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On Sunday morning, Peter was brushing his teeth when someone knocked on the door. In front of the room was the Alchemy teacher, frowning at him.
"It was convened that I'll walk the dog today," she said in a deadpan voice. "I expected you'd bring the pup to me."
"Sorry, teacher… give me a moment." Peter rushed to grab Shredder, who was sleeping. The pup yelped, protesting while the man quickly put the leash on him.
That's how cultivators are… lazy and bossy.
"You have been exercising," the woman said pensively, sweeping her eyes over Peter's body. There was a sudden change in her aura… a sultry vibe.
Peter swallowed a lump, realizing he was wearing only his boxers. "A b-bit."
"I'll keep the dog for the day," she said, snatching the leash from Peter's hand. "Come to get it at nine." Her index's long and sharp red nail rested for a second on Peter's pectoral. Retracting her hand after a short descending motion that sent a shiver up his spine, she left.
"Fuuuuck," Peter whined, resting his forehead on the door, eyes closed, banging the wood with his fist.
"Absolutely!”
“You bet… She is known for doing, err… private tantric yoga lessons with some students… if you get my point. ”
“Yeah. But hitting on a normie? That’s unusual.”
“I guess she isn’t the average cultivator,” Peter sneered.
"Just basic instinct. She’s hot… for her age… whatever that is. What should I do?”
“Maybe? The thing is, cultivators are not used to taking no for an answer… And…” Peter looked around. His studio was not big, but it was way above what he had at his last college. “The cultivators canceled all my student loans when I enlisted to Dartmouth, and nothing here costs anything… it would be really nice if not for the bullies. If I’m expelled for bad behavior, I’ll have to pay all my loans again…”
“The headmistress makes the rules, so yeah…"
"Ew!" Peter grimaced. “You’re not helping at all!”
When he went to the bathroom to shower, Peter couldn't stop looking in the mirror at his new muscles; they were not huge but more defined. His shoulders were broader, and his gray eyes had specks of gold. There was a new coldness there; he had to take a life to survive, and the mirrors of the soul showed it. He felt his pulse accelerating in anger; the world had gone to shit, and monsters in human skin like that assassin were allowed to roam free and kill at will.
That was funny, Peter conceded. You sounded more… err… human… Sorry, that might have been disrespectful. It’s OK to be an AI.
Due to your recent performances, Impulse and Influence have advanced from the Novice to the Apprentice tier. Impulse and all the skills it activates will have a 10% cost reduction. Influence will have a +10% chance of success.
Peter scratched his chin. "Costs, like in Mana, right? Do I have a Mana Pool or something?”
"Why?"
"Tell me something, System… If you take over, will the world be a better place?"
"I guess it’s better than any politician," Peter twisted his face in a grimace. “Let’s move.”
The rest of the morning passed fast, busy with training chores and relaxation because there was no such thing as too much of it, according to the System. It also helped Peter stop thinking about Regina or the mobsters. Ironically, he was more afraid of dating the first than fighting the latter. Falling in love was something he had promised to postpone until his heart would fully heal from a certain former love of his life, currently nicknamed the bitch.
“What do you mean?”
"I won't do such a thing," Peter said decisively. “It would be cannibalism.”
“All of it? Not even a molecule?” Peter asked to ensure he or those he’d give the pills to would not eat human cells of any sort. Because it was Ew, with majuscule. Or Gross, with a capital in front.
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“So something from the core goes into the pills after all!” Peter accused.
There was no way to check if the System told the truth, and in the end, Peter reluctantly agreed to proceed. The Alchemy lab was free, and after an hour of hard labor using a hammer and various files, all that remained from the core was a fine powder. The recipes were much like the simple rejuvenation or energization pills Peter already knew to do.
