The old woman heard Cedric ask for Dragon Liver and tried to stop him out of kindness.
"You really want to buy Dragon Liver, child? It's terribly expensive. Even potion-makers don't use something like this so early on. What would a beginner like you do with it?"
She broke off and looked him over. "Wait. What are you planning to do with the Dragon Liver?"
Cedric gave her a charming smile and leaned toward the counter. "Taste it, of course. See if I can cook it."
He tapped the glass jar. "By the way, what's the liquid the liver's soaking in? It isn't poisonous, is it?"
The old woman waved a hand. "Of course not. It's pure water with a Preservation Charm on it. It's used for brewing and diluting potions. Completely harmless. You could drink it straight and be fine."
She paused, still frowning. "But you really mean to eat it?"
Cedric looked perfectly serious. "Ma'am, someone has to find new uses for good ingredients. We can't keep doing things the same old way."
The old woman thought its value lay in a potion-maker's hands, not in a frying pan.
But saying that would sound rude, so she kept it to herself.
"All right. If you insist on buying it, I won't try to talk you out of it."
With no other choice, she set a jar of Dragon Liver in front of him.
Cedric picked it up, and his ability to analyze ingredients sprang into action.
[Dragon Liver] Category: Ingredient Source: Hungarian Horntail Hunting level: 70 Special abilities: Long-Range Dragon Breath A, Magic Resistance B (cannot be activated by this ingredient), Physical Resistance A (cannot be activated by this ingredient) Traits: Mellow and moist, premium ingredient, magic resistance, Magic Surge Note: Each serving must contain more than 15% of the whole ingredient to yield enhancement points and special abilities. This jar contains only 8%.
As the information flashed into his mind, Cedric's heart gave a violent thump.
A hunting level of seventy, three powerful abilities, and two traits tied to magic. This was the real deal.
Unfortunately, one jar wasn't enough for a full dish. He'd planned to eat a few bites and get the abilities first, but that plan was shot.
If there wasn't enough for a dish, he'd have to buy more.
"Ma'am, sorry for the trouble, but could I have another jar?"
A note of frustration crept into Cedric's voice.
The old woman tried again. "One jar isn't enough for you to experiment with? Child, these aren't cheap."
He knew they weren't cheap. But until he got what he wanted onto his plate, he wouldn't be satisfied.
"One more jar."
Cedric repeated himself through gritted teeth.
Paying for it made his chest ache. With the money he had on him, he couldn't even afford a whole dragon's liver.
Cedric lifted the new jar and scanned it. He was already about to leave when the panel stopped him in his tracks.
"Could I swap this for another jar?"
His expression was caught somewhere between laughter and despair.
The old woman was puzzled. "You can, but what's wrong with this one?"
"Nothing's wrong with it. It just didn't come from the same dragon as the first jar."
Cedric set the jar down.
The one the old woman had fetched came from an Antipodean Opaleye. It had nothing to do with a Hungarian Horntail, and putting the two together wouldn't count as one serving of the ingredient.
The Hungarian Horntail's Long-Range Dragon Breath became High-Temperature Dragon Breath in the Antipodean Opaleye, and their traits differed too.
If Cedric forced the two into one dish, he'd get next to nothing out of it.
"You can tell?"
The old woman took both jars from him and turned them over and over, disbelief written across her face.
If Cedric could distinguish two pieces of Dragon Hide, she wouldn't have been surprised. She'd just think he'd studied hard.
But this was Dragon Liver...
It was like identifying someone's ancestry from their teeth. Not impossible, perhaps, but how much expertise would it take to tell at a glance?
Cedric didn't want to explain himself. Mostly, he couldn't be bothered to invent an excuse, so he asked directly, "Ma'am, could you take out all the Dragon Liver from this shipment and let me look through it?"
After another round of pleading and putting on his most obedient face, he finally won her over.
"All right, all right. Take your time choosing."
She smiled kindly and flicked her wand. Every jar of Dragon Liver on the shelf floated up and lined itself neatly before him.
"But I should warn you," the old woman added. "Even jars from the same shipment aren't guaranteed to come from the same dragon."
Cedric didn't believe that. From what he'd seen of the wizards' sloppy methods, the odds were high that parts from the same dragon had been stacked together—unless someone had beaten him to it and bought the lot.
His luck wasn't that bad. It didn't take long to find what he wanted, and he sorted the other jars by dragon while he was at it.
"Ma'am, I'll take these three."
Cedric gathered three jars of Hungarian Horntail Dragon Liver together. After thinking for a couple of seconds, he decided to buy them all.
Three jars came to nine Galleons. It didn't sound like much, but it was already one-twentieth of his living expenses for the year.
At this rate, the money he had wouldn't last.
Cedric picked up the jars and glanced at the extra third one. A sly merchant's grin spread across his face.
It looked like he'd have to sell some dishes to recoup his losses.
He eyed the jar of Dragon Liver still in his hands, and a thought popped into his head: You foolish wizards competing with a chef for ingredients—just wait until your wallets start howling.