HELLO DEARIES
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Alex sat cross legged on a flat rock near the entrance of their small crevice hideout and In front of him, laid out on a large, clean banana leaf, were the meager supplies he had bought: the grey ration blocks, the water bottles, and the roll of gauze.
His mind wasn't on the food, it was on the pain, his ribs throbbed with a dull, sickening rhythm every time he inhaled and his left wrist was a swollen, purple mess of bruised tissue, It wasn't broken, but the ligaments were angry.
"Fifty points," Alex muttered, staring at his watch."Fifty points for a Potion."He let out a bitter laugh that turned into a cough.
Back in Viridian City, District 8, fifty points worth money could feed a family for a month, he remembered the memory of the view from his window in the slums...the towering silhouette of the Viridian Gym in the distance, a monument to Giovanni's power, while the streets below drowned in sewage and neon smog.
He had grown up watching trainers walk into that Gym with rare Pokémon and expensive gear, while he scrambled for scraps.
He had studied in old life, God, he had studied hard, In his past life, he had spent four years in pharmacy school, memorizing chemical structures, drug interactions, and compounding techniques.He knew how to extract alkaloids,he also knew how to synthesize aspirin and now, he was letting himself get scammed by corporate bastards?
"I'm such an idiot," Alex whispered, he looked at the Nidoran, who was gnawing on a piece of ration block nearby. The Pokémon's leg was still favoring a limp and the bruise from the Rattata bite was nasty...infected, maybe.
"We don't need to buy their trash," Alex said, his eyes narrowing ."Potions aren't magic,
they're chemistry, they are simple chemistry
It's just berry extract and a binding agent."
He stood up, ignoring the protest of his ribs. "Come on," he told the Nidoran, "We're going shopping but this time we're not paying."
They moved away from the rocky outcrop, heading back into the denser vegetation. This time, Alex wasn't looking for prey, he was looking for reagents,he activated his Status Screen, until now, he had used it to look at Pokémon but the interface had identified the Rawst Berry earlier so it certainly had a database this he scanned the surrounding areas around him.
[ Plant: Fern (Common) ]
[ Plant: Moss (Common) ]
[ Plant: Blue Bush ] -> [ Identification: Oran Berry Bush ]
Alex stopped and then he knelt down.
The bush was small, choked by weeds, but it held three small, blue, spherical fruits.
[ Item: Oran Berry ]
[ Quality: Low ]
[ Properties: Restores 10 HP. Contains mild analgesics and rapid-clotting enzymes. ]
"Analgesics," Alex noted,"Painkillers."He picked them but he didn't stop there as he needed something to bind it , something which could turn the juice into a Salve that would stick to the wound so he scanned the trees and also the dirt.
[ Plant: Sticky Barb ] -> Useless.
[ Plant: Resin Tree ] -> Too sticky.
[ Plant: Silver-Leaf Weed ]
He suddenly paused,It was a tiny, plant with a jagged, silver lined leaves growing in the shadow of a rock.
[ Item: Silver Powder Leaf ]
[ Properties: Antibacterial
Stimulates cell regeneration,Bitter]
Alex's eyes widened,"Antibacterial now that's the actual money maker."
He carefully dug up the weed, preserving the roots and the plants.For the next two hours, Alex didn't hunt, he simply scavenged.
He was like a man possessed, to any observer, he looked like a desperate recruit eating grass but inside his head, he was back in the lab.
He found four Oran Berries, two clumps of Silver-Leaf Weed, and a handful of Pecha Berries which contained antitoxins and with those he returned to the hideout.
It was time to cook, he didn't have a mortar and pestle, so he found a smooth, concave river stone and washed it with a splash of his precious bottled water, he used the handle of his combat knife as the pestle.
"Okay," Alex muttered.
"Oran berries first,remove the skin...it's just fiber,We want the pulp, easy...easy...right."
He peeled the blue berries with surgical precision using the knife tip and dropped the pulp into the hollow stone and began to mash it, It turned into a blue sludge.
"Add the Silver-Leaf."
He tore the leaves into tiny pieces and added them to the mix,he had grounded them together, the friction releasing a sharp, medicinal smell that made the Nidoran sneeze.
"It needs a base," he muttered."Water makes it too runny. It'll wash off." He looked around the hideout and he saw a glob of sap oozing from a pine-like tree nearby so he tested it with his finger.
Tacky and thick
He added a small amount of sap to the mixture and continued grinding. After 10 minutes , he had a small pile of thick, dark blue paste which smelled strong...astringent and sweet.