Peter added flavors and colors to distinguish the variants at the System's suggestion. The Blueberry pills were supposed to restore Mana, while the Chocolate and Mint were about health. The final result was three hundred small pills, cooked slowly in the lab's oven at low heat, and he got a notification about it:
You have crafted a large batch of Health and Mana rare-tier pills. Warning: The recommended dosage is not more than a pill of each kind every half-an-hour
When the pills were ready and cooled, Peter packed them into two recipients, one colored blue and the other red, to better distinguish them, and went to the cafeteria to eat a late lunch. He had skipped breakfast and was a bit hungry. Afterward, he went home to pick a blanket and set himself for a siesta on Dartmouth Green under a majestic oak. All was peaceful, and Peter dozed off until a weird feeling put him on alert, and he opened his eyes.
There was a clap of thunder, loud enough that all windows around trembled, followed by blinding lightning. The air was still crackling with electricity when a man appeared in the middle of the lawn. He looked in his early thirties, with long white hair and an elegant Cultivator-style tailcoat. Electricity sparks ran over his skin.
“Qi Message: Grand Master Li has arrived," a voice spoke, almost as loud as thunder before.
"Intruder!" a voice screamed. "Hands up!"
In an amazing stupidity display, the campus guard, Kostel, ran toward the Cultivator, fumbling to unholster his gun. The long-haired man raised an eyebrow, and a wave of qi pressure erupted toward the guard, making ripples in the air. Peter felt his stomach churning even sixty feet away from the brunt of the attack.
Nevertheless, Kostel persisted. He vomited and fell on his belly, eyes rolling empty, but he managed to press the trigger thrice. Click, click, click, the revolver said before the guard collapsed unconscious. The weapon was still empty.
What an idiot!
Floating down in a gentle glide, the Alchemy teacher landed and knelt before the cultivator. "Grand Master Li."
"No need for etiquette, Melinda, my child. Raise," the man said.
“What brings you here, Grand Master?” Melinda continued.
"You asked for my help. I sent you one of my best bloodhounds. He never returned to the base. Tell me what happened. From the beginning.”
“Of course, Grandmaster,” Alchemy bowed. “A scuffle occurred at my experimental club between a boy who recently advanced to the second stage and my manager. Someone profited from the diversion to steal a handful of pills.”
What the heck? This is about the club? Melinda’s the owner?
“I understand,” the cultivator nodded. “It’s a valuable invention; we don’t want the secret revealed. And you sent my bloodhound to chase the culprit.”
“Indeed, Grandmaster. He was meeting the local Resistance cell when we had the last communication. I thought he had disposed of them and moved on.”
“If he didn’t report back, it means he was killed. Do you know where he met the Resistance?”
“I don’t, I’m sorry. Couldn’t your bloodhound have been delayed for some reason?” Melinda asked in a shaky voice.
“He lived for his job. Delay was not his middle name.”
Goodness, what an awful pun!
“You think the resistance got him, Grand Master?”
"No, my child," the man said, patting her head like she was a pet. "Human weapons are useless against my finest. There’s only one possible answer,” Li said, grabbing his chin and walking back and forth. “The manager did it. He stole the pills under the pretense of the fight. After finding out the Resistance was not guilty, my man went to confront him and got ambushed. As it is said: Once you’ve tossed out all the wacky stuff, whatever’s left—no matter how nutty it seems—has to be the real deal.”
“Sherlock Holmes?” Melinda asked.
“Scooby Doo. I take comfort in watching silly shows during my meditation hours.”
Awful! Is there nothing sacred left for cartoons? Sherlock doesn’t deserve to—
“And I’ll prove my theory this instant. As you know, I’m a living truth detector.” With a brief flash, the cultivator disappeared, returning a second later, holding the club manager by the head, suspended in the air, and flailing his members, trying to escape. “Confess! I know you are guilty!” Li thundered.
“I am sorry!” the manager screamed. “It was a mistake. I thought sh—”
The manager’s body transformed into ashes. A buzzing sound akin to the one of the electric insect killer echoed for a moment. A sickening burnt grease smell lingered on.
