My three band members all stood next to each other with their arms crossed. None of them were backing down as they argued.

I sighed. This was why group creative projects were the bane of every good student’s existence. Well, this and group members bailing at the last minute…

Shit. Bands often broke up because of these kinds of arguments. My precious band members better not drop out. If any of them did, I’d figuratively murder them.

Goddamn it. This was happening because I just had to raise that formation flag about artistic differences, right? Fuck.

And why did I think creating a song from virtual scratch was a good idea again?

Right, Ghosty needed something that fit his situation in order to heal. And it was best — and faster — to create a specific one for his situation than to teach these guys all the healing songs I knew since I did not have years to test every one.

So far, we had spent three days developing our new song. With practically no break.

Little Spring had visited to make sure I’d eaten... which I hadn’t. And he may have accused me of being hangry.

Fuckin’ brat. He made me regret teaching him that word!

I’d been through grain liberation, damn it!

Aside from that kid, we also had other visitors. Mostly, Dread Lotus’s family who looked out for her like she was still that delicate flower.

The worst one was Noxious Fangstrike. He kept popping over, using me as an excuse when he really wanted to check on his niece. As if my brain wasn’t almost fully occupied in scoring a badass healing rock song that could practically bring a Nascent Soul back to life from the brink of death.

Wait! Could some parts of this song be improved with some inspiration from ‘Bring Me to Life’ by Evanescence?

I’d have to consider that later because it sounded like the argument was finally getting to the main issue.

Gold String scowled at Dread Lotus. “Your drumming is too extreme during the outro.”

She crossed her arms and glared. “I think it’s fine. It’s your bass playing that’s too complicated for something that should express the feeling of being healed.”

Azure Melodic River hesitated, then stepped forward. “As much as I want to agree with Dread Lotus, emphasizing my keyboard would be a better fit here to show the softness of this part of the song.”

Gold String gestured to the keyboardist with both hands. “See.”

The blue-haired girl winced and looked at Dread Lotus like she was desperate for her to understand her position.

The look she sent Azure had the keyboardist looking pained, but then her face firmed, showing that she wasn’t backing down.

Of course, Noxious Fangstrike, who had entered our practice grounds with the worst possible timing, said, “I think my niece is right.”

I glared at him. “You don’t even know what we’re talking about... Senior.”

“Stay out of this, Uncle. We need to figure it out ourselves.”

He shrugged. “I’m merely being supportive.”

I crossed my arms. “Do you want to hear ‘The Song that Never Ends,’ again?”

He gave us a disgusted look. “No. If I never hear that… sound again, I’ll be satisfied.”

During his last visit, we had chased him out by singing it to him. It brought me joy just remembering it. Plus, knowing that it was deviously cursed and that he was bound to have it suddenly pop into his head when he least expected it? Muahahaha! Perfection!

“I think,” I looked around at everyone to emphasize that I was serious, “we should confirm our lyrics here before we finalize this portion. They’ll tell us if we need it to be softer or more intense.” Then I turned to Noxious. “Now, do you have a reason you’re here or are you just...” being an ass, “wanting an update?”

::I promised I’d get you when the peppers arrived,:: he sent through a telepathic technique.

Which meant that it was time to work on the cure.

Damn. We were so close to resolving this shit and finishing our song, too.

“Everyone, let’s take a break. Once you come back with rested minds, you might perceive things in a different way.”

They nodded.

“And don’t let a possible slap to your face get in the way of composing a rock song so incredible that it can heal even a comatose Nascent Soul.”

I stared at all three of them, so they understood my meaning.

“Yes, band leader!”

Gold String, who had the most at stake here, appeared chastised and immediately left the area.

Dread Lotus stayed behind while Azure hovered nearby like she desperately wanted to say something. Considering how she constantly took Dread Lotus’ side, she almost made me think bringing her in was a mistake. Fortunately, she’d shown promise today that reminded me of when I first met her.

