in the back mountains, they try their best to avoid being seen.

"Thank you for your hospitality today, dinner was delicious." Lena looked up and thanked Leon.

"There's no need to be so polite. After all, it's money from selling magic essence, so it's like we each paid half," Leon replied with a smile.

"Hey, you didn't even consult me!" Lena said, dissatisfied, but then relented, "Well, whatever, it's fine then..."

“Just kidding, of course this meal is on me. I’ll divide the money as soon as I get it. Just like we agreed, 20,000 pfennigs per gram of magic essence, 800 pfennigs per headhunter rabbit, that’s 22,400 pfennigs in total. This is your half.” Leon handed the pre-divided money bag to Lena. “Count it.”

Lena took the money bag, opened it, and found five gold shields and six silver wolves inside, exactly fifty-six Taylors, which was eleven thousand two hundred pfennigs.

Normally, she would save up her things for four months and hand them over to Hannah Wesland for purchase, and that would be about the same amount of money she would receive.

This time, I casually killed three headhunting rabbits and actually earned more than 10,000!

Lena stared blankly at the money in the bag. She had been somewhat skeptical of Leon's promise of a purchase price of 20,000 yuan per gram, but now Leon had fulfilled his promise with real money.

"Thanks." Lena carefully put the purse away.

“We’ll make a lot of money in the future, but we need to be careful not to spend it too extravagantly. Showing off your wealth can easily attract attention,” Leon cautioned.

“You should keep that to yourself. Who’s the kind of person who buys lavish meals as soon as they make money?” Lena frowned and stared at Leon.

"It's just a celebration this time, don't act like you didn't get to eat any. You should have looked in the mirror and seen how greedy you were!" Leon teased Lena.

"No, no! It's because you insisted on inviting me..." Lena muttered shyly, looking down.

“Anyway, it’s so nice that you could stay for dinner. I haven’t seen Mrs. Hershey and Melissa so happy in a long time, and it’s all thanks to you,” Leon said earnestly, looking into Lena’s eyes.

“I was just researching my own medicine.” Lena avoided Leon’s gaze. “But anyway, thank you.”

"You've already thanked her," Leon reminded her. Whether it was for the meal or the money, Lena had already expressed her gratitude.

“I’m thanking you for making my research meaningful. I’ve always worried that my research would be useless in the end, just like when I couldn’t save my grandmother… Leon, meeting you might not be entirely a bad thing,” Lena said earnestly.

Seeing that her medicine helped Hershey and her daughter escape the shadow of illness, even if only temporarily, made up for Lena's regret of not being able to save her grandmother.

Leon stared at Lena for a while, then said, "So you always thought meeting me was a bad thing, right?"

"What do you think? Or what?" Lena retorted, somewhat angrily.

Leon shrugged, then asked, "By the way, I wanted to ask, given the current progress of the research, is there any possibility of a cure for Mrs. Hershey?"

Lena thought about it carefully for a moment and replied, "I can't guarantee that. Judging from the current effects, the general direction of the formula should be correct, but the effects need to be improved. One direction is to find more effective raw materials, and the other direction is to use higher purity magic essence."

"Higher purity magic essence?" Leon's interest was piqued upon hearing this. "Is there any way to increase the purity of magic essence?"

"I don't know. The current limit of purification I can achieve is 75%, which is already higher than what my grandmother could do back then. Maybe there are more powerful witches who can extract even higher purity," Lena replied.

“Once we have the funds after the next batch of goods, we might try to acquire some higher purity magic essence from underground channels. If it's just for research, the cost won't be too high. However, as far as I know, Hamel Town doesn't seem to have any goods with higher purity than what you have here,” Leon pondered. “I'll inquire about it first.”

Lena chuckled softly when she heard Leon say that. Acquiring higher purity magic essence was an extra expense for Leon. He would do it to help Sally and Melissa, as well as to aid her research.

"Then I'll leave it to you." Lena smiled, her eyes narrowing, then turned around with the lantern in her hand. "I'll head back now."

"Be careful, see you tomorrow," Leon said.

"Okay, see you tomorrow." Lena said goodbye to Leon and walked to the village entrance. When she looked back, she saw Leon still standing in the distance with a lantern, watching her go.

She laughed, raised her hand and waved, and Leon then mounted his horse and turned back.

"Hmph hmph hmph hmph..."

Lena hummed a little tune as she walked through the village back to her mountain home.

The drug she was researching was showing the expected results in patients, which gave her a great sense of accomplishment. Coupled with the slight buzz from two glasses of cider, she was in a better mood than ever before.

Until she saw Hannah Wesland sitting in front of her house with a lantern.

"Grandma Hannah?" Lena was caught off guard and stood there stunned.

"Ah, Lena, you're finally back." Hannah's wrinkled face broke into a smile when she saw Lena.

She got up, dusted herself off, and walked towards Lena.

"Grandma Hannah, it's so late, is there anything I can help you with?" Lena asked, trying to remain calm.

