I wasn’t exactly thrilled by the sudden arrival of a dozen new clients suddenly asking me to make pills for them. If these people were poised to make a deal as generous as the Hu Clan’s, then they wouldn’t have ignored me for several years. Instead, these were the bottom feeders who were hoping to snatch up some cheap pills by being the first to offer me ‘charity’ now that the competition for Eight Flower King was over.

So, I asked Manager Bai to handle most of these requests with a direct rejection. She wasn’t exactly happy to be given this responsibility, but she still accepted the task willingly. However, while we could handle the pettier parties in this manner, there were a few clients who she felt required a more deliberate approach. So, we set up a meeting to discuss these offers in detail before entering into any negotiations.

When I arrived at this meeting, however, Manager Bai was nowhere in sight. Instead, the person who greeted me was Alchemist Li, who I hadn’t seen since my registration exam when I first entered the city.

“Su Fang, how have you been? Has Eight Flower been treating you well?” His voice was pleasant, and he spoke in a grandfatherly manner.

“Alchemist Li.” I cupped my fists and bowed to the older man. “Thank you, I have been doing quite well recently.”

“Excellent, excellent. Come and sit, let’s talk about your future,” he said, guiding me toward one of the conference room’s chairs. “I have been paying close attention to your progress. It seems that you have made great strides in filling those gaps in your knowledge.”

“Thank you, Alchemist Li. I have done my best to learn what I can, but there are many new herbs that I have yet to explore.”

The older man took out a small jade bottle, poured out the pill it contained, and held it up to the light. “You have indeed been progressing very well. I must admit, your ability to mend medicinal energy has even surpassed my own, and I’ve been studying for centuries.”

That comment made me wince internally, but I tried to hide my reaction.

“So, what are your plans?” he asked. “You’ve reached the peak of Grandmaster Alchemist, and you are only a few decades old. How do you plan to move forward?”

This was something that I had been considering for a long time, and while I had made my decision, it still made me anxious. “I’m going to compete for the position of Water Groom.”

Alchemist Li stroked his beard in thought. “Your friend is the Water Flower, correct? It’s not a terrible choice. Becoming a Lord in Eight Flower comes with certain benefits, and with your skills, you should be able to improve the city enough to reach Peak Lord by the end of your term. As long as you are willing to do the necessary work, that is.”

I wasn’t sure how to reply to this, so I kept my silence.

“However, there are other paths open to you if you wish to take them.”

Alchemist Li’s voice was filled with meaning, and I could only think that he was suggesting I accept a position as a nominal Lord within the Blue Wind Pavilion. I had already considered and rejected this option, however, so to avoid offending him, I sidestepped this topic.

“Yes, Manager Bai has informed me of the new Eight Flower King’s offer. I would become his direct subordinate, and in return, he would use a special technique to share a portion of the karmic energy that he receives, allowing me to ascend to Lord.”

Alchemist Li nodded. “This new King is a powerful alchemist in his own right. He isn’t quite as skilled as you are, but his blessing more than makes up for his deficiencies. Right now, like you, he is only a Grandmaster, but with the karmic energy that he will gain from his new position, he will quickly rise through the Lord realm and ascend to Martial King. I doubt his alchemy skills will keep pace—I expect him to stall in the mid-Pill Lord stages—but if you prove yourself a valued ally, you may be able to ride his coattails during the next King selection in twenty years.”

“It’s not the right fit for me,” I stated firmly. “I’ve looked into the man. His connections are all downward, to people below him. Following him will only be placing chains on myself that won’t allow me to rise beyond early Lord.”

“What do you want, then?” asked Li, a small smile hidden under his beard.

I felt a weight to his question. My answer needed to be clear and forthright. “I want to become both a Pill King and a Formation King. I also want to become a true city lord—one with actual authority—so that I can test certain ideas I have for city development.”

A resigned expression crossed Li’s face. “I would offer you a position as my disciple, but I could only teach you a bit of alchemy. I know little of formations. And, while I could arrange a position as city lord for you through the Pavilion, it would only be a nominal one.”

I wasn’t sure how skilled Alchemist Li was—I had only ever heard him referred to as Alchemist Li, no one ever mentioned his realm—but I had the feeling he was far beyond me. Becoming his disciple would almost certainly be an incredible boon to my skills as an alchemist.

During my lessons for both formations and becoming the Water Groom, I had come up with a plan. I would develop a method for generating far more karmic energy than was normal in this world, and I would use this method to establish a relationship with the royal family of the Brilliant Sun Empire. If everything went well, this would give me a path to Formation Emperor Du XiongMing and the spatial fire seed he possessed.

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While this plan may or may not be feasible, I was excited by the prospect of having a path to the fire seed without first needing to become a Pill Emperor.

However, if I could study under Alchemist Li, I might not need this secondary path at all. With his guidance, I might be able to reach Pill King in only a few decades. I might even be able to reach Pill Emperor before Du XiongMing passed away.

My conviction began to waver, but Alchemist Li waved me off. “The timing isn’t right.”

“I don’t have much time left, so there may not be another chance, but I can feel that now just isn’t the right time.” His voice was rueful, and when he finished speaking, he tapped his temple with two fingers.

It was his blessing. Did his blessing give him knowledge about the correct timing of events? If so, then that would be an interesting blessing for an alchemist to have. It could be incredibly beneficial—depending on the specifics of how it worked, of course.