Seeing her speak up for herself and her artistic choices gave me hope that her fangirling might die down and turn into genuine friendship. I really hoped they could get along. If she kept bending blindly to Dread Lotus’s opinion, she would never go further down her Dao of Rock.

“Uncle, remember to be good to Sister Linlin.”

He held up both his hands in exasperation. “Of course, I will.”

“And don’t yell at her like she’s one of your disciples.”

Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.

“I think she is more likely to yell at me.”

They both looked at me, horrified. “What are you talking about? I am always respectful to my seniors.” I wouldn’t have survived as long as I had otherwise.

::Do you even consider me your senior?::

::Of course! When it comes to poisons.::

“Let’s go, junior Linlin.” He flicked his sleeve and flew off.

***

The first thing I did when I walked into Noxious Fangstrike’s alchemy room was make my way to the worktable to look over the ‘old’ peppers using my divine sense. They looked very similar to the new ones, except that their color wasn’t as vibrant and they didn’t have a potent scent. Once I confirmed that their Scoville scale—er, poison level—was weak, I took out a knife and delicately cut one open to expose the seeds.

Flames appeared around the pepper nearly scorching the tabletop, but they didn’t burn the actual ingredient.

image [https://i.imgur.com/QVpP0Ub.jpeg]

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Noxious almost grabbed it from off my work table. “Are you crazy?”

“Of course not. I’ll grow these myself.”

I carefully removed each of the ‘old’ seeds and sent them into the space to soak in a bowl of spiritual spring water I had the kid prepare earlier.

If Little Spring was planning to continue down the path of a beast blood contractor, then we would have to cultivate these ourselves. Of course, I’d have to free the bath from its odd side effects first so it could be considered an orthodox cultivation method or we might actually get kicked out of the sect.

Noxious Fangstrike crossed his arms. “I already sent some to the horticulturists.”

I narrowed my eyes on him. He remembered how those guys didn’t even question the pepper breeding they did, right?

He huffed. “With instructions! And I’ll visit often to make sure they’re doing everything correctly. I won’t neglect this side of alchemy anymore.”

I nodded. “While I was away, I didn’t have time to think up solutions, but I considered a few directions we could take the bath in.”

“Oh?”

“But I need to grow a copy of each plant by myself to compare them with those you receive from the sect. Especially if I’m going to work around the Irrepressible Blood Chrysanthemum’s issue.”

He frowned. “Alright. I’ll get you some seedlings. The horticulturists won’t be happy about it, though.”

“They can be angry all they want. They’re the ones who messed this up first.”

From the tightly held fury in his eyes, I could tell that he also had similar thoughts.

“While you procure those, I’ll concoct the original version of the two-chrysanthemum-bath using these old-style peppers. But we’ll need a willing test subject to go through with it so we can record the difference and ensure that it’s an improvement.”

***

By the time he returned carrying a massive crate full of seedlings, I had a bath bubbling inside his cauldron that was enlarged to the size of a barrel bathtub.

I grinned down at its red bubbling surface. Proud that I’d produced a high-quality version during my first attempt at concocting this bath.

When he set the plants down, I sent them into the space where Little Spring could plant them for me.

When I looked up, Noxious was staring at the bath excitedly. He walked over to it and closed his eyes. “Ah. This feeling. It is closer to the version we had when I first entered the sect.”

“That’s because it’s missing all that poison your sect inadvertently added.”

With a wave of his hand, a huge spiritual snake appeared beside him.

On reflex, I took several steps back. I’d had too many beasts attempt to murder me for no reason to do anything else. Even now, I could see from the way it stared at me that it wasn’t happy to exist in the same room.

The spiritual beast had a ‘V’ shaped head with a round snout. The scales all over its body were a fascinating mixture of black and pale yellow. It had a faint musky scent that reminded me of the horrible stench Noxious produced back when I first met him.

It didn’t attack me though. Which was good. It seemed like, even before the bath, their taming methods were effective.

Actually, the reason I was so impressed with this unorthodox sect, and something that made it easier for me to willingly go so far to help them, was the control their tamers had over these beasts.

