After his time with Chief Elder Baishen in the martial art pavilion, and even with the consumption of almost a fifth of a small spirit stone's Qi, Cao Yun could not train his body the next day. Hence, he decided to go back to the alchemy pavilion. Recently, he had finally achieved less than 5% toxins in a Pure Cold Blood Clotting Pill. In a batch of five pills, only one was sure to achieve such a state when he refined pills though. It still met the criteria to say that he had gotten an understanding of the toxins minimization from the Minor Principles of Silver.
As usual, Meng Jia was almost sleeping during the session, but Cao Yun had seen him awake. From the day of the competition, he had started to see his instructor in a new way. He really was a sleeping tiger, ready to bare his fangs if need be.
"Good, good. Now that you have achieved this grade, we can try to work on your 2-star Earth rank. To be awarded this grade, you have to be able to forge a Pure 2-star Earth pill. But we'll still work with a 1-star Earth pill. It's considered as one of the most difficult because the ingredients used in it all contain very potent toxins. These toxins will clash with the medicinal essence and they will damage them. On the other hand, if you're able to make such a pill at a Pure rank, you'll have no problem to increase your rank. That's why I first asked you to master toxins minimization.
The pill is called the Seven Frogs Winter pill. The main ingredients are seven poisons. They don't all come from frogs, but two of them, the most powerful, do. They come from the Golden Leaf Frog and the Winged Bull Frog. There's also the poison of an Eternal Crouching Toad. Despite being made from so many poisons, the pill is not a poison itself. On the contrary, this pill is used to soothe pain and relax muscles. Controlling the seven poisons and avoiding their toxins from ruining the pill is highly difficult.
The day your mastery reaches this level, you'll in fact almost be a 3-star Earth alchemist. I mean, you already have the bare qualifications to become a 2-star Earth alchemist. But there's no reason for you to advance too soon. As you're not using all your time on alchemy, I think you should focus on actually training your skills and not only work on trying to increase your rank."
In fact, Cao Yun didn't care about his rank. It was useful to increase it, especially just before the end of the month, to get higher into the alchemy ranking scroll. But apart from that, he did not want to make alchemy his profession, so the level did not mean much to him.
"I understand your words."
Cao Yun worked on this pill all morning long. It really was difficult. Thanks to his 'Shen Visualization', Cao Yun quickly got the hang of it. But, even though he did not fail a single refinement, the result was always lacking. The highest quality he got was 87% of the medicinal essence with 12% of the toxins.
But he understood why his instructor had chosen this pill. It really worked on his control of what was going on in the cauldron and of course on his perception of it. Thus, it trained his 'Shen Visualization' and by extension his Shen itself. Thanks to this, Cao Yun was getting closer and closer to achieve Perfection in the Shen character of 'Sealing the Seven Demons in the Nine Peaks'.
-
In the residence of the first-years, Ren Chao was training as well. His group training had just ended and he was trying an exercise of Cao Yun. By his side was the furnace he had received. With eyes closed, he was trying to feel the temperature of the flame. Over the furnace was a small copper bowl filled with an orange liquid. The goal of Ren Chao was to keep it just at the boiling point. The liquid had to produce bubbles without disturbing its calm surface.
The goal of Ren Chao was to control perfectly the temperature of the metal when heating it. At first, this training was terribly tough on the man. Until now, he had mainly trained his body, and switching his focus on his mind was torture at first. It wasn't painful, but terribly exhausting and frustrating. However, every time Ren Chao thought about quitting, he saw the image of Sun Liao who would mock him. Just this sight gave him enough fortitude to push through.
After a very intensive training, Ren Chao was getting very good results. He had chosen a variety of liquids with different boiling points. This allowed him to train his ability to maintain a given temperature for as long as he could, but also his ability to rapidly increase or decrease a flame to get to a precise temperature as fast as possible.
In order to increase his progress, he found out that Cao Yun was right. By closing his eyes and focusing all his senses on the flame, he was getting better results. At first, it was even harder, but he trusted his friend and again pushed through a disheartening phase. But now, he almost never trained with his eyes open.
