Bai Lingxi had run away a considerable distance before she stopped and found a place to sit.
Her mind was racing at light speed as she thought about what to do. There is simply no way she can allow this to continue!
Jian Long was living in her house! Whatever that man was, he had to leave!
’But...’
The beauty frowned. She can’t allow the Sect to kill him; that means she can’t tell anyone what happened in the house.
Underworld Vine? That’s toxic! If he is playing with it, then the Cloud Sword Sect must deal with it! Cloud Sword Sect must exterminate anything like poison, evil or deviant techniques.
Obviously, some Sects are a bit more tolerant, but the Cloud Sword Sect developed a reputation as a Righteous Sect. They have an image to uphold!
After thinking for a bit, she made up her mind. As a Stage Seven of Gathering Qi, she is confident enough that she can hold her own against someone who has an unstable and damaged cultivation base.
With that in mind, she rushed back to her house.
Yet, what she found in her place made her even more panicky!
Jian Long was lying on the ground, twitching and spasming!
"Long’er!" The girl rushed over, but she didn’t touch him, remembering how mad he looked, which made her feel repulsed.
She slowly stood up and began to pace, thinking about what to do.
Bai Lingxi can’t tell the Sect; her Sect would end him for practising poison, and if she tells Jiang Mengxue about Jian Long, Jiang Mengxue would do the same as the Sect.
The beautiful girl stopped and bit her lower lip. Only one person could possibly help her.
But...
"What can I possibly offer back for removing the poison and fixing this?"
A certain expression settled on her face. A large part of her was thinking of just letting this guy suffer and die in some ditch.
But a considerable part hoped that Jian Long could be saved; a good dose of medicine should fix him, right?
In the end, Bai Lingxi decided to try at least.
~~~
"Hmm..."
Ye Ming looked at his handywork. He made four purifying pills, several Detox pills and a bit more of the Qi Gathering pills.
Well, he had a small bag of those, but this was more or less a bit of practice for him.
Though not long after, Jiang Mengxue returned with a small smile on her lips. The girl noticed Liu Li in the house with him.
A complex emotion flickered in her eyes. The Young Mistress wants to have those moments with him, but she can’t, as it depends on Ye Ming. It’s a frustrating situation she has to go through.
"I have the flowers and a bit of Qi Gathering Herbs." She pulled out a basket with two materials for him.
"...Fantastic. I was just practising with Qi Gathering Herbs." He smiled at her as he inspected the materials.
More specifically, the flower.
"Hmm... interesting...I never had a chance to work with anything other than grass or herbs... well, herbs are still more or less a piece of grass." By this point, he just nitpicked about that stuff as he picked one of the yellow lotuses.
"...Well, that is true. So do you think you can do it?" Jiang Mengxue asked him hopefully.
"Oh, it’s not that different." The Alchemist smiled at her. It was cute to see her worried expression.
"I do have some things prepared for you." He summoned the purifying pills and some of the Qi Gathering ones.
"Give these to your family."
Jiang Mengxue perked up at the sight of a bag of pills. She swiftly inspected them, recognising them!
"I-I’ll give them immediately!" The girl scrambled from the house.
’These are the purifying ones that cleansed the meridians!’
"Hah. So excited." Ye Ming shook his head and went over to start his first test. He has around ten of these lotuses.
He can play around with two, if not lucky, three.
So he started by placing one in the cauldron, then activating his alchemist’s fire.
The Alchemist immediately noticed how ’dirty’ it was. The Qi in the flower was very potent, but the impurities it held were considerable.
’Let’s start slowly.’
Ye Ming started with a slow burn. Bit by bit, burning the flower, turning it into liquid essence.
’Hmmm...’
This gave him a clear idea of what he was working with.
He turned up the heat a bit more as he began to separate impurities from the essence, then burned them away.
Once he was done with that, he maintained the lotus flower in an essence form and then threw in the Qi Gathering Herb with the other hand.
He swiftly turned the herb into essence and began merging it.
"And done."
The pill flew out of the cauldron and into his hand.
It was light yellow, almost sickly gold.
"The problem is that it takes time to remove the impurities. The flower’s nature is to collect garbage and use that to strengthen its Qi essence.
I assume this nature of the flower is what allows the Qi channels to strengthen themselves, forming the so-called Foundation Realm." He explained his thoughts to Liu Li as he was throwing up the pill and catching it.
"You did it on the first try!" Liu Li commented as she was watching the whole thing.
"Well, things like that depend on the essence of the material.
From the looks of it, the flower is quite resistant to fire. So I slowly increased the heat while focusing on the essence. Midway, I was able to sense the impurities and separate them from the essence." He explained, then returned to the cauldron and restarted the process after pocketing the pill.
’To have Spiritual sense where he can easily pick up impurities... that’s not what a simple Qi Gathering Cultivator should have.’
Liu Li, who knows that bloodlines are a thing, is starting to believe that the Alchemist is a descendant of some Alchemist family!