Though… If he did have such a powerful blessing, would he really tell me about it so openly? If his blessing told him to tell me, then maybe… But—

“For now,” said Alchemist Li, breaking me from this train of thought, “I’ll do what’s proper for when an old man like me meets a young up-and-comer like yourself and give you three gifts. First, do you know what separates Ruler Tier alchemy from Warrior Tier alchemy?”

I was thrown off by his change in topic. “Not exactly… The most I have been able to learn is that Ruler Tier alchemy requires a Profound Rank spirit fire.”

Li shook his head. “No, not right. You can get by with worse in the Lord realm, though you won’t be happy about it.”

He took out a small pill furnace and a strange herb from his storage bag. “This is a Rank 4 herb. It can be refined into a somewhat basic pill just by itself. Please, go ahead and try it.”

A bit worried, I approached the furnace and got to work. I approached the task as I would with any Rank 3 pill, but when I closely examined the medicinal energy, I was stunned. It existed only as small flecks suspended within a sea of toxins.

I started to carefully burn away the toxins. This took significantly more energy than I was used to, but by relying on my fire seed, it was manageable. At this point, based on the way he talked, I wasn’t worried about Alchemist Li being greedy for a Yellow-Rank seed, so I used it openly.

My control and power were sufficient to refine this herb—which surprised me. This would mean that I should be able to make a few of the more basic Rank 4 pills. However, the moment one of the flecks of the herb’s medicinal energy was freed from the toxins, it fluttered into the air and dispersed. Thinking that this was a bad coincidence, I freed another bit of energy, but it also fluttered away and vanished into the air.

After my third attempt, I put the herb down in defeat and looked at Li.

“Alright,” he said, grinning, “punch me.”

“What?”

“Punch me as hard as you can. Don’t worry. You can’t hurt me. Put all your strength behind your fist and punch me anywhere you want.”

I was confused, but I balled a fist and punched directly at his chest.

Halfway to its target, my fist froze in the air. I could neither move it forward nor backward.

“This is the difference between a Warrior and a Ruler. After forming a core of karma, the Ruler is connected to the world on a fundamental level, and this provides them with some amount of control over it. I am not using qi to hold you in place. I am using only my will and my connection to this world. To become a Pill Lord, you will need to be able to impose your will onto herbs and prevent their medicinal energy from dispersing. Otherwise, you will never be able to make anything beyond Rank 3.”

I looked at the ruined herb that was still sitting in the pill furnace. Locking down medicinal energy like he had locked down my fist would indeed keep it from dispersing, but wasn’t there another way?

“Wouldn’t high enough affinities be just as good? If it’s just a matter of keeping the medicinal energy from dispersing, then affinities should also work.”

Li rubbed his hands in excitement. “Yes, they should, but that has problems of its own. You will need a peak five-star affinity to make Lord-level pills, a peak four-star for King-level pills, and a peak three-star for Emperor-level pills. This isn’t just about having an affinity for fire, either. You will need this level of affinity for each element of medicinal energy you wish to be able to use. Far easier to just raise your cultivation base, wouldn’t you say?”

In the short term, I couldn’t help but agree that he was right, but long term? Affinities were something that I could have from the very beginning of a life, long before I could raise my cultivation level to match.

“My second gift is this,” said Li, pulling out a thick, worn book. “It has many of my thoughts and recipes regarding Rank 4 alchemy. It should be of great help to you in the near future.”

My eyes widened in shock. “This is too precious. I can’t take it.”

“Then throw it away. I no longer have need of it, and I am giving it to you.”

Li placed the book on the table and dismissed it from his thoughts.

Both reluctant and greedy, I picked it up and carefully placed it into my storage bag. My only regret was not being able to carry such an important text with me into future lives. Since this was Rank 4 knowledge, my mental library couldn’t store it, and the book was far too large for the limited storage space in my soul. I could try to memorize it, but as my experiments with the Peak-Earth cultivation techniques had already proved, something about this world actively prevented people from accessing knowledge that was too far beyond them.

“Finally,” he said, taking out a jade box and placing it on the table, “to do proper alchemy, you need a proper spirit fire. It will take you time to adjust to using a simple spirit fire instead of that seed of yours, but you’ll find this one to be much more suitable for alchemy. It’s the fire-based Three Thousand Flames Spirit Fire. With this, you won’t be able to pull off some of the tricks that you can with that earth and water flame, but you also only need to worry about finding a way to improve your fire affinity.”

I stared at the box. “What level is this spirit fire?”

Alchemist Li just gave me a simple smile, stood up, and began to leave the room. However, before he disappeared, he turned back and tossed me a large purple coin that had been embossed with the image of a plum blossom.

“When the time is right, come to the main branch of the Pavilion in Blue Wind City. I don’t know how much longer I’ll be around, but when you come, just show them that coin and ask to see Pill Emperor Li.”

Stunned by his words, I barely noticed when he vanished.

After Emperor Li left, my first thought was to commit suicide immediately and go search him out to become his disciple. However, that feeling only lasted for a second before I regained my composure. Such an action would be meaningless.

Emperor Li was relying on some kind of blessing in his dealings with me, and if it didn’t want him to accept me as a disciple, then simply restarting likely wouldn’t change that.

Still, his gifts had significantly boosted my chances of successfully completing my plans for this life. I would wait a few years, take over North Lake City, and see about transforming it into a haven of peace and prosperity that could produce karmic energy at an unheard-of rate. Then, I would look at using this method to make contact with the Brilliant Sun Empire.

Even if this failed, Emperor Li’s notes should still, hopefully, be enough for me to reach Pill King and follow through with my original idea.