What witch? The Deadly Pharmacist!

Owl Recycling Shop, Shekou Lane, Bourbon Street.

The old shopkeeper held a piece of magic crystal with tweezers, held it up to the firelight, and squinted at it through a special lens, observing it closely as if he were under a spell.

“The purity is around 78%, we’ve already verified it ourselves,” Leon said, arms crossed.

After a while, the shop owner put down the lens and tweezers and said with emotion, "You brought ten grams of this, just as agreed, but you didn't say you would bring such pure stuff. I really can't believe where you got it from?"

“You know you shouldn’t have asked that,” Leon said.

“Apart from the Earl’s goods, I haven’t seen any with a purity close to 80%. At least you don’t get your goods from there, do you?” the shopkeeper asked Leon to confirm.

“The Earl?” Leon repeated the title instinctively.

"You're in this line of work, you must know what a 'Count' is, right? Especially since you're an Inquisitor." The shopkeeper chuckled.

“I’ve heard a little about it,” Leon nodded. “But this doesn’t seem to be his territory.”

"The Earl" is a title in the underworld, referring to a smuggling tycoon.

It is said that 70% of the magic essence flowing into the empire from the outside world passes through his hands, and most of the magic potions and magic essence circulating in the underworld are related to him.

His goods circulated throughout the eastern part of the empire, and his influence was widespread.

Leon had even heard that the Inquisition at the top had always known the "Count's" identity, but had been unable to touch him.

He was a high-ranking and powerful figure with connections within the church, and the Inquisition could only turn a blind eye to it.

Of course, this is just hearsay, since Leon has not had direct access to any firsthand information.

Because in Hamel town, neither the person nor the goods that were supposedly the count were ever seen.

According to information obtained by the Inquisition, other local tyrants in Hamel and the surrounding area control this type of transaction.

Although their overall strength was far inferior to that of the count, their influence in the local area was still enough to fend off powerful dragons from outside.

However, the shop owner suddenly gave a wry smile and said, "That's how it is now, but it might not be in the future."

"What do you mean?"

"The Earl's influence is expanding throughout the entire Southport County, and it's only a matter of time before it affects this area. The covert conflict has already begun. It seems that the Inquisition has not yet noticed, but that's not surprising. In the underworld, insiders have the best ears."

The shopkeeper smiled slightly at Leon, put away the magic essence, and began counting the remaining monster materials.

"Who are the Earl's men fighting with? Mr. Griffin?" Leon confirmed with the old shopkeeper. "So your supplier is Mr. Griffin?"

"Mr. Griffin" is also a name used in the underworld.

He was the local bigwig who controlled the underground trade in Hamel and even Southport County, and the number one person that the Inquisition, where Leon worked, was investigating.

That being said, Director Caron Esso was more interested in making a quick buck than cracking down on the magic element trading crimes in Hamel Town, so he naturally had no interest in putting in a lot of effort to track down that Griffin Man; at most, he would just catch the small fry underlings.

There are hierarchical levels within the underworld. The fact that the old shop owner had firsthand information that the Earl's forces were vying for Mr. Griffin's territory suggests that he wasn't far below Mr. Griffin in rank, and might even be one of Mr. Griffin's direct subordinates.

"Hey young man, you know you shouldn't ask me questions like that, right?"

The shop owner raised an eyebrow at Leon. "I think you understand that asking about someone else's supplier is a taboo in this business, especially since you're an Inquisitor. I advise you not to try to bypass me and go to my superior. He doesn't accept goods from strangers. If your identity as an Inquisitor is discovered, you'll be shot dead on the spot as an undercover agent."

"Just a casual question," Leon shrugged.

"So you didn't get your goods from our competitors, right? That's important. If we're mistaken for the Earl's mole, we'll all be in trouble," the shopkeeper continued to confirm.

“These are my goods. Recently… I’ve slightly changed the process, which has improved the purity,” Leon replied.

"With raw materials of this purity, the products you make should be able to compete with the Earl's. You'd better produce more stock as soon as possible; I'll buy as much as you have. By the way, is there any change left over from this exact ten grams?" The shopkeeper smiled and shook the magic essence in the test tube.

“It’s not much, I’ll keep it for myself,” Leon replied. “So, according to what you just said, will I be being targeted?”

Assuming the shop owner's supplier is Mr. Griffin, and since Mr. Griffin is currently facing power competition from the Earl, he will have a greater demand for high-purity magic essence.

After all, if the product quality can't compete with the competition, customers will be lost.

In this situation, the magic essence he produces will be even more scarce, but correspondingly, if the Earl's forces discover that Mr. Griffin has a new source of supply, they may also set their sights on him.

Getting involved in this level of underworld power struggle is undoubtedly extremely dangerous.

"I'm just reminding you because of the goods you have; you need to be careful," the shop owner said.

