Chapter 8: The Task from the Treant Amos
"I truly am a genius!"
After tidying up the alchemy room and dragging his exhausted body onto the bed, Charlotte still felt a sense of fulfillment.
The successful concoction of the hemostatic potion boosted his confidence in running the clinic.
However, today's workload made him realize the urgent need for a diligent and capable assistant at the clinic to handle miscellaneous tasks.
Once the rent was paid and the business stabilized, if there was any extra money, he would consider hiring an assistant.
Before closing his eyes to sleep, Charlotte glanced at his attribute panel.
【Player: Charlotte】
【Profession: Doctor, Alchemist】
【Level: Fourth-tier Mage Discard】
【Wealth Value: 4323】
【Professional Skills:
Wound Dressing and Medication Replacement: Intermediate: 1321/2000
Skin Wound Suturing: Intermediate: 1926/2000
Uterine Incision Surgery: Beginner: 230/1000
Castration of Cats and Canine Animals: Advanced: 650/4000】
...
【Special Skill: Hemostatic Potion Brewing: Beginner: 90/1000】
【Main Quest: Attain an Influence of 1000 as the Abyssal Physician! (Treating a patient grants 10 influences) Progress: 90/1000】
【Side Quest: Not Triggered Yet】
【System Shop: Not Opened Yet (Opens when Wealth Value reaches 10,000)】
【Favorability Panel: Not Opened Yet】
The wealth value remained stable at 4323, and the fifteen silver coins spent in the afternoon did not deduct from the wealth value, which was consistent with his previous conjecture.
Moreover, he now possessed a special skill—Hemostatic Potion Brewing.
What intrigued him the most was the experience bar. He was currently at the beginner level. If the experience points reached 1000 and he reached the intermediate level, would the brewed hemostatic potion also become an intermediate-level one?
What about reaching the advanced level?
With beautiful visions in his mind, Charlotte entered the realm of dreams.
...
Two towering lampposts, each a kilometer high, turned the bustling city of Calwa into a sleepless city.
A white unicorn carriage slowly stopped in front of a magnificent mansion. A handsomely dressed man embraced a seductive succubus with a revealing neckline as they stepped out of the carriage. He turned to the attendant beside him and asked, "Have you captured that little girl?"
"Milord Viscount, we haven't found Vivienne yet. My subordinates suspect that she may have already entered the Abyss," the attendant replied, bowing his head, his forehead covered in a cold sweat.
"A bunch of useless fools! You can't even capture a little girl who only knows healing spells." Lord Capas' face turned cold, and a fireball flickered in the palm of his hand.
The attendant's face turned pale, and he knelt with a thud.
"Milord Viscount, this is Calwa. Don't forget the Duke's instructions before he left," an old man in a gray robe approached from behind. With just a glance, the fireball in Capas' hand extinguished.
"You're lucky," Capas put down his hand and continued, "Go find Carol. The Abyss is his territory. Make him pull that girl out."
"Yes!" The attendant, relieved, immediately got up from the ground and hurried away.
Capas walked towards the mansion with the succubus in his embrace, and the old man in the gray robe followed by his side.
"Milord Viscount, you came here primarily for Miss Elizabeth. You still need to be mindful of your words and actions within Calwa. You understand the importance of this marriage alliance," the old man said, casting a glance at the succubus.
"Go wait for me in my room," Capas patted the succubus' plump buttocks.
The succubus obediently departed.
"Uncle Bill, my father sent you to protect me and keep an eye on me, right?" Capas looked at the old man in the gray robe with a helpless expression.
Bill didn't respond directly but said instead, "Carol is not trustworthy. If the account book falls into the hands of the Jadeson family, it would be troublesome for the Duke."
"Don't worry, even if Carol had a hundred times the courage, he wouldn't dare to do such a thing. They've always wanted to sell magic potions to the Lance Empire, and Carol has come to me several times for this matter. I'm giving them an opportunity," Capas smirked, revealing a cold smile. "If they can't handle it, they know the consequences."
...
Charlotte woke up early in the morning. Despite the continuous yawns, he couldn't bear to take a bottle of invigorating stamina potion for himself.
He went out and bought two black bread rolls, spending four copper coins. He ate one to fill his stomach and kept one for lunch.
Poverty had bestowed upon him a strong will to face adversity.
While no patients were coming in yet, he cleaned the operating room thoroughly.
The poor surgical environment could easily lead to post-operative infections, increasing the mortality rate.
As for the miscellaneous surgical tools, they gave him a headache.
Rusty saws and scalpels were like enchanted tetanus blades. Only the brave would dare to come off the operating table alive.
Charlotte selected two relatively sharp and less rusty short knives, polished and cleaned them, and then sterilized them for future use using the boiling method.
"These seem more like tools for chopping people rather than surgical knives," Charlotte waved the half-pound heavy short knife in his hand. It felt awkward as a surgical instrument.
