This was the only reply I had in mind, luckily I didn't need to say anything else, since Shi Ru Yi took upon herself the role of denying such a remark, but how should I put it, her tries to revoke such claims made the old man believe it even more .
She startled shaking her hands in protest while denying that there was anything of this sort between us, she kept on saying that we were just an acquaintance and nothing more.
But the blush and the nervousness in her voice only made her look even more guilty, but luckily the old man didn't want to pursue the matter anymore, he just gave her a knowing smile and shook his hand before turning to me who was still completely baffled at this sudden development and said :
So tell me, what made you come here today, don't tell me that you need that potion, your father might skin me alive, if he were to know I gave you something like that .
Thegirl's face become red like a tomato and she directly started pinching the old man's ear after she heard him mention ' that potion ', I had no clue what that potion even was, but since it made Shi Ru Yi react like this, then it must be something utterly ridiculous .
The two kept quarreling with each other for a while, before the old man finally gave in and said :
The Young Miss said that you came here to buy Alchemy Materials, allow me to ask, are those for you or for your Master ? .
I was finally hit with a question that I could actually answer, I directly said that it was for me, he looked at me and fell deeply into contemplation before saying :
I heard that your Martial Arts talent is extremely strong, I heard that you even killed a person in the Bone Forging Realm, but this is more than enough reason for me to dissuade you against dabbling in alchemy in your current stage and circumstances .
Your lack of Vitality was one thing, but I had to make everything clear for you before you start your Alchemy path and eventually end up seeking death .
Alchemy is even more vitality consuming than the practice of Martial Arts, a person who practice Martial Arts can still continue to live vigorously until he die, an alchemist can only hope for his life to increase by a few more days or months in hope of finishing the pill he is working on .
Both can't interact with one another, unless the person was able to balance the time between the two of them, otherwise that person will end up having more than enough hurdles to stop him from moving forward .
And for that, most people only start dabble in alchemy after they had already achieved enough in their Martial Arts path, so tell me had you informed your Master about that decision of yours ? .
Hearing his serious tone of voice, I couldn't help but such a deep breath of air inwardly, this old man named Wi Jon eyes were quite sharp and his reasoning was indeed logical and flawless, I had completely forgotten about how silly was he acting just now and just as I was about to say something, a sudden sound of a door getting opened aggressively appeared .
The sound came from upstairs on the the second floor and for some reason the old man had suddenly tensed and stare at the the guy who was screaming at the old man and looking quite terrified wailing and asking for help, saying :
Master Wi, where is Master Wi, the cauldron is unstable and about to explode .
The old man was suddenly shaking and directly sprinted towards the second floor while leaving us with a severe warning, saying :
Both of you need to stay here, otherwise I may not be able to save you .
Saying this, he directly unleashed a movement skill and vanished from our sight, the girl moved a bit closer to me and asked me something, but I was completely engrossed in watching the process currently going on in the Alchemy room on the second floor .
A bronze cauldron was there swirling crazily like as if it was possessed, from time to time steam would be released from its lid and through my enhanced senses, I heard the Medicinal Materials inside it making a crunching sounds and exploding one after another in a chain of reaction like manner .
I understood what the issue was and the second I saw these guys about to use water to turn of the cauldron heat, the seal on my mind come to life and gave me a sudden realization regarding what they were doing and the results of them doing this .
Getting my answer, I didn't waste much time and directly stormed towards that alchemy room after leaving Shi Ru Yi with a word of advice, she shouldn't stay in this shop for long, before she say anything, I had already vanished from her sight .
Appearing in that alchemy room, I saw that most of the people here were unable to react and make the decisive decision of retreating or even try their best to stabilize the angry cauldron, they just stood there dazed and completely terrified .
Then I saw old man Wi Jon hitting the cauldron with his gleaming green palm a few times, he was trying to make the energy in the cauldron settle down, but these guys who poured water earlier to put the fire off had made things extremely dangerous .
If the cauldron wasn't stopped, not only would this shop be destroyed, a whole section of this place would be demolished, luckily the seal on my mind and the Records On Evil Ways Of Alchemy allowed me to come with a method that might solve the situation while also saving the pill inside .
What are you doing here, I had told you to take the Young Miss back .
