407 Swine

Alex logged back into the game after returning from his classes. It was nearly 4 pm, so he had to go do what he needed to very soon since he didn't know the time frame for when it was allowed.

"I sure hope it's available all the time," he thought. He quickly walked out of his house and made his way to his master's residence.

He saw a few girls, different from the ones from this morning, taking care of her. They looked like they were slacking off quite a bit, but considering that they had nothing to do except literally just keep an eye on their sect leader.

He walked into the cold room and saw that his master's face was very comfortable and it looked like she was just sleeping.

"Hello," he greeted the girls. "Were there any changes since last night?" he asked.

The girls greeted him back and let him know that there was nothing of that sort happening. Apparently, she'd hadn't woken up a single time since she was asleep, not even a little movement.

'Her body must've really been exhausted,' he thought. Just fighting with the yang energy all day would have surely caused her very high distress.

"Are you guys giving her anything to eat?" he asked.

The girls looked at him with a weird look. "She's still unconscious. How could we give her anything to eat?" they asked.

"Ah, my bad," he said. 'I forgot this world doesn't have saline drips and such. Maybe they could give her some fluids— Or not. I guess cultivators don't follow the same rules as a normal sick person. As long as they have Qi, they should be fine,' he thought.

Now that he knew of Ma Rong's status, he decided to leave to do what he had been planning for the whole day.

"Oh right, did Zhou Mei or Fan Ruogang come here today?" he asked.

"Yes, for a while. But they left soon after," the girls said.

"Um… do you know where they are right now by any chance?" he asked. He needed at least one of their help.

"Uhh… not really. But they should be in their homes. I don't think they have anywhere else to go," the girls said.

"You guys don't have direct communications to either of them right?" Alex asked expecting nothing.

"No," all the girls said as they shook their heads.

"I see. Thank you anyway," he said as he turned around to leave.

"Oh wait," one of the girls said. "Sister Zhou's little sister should be in her house, and sister Zhou visits there a lot," she said.

Alex's eyes lit up. "Ah, that's right. Zhou Mei had a little sister. I'll ask her for her sister. Thank you," he said and left for sure this time.

He walked down the sect leader's mountain until he reached the sect valley and walked through the crowd. A few disciples turned around to look at him, but most inner sect disciples, let alone outer sect disciples, didn't even recognize him.

Only a few of them turned around to say their greeting to him at all.

Alex liked this invisibility he got despite being very popular in reality. The knowledge of him making a 60% harmony pill in the Annual Sect Competition was not something people could easily hide. Add to the fact that he was the sect leader's direct disciple, he was a direct contender with Wan Li for the most popular disciple in the sect.

He went past the sect valley and made his way to the Core mountain. The elders didn't stop him, and he easily went up the mountain.

'Oh, they already filled 2 more houses in the month I was away,' he thought as he looked through the houses. He finally reached the house that was his but gave away.

He sent his spiritual sense inside but didn't find anyone in. 'Hm… where'd he go?' he wondered, but quickly changed his thoughts and moved on to the next house.

He sent in his spiritual sense to check and smiled when he saw that all three of them were indeed there. He waited for a bit as it seemed like Zhou Mi was in an important step of the pill-making process. Once it seemed like she was over it, he finally walked up to the door.

KNOCK KNOCK

He knocked on the door and waited.

"Go and check who it is," Zhou Mei's voice could be heard from inside. Alex heard loud footsteps coming out of the house and smiled.

The door opened to reveal the large Kong Yuhan, who seemed to be a little annoyed. However, the moment he saw Alex, his face changed and he immediately got Alex into a tight hug.

"Brother Yu! You really are okay," he shouted out loud.

Alex smiled. "Yes, I am, Brother Kong. Sorry for worrying you," he said.

"It's okay. It's fine as long as you're fine. I was so afraid that you might have been really injured or something. I thought sister Mei was lying to me to give me false hope," Kong Yuhan said.

The two of them talked for a few more minutes before the Zhou sisters walked out.

"Yu Ming? Why are you here?" Zhou Mei asked as she walked out.

"Oh, I need your help a little. I can use Fanfan's help as well, but I don't know how to contact her at all," he said.

"Our help? What for? I doubt there is anything that I can teach you which you don't already know," she said.

Alex reached into his bag and brought out a pill bottle. "I need to know what this pill does," he said.

Zhou Mei instinctively took the pill bottle and opened it up to see what was inside. She took out one of the pink pills and placed it on her hands.

Alex was curious as to what she was trying to do and watched without saying anything. After a minute of checking the pill fully, she placed it back on the bottle and said, "I don't know what this pill is, so I can't help you."

