There was a lot of beast blood in the treasury—that is, until Lucia drank it all. Old Bai wore a really pained expression on his face the whole time Lucia was drinking, but he didn’t say or do anything to stop her. Beast blood has many practical uses: Watching Lucia drink it is like watching her drink money. The best blood probably has a deeper meaning for the disciples of the Holy Beasts Sect, but, well, since the majority of them don’t have their limbs anymore, there isn’t really anyone left who’ll need it.

“Ooh.” Lucia stood up, then she sat back down. She crushed an empty bucket with her butt and exhaled. “Whew. Um….” She yawned. “Go on and make the virility pills without me. I’m going to rest here for a … second….” By the time she finished her sentence, her eyes were closed, and her ears and tail were drooping. With a thud, she fell over backwards, and snores rang out, echoing off the treasury walls. Beside her, Mrs. Feathers was sitting with her eyes closed.

I looked at Old Bai, and he looked back at me. Without saying anything, he broke eye contact and marched up to Lucia. I wasn’t worried about him hurting her or anything. If he did, he’d be struck dead by heavenly punishment. Could the lightning from the heavens reach someone this far underground? Obviously. If it couldn’t, people would easily skip their tribulations by hiding in an underground shelter. As I expected, Old Bai didn’t attack Lucia; instead, he opened the pouch by her waist and pulled out a woman, his disciple, Hu Shen. …Did Lucia form a contract with her? I know I didn’t. “Old Bai, stop right there.”

“Master Ilya,” Old Bai said. There was a strained expression on his face. One of his hands was hovering over his disciple, ready to free her from her restraints. “I don’t want my disciple to suffer the same fate as the rest of my sect. Do you think you can let her go?”

“Is working under me that bad?” I don’t think it is…. Even Old Bai pretty much accepted the terms and conditions I drafted up.

“You’ll let her work under you?” Old Bai asked and raised his eyebrows. “I thought you would cut her limbs off.”

Oh, c’mon. “I only helped Lucia remove the limbs of sky-realm experts who would contribute more to my strength as four weapons instead of as one person.” From my interspacial ring, I took out a piece of paper. “Hu Shen, was it? Here, sign this if you want to live.”

Old Bai’s expression relaxed. “I thought your criteria for selecting people was random. If what you said just now was really the truth, why did you dismember Old Lan’s disciple?”

“I didn’t like him.”

“…And Old Hong’s disciple?”

“I didn’t like her.”

“You…, aren’t you afraid of someone attempting to kill you despite the heavenly punishment?” Old Bai asked. We both watched as Hu Shen signed the contract with her one free hand that could still move.

“There probably will be one or two people desperate enough who’ll try to kill me, or maybe they’ll just be out of their minds like Crazy Hong. Either way, I’m not too worried.”

“Why?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” The Holy Beasts Sect might be defeated, but the members still have lots of pride. I washed away some of it with blood and fear, but these people have been the strongest cultivators of the Immortal Continent for hundreds of years. It’s no surprise Old Bai’s looking for a way to set himself free. “If you’re ever tired of living, you can attack me to find out.”

Old Bai stared at me for what felt like a long time. In reality, he probably only looked at me for two seconds. “I’m still looking forward to becoming an immortal. I won’t let myself die before then.” He shook his head. “The squirrel wanted us to craft the virility pill while she slept. The core of the world tree is right there, but can you craft the pill by yourself?”

“Yes, it shouldn’t be an issue.”

Old Bai sighed as he freed Hu Shen. “As expected from the most talented disciple of Pill Valley.”

It didn’t take too long to reach the place where the Holy Beasts Sect stored their alchemical materials. Crafting the virility pill is a long and arduous process. It takes several days of intense concentration to refine the ingredients. One mistake could end up in the materials being wasted. Under normal circumstances, an alchemist would set up a formation to gather qi for himself to make sure he doesn’t run out in the middle of the process. Of course, I didn’t have to do that. Instead, I pulled out a stove with a bunch of branching arms.

“What’s that?” Old Bai asked. He and Hu Shen stared at me as I placed the stove down onto a box that I took out of my interspacial ring. I opened the side of the box and threw a bunch of spirit stones inside.

“This is my personal alchemy stove that can craft nearly any pill in existence.” I pressed on the box that the stove was resting on, and an interface appeared on its surface. I scrolled through it until I found the option for virility pills. On the branching arms of the stove, a few words appeared, telling me which ingredient had to be placed where. Once I loaded everything onto the stove, the world tree core included, I pressed the start button. “You see, anything a person can do, a formation can do just as well—maybe even better. Alchemy is very similar to cooking. You have to add the right ingredient at the right time, and all I did was simply automate that process.”

“Can this even be counted as alchemy anymore?” Old Bai asked. “Alchemists study for countless years to understand how to refine materials, how to control their flames. How can a process like that be automated? No two herbs are alike, and each have to be processed in a similar yet different manner. Is your alchemy stove that delicate?”

“Yep.”

“…Really?”

“Uh huh.”

“Those numbers counting down…,” Old Bai said. “Does that mean, in three days, a virility pill will appear without any additional input on your part?”

“Mhm.”

“…How did you create something like this?”

“Pill Valley spent a trillion spirit stones to buy the design for the downgraded version of this stove. Right now, you’re too poor to even afford that, and you want to buy the blueprints for this one? Come back when you have a quadrillion spirit stones.”