[ Item Created: Crude Oran Salve ]
[ Quality: D+ ]
[ Effect: Heals minor wounds over time. Prevents infection. Efficacy: 1.5x of raw Oran Berry]
"1.5 times," Alex grinned . "And it sticks."
He scooped some of the paste onto his finger."Come here," he signaled to Nidoran.
The Pokémon backed away, wary of the strong smell,It growled low, "It's for the leg," Alex said, his voice firm but calm. "It's going to sting, but it will stop the rot,trust me."
He didn't force it,he simply held his hand out and nidoran looked at the blue glop then at its swollen leg and then it looked at Alex.
Slowly, it limped forward and it laid down, exposing the injury, Alex applied the paste gently with care ,Nidoran flinched and let out a sharp squeal as the astringent hit the open wound, but it didn't bite.
"Good boy," Alex whispered."That's the bacteria dying,that's good."
He wrapped the leg with a small strip of the gauze he had bought and then he treated himself.
He smeared the paste liberally over his bruised ribs and his swollen wrist and the cooling sensation was immediate.
The throbbing heat dialed down from a scream to a whisper.
"It works," Alex sighed, leaning back.
"It actually works.",he looked at the leftover paste and thought that he had enough for maybe three more applications.
A Potion cost 50 points and healed instantly.
His paste cost 0 points, took 20 minutes to make, and healed slowly but here was the kicker: Ingredients were absolutely free.
"I can sell this," Alex realized,the other recruits were idiots,they were thugs and gangsters and they didn't know how these berries could be used, they saw weeds while Alex saw 💊 medicines.
If he could refine the process..... And maybe find some Revival Herbs or something else ...then he could make more goods.
He looked at the Pecha Berries he hadn't used yet.
[ Item: Pecha Berry ]
[ Properties: Neutralizes neurotoxins. ]
He looked at the Nidoran's horn, It dripped with venom."Wait," Alex murmured, "If I could maybe reverse the process... If I could concentrate the toxins instead of the antidotes...", he grabbed a Pecha berry.
In a pharmacy, an antidote often contained a neutralized form of the poison, or a chemical that bound to it and if he could isolate the binding agent, he could potentially create a coating that made the Nidoran's poison sticky.
"Sticky Poison," Alex mused, "So that it doesn't just drip off when you hit something but will stay in the wound."
He mashed the Pecha berry, but this time he mixed it with the sap and a poisonous mushroom he had avoided earlier, a Spotted Toadstool.
[ Item: Toadstool Cap ]
[ Toxicity: Mild Paralyzing Agent. ]
He ground them together and the result was a purple, foul-smelling sludge."Come here," Alex said again,this time Nidoran looked at the new goop with interest,It smelled like home and also smelled like danger.
Alex carefully applied the sludge to the Nidoran's horn, being extremely careful not to touch it himself.
"Don't lick it," Alex warned. "Ram it into something.", Nidoran shook its head.
The sludge clung to the horn, It didn't drip so
Alex checked the status.
[ Pokémon: Nidoran ]
[ Weapon buff: Paralyzing Toxin Coat (Duration: 3 hits) ]
[ Effect: 20% Chance to inflict Paralysis on contact. ]
Alex sat back, wiping his hands on the grass, he was a pharmacist from Earth.
He didn't have a Charizard and he didn't have a million fucking pokedollars but he had knowledge, freaking 🧪 science.
"We just upgraded buddy ," Alex said, his voice thick with satisfaction.
He checked his inventory and it still had the lot of empty space.
"We need jars, lots of them" he planned. "We need containersas well ,If I can fill ten jars with that Oran Salve, I can undercut the Rocket Exchange and I can sell them for 20 points each and that's 200 points, that's a Pokéball."
He looked at the jungle with new eyes, it wasn't just a slaughterhouse anymore, for him it was a pharmacy and he was the only one with the key.
"Let's rest for an hour," Alex told Nidoran who was testing the weight of the sludge on its horn.
"Then we go find some containers, if i remember correctly there was a trash heap near the coast where the tide washes up debris, Plastic bottles, glass."
He closed his eyes, the cooling paste on his ribs lulling him into a sense of security he hadn't felt since arriving. He wasn't helpless anymore, he could survive,no...he will survive and he will thrive, he was a topscorer in classe and he will be at the top here as well because he was essential.
In a war zone, the doctor is king but on Island 4, the man who makes the medicine... and the poison.... is God.
Authors Note:-
Well finally Alex uses my ...his knowledge to do what he does best.
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