"Hold on, I wanna be able to focus clearer if I’ll be learning a new arrayment."

  He swallowed the teal pellet and then sat down to meditate. A couple hours later, the storm of energy within his body was soundly under his control. Once he'd assimilated it with the filtered energy within his body, he opened his eyes and looked over at Uncle Grey, who had returned to the branch upon which he'd initially been lazing.

  "Okay," he called up. "I'm good to go."

  "So, you want to learn the pill recipe first, then?"

  He nodded.

  "Okay, then take out your pill cauldron and listen carefully."

  Contrary to what his teacher had originally said, Nolan lacked the exact ingredients necessary to prepare the proper pellet, but he had more than enough substances that could function as less potent substitutes. Once he had taken out the necessary items, he portioned them according to his teacher's advice and then placed a small amount into the cauldron, enough to create three pellets. These, unfortunately, were destroyed before they could be completed, since the circulation routes of inner essence and spiritual energy that the process called for was much trickier than those of the recipes that he had previously learned. Unlike with his inner essence channels, the cauldron had no system of circulation in place, so it was an entirely different beast when it came to manipulating energies within it.

  Alright, he sighed, blocking out any frustrations with sage-like efficiency, let’s try that again.

  The cauldron was an essence fusion object that functioned by relying on the user's energies to refine different types of medicines. Even though his was of extremely high quality and made the entire process significantly more manageable, he still burned through enough supplies to make seven batches of pellets before he was even able to move on to the second stage of pill refinement.

  "Another failure?" he sighed, though he wasn't discouraged in the least. If he had learned anything since the Interspatial Migration, it was that patience was a virtue. "Man, this is way harder than any of the other recipes you've taught me. That means that there're levels to these recipes, just like with cultivation and arrayments and all that. Don’t you think it’s about time you filled me in?"

  "Why does that matter?" said his teacher, who floated around him like an object in orbit. "Who cares about all those classifications? All that matters is that you know how to make them."

  "I wanna be able to measure my growth. Come on, man, you should have taught me that to begin with."

  "Fine, fine…" Uncle Grey let out a soundless sigh and then lowered himself to stand in front of Nolan with a mentor's smile. He might put up a fight when it came to explaining some things, but there was no doubt that he enjoyed it. "It's actually pretty simple. You already know that pellets are either classified as low, medium, or high quality, which can be distinguished by the presence of a single mark of discoloration, two marks, or three, respectively.

  "When it comes to medicinal recipes, they're classified based upon difficulty, and in the exact same way that arrayments are. So, if there're only a couple of lines to the recipe then it's a novice recipe, which is akin to a basic arrayment. If there’re three or four lines, it's an intermediate—same as the next arrayment classification. Anything between five and eight is advanced, again the same. Eight to twelve is complex, thirteen to nineteen is grand, and anything beyond that is at the level of master."

  "So this one's an intermediate recipe?"

  "Yes, one of the more difficult ones."

  "So I'm basically a pushover, huh."

  "As long as you understand—ahem, I mean, I told you that there was no worth in knowing the classifications." He floated back up into his trademark reclined position. "Now, you'd best get back to work. I still have to teach you how to create a basic meditation circle arrayment after you make a few batches of essence reining pellets."

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  "Alright," he sighed. "Let's try that again."

  He portioned off enough medicinal ingredients to make another batch of pellets, and then gently placed them inside of the cauldron. Then, he activated its essence fusion effects and began the careful process of breaking down its contents and dividing the powdered version of each ingredient by relying on his spiritual sense. Next, he attempted to blanket the powders in energy and mix them together in a seamless manner, though he wasn't able to keep the different circulations of energy from disrupting one another. With a violent discharge, a small, contained explosion threw his cauldron three metres into the air. He caught it with a small amount of spiritual energy and then summoned it into his hands, giving it a quick inspection to make sure that there was no damage before expelling any remnant energies from within it and then starting the process over from scratch.

  For somebody that had lived and breathed chemistry back in his high school days, refining medicinal pellets via this world's version of alchemy was a very satisfying and enjoyable experience.

  Five days later, Nolan finally succeeded in making his first batch of pellets, all of them of low quality. He had only left his training spot here and there to relieve himself, to take quick naps, or to scarf down an occasional snack. Uncle Grey, on the other hand, had gone off to tutor Alicia and Aine in the Profound Soul-Splitting Technique, which they had learned from Nyla in the days since their arrival.

  After checking up on everybody with his spiritual sense, Nolan decided to continue refining medicines for another week, although with some reluctance. Unfortunately, Uncle Grey's earlier words had unsuspectingly stuck with him, about how sect masters needed to know certain things. This had made him realize that, if he was serious about creating a place on Venara where those from Earth could live in peace while also learning to defend themselves, then he had to take his role as sect master seriously. That meant that he had to provide them with the same sorts of resources that were customarily enjoyed by the members of other sects, such as cultivation methods, martial skills, medicinal pellets, talismans, weapons and armour, among other things. Thankfully Uncle Grey filled in most of these spaces, but Nolan felt that he had to step up his efforts to properly fill out the shoes that he'd decided to step into.

  A week later, or twenty-seven days since they arrived at the glade, Nolan had everyone gather in the Divine Spirit Fountain so that they could discuss the future of the Earth Sect.

  "Is that really a priority right now?" said Sean, having broken the silence that followed Nolan's explanation as to why he'd gathered everyone together. "We should worry about what'll happen once we get back to that tower."

  "I agree with Sean," said Ian, who spoke without directing his gaze away from the featureless sky above, head resting against the stone ledge of the fountain. "Back when we left Ridgerock, that Keplin guy almost killed us, and he was only at the peak of Integration. Even if we ignore the fact that the Falling Rain Sect has however many members at the Genesis stage, they should still have hundreds of disciples and elders around the same strength as Keplin."

  "He's right,” said Lyra. “If we're going to talk about anything, we should be coming up with a plan for when we get back to Venara. I mean, if this really is another world.”

  Nyla rolled her eyes. "There's no daytime, no nighttime, no sky, and that mysterious repelling force in all of the colourless places. What more do you need?"

  "I'm just saying, this could be an independent space, like those cultivators of legends were able to make. Or we could be somewhere else on Venara, or in some expert's spiritual space. Moving worlds is just…"

  "We're from a different world," said Esteban. "If everyone from Earth could be sent to Venara, then what's nine people to some other place?"

  "Regardless, my brother's right. Why don't we try to come up with a plan for once we get back to the tower?"

  "I already thought of a plan," said Nolan. "Nyla uses her painting, we appear back at Elmer, steal a boat and then haul ass.”

  “I hate how much that makes sense,” said Sean, shaking his head with a slight grin.

  “Of course it makes sense. Anyway, if there're no boats, we can just have May fly us across the lake."

  "So she's coming, then?"

  Nolan gave Lyra a helpless look. "You don't need to be so critical, you know. She's already risked her life to save us, and it's not like we have a ton of options here. No matter what, we can't throw away our strongest asset."

  "You can call it whatever you want, but I've only lived this long by being critical. For years it was just me, with only my own judgement to rely on. And let me tell you, I've seen plenty of people die early because they didn't ask questions. Because they weren't critical."

  Ian clapped her on the back after a glint of guilt flashed through his golden eyes. "Well said. Truly worthy of being my sister!"