Alex nearly burst out laughing when he heard that. "Uhh… I wasn't expecting you to know that," he said.

"Then? Do you know what this pill is? Maybe the name can help me," she said.

Alex shook his head and said, "I made this pill, and need your help with the testing. I wanted you to teach me how it works with the pill swine, how I'm supposed to understand what this pill does."

"Ohhh!" she said as she understood what he meant. "Wow, you made a pill of your own? Congrats, that's quite an achievement. Even Wan Li only has about 2 pills he made on his own, and neither of them came out any good. I, myself, have only made only one," she said.

Kong Yuhan and Zhou Mei were on the side, looking at him, absolutely dumbfounded.

"Br-Brother Yu, you made a new pill? How?" Kong Yuhan asked. "Just a few months ago, you didn't even know how pills were made."

"Haha," Alex gave a dry laugh. "I've had some good fortune come along my way."

Zhou Mei thought for a moment and said, "Alright, come with me. I will take you to the pill swine field to check your pills. I hope you have enough contribution points."

"Uhh… I think I'll manage," he said.

"Alright, practice what I taught you. I will return later," Zhou Mei said to her sister.

"Okay sister," she responded back.

Alex said farewell to Kong Yuhan and walked along with Zhou Mei. They quickly took a path and walked down the mountain on the other side and went to an open field behind the mountain with the alchemy garden on it.

"So that's what was behind those giant bushes," he said as he looked at the back half of the Alchemy garden.

"You've been inside there before?" she asked.

"Yeah, I used to work in the gardens at night, finding the requested ingredients," he said. "Master saw my talents at recognizing ingredients was fit for the job and gave it to me."

"Ah, I see. They haven't let us in for quite a while now, so I was a little confused as to how you even got inside. So you worked there huh?" she said as she walked.

Finally, they reached a section of the sect where a few elders were walking with many pigs behind them.

The place was massive, almost half as large as the sect valley, and all of it was filled with pill swines.

Alex got closer with Zhou Mei and they were stopped by an elder. The elder then saw who the disciples he stopped were and said, "Oh, it's you disciple Mei, did you make a new pill?"

"No, he did," Zhou Mei pointed behind her. The elder wasn't usually in the know about the disciples of the sect, so he got curious if he had ever seen Alex, but quickly stopped caring about who he saw.

"So you want to test on a pill swine huh? Do you know how it works?" he asked.

Alex shook his head.

"Alright, each pill swine you test on will cost you 500 contribution points. If the swine is fine by the end of your testing, you will get 250 contribution points back. However, If your pill ends up doing something irreversible to a pill swine, whether it be some physical or mental effects or death itself, you will not get any contribution points back. Do you understand," the elder said.

"Oh, uh…" Alex quickly took out his nameplate and asked, "Does my authority extend here too? I don't remember if master ever gave me that."

"What? What authority?" the elder asked, but still took the nameplate and checked it. His eyes quickly changed as he got serious.

"You are the Sect Leader's disciple that came back alive yesterday?" he asked.

"Oh yeah," he said.

The elder handed him back the nameplate and said, "Yes, your authority runs up to here. You can go inside and use any amount of swine as you wish. However, do try to be thoughtful of the people that work here and try not to use too many."

"I see. Thank you for advising me; I will keep that in mind," Alex said and walked past the elder.

Zhou Mei was pretty surprised when she saw what had just happened. She quickly ran behind him and asked, "What's going on? What authority were you guys talking about?"

"Oh, I have the authority to use whatever is there in this sect without requiring to pay a single contribution point," Alex said.

"Oh, right. I forgot you had that. Master never told me what it was for. He said you did something to gain all the contribution points in the world, but never what. Can you tell me?" Zhou Mei asked.

"Um…" Alex thought for a second. "It's quite a dangerous knowledge to have, so you will have to ask my master once she wakes up. She might scold me if I went around spreading sect secrets," Alex said.

"Oh, so it concerns the sect huh? Never mind then," she said and walked in front of Alex.

They reached a place where the pill swine were kept in simple, singular cages. When Alex saw them he was truly surprised. He was used to seeing pigs at his home with their pink snouts, open ears, and furry body.

However, these ones were different. These swine had no snout and instead had a human-like nose. They didn't have any fur on their body either. Only their ears were like that of a pig.

"These are creepy," Alex said as he looked at the uncanny face of the pig. If not for the cloven hooves and the ears, Alex would have certainly expected the pig to just be a really fat man in prison.

"That's what you get when you have something that is really close to a human in body composition," Zhou Mei said.

"Anyway, bring out the pills. Let's test them."