He didn't expect Leon to give up because of such a small amount of information. After all, Leon dared to commit apostasy as a clergyman to do this kind of business, so he wouldn't be scared off by a mere underworld struggle. He just didn't want the stable source of goods he had just connected with to run into trouble too soon.

"Well then, let's talk about money. If you can continue to bring in goods like this, let me think... 23,000 is a good price." The shop owner offered a price.

Leon pondered for a moment and replied, "Twenty-five thousand."

Considering the risks he might face in buying this batch of higher-purity goods, he felt it was appropriate to raise the price a little further.

“Oh, buddy, you should know that the price I gave you was already the same discounted price as Caron Esso's, there wasn't that much profit margin.” The shopkeeper shook his head, “Twenty-three thousand five hundred, that's the most I can offer.”

“Twenty-five thousand. This batch of goods will improve your superiors' evaluation of you; it’s worth the price.” Leon did not back down.

"Looks like I've been talking too much." The shopkeeper looked helpless. "Alright, 25,000 pfennigs per gram. Make sure to bring more in four months."

“Okay,” Leon replied.

There are still a number of monsters that have eaten Hannah Weslan's corpse.

If the purity of magic essence is indeed related to this, these monsters should at least be able to guarantee the purity of the next batch of goods. As for after that, they can continue to sell goods with the same purity as the previous batch.

He only cares about making money and has no intention of pursuing the purity of the goods.

Higher purity of magic essence does sell better, but he doesn't want to be forced to feed monsters with dead people all the time.

"Can you get any magic essence with a higher purity than this? I think it might be useful for researching the process," Leon asked the shopkeeper.

"If this would be helpful to you, I'd be happy to get you some, but unfortunately, I don't have that kind of connection right now," the shopkeeper said, shaking his head as he counted the money behind the counter.

"Can you get your hands on chicken snake venom?" Leon asked again.

The shopkeeper paused in counting the money, looked up at Leon with a puzzled expression: "What are you going to do with this?"

“It works. Just tell me, do you have it?” Leon said.

"As for the raw materials, I'll sell them to you for five thousand per gram. But to be honest, if you're going to kill someone, I recommend cheaper, common poisons, like arsenic. Monster poisons are deadly, but the symptoms are too distinctive, and the supply is scarce, making it easy to be investigated..." the shopkeeper advised.

"No killing, just give me a test tube." Leon raised his hand to interrupt the shopkeeper.

"Alright, then come back in two weeks with the money ready to pick up the goods." The shopkeeper said, placing five tickets and a bag of coins on the counter and pushing it towards Leon. "This is your payment."

Leon took the five tickets, which were gold vouchers issued by the church, each worth 50,000 pfennigs, which could be redeemed for that amount of cash from church facilities.

In the empire, the church, the royal family, as well as some great lords and large merchant groups, anyone with the qualifications can issue such gold certificates.

Lords' and merchant guilds' gold certificates could only circulate within their spheres of influence, while church and royal gold certificates could circulate nationwide, functioning as paper money.

Large transactions are usually settled using standard weight gold and silver ingots or gold certificates.

After carefully checking the authenticity of the gold voucher, Leon put it away. Just as he was about to count the money in his purse, the shopkeeper suddenly asked, "By the way, how should I introduce you from now on?"

"Introduce me?" Leon frowned.

"Just give me a name. When someone asks me where this batch of goods came from, I can't exactly say that I made it myself, or that some apostate youth from the Inquisition gave it to me, can I?" The shop owner spread his hands.

Leon realized that he needed to come up with a pseudonym used in the underworld, like the Earl or Mr. Griffin, so that even if others didn't know who he was, they would know which products came from him.

He lowered his head and thought for a moment, his gaze inadvertently falling on the Taylor silver coin peeking out of his money bag, which was printed with a wolf's head.

The imperial family used the wolf totem as their family crest, supposedly because wolves are social animals and represent group order in imperial culture.

A country needs order.

But at this moment, something else came to Leon's mind: he remembered a myth he had heard in his previous life, about a demon wolf feared by the gods. The gods wanted to control it, and the God of War swore an arm to put it in chains made by a dwarf. When the gods broke their promise and refused to release it, it bit off the God of War's arm.

When Ragnarok arrived, it broke free of its chains and stormed into the kingdom of the gods, devouring the king of the gods.

He looked up at the shopkeeper and uttered that name for the first time in this world:

“Fenrir, tell them my name is Fenrir.”

Chapter 31 Head of the Inquisition

Ten days later, at the Inquisition.

As usual, Leon arrived at his team's duty room and exchanged pleasantries with his colleagues.

His secret magic essence business was thriving, and in less than six months, he had amassed a fortune of over 100,000, more than all the salary he had earned in two years working at the Inquisition.

Even so, he still couldn't quit this demanding job that required working year-round without breaks and sometimes even overtime.

Now that he's engaged in illegal business, his identity as an Inquisitor is even more important to him. It's a protective shield for him and the basis for his initial claim that he could provide protection for Reina.