Seeing Hannah visit her at such a discreet time, she had a bad feeling.

"I haven't seen you much lately. The tomatoes and cabbages in the field are growing just right, so I brought you some." Hannah smiled and pointed to the vegetables in the cloth bag at her feet.

She has been visiting Lena, who lives alone here, from time to time, and she would bring vegetables harvested from the fields.

Lena had always been grateful for Hannah's care, but as Leon told her about the possibility that Hannah had been deceiving her, her opinion of Hannah inevitably changed.

“Thank you, Grandma Hannah…” Lena thought for a moment, then looked at Hannah earnestly, “Is this what you came for?”

Hearing this, Hannah rubbed her hands together and thought for a moment before finally revealing her intention: "Lena, why don't you try... doing that business again? Let's start over together."

Chapter 23 Thief

As Lena had expected, Hannah had come here to persuade her to resume her magic essence business.

“Grandma Hannah, I’ve already made it very clear to you before, I don’t plan to do it anymore.” Lena gave a straightforward answer. “You should also consider stopping. Once you’ve been caught, the church will be watching you. If you’re caught again next time, you might not be able to get away with it as easily as this time.”

Now that she has decided to cooperate with Leon, she will definitely have to cut off contact with Hannah. Even without Leon, Hannah is already registered with the Inquisition. In the future, Hannah's entry into the city will attract the attention of patrolling guards and Inquisitors, and the risk of being caught again is very high, which will also threaten Leon.

She had already spoken to Hannah about it before, and Hannah had tried to persuade her to lay low for a while before reconsidering, but Lena insisted on refusing.

Lena advised the other party to stop, both to protect herself and for the other party's own good, but after so much time, Hannah still came to find her.

"Oh dear, don't say that. You still need to think this over carefully, otherwise how will you live in the future? Have you been eating properly lately?" Hannah feigned concern.

“Don’t worry, Mother-in-law, I’ll figure something out myself. Anyway… this won’t make much money.” Lena looked into Hannah’s eyes expressionlessly. “Mother-in-law Hannah, you should have saved up a lot of money these past two years, that should be enough, right? Don’t do such dangerous things anymore.”

Based on Hannah's purchase price, Lena's annual income wasn't much different from that of a waitress at the tavern. If Hannah had sold those goods at the normal market price, she should already have some savings by now.

Hannah's expression changed upon hearing this: "What are you saying? I don't earn much money either. We're all in the same boat, just trying to make a living..."

Faced with Hannah's evasive answer, Lena interrupted, "Those magic essences, did you really only get that little money from selling them?"

"Of course..." Hannah had just answered when she noticed Lena staring intently at her. She instinctively looked away and asked somewhat guiltily, "What's wrong with you? Why are you suddenly asking that?"

Lena observed Hannah's reaction and got a general idea of ​​what was going on.

She had previously considered that Hannah, like her, was unaware of the true value of magic essence and had simply been scammed. But now, seeing Hannah's reaction, she was certain that what Leon said—that Hannah had been taking advantage of her ignorance—was true.

"Enough, Grandma Hannah. Things have come to this, please stop. Let's try to have less contact in the future, it'll be better for both of us." After saying that, Lena walked past Hannah, opened the door and went inside. "It's very late, you should go back and rest early."

Lena closed the door, leaving Hannah standing there, stunned.

Did she already know that she had lied to her? What should she do now...? Hannah's heart sank lower and lower.

Although she has indeed saved a lot of money from Lena over the years, in her opinion it is still not enough to support her youngest son and grandson for the rest of their lives.

When she persuaded her daughter-in-law to remarry her younger son, she promised a large sum of money as a form of support every year, as well as an inheritance.

Is Lena really giving up so easily, just like her grandmother used to be?

No, who knows, maybe she'll still sell them secretly? Speaking of which, she hasn't been around lately. I asked the people at the village entrance, and they said she often leaves the village, and sometimes she's not home even when she's not leaving. I don't know if she's gone into the mountains or somewhere else.

With that thought in mind, Hannah had already circled around to the backyard of the house.

She slowly reached her hand into the pocket of her apron, fumbling for a set of keys she always carried with her.

Her rough fingers rubbed the key back and forth, her eyes fixed on the cellar door, before she chose to hide in the bushes.

Hannah waited patiently in the woods, and after a while, the lights in the cabin finally went out.

Hannah hid in the woods for a long time before tiptoeing out and making her way to the cellar door in the backyard.

She looked around and carefully took out her keys.

In the past, when Lena went on a long trip, she lent her the key so that Lena could replenish the monsters' food and water.

She had secretly copied the key back then, and it came in handy today.

If Lena is still doing this business, then there should be magic essence left in the cellar.

If she's still doing it, you can try to coax her into continuing to sell magic essence to you. If that doesn't work, you'll have to resort to threats and intimidation... Although this girl is a witch, she's actually quite easy to deal with.

Thinking this, she inserted the key into the large padlock hanging on the cellar wall, but suddenly felt something was wrong with the feel.