This guy hadn't left me a chance to say even one word ever since I had met him and even now, the situation is already about to reach the exploding point, so there wasn't really that much room for me to answer him .
I directly punctured my finger and drops of my blood was dropped on the cauldron, then following the gestures mentioned in the Records, I start moving my hand and instantly felt a connection with the cauldron through the blood on it .
I inscribed a sealing rune as mentioned in the Records through the connection I had with it, using my own blood as a medium, the seal lit up for a second before it sunk into the cauldron and soon the angry cauldron started to calm down .
The seal also disappeared right after and the cauldron suddenly spat a dense clould of black smoke that engulfed the whole room and dyed a lot of faces around me black, the shock was apparent on all of their faces as the tensed situation finally settled down .
Their faces together with the shocked expression they had, almost made me unable to contain my laughter, but luckily there was something else to think about that managed to keep me busy .
The pill inside the cauldron had indeed formed, as for its grade and quality, well that's completely unknown, as the cauldron stabilized, a mechanism seem to have been triggered and a pill appeared as the lid was opened and it landed precisely in the hand of the person responsible for holding the successful pills .
It directly landed in the tray in one full sweep, I looked at it and it took merely a sniff for me to recognize what kind of pill that was, Fire Wolf Blood Pill, its rank was a 3rd grade pill, it helped the Martial Artists and those who are in the later stages to enhance his combat ability by 15% .
This might sound weak, but even the slightest bit of increase in strength at critical time during the fight can determine Life and Death, the ratio is 15% is for the Organ Quenching Realm experts, 10 percent for the Bone Forging Realm experts, 5 percent for Marrow Cleansing Realm experts .
The increase in power in the later stages could be considered meaningless and other more powerful pills would be needed to enhance combat strength at these stages, the pill is quite simple to make, the only problems lay in the scarcity of Fire Wolves, a peak grade 2 Monsters, its core was needed for the pill !!! .
And also the fact that it follow a pill per cauldron principal, meaning that each cauldron can only produce one Pill, if a person tried to make more than one Pill, then the cauldron would explode and this exactly what was going to happen here .
How....., how did you manage to stop it from exploding ? .
I heard the voice of Wi Jon coming from the side and turned to see him together with others completely looking at me with identical shocked expressions, I wasn't able to pinpoint where he was first, but luckily he was the only one among the group of black faces in front of me who was moving towards me and so I was able to recognize him with ease .
I cupped my fist and already came up with an excuse, saying :
" Replaying to senior, discussing the methods my Master had imparted to me here in the open like this, could end up creating troubles .
He took a few seconds to think about what I was saying, before he nodded his head and changed the subject, saying :
You are right, pardon me for my ignorance just now, it seem that you haven't been taught alchemy by that old fool and his Disciple, your Master Chen Fan .
" Senior is indeed quite perceptive, yes, my alchemy insights were acquired from my Spiritual Master, I had one Master guiding me with Martial Arts and another one who had approached me with the intention of guiding me in the spiritual path .
That Spiritual Master was the one who taught you how to make seals as well .
I nodded and instantly a hand landed on my shoulder and Wi Jon kept repeating the word ' good ' three times then said :
It seem that I had truly underestimated you, to think that you are already this skilled at such a young age, who is Gu Xing compared to you, he might as well call himself a waste .
Master, about the cauldron.... .
A few assistant came to report their mistake earlier, those guys were the ones who tried to put out the fire just now, he directly turned furious after he heard what they had to say and was about to hit each one of them as a punishment but I had stopped him with saying :
" They tries to put out the Earthly Fire happened only after they lost control over the cauldron and not before, there was a problem with the method used in concocting this pill .
The second I finished saying this, insults began to fall down on me like rain, even the guys whom I was trying to help with my words were no different, they all were criticizing my poor judgement, all but Wi Jon who should have been the most angry .
To dare and doubt the methods used by another alchemy master was nothing short of a grave insult and this when putting in consideration that the two alchemists were both masters, not to mention when such an insult come from a boy who looked quite young .
But unlike what I expected, Wi Jon didn't go berserk or anything like that, he raised a hand and the curses stopped then he said with much humility in his voice :
I hope that you can enlighten me on what kind of mistakes did I make while concocting this pill ? .
Seeing him not taking my words wrongly, I decided to clear the confusion regarding what happened here, but first I needed to ask about something, so I said :
" Where did you acquire the recipe for this pill, if you don't mind me asking ? .
