1934 A Decision

Alex decided to not lodge a complaint about what happened for his own sake. But what was keeping the people that had poisoned him from doing so?

Right now, at the very least, 2 people were aware of the fact that he had in fact survived a poison that was far beyond his capacity to survive.

An act of revenge on the First Elder's part had revealed the fact that he could in fact survive such a dangerous poison to not only the First Elder but also the Elder that had partaken in his murder.

Two people in the sect were aware of very important information.

Fortunately, Alex didn't believe they knew he could survive such a strong poison. If he was in their place, he would believe that he had cheated somehow. Maybe a pill that he ate beforehand to deal with the poison.

He was an Alchemist after all. Making a pill that preemptively attacked poisons was not an impossibility on his end. God knew the woman thought he could do way more than just that.

'Shit!' Alex thought as another problem surfaced, one that caused more division between him and the old woman.

He had survived the Nether Ice Immortal poison that he had unknowingly consumed. Meanwhile, her son had died while knowingly consuming the very same poison.

And that was while he ate a pill made by none other than Alex.

'Damn it. She is absolutely going to think that I had purposefully let her son die,' Alex thought. What was he to do now?

If nothing else, he needed to be more careful about what he did next. The old woman wouldn't just stop now. If she had tried to kill him during such an important event as the Poison Assembly, she was absolutely going to try and kill him somewhere else as well.

Alex needed to make sure he didn't get into those sorts of problems. He needed some ways where he couldn't be targeted.

His first instinct was to hole up somewhere and not show his face for a year or more, but his work demanded he go to the valley for at least 10 days out of a month. His pockets demanded he did so as well.

With the increase in workload, he was going to be earning a lot more soon enough. He couldn't stop earning now.

In the end, Alex decided that the best way to not get caught off guard from such attacks in the future was to always be around people.

Being around individuals was bound to get the woman or anyone else she employed to be less confident about getting away with their attacks.

Getting poisoned was something he could handle. Getting attacked directly, he could avoid. With these two out of his thought, surely there would be no more trouble.

Alex decided on something very quickly. He wanted Tai Guidao to be his bodyguard to and from the valley.

"You want me to… escort you?" Tai Guidao asked, confused at the request. "Why?"

"I can't explain really, but I need you to be with me while I go to my work and come back. Is that possible?" he asked.

"I mean, sure I can do that," Tai Guidao said. "I'm just confused by the request."

"Thank you," Alex said. "Do you want contribution points for doing that? I can make it a mission."

"No-no, I'm helping a friend. I can't ask for compensation," Tai Guidao said. "If you truly need it, you need only ask."

"Thank you, brother Tai."

From then forth, Alex had a person to take him to the valley and back to his home. At his home, no one could enter without being notified, and hence he felt much safer.

If someone did manage to sneak in, Alex had other ways to deal with the person, assuming they weren't someone too strong.

Of course, Alex didn't let Tai Guidao escort him around for free. He made pills for the man, helping him in his cultivation journey.

Tai Guidao was more than ecstatic to receive such pills. What he gained in a month would have taken him years to gather the normal way.

Alex was just too generous in his eyes.

Alex helped Tai Guidao get better at dealing with the Brute Bloom poison. Since he had failed the last time, he more than wanted to pass the poison test this time around.

Since they would be changing houses, he wanted to get as far up in ranking as he possibly could at that time. Little by little, he made his progress, and just 7 months later, he had successfully handled the Brute Bloom Poison.

Tai Guidao was certain to get a good ranking in the next Poison Assembly.

Alex's own work was going quite well as well. He had begun making better pills consistently as most of his pills had come to be around 80%. He had thought of going even higher, but given how Elder Lan was already shocked by his progress of just these few percentages, he didn't want to go further.

Money flowed in quite nicely for Alex at that time. He managed to earn around 250 Immortal Spirit Stones on average in a day.

Alex's daily life was going splendidly.

Perhaps because of what he did, or because they never meant to, no one attacked Alex during the year.

Nobody claimed that he could deal with poisons way stronger than anyone else, and nor did anyone claim that he cheated on his last Poison Assembly.

In fact, he even heard that the First Elder had taken some time off to mourn her son's death and wasn't around in the sect.

That woman had cleverly made it so that she wouldn't be in the sect when she died. She was very much sneaky.

Still, even though nothing happened, Alex didn't let go of his vigilance. Every time he was to go to the valley, he went with Tai Guidao. And when he returned 10 days later, Tai Guidao would be waiting for him.

At home, he had set up multiple formations both to alarm and defend him from intruders.

None had triggered. No one had come.

That was not to say that no one would come. He continued being on the defense. He continued being wary.

Throughout the year, he did not spend a single day without being on guard. By the end of the year, Alex began feeling tired of it all.

He wanted to stop doing that, but he knew that the moment he stopped, the enemy would come to attack him.

He had to continue.

For how long? He did not know. How he would get out of it was also something he did not know. All he knew was that he did not want to die, and so he would do whatever he needed to continue living.

Alex walked out of his house early in the morning one day and saw Tai Guidao waiting for him outside.

"Greetings, brother Dawnblade. Shall we get going?" the man asked.

Alex nodded. "We shouldn't be late."

After all, today was the day for another Poison Assembly.

Today was the day when he was going to become an Inner Sect disciple.