After eating a few pills, Pearl was healed as well. Then together, he and Alex started cultivating.
They cultivated without stopping for the next 5 days as it took Alex that much time even with all of his pills to return back to how strong he used to be.
"I should have been close to breaking through to the 5th realm, but that has been pushed back a little," Alex said softly. "I need better cultivation though if I want to fight the Emperor."
"He's strong, isn't he?" Pearl asked. "How can you become strong enough to fight him in a short time?"
"By being reckless, Pearl," Alex sighed. "By being reckless."
He had been giving it some thought but he truly saw no other way to do what must be done. He needed to get stronger and the only way to do that was to do what Scarlet did to become strong once again.
In the same way, all the players got strong quickly, while forcing their cultivation base to not be as stable.
"I'm going to have to start breaking through before I could possibly be ready for it. My Qi quality with increase thanks to that, but the chances of me going through Qi Deviation will increase as well."
"It's dangerous," Pearl said.
"It is," Alex said. "But I must do it."
"Then I'll do so as well," Pearl said. "How do we do it?"
"How else?" Alex asked. "We eat beast cores."
Alex flew away and went to find the old man in deep cultivation inside of his cave. Coming close, Alex could now feel his strength once again.
Zhou Linfan looked no different to Alex than what he had been like when Alex was without a cultivation base. However, now that he had one, the old man felt like a hidden master with a cultivation base so strong that Alex felt threatened to even get close enough.
"Are you finally free enough to come to talk?" the old man asked as he slowly opened his eyes to stare at Alex.
Alex smiled back at the old man and nodded. "Indeed. You must have had a lot of questions, senior. Thank you for your patience."
"I do indeed have a lot of questions," the old man said. "How are you feeling? Anything wrong with your cultivation base?"
"No, everything is fine," Alex said. "I'm as good as I was before I was crippled."
"And your Nascent Soul? Was it hurt? Was it healed?" he asked.
"It's doing good too," Alex answered.
The old man had a lot of questions to ask of Alex, but most of them tread around Alex's secrets, so he couldn't get much answer from Alex.
"You're an alchemist, so can you make me some pills?" the old man asked in the end. "I haven't used a pill in a very long time."
"I… can't make pills right now," Alex said. He couldn't let the soldiers that were flying around know where he was. "But I can give you the ones I have already."
Alex brought out a few pills and handed them over to the old man. "There are some pills to help you with your cultivation, some to heal your wounds, some are antidotes, and some for your spirit."
"Is that so?" the old man asked and took the pills.
"Also," Alex asked. "Do you have any Earth or Water spiritual roots?"
The old man frowned a little. "I do," he said. "I have an Earth spiritual root."
"You should eat one of these and cultivate right away," Alex said, handing over a single pill. "It will help improve your Spiritual root to a Superior one."
"What?" the old man asked in surprise. "There is a pill that can improve my spiritual root?"
"Yes," Alex said. "I would've given you one for Water root too had you had it."
"I don't," the old man said. "Only Metal, Fire, and Earth."
Alex thought of the Flame Mastery technique that could be used to help the man improve his Fire spiritual root too, but that required a large amount of Fire treasure which there was not right now.
The only good place Alex could remember for that was the Fire region around the 13th Volcano in the Northern Continent.
As for Metal, Alex didn't even have a way. He himself only raised it to the Supreme level by accident.
"By the way, how many beast cores do you have?" Alex asked the old man. "I was wondering if you could give some to me and my beast."
"Beast core?" the old man asked with a puzzled look. "But why? You already got your cultivation back."
"My body is capable of converting beast cores to Qi, so I was hoping to eat some and start breaking through," Alex said.
"To the 5th Saint Soul realm?" the old man asked. He didn't think Alex was ready yet. His aura gave off the impression that Alex had only been in that realm for half the time needed.
"To the 5th realm and above. I need to get stronger quickly," Alex said.
The old man frowned upon hearing that. "Does this have in any way something to do with the fact that you want revenge on the emperor?" he asked.
"That… is exactly the reason I'm doing this," Alex said.
The old man couldn't help but sigh in response. "Okay, I understand that you might be very angry with the Emperor right now and want to become as strong as you can, as quickly as you can, to get revenge against him, but that is not the right way."
"Look at me. I have a stronger reason than you to be angry with him. He killed all of my family without cause and made me an orphan. My entire life has been about killing him, but even I know that I'm not strong enough to do so. Not yet."
"Truth is, I might never be strong enough to defeat him, and the only way to get even remotely close to being as strong as him is to rush through my cultivation realm. However, I know that the moment I do that, I have already lost."
"Rushing through your cultivation realm just for revenge is not the right thing to do, young man. Because the moment you do, your loss is all but sealed."
Alex said nothing for a while taking in the old man's words. He could see the logic in that, the wisdom that came from being over 5 thousand years in pursuit of that very goal.
"You are correct," Alex said. "I know that rushing into things isn't a good idea at all, especially when it is your cultivation base."
The old man nodded in agreement.
"However, you are missing 2 pieces of vital information," Alex said.
The old man raised an eyebrow. "And what exactly is that piece of vital information?" he asked.
"First." Alex put up a finger. "You failed to take into account that it is me who will be rushing through my cultivation base, and my body is unique."
"Oho!" the old man was intrigued. "And the second one?"
Alex took a deep breath. "Second, if I don't meet with the Emperor again for a trade within the next 2 and a half years, I will die."
