753 Blood Aura
Ingredients with blood aura usually came from a location where blood was spilled. Since blood aura wasn't natural, without death or at least heavily injured human or beast, such ingredients were impossible to obtain.
As such, many of the ingredients had mutated to the point that they were carnivorous and would kill any beasts that got close to them to improve themselves.
Blood Ginseng, a common rank ingredient was mostly vines above ground that would grab and kill any beasts that walked close by it.
Similarly, other ingredients also had evolved to kill beasts and humans for themselves.
As Alex recalled all of this, he realized the main problem he hadn't thought out before going out to buy a bunch of such ingredients.
It was the fact that any ingredient that had a blood aura was a byproduct of the death around it.
At the center of it all, the ingredient itself existed which had its own energy. As no ingredient had neutral energy, any ingredient he did put in the recipe would drastically change the final result and end up becoming a different pill from what it already was.
'I need pure blood aura and nothing else,' Alex thought. 'How can I do that?'
He started going through his mind once more to remember more about the blood aura, but he couldn't think of any ingredient that he had read about that did have only it.
As he thought more and more, Alex's mind went back to the time in the Demon realm when Song Shing attacked the door that wouldn't open.
The Song family were known as a bunch of Blood aura users whose entire arsenal revolved around fighting using blood aura.
Alex remembered the attack he did. He had brought out a vial of blood and used it to attack the door. The attack had been quite strong as well.
'Blood,' Alex thought as he realized. "Will blood work?"
He needed to try it out immediately. Alex thought about how he could find blood to use, but it would be hard to come by unless he went and killed some beasts.
However, even then it would be difficult.
"I can't use just blood," he thought. "Blood contains energy too."
He remembered the Blue Flame Monkey's blood that was also an ingredient for this part. The blood was of Fire attribute, so it was impossible for just blood to be an ingredient.
'Maybe I can keep the ginger vine in a blood overnight for it to gain blood aura?' he wondered.
With no other choice, Alex cut his palm and collected a bowl full of his own blood. He placed the ginger in the bowl, and left it aside to cultivate after eating a blood rejuvenating pill.
The whole night, he was anxious, but he managed to keep himself from getting distracted and focused on his cultivation.
The next morning, he got out of cultivation with a hopeful heart and went to check on the ginger vine.
Alex instantly took out the Ginger Vine and even without checking anything else, he knew he had passed somehow.
Having stayed in the blood overnight, the Ginger Vine was absolutely full of blood aura. While it wasn't of the same level as the Blood Spirit Ginseng, this was good enough for a True rank pill.
Alex excitedly thought of making the pill when the vine in his hand gave information about itself that immediately disappointed Alex.
The Fragrant Ginger Vine that was supposed to be a Wood Element ingredient, was now a Yang Element ingredient.
Having stayed in his blood overnight, the extreme yang from his body had messed with the ingredient.
"Dammit!" Alex cried out. He was so hopeful, and it had even worked. And yet, he still failed.
He started cursing at his own body for being so full of Yang. He needed blood from a body that was without yang.
'Wait,' Alex thought. 'No, I still have a way, don't I?''
Alex quickly brought out the Saint ingredient that was part of his rewards for winning the competition.
The Blizzard's Rainbow Core.
The fruit looked like a multicolored apple, and the moment Alex took it out, the surrounding chilled to a few degrees lower than it previously was. It wasn't the same sort of drop in temperature as the water that the princess had given him, but it was close enough.
Alex took a deep breath and started cultivating as he ate the fruit. The Yin energy from the fruit started invading Alex's meridians and fighting with the Yang energy in his body.
Very soon, Alex could feel the yang in his body lowering to a point where it was nonexistent.
It lasted an entire day and night as Alex took things slow, but somehow it felt like just a couple of hours for him.
When Alex opened his eyes the next morning, he could feel not a single bit of Yang in his body.
Using the opportunity, Alex immediately cut open his palm and gathered another bowl full of blood, and placed another Ginger into it.
Alex spent the next whole day once again cultivating and only stopped when it was time for the Ginger to be ready.
Alex took out the ginger from the bowl and was immediately surprised at the even stronger blood aura that was coming off of it. It was almost as if leaving it in the blood for a long time was helpful.
Alex took a deep breath to calm his mind as he took the Ginger out to check its properties.
"Yes!" he shouted out as he realized that the Ginger was still a Wood ingredient. Only now it was full of Blood Aura.
Alex took another deep breath as he started preparing the ingredients once more for the pill and started making it.
Without his yang body to make problems, and the perfected recipe after tons of retries, Alex had a really easy time making the pill.
There was still a lot of little fixing here and there left to do, but even with that, he managed to make an 82% pill.
Alex wanted to immediately eat it and test it, but he needed to be safe, so he continued heating the cauldron as he brought another set of different ingredients and made the True Nullifying pill.
As the pill was on its final stage, Alex started undoing the bindings on his puppet arm and it came off easily.
"I hope I do not need you anymore after today," Alex softly said as he finished the final stages on the True Nullifying pill.
As soon as the pill was formed, Alex got rid of both the fire and the heat in the cauldron.
At the same time, he brought out the healing pill and placed it in his mouth. The moment he swallowed it, Alex could feel a wave of energy pass through his body.
Alex immediately pulled out the True Nullifying pill just in case there was a problem, however, nothing bad happened yet.
As the energy moved around his body to repair what was broken, it finally reached his left arm.
Alex tried to keep away his anxiousness but that was impossible. For what felt like a long time, nothing happened, but then he felt a little itch on his stump.
Soon, the itch grew to an unstoppable degree and Alex felt like he needed to scratch it, but he held himself.
As the itch grew, Alex saw his stump wriggle as if going through a cramp. Just after that, it violently started expanding forward as bone, muscles, veins, tendons, and skins all started appearing one by one.
As if the pill had a knowledge of his genetic features, his left hand slowly grew to look exactly like the one he lost.
What was just until the elbow, grew to the wrist. Then the numerous bones of the palm started emerging as fingers grew out of it.
The bones were soon covered by muscles, which were then covered by skin. His fingers were bare for a few seconds before nails grew back on them.
Alex looked at his left arm in a daze as it grew to be exactly what it was supposed to be.
He moved his new arm a little. He grabbed stuffs. He felt the heat, the cold. He even hit it a little to feel the pain.
"I did it," he softly said to himself as it dawned on him that his arm was really back. "I really did it."
He had finally done what he had set out to do over 9 years ago.
