"Oh.. Umm… if you are taking questions too then I- I have a few that I want to ask," Reya said timidly.
"Sure, go ahead and ask. You seem to be the only one to come to my class anyway," Ning said with a smile.
"Okay," she said and brought out a few questions she had written down.
"Ah, yes this…" Reya said and quickly brought out a small tied up cloth. She quickly opened it up and showed a bunch of powder in it.
"I was trying to make the Segmented Minds Pill, but it came out all powdered, instead of forming a pill. Can you help me understand why?" she asked.
"Oh, come here and let me see the powder," Ning said.
Reya walked up to Ning and showed the powder to him. Ning looked at it for a few minutes and said, "I see… where did you get the recipe?" he asked.
"I- uh- bought it at the Alchemy guild in the city a few weeks ago," she said.
"I see," Ning said. "Does the recipe mention what temperature your fire has to be towards the end after you've put in all the ingredients?"
"Um, it does. It says the temperature has to go very low very quickly," Reya said.
"What about your cauldron? Does it's temperature go very low very quickly once you've done lowering the temperature too?" Ning asked.
Reya thought for a second. "Ah! I see. I just need to make sure th cauldron's temperature follows accordingly," she said.
Ning smiled as he saw her realize the answer without having to spell it all out.
"Ok, next question. I have this pill recipe, but I don't have this one plant. It's very rare to find this plant out in the wild, and the only time it is found, it's impossible to buy it since it's so expensive," Reya said.
"Can you help me come up with an alternative, and thus a modified recipe too?" she asked.
"Oh, that's… asking for a lot," Ning said. "But let me try anyway."
He took the recipe and looked at the ingredient. "Eroded Roots of the Sniveling Weed… that's one rare ingredient for sure. Eroded… let's see… an ingredient with the same level of yin and wood energy should be… the Bark of the Nightwind Tree."
"Yes, you should be able to swap it with the bark. Use about half as much bark as you would the roots and you can easily make the pill. The only other change you will need is to put the next ingredient at half the interval as the one said in the recipe, and it should work perfectly," Ning said.
"The bark, huh… it certainly is much easier to find," Reya said as she got more thoughtful.
"Okay, another question…"
Reya kept on asking one question after another, and Ning answered all of them without a single hint of frustration in his eyes.
Surprisingly, all of her questions were quite advanced. If he had to put a grade on them, he would've guessed that they were around Grade 6's worth of questions.
He wasn't really sure about that however since he himself didn't know much about the grades and only based it off of that he knew something a grade 9 alchemist didn't.
Ning's class was supposed to run only for 3 hours, after which, he would be done for the day, and his class would be taken by another teacher that had his schedule for the day.
So, one the class ended, he had to say goodbye to Reya.
"Come again if you have any more questions. Also, bring your friends too if you can. I can help them understand a bit more too," Ning said.
"O-Okay. Thank you, Teacher Ning," Reya said and left.
With nothing else to do, Ning went to the staff room to spend his time. He socialized with other teachers to pass the time there.
"Did you get any students, Teacher Ning?" A teacher asked.
"Oh, Teacher Boel, haha you're here," Ning said to the old man.
"Oh, what about me?" he asked.
"I had a student come into my class because her friends lied to her and said that my class was yours," Ning said.
"Ah, was it Reya?" Boel asked.
"Oh, you know her?" Ning asked. Surprisingly, Teacher Boel remembered the name of a student when they would blend in with all the hundreds, if not thousands of students he saw everyday.
"Yes, of course. She is one of the best and brightest student we have in the Alchemy wing. Her knowledge and passion regarding Alchemy is not one to scoff at," Boel said.
"Unfortunately, such cannot be said for her social skills. She can't choose who her friends are and who her enemies are. Just because some of the other students act nice to her, she thinks they are her friends when all they want to do is see her fail."
Boel sighed.
"Oh, so the girls send her to me was not a prank, but deliberate choice to make her fail, huh?" Ning asked.
"Must be. Well, I hope you helped her at least. I don't want to see such a good child fail," Boel said.
"Haha, don't worry Teacher Boel. She was my only student for the day, so I spent all my 3 hours answering all of her questions," Ning said.
"Ah, that makes me feel much better. Now that I think about it, I think I will send her to you for a few days so that you can teach her freely. This will help her stay away from the other's influence," Boel said.
"That sounds like a good idea," Ning said with a smile.
"Anyway, I need to go down to the city to do some work in the guild. See you later Teacher Ning," Boel said and left.
Ning didn't have anything he wanted to do or could do, so he spent the rest of the time inside the staff room, reading through the various books trying to see if there is anything that could help him learn some more.
Unfortunately, he knew it all. So, he walked back to underground to his room to cultivate and wait for another day.