The only other special family in the entire Western Wilderness is the Duan Dynasty! The only ones who can oppose them are literal geniuses who can wield alchemy.
That shows how powerful bloodlines are! And now she is seeing it for herself.
Unaware of what Liu Li was thinking, Ye Ming kept making the Foundation Pills.
By the time Jiang Mengxue returned, Ye Ming already had the whole batch ready.
"..."
"Here, this is for you." He handed the Foundation Pill to her.
The Sect Master’s daughter looked speechless at the pill that was handed over to her.
"...A-Amazing... you already finished!?"
"Indeed. I can give a couple more." He handed another two.
"T-This is..." For a second, she needed to process what she was looking at.
"A-Anyway! I forgot to mention." Jiang Mengxue shook her head as she snapped out of it and mentioned something important.
"My father said if you want, you can move into the Inner Sect or even the Core Sect. As you are a special case, crucial members of Cloud Sword Sect can move up without being restricted by their Cultivation Realms." She said with a small smile, hoping that he would agree.
"Nope, I will stay here."
"..."
"..."
Both girls in the houses simply stared at him. Liu Li already knew, but she was still speechless that he would say no to the luxury of the Core Sect Grounds!
"But I do request permission to build and expand. I will be making a workshop."
"O-Of course! Do what you want and like." Jiang Menguxe agreed immediately; she understood he wanted to build things up himself.
And that is even better! Some part of her is hoping that he won’t leave if the Alchemist Association find out about him because he thinks of this place as his home!
’That’s even more reason for me to win the tournament and get back to him!’ The girl clenched her fist for a second as she stored the three pills away, and she then smiled at him.
"I do have to thank you for making the Foundation Pills." Jiang Mengxue smiled as she took a step forward. Ye Ming immediately pulled her into a hug and looked into her eyes.
"Of course. I do have to thank you as well. Now I have experience in making the Foundation Pill." He whispered, and she leaned forward even more. By this point, she didn’t care that Liu Li was in the room. Instead, she kissed him, wrapping her hands around his neck. Her kiss was full of emotion.
The Alchemist wrapped his hands around her waist as he pulled her even more.
Liu Li looked at them with wide eyes. The Fallen Princess didn’t imagine that the Sect Master’s daughter would be this bold!
"Haah~~ This is only a small thank you~~ for the things that are piling up~." Jiang Mengxue said with needy eyes. Ye Ming smiled back as his hands went down to her bum. He squeezed it.
"How about this~ once you reach Foundation Realm, you will spend some time with me." He whispered into her ear as he kept on playing with her bum.
"G-Good idea~" She replied with a healthy blush as desire was slowly starting to creep into her mind.
"Wonderful."
With that said, he did let her go, and Jiang Mengxue swiftly left the house.
"Oh... and Great Uncle said he will get you some of the Heavenly Qi Grass. He hopes you can make some Heavenly Qi Pills.
The Contribution Hall will buy them in bulk, and you will get a considerable amount of Qi Stones and points." The Sect Master’s daughter returned, said her piece, and swiftly left afterwards.
’Hah... this is great... I suppose being an alchemist is the best.’ He smirked at this development. This situation was great!
Not only will they get him resources, but he can sell them! This is a cheat code for money!
"Well, I guess I will be waiting for them." He smirked for a bit. It was time for him to return to his training.
~~~~~~Meanwhile~~~~~~
Bai Lingxi looked at the Alchemist’s house. She was a bit worried when she saw Jiang Mengxue running around like some errand girl.
But it proved to her that Alchemist Ye Ming was the real deal.
She could tell Jiang Mengxue’s cultivation speed had improved considerably, and she had passed the bottleneck she had been stuck in for several months.
In fact, the Sect Master’s daughter’s cultivation was rapidly moving towards Stage Ten of Gathering Qi.
All she needed was a Foundation Pill or several weeks of intense cultivation to reach the Foundation Realm.
’The tournament to select the next Sect Master is just twelve days away. My guess is that they want him to make Foundation Pill.’
Bai Lingxi frowned. If he could make that pill... maybe he could make something that could fix Jian Long?
Regardless, she waited for a while. She could tell someone else was in the house, someone cultivating inside.
’Stage Seven of Qi Gathering... it could be one of the girls Jiang Mengxue has left for him.’
With that said, the girl decided to take her chances as she moved closer.
But then her eyes widened as she saw him leave the house and walk toward the tree a little farther away.
’Perfect!’
The black-haired beauty slowly walked over to him.
When Ye Ming saw her, he was confused. The look he gave her told her he didn’t remember her!
That is given, as she swiftly left the moment she knew what was about to happen. Now she can use that to her advantage!
Of course, soon enough, Liu Li left the house, and Bai Lingxi saw the frown on her face.
From the way she moved, the ’Heroine’ could tell that Liu Li was very respectful to him and didn’t act rashly, and that was just what she wanted.
"Master Ming, may I ask for your help?" Bai Lingxi asked with flustered eyes.