I'm not a Witcher anymore.

Zig raised his hand and flipped it over, and two potion bottles had already solidified in the fine dust of light.

Mild-acting treatment solution.

He handed one bottle to Finn and the other to Joel.

"Hold him up, don't let him choke."

Joel quickly went over and helped dismantle Ingram's deformed breastplate piece by piece.

The metal buckle was stuck very tightly, and it took Joel a lot of effort, sweat beading on his forehead, before he finally managed to remove the dented breastplate.

As soon as Ingram was freed from his restraints, he coughed up a mouthful of bloody phlegm, his face turning ashen like a crumpled piece of white paper.

Joel gritted his teeth and fed the medicine into his mouth little by little.

After the medicine went down his throat, Ingram's Adam's apple bobbed, and the bulging veins on his forehead relaxed a little.

The suffocating pain that felt like it was crushing his chest didn't disappear immediately, but it eased considerably, at least enough to keep him from being unable to catch his breath.

Finn's side was much more efficient.

He tilted his head back and gulped down the medicine. He leaned against the wreckage of the carriage for a moment to recover, and his legs, which had been weak from the violent impact, regained some strength.

"I won't die," the spearman said in a low voice, wiping his mouth.

Zieg nodded and then walked toward the dead owl-bear carcass.

A colossal beast lay across the wilderness, like a collapsed brown city wall.

Beneath the thick feathers and rough fur, the lingering warmth still remained, and the stench of blood mixed with the unique pungent smell of wild beasts pressed heavily against one's nostrils in the night wind.

Zig crouched down, took out a short knife, and with clean and swift movements, cut open the flesh behind the owl bear's eye socket.

A moment later, he pulled out a translucent dark amber crystal from deep within the sticky, warm flesh.

The object was only about half the size of a thumb, yet it gleamed with an extremely strange, eerie, and faint light in the firelight.

The inside of the crystal seems to be sealed with a layer of flowing mist, faintly revealing water-like patterns. Looking at it for a long time can even give people the illusion that their field of vision has been subtly stretched.

Zig's mind stirred slightly.

The Night Eye Crystal instantly turned into dust and vanished, disappearing into the Book of Adventure.

The pages of the book are turned.

The ink flowed.

Lines of text slowly emerged on the blank parchment:

"Owl Bear Night Eye Crystal: A visual crystal formed behind the eyes of a predatory behemoth"

"Contains the essence of refined and stable night vision"

"It can be used as a core ingredient in cat potions, and its effects are superior to regular water essence, but a large amount of honey needs to be added to neutralize its toxicity."

Zieg's gaze lingered on the pages of the book for a moment.

Cat Potion is a night vision potion commonly used by witchers. After ingesting it, one can discern roads, silhouettes, and the movements of prey in the dark.

In a world where people frequently explore caves, tombs, and underground ruins, the value of this item is almost self-evident.

According to the usual recipe, the Cat Potion requires dwarven spirits, cypress stem fruit, and the essence of water.

He already had the first two items ready.

Dwarf spirits, he has no shortage of them.

For the fruit of the cypress stem, the des fruit has long been found as a substitute.

The only troublesome thing is the essence of water, which has yet to be found.

And now, this Owl Bear Night Eye Crystal has just filled the last gap.

More importantly—

The Book of Adventure even deduced the improvement path to reduce toxicity.

This means that what he's about to concoct won't be the usual version of the cat potion.

Instead, it is more suitable for mortals to consume—Order of the Cat.

Zieg slowly closed his eyes, letting those few lines of text linger in his mind for a moment before opening them again.

He didn't stop there.

Gallbladder, sharp claws, hind neck tendons, thick feathers, oil, blood...

He extracted all the valuable parts and included them in his book of adventures.

Finally, Zieg placed his hand on the massive owl-bear carcass.

Countless tiny specks of light rose from the surface of the corpse.

The massive remains of the beast, heavy enough to make any hunter shudder, rapidly disintegrated, transforming into a flowing galaxy that disappeared into Sieg's palm without a trace.

"Zig."

A slightly hoarse voice came from behind.

Zig turned around and saw that Ravenna had walked over at some point.

Her light leather armor was covered in mud and blood, and her hair was soaked with sweat.

"Thank you." Ravenna's voice was soft, yet extremely solemn. "If it weren't for you, I would have been dead just now."

"You don't need to thank me."

Zieg casually wiped the blood off his short sword on a blade of grass, his tone still calm. "You rushed out to buy time for the front lines. We're teammates, it's only right that I save you."

He stood up, sheathed his short sword, and looked at her calmly: "You did what you were supposed to do, and so did I."

Ravenna was slightly taken aback.

She looked at Zieg's still calm face, and her tense expression gradually relaxed.

After a moment, she spoke in a low voice: "You are more reliable than I thought..."

After saying that, she smiled to herself, as if she had finally let go of the last bit of doubt in her heart.

The brief conversation ended there, and everyone's attention quickly returned to the messy aftermath before them.

The two men who had been drugged earlier were finally roused from their stupor by Joel patting their faces and pouring cold water down their throats. They were still groggy, their eyelids heavy and their legs weak; they could barely stand if they weren't leaning against the carriage shaft.

Even so, no one dared to stay here any longer.

The night was too deep.

The smell of blood is too strong.

Too many people have died on the ground.

Zig glanced at the desolate wasteland and said:

"Take everything you can. Let's leave immediately."

No one objected.

The group quickly gathered up the usable goods, put the wounded and the half-conscious crew back into the vehicles, lit a few torches just enough to light the way, and then set off again in the night wind.

The carriage rolled across the blood-stained wilderness, heading towards the border town through the night.

……

No further accidents occurred along the way.

When the familiar outline of the border town reappeared on the horizon, everyone finally breathed a sigh of relief.

The rows of buildings and the wisps of smoke rising from their chimneys looked so welcoming.

Joel sat in the carriage, watching the town draw ever closer, and let out a long sigh of relief: "Finally back."

They went through so much along the way.

A goblin attack in the wilderness, a near-death experience at the inn after dinner, a chase in the night, and finally, even a monster like an owl bear came into the fray.

The two men who had gone out with Joel sat on the truck bed, glancing at each other, both seeing a hint of relief at surviving the ordeal on each other's faces.

That night, they were almost unconscious the whole time. It was the four adventurers who truly saved their lives from the wilderness.

If it weren't for them, the convoy would probably have been scattered in the wilderness halfway through the journey.

The adventurers' expressions visibly relaxed.

Returning to town meant finally having a bed to sleep in and a roof over one's head to shelter from the wind and rain.

More importantly, from this moment on, they no longer had to be constantly on guard against something suddenly lunging out of the darkness and taking their lives.