As he was immersed in his training, someone knocked on his door. While he was about to yell for them to get lost, a sweet voice flooded the room. This feminine voice jolted him back to reality and he decided that he had trained enough.
After taking some time to fix his clothes, Ren Chao opened the door.
"Wang Mei, it's always a pleasure to see you. Come in, come in."
"Thank you. Don't mind if I do." She saw the furnace still red from the flame and quickly turned to Ren Chao. "Sorry. I disturbed your training. I can come back later."
"No! What are you saying?! It's always good to take a break. If you don't, you'll just get bad results." While he was speaking, Ren Chao closed the door and brought the young woman to his table. "I'm sorry, my servant is not here right now. I'll prepare some tea for you."
"It's really not necessary. I've come to talk about a serious matter with you."
The young man became a bit worried. Despite his lack of experience, he saw that something was troubling his lady. "Mei, I also had something to talk to you about." Immediately, he looked through his clothes and took out a wooden box. "I bought this pill from my friend. This is for you." Handing over the Low-Level Qi Gathering Pill, Ren Chao kept on talking. He didn't want her to reject his gift, so he talked a bit too much. "Chen Guo already gave me one, so you shouldn't be worried about taking it from me. Also, it wasn't that expensive so don't feel bad about me."
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Given the amount of points the Coiling Silk was making, Wang Mei could easily buy such a pill in the Wubei Merit Market now that Cao Yun was dealing with the Dragon's Fire Faction. The Coiling Silk Faction was the smallest faction apart from the Heavenly Swallow Faction, but it was the second richest. Despite that, there was something more about getting a gift from this man. This pill was rare but not priceless. However, when Ren Chao gave it to her, it seemed more valuable.
"Thank you, I'll gladly accept your gift." What Ren Chao did not know was that many suitors had already bought her hundreds of gifts. Until now, she had never accepted a single one of them.
"What I have to talk about is very important. I will be direct. The Coiling Silk Faction rules say that all its members must stay chaste as long as they're a member."
Wang Mei had imagined many ways to break the news to her 'friend' and finally decided to be as direct and frank as he was. However, she was terrified by his reaction. In her mind, many possibilities were fighting each other and she wondered if he would simply end the relationship they had. Contrary to all her expectations, Ren Chao was simply quiet, unable to understand what was her point.
"Well, that's... huh... Why are you telling me?"
"Because...! Wouldn't you want us to...?"
Suddenly, Ren Chao realized what she was hinting at, and became crimson red. "Sure, I'd ... I mean, who wouldn't? But do you think I'm such a beast that I can't wait 4 or 5 years. Blacksmiths can work decades on a weapon to make it perfect. Do you think I would be so impatient?! Wait! Were you afraid that I wouldn't be seeing you anymore because of this?!" Ren Chao got closer to Wang Mei. "You should know better. I love being around you and talking with you. Even if there was no chance that we would ever... consume it, I would still want to meet with you."
"Thank you, that's very reassuring, Chao. And I too love being in your presence."
As a very sweet atmosphere invaded the place, the two lovers kept on talking of many subjects, including their own training.
Finally, Wang Mei remembered another mission she had. "I also have a message from our faction leader, Lu Meihan. She's very insistent on meeting with your friend Chen Guo. She has some problems which I can't talk about, but the help of an alchemist such as him could be very useful. She hopes that he can meet her in secrecy. I know our Coiling Silk Faction is victim of many slanders, but Faction Leader Lu is a great woman. I do not want you to try and convince your friend for me, please just relay the message from Lu Meihan to him."
"Of course. I already told him to go to the Coiling Silk Faction residence himself in order to see that these rumors were baseless. I cannot speak for my friend but I'll relay the message, trust me."
