1971 The Two Old Men

"What world do you come from, young man?" the guild master asked Alex.

Alchemist Han had left the room to test the pill, and the old woman had left to do her job as a physician. So only Alex and the old man remained in the room.

"3rd Major Spirit realm," Alex answered.

"Oh! We haven't had people from those worlds in a while I heard. Congratulations," the man said.

Alex smiled and nodded in thanks.

"Tell me, did you make that pill yourself?" the old man asked.

Alex took a moment to wonder if he should answer truthfully. He didn't see why not. "I did," he said. "Well, I downgraded the ingredients of a Saint healing pill and fixed the recipe a little to make it work."

"Huh?" the old man responded. "You did that?"

Alex nodded.

"You must be quite talented to have done that," the old man said.

"Surely many other Alchemists here can do that too," Alex said. "Which is making me a little confused, senior. Why aren't there many pills to heal a True realm cultivator?"

The old man shook his head. "It's… a flaw of the Immortal world," he said. "Unlike your lower realm where you have to struggle through the True and Saint realm, we here simply glide through that realm, easily breaking through."

"Any Alchemist that begins learning will have reached Saint realm by the time they are good enough. So, at that point, no one wants to make pills for the weaker ones."

"There are some that do, but very few actually end up making something as substantial as what you ended up making," the old man said. "If we only spent some time thinking about the weaker ones and not just about becoming stronger, we could do a lot more as a species. But then… why would we?"

Alex found the explanation simple and yet satisfying. Not many had made such a pill as Alex, not because they weren't talented, but because they didn't want to.

If a True realm cultivator needed to regrow something, their best option was to just reach the Saint realm. Such a thing wouldn't take more than a few years in a world where the Qi was this thick.

The old man's face suddenly changed and he looked elsewhere. He smiled slightly and a few moments later the door opened.

Two old men walked into the room, one shorter and one taller.

The taller man had short salt and pepper hair, with a healthy, muscular body, making him look no older than in his 40s, even though the wrinkles on his face made him look older.

On the other hand, the shorter man was bald, with a slight humpback. He was somewhat thinner too, appearing as though someone who hadn't eaten anything for a long time.

What was truly descriptive about the man was the scars all over his body and his missing right eye. Where his eyes should've been was a giant hole instead with part of the eye socket itself missing.

Alex got an uncomfortable feeling looking at the man with no eyes. He got uncomfortable looking at all 3.

"How did it go?" the guild master asked the two.

The taller man shook his head. "We were a little late, it seems. Couldn't find what we were looking for," he said.

"Oh, that's disappointing," the guild master said.

"Yeah, and we couldn't even do much investigation. The place was already teeming with other people when we got to it. They must've noticed it as well."

The shorter man didn't say anything, but kept his one eye on Alex, forcing Alex to barely pay attention to what the other two were saying. Every time he tried to think about something important, the look of the one-eyed man made him unable to keep his thoughts assorted.

"Why did you call us here anyway, brother Blackfrost?" the taller man asked.

"I wanted you to meet this young man. He made a pill to regrow body parts of True realm cultivators using a saint recipe while he was only in the True realm. Truly a talent, don't you think?" the guild master said.

The taller man turned to look at Alex, his eyes narrowing when he sensed his cultivation base.

"He's a little weak," the man said.

"Maybe, but he made quite the pills during his test," the guild master said and brought out a few pills to show the old man. Alex was surprised that the old man had his pills. When did that happen? And why?

The taller man looked at the pill, eyebrows raising a little in surprise.

"Not bad," he said. "He does have potential."

He finally turned to look at Alex. "Young man, what is your name?" he asked.

"Dawnblade, senior," Alex said quickly, finally breaking eye contact with the one-eyed man.

The man nodded. "Are you part of any sect?" he asked. "Do you have any master?"

"No," Alex said, surprised. Was this man going to take him as a disciple?

"Keep up the good work," he said and stood up. "I'll wait for you in my courtyard, brother Blackfrost."

The guild master nodded and let the two old men walk away.

When the two men left the door, Alchemist Han was right outside. He quickly bowed to the two men deeply and finally entered the room.

The two old men made their way to their courtyard where they were staying as guests. Once they were settled, the taller man sighed. "Will I even get one in time?" he asked.

The one-eyed man looked at the man. "What about Alchemist Han? He is talented," he said.

"Not talented enough," the man said. "If we want someone to win the competition, we need more talent. Urgh!! Coming here might've been a mistake. Maybe we should just grab one and go back so it's not a waste of time. What do you think about the kid we just saw?"

The one-eyed man thought for a bit and said, "I don't know how good of an Alchemist he is, but I see the traces of Sword Domain around him. To reach such a realm with his current cultivation base, he is no ordinary cultivator."

"Oh!" the other man said, a mischievous smile forming on his face. "Do you think the Blue Silk sect knows about it just yet? They will go head over heels to get such a talented young man to join them."

The one-eyed man shook his head. "If they did, I doubt he would have been here. He would be in the sect. And he said he had no master too."

"He did indeed," the taller man said. "I should make him my disciple just to screw with them after how they screwed over me."

The one-eyed man said nothing. He knew the other man and knew him too well to say anything here. The Blue Silk sect had obviously not gone against him the past few days, and yet he had thought so.

Explaining it would just be a bothersome task anyway, so the one-eyed man chose to remain silent about it.

"We should go back to hanging around that one secret realm," the man said. "That was where we can find the most potential candidates."

The one-eyed man sighed. He had only come back and it seemed his friend was planning on moving once again.