As an Inquisitor, he could keep abreast of the Inquisition's movements and internal intelligence.

For example, he and Lena are currently raising monsters in the labyrinth, but if the Inquisition finds something amiss, they could search the labyrinth at any time. He needs to know this in advance so that he can allow Lena to escape and remove the evidence from the labyrinth before the search begins.

In addition, if he were to become involved in underworld conflicts in the future, even if he were just a lowly junior judge, he could use the clues he reported to guide the Inquisition to deal with opposing underworld forces.

After exchanging pleasantries with their colleagues, they started chatting casually, mostly about topics unrelated to work, making light of things. The team leader hadn't come over to assign tasks yet, so this was the perfect opportunity to slack off.

The meager wages and benefits provided by the church are hardly enough to motivate them to work hard, let alone give them any incentive to be diligent.

However, the good times of slacking off are always short-lived. Just as they were chatting and laughing, the captain walked in with a stern face.

Everyone immediately stopped joking and greeted the captain.

"Hey, Captain."

Good morning, Captain.

"Salute? When did you start losing all your manners?!" The captain suddenly glared at them. "I can hear your laughter from miles away. Do you think this is an amusement park?"

The group exchanged bewildered glances. Their captain was usually quite easygoing and not such a rigid and inflexible person.

At this moment, Leon and another team member noticed that their captain was standing in the middle of the speech and frantically winking at them, so they quickly nudged their colleagues with their elbows as a reminder.

One by one, the team members reacted and quickly lined up in front of the captain in the usual formation used during training, while saluting the captain.

"If I hear you talking about things unrelated to work again in the station, I'll make him clean the station's toilets. Do you understand?" the captain warned sternly.

"Understood, Captain!" everyone responded in unison.

Just then, a burly middle-aged man appeared at the door of the guard room with his hands behind his back.

He had a stern, square face with a meticulously trimmed mustache, and wore a dark blue inquisitor's uniform with a silver church emblem pinned directly to his chest.

The moment they saw this person, all the team members, including Leon, felt a chill and immediately understood the many reactions that the captain had made when he entered the duty room.

Caron Esso, the head of the Inquisition!

"Attention! Salute!" the captain shouted, turning towards the door. He led his team in saluting the station chief, then chanted in unison, "Salute to you, sir!"

"Hmm." Caron merely grunted in response to his subordinate's salute, his gaze lingering on the ordinary team members but pointing directly at the captain, leaving with the words, "Hurry up!"

After saying that, he walked past the door of the duty room, his footsteps gradually disappearing into the distance.

Some people breathed a sigh of relief on the spot, only to be glared at by the captain immediately.

"Everyone, put on your uniforms and assemble in the conference room. The chief is calling a meeting on major cases," the captain said seriously.

Leon finally understood why the director, who usually stayed in his office, had passed by the duty room on the first floor. It turned out he was there for a meeting.

However, based on his experience, when case discussion meetings were held, the deputy director would assign the case to a team, and then the team leader would lead the meeting to formulate an investigation plan. The deputy director might sit in for a while, but he was usually not present.

As for Director Caron, Leon had never seen him directly participate in investigating cases, let alone chair meetings. More often than not, the director would only give sleep-inducing speeches in front of the assembled staff during group address sessions or annual summaries.

Noticing this unusual situation, Leon asked the captain in a low voice, "Is the director chairing the meeting today, Captain?"

"Never mind that, let's hurry up," the captain urged.

Soon everyone changed into their uniforms and, led by their captain, arrived at the conference room. The conference room was already filled with smoke. Director Caron, who had been waiting there, had lit his pipe and was puffing away.

"Damn it, smoking inside without opening the windows?" Leon cursed under his breath, glancing at the tightly closed window behind Director Caron.

But no one at the scene raised this issue with the director. In fact, most people didn't have any objections either. In this era, not many people know how harmful smoking is to health. On the contrary, some people even use tobacco as medicine.

Some members of the team were addicted to cigarettes but could only afford cheap tobacco to satisfy their cravings because of their meager wages. When they saw Director Caron smoking a good cigarette, they started taking deep breaths. For them, secondhand smoke was also considered smoke.

"Is this how you usually slack off downstairs?" Director Caron's first words made everyone present break out in a cold sweat. It seemed that the director had no intention of letting what they had just done go unpunished.

“Once you’re here, you have to do your job for the church properly. As judges who urge the people to revere the church, you can’t lack reverence for the church yourself,” Director Caron said slowly, puffing on his pipe. “Each member of Team Three will have one tyre deducted this month.”

Upon hearing this, everyone began to curse the bastard in their hearts.

"Sir, I promise this won't happen again, please..." The captain tried to plead with the director, a situation that was quite painful for the team members.

"You dare to interrupt my decision? What, you want to take my place?" Director Caron glanced at the captain.