-
When Cao Yun got back from his training, he found Huang Cixi preparing the dinner. On the table she had left a letter. Since he got in the Wubei Sect, Cao Yun had sent letters to Feng Yingyue. But as the sect was pretty far from the Golden Flowery Fragrance Institute, even by using very fast birds or flyings demonic beasts, it was long to send and receive mail. The woman had finally answered him. She thanked him a lot for the new character of 'Sealing the Seven Demons in the Nine Peaks' telling him that she had mastered Yi the Earth Intent.
In the letter, she also spoke a bit about her alchemy and her progress. Apparently, in a matter of weeks, she had officially become a 5-star Earth alchemist. As the institute was closer to Yinmen City than the sect was, she had already been enrolled for at least one more month. Grand Master Hua Fenfei had also accepted her as a direct disciple and she was working on her cultivation. With the help of pills and various alchemical means, she could increase her cultivation fairly quickly to get to the Mortal Warrior realm before the Alchemy Conference in 5 years.
In the kitchen, Huang Cixi was very pensive. She had been the one to send the letters and she knew who was receiving them. This evening, the young alchemist from Yinmen City got back into her thoughts. As Huang Cixi was living with Cao Yun, she was slowly getting used to this life and even forgot about the reason of her presence here.
Everything had started because her first brother wanted to get rid of this woman. She was innocent in this, but nevertheless, she was the element who caused everything. If Feng Yingyue had never existed, her brother Huang Lixin would still be alive.
Huang Cixi put her mind in order and got back to work. She was more and more confused. She didn't know who to hate in this matter. Her first brother had given the order, her father had approved, her second brother had tried to kill an innocent woman. And yet the real culprit to hate would be Cao Yun who only saved her?
As much as she tried to be rational, she still hated Cao Yun. But she realized he wasn't a bad man at all, quite the opposite.
While Cao Yun was reading the letter, someone knocked on his door. Usually Huang Cixi would be the one to answer but she was lost in her own mind. Hearing the knocking continue, Cao Yun looked at the servant and got worried when he saw her. Apparently, something was weighing on her mind. Thus, he decided to get the door himself.
"Brother Chen!" Ren Chao was back and despite the late hour, spoke as loudly as ever.
"Sorry to disturb you so late. I hope I'm not interrupting your training."
"No, Brother Ren. I was about to dine, join me."
As Ren Chao entered the room, Huang Cixi came back to reality. She quickly apologized and set up the table.
During the dinner, Ren Chao thanked his friend profusely and relayed the invitation from Lu Meihan. This invitation got Cao Yun thinking. He knew very little about the Coiling Silk Faction and he thought it best to discuss this invitation with Zhi Yin so as no not cause trouble for his faction this time. Ren Chao really seemed trusting but Cao Yun decided to be careful.
-
In the Coiling Silk Faction, Lu Meihan was sitting on her bed. Her servant had helped her and then left. In front of her was a man in a black and purple uniform, adorned with an emblem showing two fangs biting in a red flower. They were alone in this dim-lit room.
"Are you sure that this Chen Guo can help me practice your art?"
"Miss Lu, I'm not 100% sure. But this art must be performed either with the right physique or someone of great potential. This boy is not as strong as others but his potential is incredible. And you probably couldn't handle someone stronger right now anyway."
Indeed, Lu Meihan was very weak after her backlash and couldn't even sit straight alone.
"And this technique will remove all traces of the backlash?"
"Absolutely everything, yes. It should even allow you to break through to Mortal Warrior. I'd love to practice it myself, but only a woman can."
In the faction leader's eyes, there was still a lot of mistrust. "Why do you want to help me?"
"As I said, I'm just curious to see this technique brought to life. It's been discovered in ancient ruins and even though its effects are known, I've never seen it. I'm just very interested in the results."
From the small table before her, Lu Meihan picked up a scroll. It depicted various positions to perform between a man and a woman.
"'Reversing two Universes Dance'. Indeed, this dual cultivation method seems absolutely fantastical. But..." The woman was deep in thought. She really was hesitant about such a matter until she looked back at her arms already shaking just by picking up and holding the scroll. "I'll inform you of my success."
"Great, Miss Lu. I sincerely wish you to have a full recovery and I'll wait for your good news."