"Master, is everything okay?" Alex asked after seeing Ma Rong not speak for a while as she stared at the pill in her hand.
"Yeah, yeah. Everything is fine," She said, but her eyes painted a different picture. She kept staring at the pill in her hand and said nothing else.
"31%, that's good right?" Alex asked.
"Yes, it's very good," Ma Rong said. "You don't need any more learning at all after this. You just need to keep practicing making the different pills, and you will get a lot better soon."
Alex nodded, but he didn't believe her. There were many different ways to improve even right now. He could learn how to improve the recipes to make a higher harmony pill. He could learn what the mysterious Structure and Compositions truly were. He could learn, even before trying, what ingredients could mix up to be used in any pill.
He knew he needed a lot more training, perhaps from someone, perhaps just himself, but he knew he needed them.
He didn't tell his master this, however. He didn't want her to think she wasn't teaching him enough.
'Once I find out more about these things, I will let her know about them,' Alex thought.
"You made a few mistakes, right?" Ma Rong asked.
"Huh? Ah, yes. I felt there were a few things I missed here and there because it was my first time," Alex said.
"Hmm, that means you should really be making some better pill. Maybe closer to 35% or more," Ma Rong thought out loud. "Here, take these 2 remaining sets and keep practicing. I will go deal with the sect matters I have neglected for a while."
Alex nodded. He was about to leave when he remembered something. "Ah right, master. I don't have any cultivation method. Do you know what I should do?" he asked.
"You don't have any?" Ma Rong asked, and remembered that he had just entered the True realms.
She fell into thought for a bit, not letting any of her inner voice out. After a while, she finally spoke.
"There are some True realm cultivation methods in the library, but I doubt you would want them," she said. "They are all either Mortal or Earth grade methods and given how fast you cultivate, you would want something better, I'm sure."
Mortal and Earth grade, those truly were terrible in his eyes. If possible he wanted his methods to be at least Heaven grade.
"I have a heaven grade technique I use that my master gifted me when I graduated. Maybe I can gift it to you since you have graduated too," Ma Rong said.
She brought out an old book from her storage bag and handed it to Alex. "Take care of this book, okay? Grandmaster paid a lot for this book," she said.
Alex took the book and looked at it. The book was old, decrepit, and the outer cover was torn at places. He flipped the book and fortunately the inside of the book was fine.
"Winter Moon Cultivation method?" Alex read the title. "I will check it out later. Thank you, master."
Alex left her place. He went back to his house and sat down for half an hour to make the Spirt Weed Pills once again.
He made 3 different pills this time. 2 were split up, 1 was full. The harmony came out to be 22% and 23% for the 2 pills, which told Alex that he had a lot more potential in the pill which he could refine once he had better cultivation.
The 2nd pill was 36%, which also let him know that he really needed a higher density Qi to work with the True pills.
"Fortunately, I have a cultivation method now," Alex thought and brought out the new book.
He had no intention of destroying the book as it was a gift from his master, so he started reading it, rather than using the game's system.
The cultivation method, despite looking very difficult and cryptic was actually pretty simple. All it did was mention a route in his meridians through which he was to circulate his Qi every time he cultivated.
That would help the surrounding Qi to converge onto him and increase his cultivation slowly.
Alex kept on reading and understanding more and more about the technique. He felt like he could start cultivating now without just meditating and waiting for it to automatically start.
Now that he knew what to do, he was confident that he could start it whenever he wanted. That made him a little happy.
He kept on reading and everything else about the book was normal. However, when he reached the end, he read something that troubled him a bit.
"Best used by a person with high affinity to Yin?" Alex was surprised to read. His master was a person with a high affinity to Yin. It was very high.
'Was that why grandmaster paid a lot to buy this book? Because master had good affinity with Yin?' he thought. He felt like he could understand his grandmaster's thought process.
"Master had a Yin constitution from the start, so he must've gone far and wide to find this method for her since it matched her perfectly," Alex thought. "But… will this work for me?"
High affinity to Yin was not exactly how he would describe himself. Having a body that was focused on Yang, he was sure that he couldn't really learn the method.
"But it says affinity to Yin, not Yin focused body. I do have a Yin spiritual root, which does make me have an affinity to Yin. I wouldn't be able to properly learn the Flickering Shadows technique if not for that."
"So… it should work?" Alex wasn't sure, but he was hopeful. He continued reading the method and right after he finished, he got a notification.
«Congratulations on learning 'Winter Moon Cultivation Method'»
"Aw, yes!" he exclaimed. His hope didn't betray him. "Great! This works," he said with a wide smile. Somehow, he had learned a Yin affinity cultivation method.
"Alright, I should have trained enough back in the secret realm to breakthrough right now, right?" Alex thought.
He brought out a healing true pill and ate it without hesitation. He had no wounds, so the pill instead turned fully into Qi, giving him the required amount to break through to the next realm.
Alex opened up the status page and without any sort of hesitation, hit the breakthrough button.
The Qi that was inside him started moving around his meridians. Surprisingly, the route they took was the same as his new cultivation method.
Alex waited for it to quickly complete moving completely, however, the Qi wasn't moving quickly at all. In fact, it was struggling to move through his body.
"What's going o—"
Before he could finish his sentence, the Qi in his meridians all vanished as they left his meridians and his body, giving him a feeling of backlash from the sudden release of Qi.
Had it been more Qi, Alex surely would have suffered some damage to the meridians. Had his meridians not been through body cultivation, he could've suffered some damage too.
Fortunately, none of that happened, but what did happen was worrying. He didn't feel his strength increase at all.
He had failed to break through at all.
