The Fountain of Youth as Military Supplies

Rachel Angelo was a burly man who resembled a lion. Anyone who met him was struck by his thick mop of red hair, bushy as a lion's mane. Paired with his massive, muscular frame, it made many unconsciously overlook his advanced age of eighty. This iron-blooded lion had spent forty springs and autumns on the frontier, guarding the empire's borders and forging an illustrious name. Originally, a buffer zone had existed between the Kingdom of the Unholy Hymn and Ryan, home to various races such as goblins, undead, lizardmen, and gnolls. The tieflings had used these races as a shield to keep Ryan at arm's length. Yet ever since Rachel Angelo took over as castellan of Liuyan City, he had slaughtered nearly all of them. Vast goblin tribes numbering in the tens of thousands had been trampled into bloody mud by Rachel Angelo's iron cavalry. The legendary goblin warlock's severed head, cleaved off by Rachel himself, still hung in his bedroom. Rachel Angelo's unyielding aggression was one of the prime reasons the tieflings dreaded Ryan. Every tiefling knew that if this iron-blooded general were unleashed on an offensive, their race faced total annihilation. Thus, opening more Gates of Hell was imperative. They would rather perish under the wrath of the gods than be butchered by this monstrous executioner. The Gates of Hell posed a massive headache for the people of Ryan. Once one opened, hellish monsters poured out in droves; give a Gate of Hell just one day, and an army hundreds of thousands strong could flood forth. Even a full-scale assault by Ryan would incur appalling casualties. This was precisely what infuriated Rachel Angelo most: his lifelong dream was to conquer an entire kingdom. The desert campaign had been utterly baffling—in the beginning, the dwarfs had been too weak, and later the Silvermoon Knight's reckless raid inflicted grievous losses, leaving Rachel to clean up the mess. It had been intensely frustrating. Then, when the Silvermoon Knight fell during the campaign against the orcs, Ryan simply called a halt to the offensive. Rachel Angelo had erupted in fury upon receiving the military dispatches: "A bunch of morons! So what if Silvermoon is dead? Did Ryan build its prestige on him alone?! Those cities were bought with the lives of my Ryan soldiers, and they just abandoned them like that?! A pack of foolish, rotting bureaucrats!" Lately, however, Rachel Angelo's mood had been quite good. Word had come from the imperial capital ordering him to step up troop training and prepare to receive vast quantities of war supplies—provisions, potions, weapons, armor, and more. Rachel Angelo understood instantly: war was on the horizon. An offensive against those bloodkin of hellish devils was imminent. This would be no minor skirmish. Like the desert campaign, this would be a war of total conquest! Rachel Angelo was ecstatic. Before he died, he would finally get to wage a kingdom-toppling war. All his efforts to fulfill his oath had not been in vain; the time to realize his dream had finally arrived. Ryan's institutions and culture were the finest among the continental kingdoms, and humans were the supreme race. Humanity ought to be the master of this continent, allowing the light of the Lord of the Dawn to shine upon every inch of land. Conquest existed to spread the faith—a believer's greatest offering to their god! Unfortunately, Rachel Angelo had never received an oracle from the Lord of the Dawn. Even when he ascended to legendary rank, the Lord of the Dawn had not spared him a single glance. Rachel Angelo believed it was because he had never fulfilled his vow, causing the Lord of the Dawn to be disappointed in him. Now, the hour to fulfill that vow had come! Driven by his excitement, Rachel Angelo began inspecting the city far more frequently. Today, however, an odd incident had occurred: a noble from the dwarven lands had teleported straight into Liuyan City. Supposedly, an accident had occurred during the teleportation. A spatial distortion had dumped them into Liuyan City when they were originally headed for the Kingdom of the Unholy Hymn. Rachel Angelo hadn't believed it at first. If it were that easy to forcibly teleport into the city, what point was there to the defensive magic array? Anyone could just teleport explosives or poison inside, and defending Liuyan City would become a joke. Yet subsequent interrogation confirmed that this was indeed the truth. When he questioned the clerics managing the city defense magic array, he received an answer that was both laughable and infuriating. Liuyan City's magic array was designed only to defend against targeted, forced teleports. In other words, if it detected someone attempting to forcefully breach the spatial lockdown, the array activated automatically to block the intrusion. However, if it was non-targeted, random teleportation drift, the array would not trigger. A teleportation failure causing an off-target drop directly inside the city was exceptionally rare—unlikely to happen even once in a century. Ryan couldn't reasonably multiply the cost of the city defense array tenfold for such an infinitesimal probability, especially when doing so would impair the operation of other defensive functions. Rachel Angelo didn't know much about magic, but he trusted that his subordinates wouldn't make a mistake. This teleportation truly was merely a misunderstanding. His subordinate quickly asked, "General, how should we handle that noble locked in the dungeon?" "Thoroughly investigate his business associates. If there is any connection to anyone on our wanted lists, execute him immediately. If not, make his family pay up. Illegal entry into Ryan's territory—fine him by the book. Confiscate all of his cargo..." Rachel Angelo paused, then