The second that my question fell on his ears, his expression changed slightly and even though the people present all tried to dissuade him against telling, he still said :
I can't share the exact location with you, all I can say was that it was excavated from some Relics together with other recipes .
" So that is the case, can I ask about the state which you found these recipes in ? .
Well, it's difficult to answer this question, but most of these recipes were found damaged and needed quite the time and resources to be repaired and even then the names was still beyond salvation, so we can only try and see if a full pill recipe can be successfully obtained or not .
This pill is one of the few pill recipes that had been repaired, its name was Red Fire Warrior Pill, as for its effects, today was the first time it was supposed to be concocted and as you see it almost ended in a disaster, is something wrong with the pill even after its recipe became completed .
So that was going on, no wonder I felt something wrong with this pill, it was a miniature version of the Fire Wolf Blood pill, the pill in my mind was a Human grade 1 pill, but the one in my hand was no doubt similar but downgraded by two grades as well .
No wonder I kept feeling that something was wrong, I thought that maybe it was a naming problem, but it seem that things were completely different than I imagined, sensing his intense gaze on me, I said :
" I know another pill that shared the same problem with the recipe in your hand, my master had once mentioned that sometimes Medicinal Energy in the cauldron would become unstable due to the fact that there was one domineering attribute put in the mix .
" Did you use the Orchid Flower of a Red Bear tree while concocting this pill ? .
The guys who were already dissatisfied with me nodded their heads at each other with their shock completely displayed on their faces, seeing this I continued :
" There is nothing wrong with following what is written in the recipe, but the only issue is that you used a lot of portions to try and make a batch of pills in your first try, the orchid flower of that particular tree lean towards the Yang side .
" You putting a huge amount of them together while having no idea about how will these Yang energies interact with one another in the cauldron was the same as seeking death, I don't believe that among you there is a person capable of concocting a Grade 3 pill, is there ? .
Huh, grade 3 , are you really suggesting that this is a Grade 3 Pill, we successfully managed to excavate and repair a Grade 3 Pill .
They suddenly become excited to know this, I was confused for a while, but then I recalled that out of the human graded pills, the first grade pills were now nothing short of myth .
Even Senior Brother back then had his heart already for parting with a support 2nd grade pill, the Azure Wood Pill, this was a bit lower in rank than the the current pill, but it was enough to make them get this much shock .
I couldn't help but wonder what would they do if they know that the pill in their hands can actually be of the first grade in the human ranking, they might directly drop dead .
" I don't want to stop you from celebration, but I wish to see the recipe of this pill if possible .
I once again made a reckless request, but I was surprised that he actually directly complied this time and gave me the pill recipe, looking at the content, I finally understood what made this pill grade fell down like this, the pill requirements had been altered .
The orchid flower was used together with Blood ginseng of insufficient age, but this wasn't the only issue, the real problem laid in the fact that the Monster cores changed to peak grade 1 ferocious beast Red-tailed Squirrel, but that beast leand more to Wind Qi than to Yang Qi .
The grade one pill I had in mind was twice as strong as the one in front of me, I managed to find the problem, but I didn't trust these guys enough to try and give them such a big gift, not to mention that even if I actually did give it to them, they might be unable to make them, not to mention the problem with the cores, the cost would increase and the success rate will plummet .
Not to mention that I wasn't stupid enough to tell them about where I acquired such knowledge, else they doubted me or worse suspected me of hiding something, at that time, I could easily lose my life .
" I understand everything now, the problem with this kind of pills had been addressed by my Master and he gave me the solution as well, due to the domineering nature of Yang Qi contained inside the attributes of Materials used, the furnace would have exploded sooner or later .
" The solution was simple but a bit time-consuming, you need to prepare one pill at a time, but unless you have high skilled alchemist, you shouldn't try mass producing this pill any time soon as you would be just burning money .
" I will suggest that you replace the squirrel core with a peak grade 1 Red Phyton core, its gallbladder might also help enhancing the quality of the pill slightly .
As I finished saying this, the old Man stayed silent for a while contemplating about something, then his eyes lit brightly and maybe due to extreme excitement he said something utterly ridiculous, saying :
What an alchemy genius, I had no problem with you marrying Young Miss .