章 4: Not your typical drink

Ignys took a look at his body.

Somehow, his entire body was restored and he no longer was missing an arm.

He wanted to question it, but when he looked at the creature in front of him, Ignys realized his situation.

The first thing Ignys did was crawl back five meters when he saw the creature in front of him.

"Now, now, no need to be afraid of me." said the creature

Ignys' heart was beating quickly as he spoke out in a scared voice.

"Y-you're not my grandfather!"

If the creature in front of Ignys had a face, it would look very confused.

"Of course I am not your grandfather, I am the deity which you requested to start a tavern with." spoke the creature in a relaxed tone.

At this point, everything connected in Ignys' head.

"I didn't want to start a tavern with you, I confused your voice with that of my grandfather! I wanted to run a tavern with him!" yelled Ignys.

"You confused my voice... With that of someone else?" asked the creature in a confused tone.

"Yes! Reincarnate me again! There is no way in hell I can run a tavern here!" said Ignys.

The creature sighed.

"Sadly, I am not able to do that. You see, it costs a lot of mana for me to reincarnate someone, that is also why most of the crystals in this area are drained. I only know a handful of locations where we could reincarnate you again and those are too dangerous to reach as I am afraid you will die as we travel to said location."

Ignys had a minor mental breakdown.

"This... All of this isn't real... This can't be happening it simply isn't possible!"

"What isn't possible?" asked the creature in a calm tone.

"All of this! First of all why is there even a tavern here?! It shouldn't be possible we are in the outerlands! How did you even reincarnate me!? No magic is capable of doing that! How do you even speak when you have no face! It all shouldn't be possible!" yelled Ignys out.

"Allow me to first answer your question on how I can speak, I use wind magic in order to compress the air around me meanwhile simultaneously using telekinesis to make the air vibrate, that way I can mimic a voice. Reincarnation magic is very much possible, but the spell is ancient and requires hundreds of years of practice in order to execute, and of course, it is possible for a tavern to be in the outerlands, I am the most powerful entity in the outerlands after all."

The creature answered the questions in a simplistic tone, like explaining a casual thing.

"W-wait, you are the most powerful creature in the outerlands...?" asked Ignys in a confused tone.

"Yes, I am. You see, each zone of the outerlands is ruled over by a strong monster. I am the thing that oversees all those monsters, so I practically rule the outerlands. However, I mostly stay within the core as I technically am supposed to manage it. Believe it or not Ignys, we have met before."

"We have met before?" asked Ignys in a confused tone.

"Yes, allow me to show you." said the creature.

Ignys saw the mana in the crystals visibly drain away and flow toward the creature.

Within seconds it shapeshifted into a feminine form Ignys had seen before.

"Wait... You were Adora?" asked Ignys.

"Indeed, I didn't speak a lot since speaking requires me to use mana, and I did not want you and your group to notice."

Ignys wasn't mad that the creature fooled him, but he was mad about something else.

"If you are the most powerful creature in the outerlands, why the fuck didn't you save me from that beast then!" yelled Ignys in anger.

"Allow me to explain, the creature you were facing was from an area known as the scarred desert, an area located pretty far into the outerlands. It was starved and therefore moved away from its area, moving closer to the first couple of sectors in the outerlands. If I would have attacked it I would need to use quite a substantial amount of mana, I would have needed to drain about half of the mana located in the canyon, leading to detrimental effects on the environment, possibly even the collapse of the sector."

Now that the creature had a human form, it looked at Ignys with a serious expression on its face.

"There is no way in hell that creature would require that much mana to be put down! I even injured it!" responded Ignys.

"The only reason why you were able to injure it is that the creature was starved, fatigued and it only used its instincts, even with the creature being so weakened it still killed you with ease."

After all the arguing, silence finally fell for a second.

"Honestly, what do I do now?" asked Ignys to the creature.

"I cannot revert your wish and it will take a while for the mana crystals here to recharge, so there really are only two options for you."

"And those options are?"

"Either you run the tavern here with me and keep me company, or you head into the outerlands and die."

Ignys sighed upon hearing his choices.

"Not a hard choice. Guess I will be staying here for a while after all." said Ignys.

"Great! That way there will be someone to keep me company here. Please, feel free to enter the tavern." said the creature.

Ignys obliged and opened the door before stepping inside.

The tavern on the inside looked very typical, but the mana was ridiculously dense inside.

Stepping into the tavern brought back a lot of memories for Ignys as he looked around.

"Hey, uh..."

At this point Ignys realized that he never even asked the creature what his name was.

"Ah, I never told you my name, apologies. You may refer to me as Aegion, I don't like being called a creature."

"Right, Aegion, how come the mana is so dense in here?" asked Ignys.

"You see, I built this tavern on short notice, so I mostly used resources that are located here in the core of the outerlands. For example, I used soul wood from the undead forest to construct most of the tavern, which is quite dense in mana."

"So what you are trying to say is that you only used top tier resources in order to build this tavern?" asked Ignys

"Yes, pretty much" responded Aegion.

Ignys looked around the tavern and noticed that what Aegion said was true, everything in the tavern was of top notch quality.

However, the walls were relatively barren and could use some decoration.

"So Aegion, what do we serve in this tavern?"

"For now, we have three things in stock. We have normal beer, wine, and whiskey." responded Aegion in his calm tone.

"Alright, mind if I pour a glass out of each one so I can test them for quality?"

Aegion chuckled.

"Sure, but I can assure you that quality is not a problem with the drinks we will provide."

Ignys walked behind the bar before searching around for a while before finding three glasses.

Upon observing the glasses, he noticed something weird.

"Wait... This isn't glass, this is crystal! Mana crystal at that!" said Ignys in shock.

Mana crystal glasses were usually only used in high-standard taverns where nobles would usually have a drink.

Ignys poured out a bit of beer in a glass before drinking it.

It tasted like average beer served in an ordinary tavern except that it was more refreshing, a wave of calm hit Ignys when he finished it.

Up next Ignys poured some wine into a glass before drinking it.

However, this time he noticed something.

The mana inside his mana circuits started sloshing around faster and faster. Ignys felt his mana circuits bend slightly.

"The hell is this wine, Aegion!" yelled Ignys out in a panic.

"Ah, that wine has been made from a mix of local berries, usually, monsters feast on the berries since they are quite dense in mana. The effects of the berries must've been carried over to the wine, if not amplified. Do not worry, your mana circuits are just expanding, which is a good thing."

After a while, the mana inside Ignys' body stopped sloshing around as he sat down and took a breath.

Up next was the whiskey, but Ignys really didn't feel comfortable with drinking it without any information.

"Hey Aegion, does this whiskey also have some effect?" asked Ignys.

"I assume so, I made the whiskey by fermenting multiple grains from the core together before using time magic to speed up the aging process. Most of the grains I used were known to mess with the magic circuits of the creatures which live in the outerlands so it probably has a similar effect to that of the wine, but stronger."