asked, "By the way, what was packed in that carriage? The packaging looked rather exquisite." His subordinate hurriedly answered, "It's the Fountain of Youth, a new variety of Potion of Youth that's been gaining popularity recently." "Potion of Youth? That much?!" Rachel Angelo was stunned. A single bottle of Potion of Youth was worth nearly five hundred thousand gold coins. How much would a whole carriage load be worth? Even Rachel Angelo was shocked by the figure; a carriage full of Potions of Youth was almost equivalent to five years of Liuyan City's military budget. The subordinate quickly explained, "General, this isn't the complete Potion of Youth. Word is it has no real life-extending effect; it only restores youth for a few days, and once the effects wear off, the user reverts to normal." "So it's just some swindling gimmick cooked up by alchemists... Wait. When you say restoring youth, do you mean purely in appearance?" Rachel Angelo suddenly grew animated, sitting bolt upright. "Uh... I'm not entirely certain, but I hear that for the duration of the effect, one's youth is fully restored. Those nobles treat it as that sort of medicine, so it shouldn't just be an alteration in looks." Rachel Angelo snapped, "Go find out! And have that Fountain of Youth brought to me!" Watching his subordinate hurry out, Rachel Angelo paced restlessly back and forth across his office. He hoped the Fountain of Youth's effects were genuine—that it truly could restore a person to peak youth for a brief time. The Ryan Empire strictly forbade using Potions of Youth to prolong life; it was an ironclad law. If caught, all assets were seized, the principal offender executed, and the entire family exiled. Even someone of the Silvermoon Knight's towering stature had no choice but to bear the toll of aging, ultimately dying of old age on the battlefield. "If only he could have been given a bottle of this Fountain of Youth, the Orc Kingdom would have been destroyed long ago!" Although Rachel Angelo looked down somewhat on the Silvermoon Knight as a reckless brute who only knew how to swing a sword and lacked command ability, he had to admit that the Silvermoon Knight's strength defied reason. If he were restored to youth—even for just a few days—all the legends of the Orc Kingdom combined would have marched only to their deaths. Tragically, he was already dead. Yet this Fountain of Youth was still useful. Rachel Angelo was thrilled. The Fountain of Youth only offered a temporary return to peak condition without prolonging life, so using it didn't violate the law. Rachel Angelo was eighty himself; his stamina was nothing like his youth, but the combat experience he possessed now far surpassed that of his younger days. If he could return to his prime, he would become a nightmare to all his foes. Most of Ryan's legends were over sixty. If every one of them could drink a bottle before taking the field, how terrifying would their combat strength become? Why hadn't anyone told him about such an incredible thing? Presumably, it was due to Ryan's laws: anything related to rejuvenating youth was considered taboo in Ryan, something ordinary people dared not even mention. Who would have thought he had almost missed out on something so magnificent? Before long, the carriage load of the Fountain of Youth was brought before Rachel Angelo. Inside palm-sized bottles, the potion sparkled like a starry night sky. "Exquisite. How much does a bottle of this Fountain of Youth cost?" Rachel Angelo asked. "At least two thousand gold coins, it seems. I've inquired, and this potion does indeed restore bodily functions alongside appearance. This batch is the lowest grade, with effects lasting only about three days. There are higher grades that can last up to ten days." Holding the vial, Rachel Angelo could hardly bring himself to set it down. He asked again, "Are there side effects?" His subordinate replied, "None reported so far. However, once the effects of a bottle wear off, it cannot be taken again for at least a month, or else symptoms like diarrhea and dizziness will occur." Rachel Angelo hesitated a moment, then ordered, "Go, fetch me a prisoner. An old one." A few minutes later, a hunched old man was brought before Rachel Angelo. Without asking what crimes the man had committed, Rachel tipped the bottle directly down his throat. Barely a dozen seconds after downing the potion, the wrinkle-faced old man transformed into a young fellow in his twenties or thirties. Delight washed over Rachel Angelo's face, yet he still observed cautiously for a time and had people examine the convict's body. The conclusion arrived swiftly: from the inside out, the man had completely returned to his youthful state, with no anomalies detected. Three days passed, and as the potion's effects faded, the old man merely reverted to his former state without any unusual symptoms. The clerics of light performing the examinations simply failed to notice that this unkempt, grimy old man had shed a few strands of white hair over those three days. That was entirely normal—how could hair loss count as a side effect? Even if someone had noticed, they wouldn't have thought anything of it. A prisoner locked in a dungeon with meager food and water, unable to bathe—what did losing a few hairs matter? The fact that he hadn't fallen sick and died was already proof of remarkable vitality. The final report confirmed that everything was normal, with no side effects discovered. Reviewing the report, Rachel Angelo exclaimed with excitement, "Excellent! What a magnificent substance! Write to the imperial capital at once—requisition this Fountain of Youth as military supplies!" Then, he poured a full bottle down his own throat. Rachel Angelo intended to thoroughly experience the sensation of regained youth.