His snake was only a dozen yards away, but it wasn’t curling in on itself as if preparing to strike!

It had only been a few years since I was attacked by that one-eyed, one-horned Halloween song of a viper. And back then, I hadn’t been close to it nor the biggest threat. But now I was so near to it that I could see the tiny scales on its eye ridges, but it only looked irritated!

Seriously fucking amazing! It almost gave me hope that someday I too could have a fluffy spiritual beast pet.

Almost…

“This is my Ten-Thousand Scents Grand Stinking Goddess. Her name is Inky Air Corrupter, and I am planning on making her my new spiritual beast companion.” He gestured to me. “Little Inky, this is junior Linlin. She’s going to help us save the sect.”

She bobbed her patterned head.

If Noxious Fangstrike’s previous spirit pet was also a Stinking Goddess, then it explained the yellow highlights in his hair and his gold eyes.

The snake bit her tail and added her blood to the bath just before Noxious jumped inside it.

It took me a solid five seconds before I could actually open my mouth and yell, “Are you crazy?!”

“Someone has to test it.”

“It doesn’t have to be you. No, it shouldn’t be you.”

“What? Is the great alchemist Linlin not confident in her work?”

I crossed my arms and huffed. “Of course I am. But this is the Qi Condensation version. It’s not going to do much.”

“Trust me. It’s fine since Inky is only a low second rank beast. You only use the other baths when both the pet and the cultivator have a similar power level.”

“Still y—”

“And since I went through the old bath, I will see if it’s different from the one from my youth.”

This crazy asshole shouldn’t be testing this on himself! Scientists should not do tests on themselves. Fucking idiot. What if I had poisoned it? How could he be so damn reckless? “I asked you for volunteers!”

“I am a volunteer. And since I can compare this to my previous experiences, I am the best person to go through with this. If anything goes wrong, I’ll trust in your genius to fix it.”

Goddamn, why was he making sense? Especially the part about my genius.

I still wanted to kick him. This bath was only half-fixed, so I was only planning on testing it on someone older and desperate… okay, both of those descriptions fit Noxious. What I meant was that we could have used someone in their last decade from the outer sect who wanted to get paid a good amount!

But since this guy decided to be an idiot...

With frustration, I stretched out my divine sense and cataloged the minor changes in his body. Through this, I was able to list out how the concoction affected him so I could extrapolate how it would affect a disciple in a lower realm.

There also didn’t seem to be any pain.

“How is it compared to what you experienced in the past?”

“It actually feels cleaner. Instead of ghost pepper soup, it’s more like mint tea.”

I nodded. We went over a few more questions while I poked and prodded him like the test subject he was, attempting to figure out if his skin weakened due to the bath at all.

Of course, this earned me a hiss from Inky.

“Quiet you. This is necessary.”

The snake just glared with eyes that matched its owner. Whatever.

“Has the bath affected your vision or energy?”

“No.”

“And do you have any strange snake-like urges?”

That invasive question earned me a piercing glare.

What? I only asked because it was necessary. If scientists were worried about making people uncomfortable with their research, they couldn’t do a thorough job, thus ensuring that a certain drug didn’t have unintended side effects just because the topic was embarrassing.

That said, he never did answer that last question. And I respected him enough to let it go.

By the time I finished all my tests, he was not happy. But the dumbass had volunteered for this. Muahahaha!

image [https://i.imgur.com/DCOcLMO.jpeg]

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Revenge was a dish best served with a side of science!

For some reason, I felt like I could finally forgive him for that cauldron stunt from a few days ago.

This test had given me a whole new perspective on the concoction. I saw not only how things were supposed to fit together but how the two flowers instead of one left the recipe feeling uneven, though it seemed cleaner than before.

Since we couldn’t grow healthy chrysanthemums just yet — and since using the spiritual spring water to purify them wasn’t a viable option if I didn’t want to get kidnapped and shaken down for all of Little Spring’s treasures — I had to think of a way to purify the impurities in the flower without the cheat I would normally use.

Easy, right? Hah!