By Drinking a Potion Herself!

Later that night as the sun fell, Anna caught Aldric trying to fall asleep on her, with the others growing tired too. She had been thinking about it for a while, and to prove to the group she was a capable leader, she wanted to take the first leap and show them firsthand how wrong they are about the potions.

Clearing her throat, she drew everyone's attention to her, before standing up. "So I know things haven't really gone our way since the ghost town... But I promise better days are coming. I think the potions from that vendor will be that little boost to help us make it back to civilization, but I know you all don't trust them."

Aldric scoffed and smiled, before wincing, his ribs hurting from the jerky movement. "Like I said, I'm not-"

"You don't have to, at least not yet... Look, I'm gonna drink one and show you they're totally fine. Worst case scenario, they're not the best quality and they don't heal much. That's why I got a ton of them for us." Anna reached down and grabbed the glass bottle. The contents inside were the usual bright red they were all used to from healing potions, but just on the edge of the liquid, it almost looked like it faded into a similar shade of pink. The rogue girl popped the stopper off the top, and brought it to her lips. "Watch..." She said, before finally tilting her head back and downing the contents.

Sitting up a bit more, Aldric scowled. "Are you serious?" He'd been traveling with Anna for years now, and even still nothing he's tried to teach her has stuck. She's still that same stubborn girl...

Finally finishing the liquid, Anna through the small bottle away, hearing the glass shatter in the grass a distance away. Everyone watched to see if anything would happen, but they were just met with the usual. Red sparks appeared around Anna's feet, before swirling up and around her body, eventually reaching above her head. Sparkles trailed around the source of energy as it moved up, illuminating the area. Once above her, it was topped off with a brief pop, crackling like a firework in the shape of a heart. It was the basic sign of a well made healing potion, regulated to have that effect by the long-standing governments of the area.

The little display took a second to sink in, and Anna held her arms out, waiting for an answer from her comrades. "Well? Look that cut on my arm is even healed!" She rolls up her sleeve, showing her smooth freckled forearm.

There's another moment of silence before Nyra spoke up. "...it did seem alright..." She glanced over to Aldric, waiting to see his response.

"Hm..." A low grunt was all they could get out of him before he rolled back over to sleep.

Anna groaned. "Really? That's it? Rowan back us up here." Nyra shook her head silently, trying to get out of being lumped into the trusting group. But Anna dragged her in anyway.

Rowan grabbed a bottle from his bag, inspecting it again as he set his lute down. "Well, as far as I can tell..."

Anna smiled and took another step towards Aldric, staring down at him. "See? We could get going by tomorrow if we wanted." She had a wide smile on her face, one that slowly grew bigger as she got more support.

Aldric just grunted, never turning back to face her. "We'll see tomorrow..."