On Baka Street, there was a dwarf blacksmith shop. After paying the rent and having some extra money, Charlotte considered getting a custom-made surgical knife that would suit him.
His current goal was to earn ten thousand pieces!
He activated the system's store and checked out what good items were available.
Speaking of which, this system was amazing.
Earning money from one task and spending it on another.
It was like double happiness!
Thud! Thud! Thud!
Suddenly, the clinic's door violently shook, as if someone was pounding it with a siege hammer.
"What's going on? It shouldn't be a daytime robbery on Baka Street, right?" Charlotte was startled. He grabbed a magic talisman and concealed a short knife in his hand before cautiously opening the door.
As he opened the door, he was faced with a pair of cloudy large eyeballs.
Then he saw a face that occupied the entire door panel.
It was a face covered in gray-brown bark, with features twisted in pain. When the tree person saw Charlotte, a glimmer of hope flashed in its eyes.
It was a treat!
The treant took two steps back, allowing Charlotte to get a clear view of this colossal treant standing over nine meters tall.
Despite its towering stature, the treant appeared weak. Much of its bark had peeled off, revealing withered branches. Its right arm was severed, showing signs of burn marks, although they were old injuries.
The treant held its throat with its left hand, looking extremely pained. When it saw Charlotte staring at it, it quickly pointed at its open mouth.
"Choked on something?" Charlotte quickly understood its meaning.
The treant immediately nodded.
[Ding! Treant Emos has assigned you an emergency task: Remove the obstruction from its throat! Task reward: 100 copper coins!]
The system's voice rang out.
"Choked. You should immediately use the Heimlich maneuver, embrace the patient from behind, make a fist between their lower rib margin and navel, and then push upward..." Charlotte looked at the treant's massive figure and stopped recalling.
None of the people present, including the onlookers and neighboring residents who came out to watch, knew how to perform first aid on a treant in this way.
"A treant choked to death. That's rare."
"Why did the treant leave the forest and come to the Abyss? This place is not suitable for treants to survive, not even a trace of sunlight."
"Can we chop off some wood and take it back for burning? We just ran out of firewood at home."
The onlookers whispered among themselves, showing little sympathy.
Charlotte has no time to marvel at the kindness of people in the world. Looking at the massive body of the treant, its nearly one-story-high head, and its mouth that opened like a large gate, he had a new idea and shouted, "Lower your head, and I might be able to help you remove the obstruction directly."
The treant was nearing a suffocating state, its emotions becoming restless, and gradually losing control over its body.
But upon hearing Charlotte's voice, it clung to the last straw of salvation and crawled towards the direction of the clinic, prostrating itself on the ground. Its enormous face once again crowded in front of the clinic door.
"Open your mouth!" Charlotte said.
The treant opened its mouth, resembling the opening of a large gate capable of easily swallowing a grown human.
A strong foul smell rushed out, like an eighty-two-year-old sewer, indescribably pungent, causing Charlotte to instinctively cover his mouth and nose.
The gaping mouth was pitch black inside, and nothing could be seen.
The abyssal visibility was insufficient to illuminate the treant's oral cavity.
Charlotte turned around and took an oil lamp from the wall behind him, but as he looked at the pitch-black abyssal mouth, he felt a moment of hesitation.
He was just a mortal now. If he entered the treant's mouth and it suddenly went mad and lost control, the probability of his death would be extremely high.
Huff, huff...
A weak sound emanated from the treant's throat, like leaky bellows, and its body began to tremble uncontrollably.
The situation was critical, and there was no time to waste!
"I'm going in!"
Carrying the oil lamp, Charlotte took a step into the mouth, looking at the pitch-black expanse before him.
The interior of the treant's oral cavity was not as sticky as he had imagined. Charlotte held the oil lamp and walked further inside.
"The level of tooth wear is simply appalling! All the teeth need to be replaced!"
"Poor oral health, in urgent need of comprehensive cleaning!"
Charlotte grumbled while climbing over the half-meter-tall brown teeth, ignoring the remnants of plant fibers and minced meat in the gaps, and crawling onto the whitish tongue, heading deeper into the throat.
He had to find the foreign object stuck in the treant's throat and figure out a way to remove it.
With another person inside its mouth, the treant couldn't ensure the calmness of its oral cavity due to the strong sensation of a foreign object.
An uneasy tongue, trembling teeth, and the wriggling inner walls of the mouth were all dangerous to Charlotte.
Soon, Charlotte climbed over the tip of the tongue and stood on its base, holding the oil lamp high and illuminating the dark depths of the throat—a slanted and narrow passage.
"Hey, how are you doing?"
At that moment, a faint voice echoed from deep within the treant's throat, resonating continuously in the confined oral cavity.
The eerie voice appeared suddenly, causing Charlotte's hand to tremble, and the oil lamp nearly slipped out of his grasp.