I bet he did…
Meanwhile, the cultivator had spoken on. “Some of your ideas have merit, Melinda. Breaking qi-advancement pills in homeopathic doses fastens cultivation. But why make your students jump up all night? Is this… dance,” Li wrinkled his nose, “good for anything?”
"They're doing double the physical training without even realizing it!” Melinda said.
“Yes, but it also creates the premises for unethical intercourse.”
Unethical what?
“I know you believe in this… sexual liberation idea,” the cultivator shivered with an expression of disgust, “but it can’t work, Melinda. It will ruin the foundations of our society.”
Add patriarchal before society, and you’ll be right, Peter frowned. What an asshole! He wasn’t what people called woke, but he was not going to stop calling bullshit when he saw it.
“You’re closing that club, starting immediately,” Li said. “From the first Wednesday of next month, your proteges will start to train for real on floor three. Like everyone else.”
"But—"
"I'm not asking," the man's voice became harsher. "It's an order. Get it done. I'm discombobulated by how far behind your little project is… and how you surround yourself with the corrupt and the dumb." The man turned his eyes toward Kostel, now on all fours but struggling to get his Taser out, never mind that the Cultivator had arrived on a roll of thunder.
A reversed lightning shot out toward the sky, traveling through the faraway clouds, and the visitor was gone. The booming noise came later and distant.
So… The club was a scheme to advance the training… Wow…
At least we’re safe…
Meanwhile, the Alchemy teacher had walked to Kostel, pulled him to his feet, and slapped the man abundantly until he woke up.
"Mini-master Melinda, are you all right?" Kostel mumbled.
"It's Journeyman Master Melinda, you moron, and the one you tried to shoot was my boss. You're incredibly lucky to be alive."
"Sorry," Kostel lowered his eyes.
"Look at me!" she yelled, pulling the guard closer by the lapel. "I know you're Resistance."
"Advanced Master Melinda, I swear I'm n—"
"Journeyman! Do you think I didn't notice the manuals stolen from my library? Every time you came pretending to dust the books, only to stare at my boobs, like the idiotic monkey you are?"
"I'm sorry…" the man whispered. "I can't help it, you're too beau—"
Goodness, he's suicidal!
"I don't care. What I care about is who took out a stage six Body Cultivator. Because my employees would never be able to do that. Where were you two nights ago?"
"I was in the Campus, Journeyman Melinda… And we didn’t know he was a cultivator."
What did you expect?
The Alchemy teacher stared at the guard like she was trying to strangle him with her eyes. The man's will collapsed. "I'm sorry, Your Highness, I didn't mean to do wrong," Kostel fidgeted. "We have a society… of people who fight for better conditions. Me, Garcia, the pizza restaurant owner, the one who organizes protests, and a masked girl who saves monster cubs. I don't know her real name."
"Which of them killed the assassin?"
"Neither. We met at Garcia’s, like usual. There were two guests: a policeman and a biker. He had his helmet on, and I didn't see his face. Very tall, broad-shouldered, tattoos everywhere."
"Cartel tattoos?" Melinda asked.
"I think so… Words in Spanish, for sure. Muerte, suerte… And BAM!" Kostel clapped his hands. "The cartel guy shoots the policeman in the head. I restrain him and—"
"Don't even bother," the teacher interjected.
"The biker told us the officer was an assassin and that he was a bounty hunter hired to kill him. I saw the dead guy’s phone... photos with his victims… kids, elderly, horrible stuff… The biker took the body and went away, and I ran back here. Miss… please… will Garcia be in trouble because of me?" Kostel tried to make puppy eyes, only succeeding to look constipated.
"This stays between us. Tell Garcia to keep his nose clean from now on," Melinda said, letting the man free. "You'll let me know if you ever see the biker again, or you're fired."
She walked away, shaking her head. "A gun against a Body six?" Peter heard her say.
Thank goodness… It looks like this is over. What was that about the third floor?
Then we better hunt some monsters and level up…