"L-lousy pill?" the elders couldn't be surprised to hear him call his own pills lousy, especially given that they had heard about his pills reaching 100%. What could it be that he was going to give them that was better than those pills?
Alex suddenly stood up. "Let's go outside, I need your help to find the perfect location for it, headmaster," he said.
"Perfect place? What sort of place might you be looking for?" Bai Qiyi asked.
"Hmm, it should be a place that is controlled by the sect, but a place without much activity if possible," Alex said. "But it also must be easily accessible to students who want to go there, so no forbidden sections."
"We… have a few of those places," Bai Qiyi said.
"Would you consider the mounds around the sect one of such?" Alex asked.
Bai Qiyi thought for a bit. "Yeah, it surely would," he said.
"And do any of the mounds have Spirit veins under them? Or even close to them," Alex asked.
"I believe so," Bai Qiyi said. "Even if there is not, we can place one in there if needed. We have spare veins after all."
"Spare veins… let me guess, it's from your attack on the Western Continent?" Alex asked.
"Uhh… yes," the sect leader said. "I believe that's where it came from."
"May I ask why your ancestors participated in the war?" Alex asked. "It surely wasn't because you thought the people of the Western Continent deserved the punishment, right?"
Bai Qiyi looked around for his ancestors to answer. After all, he had only just become the sect master a century ago and didn't have much knowledge of the past.
"We… we needed resources to grow our sects," one of the ancestors said. "Most of our previous ancestors had died while fighting Xue Kuangren, so we were forced to find resources to help ourselves. The war just happened to be something that helped us."
"I see," Alex said. "Let's move on."
If it was a decade ago, he might have tried and persuade these people to give back what they stole from the Western Continent, but now that he was the King of the Southern Continent, he had no right to speak on behalf of them.
So, unless someone from the Western Continent itself came to ask them for it, they were most likely never going to return the items.
Alex walked out of the room and soon everyone followed him. The sect master ordered one of the people next to him to bring a spirit vein from the treasury just in case they needed it.
"What exactly are you planning on doing, Yu M— I mean, Alex?" Tai Guan asked.
"You said you had to use a lot of resources to help my aunt become what she is today, right?" he said. "Now, while I cannot give you the resources back myself, I can make it so you save a similar amount of resources in the future. Most likely you will save a lot more than anything you could ever spend on my aunt."
The ancestors got more and more curious now.
"What exactly is it though?" Tai Guan asked as she couldn't contain her curiosity.
"You'll find out soon enough," Alex said.
They arrived outside the sect walls, in front of one of the 12 massive natural rock pillars, on top of which the disciples of the sect trained every morning.
Since it was evening right now, no one was currently training here, making it the perfect time for everyone to do what they wanted to do.
"Choose a location here," Alex said. "I would suggest making it a spot everyone can go to regardless of where it is they are training."
"Uhh… then that place? Between the two pillars?" one of the ancestors pointed. It was the closest location on average from every single pillar while also being just outside the sect walls.
"Is there a spirit vein here? If not, you should place one here," Alex told them.
The ancestors nodded and immediately started checking the location. They did sense that there was a spirit vein, but it was a common spirit vein, which Alex couldn't really work with.
"Change it," he told them.
A few ancestors immediately got to work as they took out the common spirit vein from the ground and replaced it with a Saint spirit vein.
The replacement took no more than 15 minutes as multiple ancestors quickly got the work done. Once the dirt was replaced and everything was back to normal.
Everyone looked nervously, waiting for Alex to do whatever it was he was going to do. The ancestors were curious about what it was he was doing and nervous that it would not be as good as getting another pill recipe.
Alex walked away from the group and arrived on top of the land that was just refilled. He looked around for a few seconds to find a perfect spot and looked at his shoulder before nodding.
The ancestors were surprised when the bird that was sitting on his shoulder suddenly moved. The bird flapped its wings once and out of nowhere burned a colorful fire in front of Alex.
The ancestors were entranced by the fire, but they weren't sure what to make of it. Was that it? Was the fire what was better than a lousy pill?
Graham and Hao Ya realized what was happening, but the rest of them, including Liz and Ronron, were equally unaware.
"What is this?" Bai Qiyi couldn't help but ask.
"Oh, I thought you would recognize it," Alex said. "Do you not?"
The ancestors shook their heads.
"This is Phoenix fire," Alex explained.
Immediately, the faces of the many ancestors changed from confusion to shock as they realized what they were looking at.
"Tha-that's Phoenix fire?" one of them asked.
"Yes," Alex said "I'm sure you know what a phoenix fire is capable of right?"
"It can destroy almost anything and can also heal any injuries," one of them spoke. The ones that didn't know about it were finally realizing what it was.
"Yes, but not this one," Alex said. "I do not wish to give you a weapon that you can use against someone else, so this fire won't destroy anything, so long as you don't touch it. All it will do is heal whatever injuries one may have. It's useful, right?"
The ancestors couldn't help but nod.
"But… how did that fire just get here?" one of them asked. "Is that bird on your shoulder… a Phoenix?"
Alex smiled. "I don't think you can keep hiding anymore," he said.
The group was a little confused about who he was talking to when the bird on Alex's shoulder suddenly grew in size and landed in front of them all.
Scarlet's body slowly started glowing, gaining many colors that were the same as that of the fire behind her. She stood tall and proud, and her cultivation base pulsed around her.
The ancestors watched in shock as they finally realized that they were in the presence of a noble Phoenix, which also happened to be one of the beings with the strongest cultivation base they had ever seen.
"Let me introduce her to you," Alex said. "This is Feng Nuanhuo, otherwise also known as Scarlet, and she is the Phoenix Ruler of the Southern Continent."
