1072 Quad Annual Pill Making

Alex arrived back at the Alchemy association. He met up with the leader as soon as he got there.

"Where were you? I thought you were coming much earlier," he said worriedly.

"Oh, sorry about that. I had to stop by somewhere for a bit, and they took some time," he said. "Anyway, how is it going? Are the slots finalized yet?"

"We're all but done," the man said. "The slots have been sold, so we only need to wait for them to let us know what pill it is that we need to make."

"I see," Alex said. "So it will take a day more at least?"

"Yes," the leader said.

"Alright, I will go for now. I have something to do today," Alex said and turned around to leave. "Oh, any news on the searches?"

"No, none of the investigators have found anything. None of them have found any clues to any boat that may have come here without being found by someone," the leader said. "Can I ask? Is his Graham fellow your brother?"

"My father," Alex said. "Please continue searching. Take the pay from my cut for whatever is needed." He left without waiting for the leader to say anything else. He was in a bit of a hurry anyway.

After leaving Scarlet's secret realm and dealing with Godslayer's tantrum, Alex visited the Blindheart city's Insight pavilion to get the end-of-the-month report on everyone that had searched for him.

Because it was the month of his slots opening, the searches had grown a lot more and as such there was more for him to look through.

He would need an entire day and more if he wanted to completely read through it all.

"Hey! Alex, wait up!" someone spoke.

Alex turned around and found Harry not far behind him. "Hey, I haven't seen you in a while," he said.

"Of course you haven't, you are never around anymore," Harry said.

"True," Alex said. "Anyway, how's everything going?"

"Fine, I suppose," Harry said. "Listen, after our lesson so many months ago, I started trying to understand it and improve myself. I used one of the pills you make and have done whatever I can to improve it. But I somehow still can't seem to go over 70% for that pill. Can you check what's going on or if I misunderstood something?"

"Sure, after I'm done with the pills I will have to make this week, I will take a look at it," Alex said.

"Thanks, I can't wait," Harry said and walked away.

Alex himself walked back to his dorm room which he hadn't visited in the last 3 months and settled down.

He lay on his bed and brought out the talisman one by one as he read through them all. It was a mindless task that he had to pay barely any attention to, but it was important as it might hide clues from his father.

So, he read through it with half a mind while the other half wandered on its own to who knew where.

He continued doing this for nearly 6 hours when he read something curious. "Hmm?" he looked at the information. Someone had tried to check how Graham and Alex were related. He had also at the same time checked if Alex had any other family members.

"Hao Mingzhe?" Alex read the name of the person who had checked his name. "How does he… Oh, from the Rising Phoenix sect, no wonder."

He got a little happy knowing that Tan Yang had contacted his sect and had asked them to help find his father as per his request.

As he continued reading, it wasn't just Tan Yang who had done that, everyone had. The Yao family, the Kang family, the Liang family, Dawn's Light sect, the Cloud Fire sect, and the Jade fire sect. Even the Huang family seemed to have received a message from Huang Chen, despite how much he hated the new family leader.

Alex finished looking through the rest of the talismans. While they didn't have any useful information, he was happy knowing that there were many people out there looking for his father.

The next day came and he was handed a list of pills he was to make. He had a day to prepare before he started making the pills.

Alex spent the day improving whatever ingredients he could while he waited for the next day to arrive. When it did, he spent the next whole week just making the pills.

The pills were very simple to make for him at this point. They were so simple that he was starting to make over 4 pills at once.

Since he didn't have to worry about using his Pill Splitting Qi, he could easily form those many pills.

The ingredient improvement was what took the majority of his time. The pill themselves were done in about a day's worth time in total.

Once he was done, Alex sent out the pills and waited for the earnings to come in.

Harry came over a day or two later and sat down with Alex to learn a few things. He showed what he had learned and Alex found a few mistakes along the way which he helped point out.

Harry still wasn't using a good pill-forming technique, and that was something essential. Alex didn't give out his own, but he did tell him to get a good one.

A cultivator could only be so good. They couldn't focus on every detail of the pill when making it. Sometimes, they had to leave some techniques that were there because others had gone through the same thing and found something better.

After he was done teaching, Alex went to the leader to take what he had earned and decided to leave once again.

"You're leaving already?" the leader asked with a curious expression.

"Yeah, well I don't really have anything to do here, do I?" he asked.

"No, but… where will you even go?" the leader asked him.

"Oh, I've been going to the Battle Hall in Spiritsong city to practice. I will be returning there again," he said.

"Spiritsong city? You're fighting there?" the leader asked with a concerned face. "Why are you fighting?"

"I just want to," Alex said. "Don't worry, I'll be fine."

"I'm gonna worry anyway without star alchemist fighting like a ruffian," the leader said. "Didn't you say something about having to work on some pills for the council? What about those? Please don't tell me you are taking things lightly. It's the council, you can't do something like that."

"No, no, I'm not taking things lightly, everything is alright. I'm simply waiting for the secret realm to open so I can find a crucial ingredient before I can start. Right, when do you think that will be?" Alex asked.

"I can't really tell you honestly. Might be a month or 3 months or 6. But, we will know when it is about to happen after it blasts out pollen twice in a single day. You should have 3 days or so to return when that happens," the leader said.

"Great, let me know when that is," Alex said. "I can't miss it."