“Whew,” I said, as I finished the first cycle of refinement. I picked up a piece of paper and began writing down the formula for making the pill. My brush hovered at the top of the page. “Hm.”

This was my first original pill. Nobody other than me could make this pill. Naming should have been a mundane process, but this one felt like it carried more significance.

“Total Buff Pill,” I wrote. I crumpled the paper and threw it into the bin.

The pill was dull golden brown and the size of the tip of my thumb. “Brown Invincibility Pill,” I wrote.

I threw that one out as well.

A thought flitted through my head. I put the brush on another paper and wrote the first thing that came to mind. “Vince,” I jolted down. My eyes closed in satisfaction. Below that, in smaller text, I wrote, “Pill of Totality.” Then I slowly recalled all the steps and traced them out on sheets of paper. I wrote every painstaking step in the conception and refinement process.

I didn’t try to start the second cycle of refinement. I knew I would fail. I was improvising the method as I went, I was lucky enough to have finished the first cycle without burning the pill, but the second cycle was exponentially more difficult than the first. I saved the pill and put it aside.

I moved on to creating more Pills of Totality. Unlike other alchemists, I had an infinite pool of every herb I touched. I could keep making these things for as long as I could stay awake.

Of course, I was also conscious the power “The Cultivator” gave me. One was defensive, but the other was economic. If I wasn’t careful, I could upset the billions of little balances that made the economy. I had to keep reminding myself to not go too crazy. Most of the pills I made were strictly for fun. Selling them would ruin my economy.

But what did I know about economics? There was no way for me to control this power.

Unless, of course, I kept it on a small scale. I couldn’t cause too much harm if I kept myself in check.

A law book lay among the stack of books I still hadn’t unpacked. It was titled “Grand Flames City Guidelines.”

This city had no laws. There were only soft guidelines, most of which could be broken without consequence if you were powerful enough. Although the sects did police the public, their policing was based on whim and personal judgment.

To boil down the book into a sentence : Might makes right, but there are still social consequences.

Everybody had incredible freedom, even the weak. Nobody would stop you from beating somebody up in broad daylight, but nobody would stop somebody else from beating you up either.

Which meant I could do whatever I wanted. Nobody could stop me. There was no supreme government to smite me or my dubious activities.

I heard the door creak open. “Ah, there you are. Set that over with the seeds please” Hui Ming walked through with a suitcase of money. “Do you know what this is?” I held up a pill.

“Yes,” her eyes widened, “It’s a Golden Transformation Pill.”

I lifted a bottle and the Golden Transformation Pill dropped to the bottom, along with ten other identical pills. I grinned at her.

“Are those all…?”

“Yep, all of them are at the sixth cycle, too,” I said. “You can’t tell anybody about what I’m about to show you.” She nodded.

I tossed her a seed. It turned into a Six Petal Goldflower as it flew through the air. “I can make as many of these as I want. Cool, huh?”

“Very, uh, cool,” she replied shakily. “Are you going to give one to the Blue Fire Sect head?”

“No. She needs to learn to take care of herself. I already saved her life once and gave her the ingredients for the Golden Transformation Pill. I’m not her father.” I said. “But you’re different. You’re my responsibility.” I beckoned her forward.

Damn, now I feel like a sugar daddy.

But I had to make her as powerful as possible. She was the only person I could trust.

I gave her the first cycle Pill of Totality. “This is an extraordinary pill, unique in this world. It directly strengthens and heals every part of your body, on top of improving your senses. You are to take one every day.”

I got up to get her more medicine. I poured bottles and boxes into her hands until she couldn’t carry any more. “Take those slowly. Each of them are labeled, so you’ll know what each of them are. You should take a bunch of those Qi boosting ones. Eat them like you would eat rice. You should be able to get to the fifth stage in two days if you take enough of them. With the Golden Transformation Pills, getting to the sixth stage in a week shouldn’t be difficult.”

She looked at me wide eyed. “From the fourth stage to the sixth in less than a week? Ar- Are you sure?”

“Yep,” my fingers toyed with the edges of the Pill of Totality. “I’ll give you some more later. Drop those in your room and meet me outside. I have a small project I need your help on.”

Her hands quivered and her body rocked back and forth. Her head bobbed up and down and she disappeared.

This house had three bedrooms, one master bedroom, and a decently sized living room. Unlike the fancy houses in the Blue Fire Sect, this place was more… normal. I liked it this way. It was like my old apartment.

The couch beneath me creaked like an old man’s bones. I’d been sitting in the rickety thing for a long time. It was time for me to do something more interesting.

I walked to the front door and touched the white walls surrounding it. The walls were painted white, but years of dirt and grime had turned it gray and yellow, like my apartment back in that old world.

It had been so long since I thought about that world.

I’m a lion in a dog eat dog world. Things in this world were so much easier.

Things were easy here, not that they were hard back in the other world. But I wouldn’t move back, not even to see my parents.

It was likely that my other classmates had also been teleported here. Looking for them, though, was too difficult. The Grand Flames City contained at least ten million people, unless they decided to stick their neck out on purpose, finding people was almost impossible.

I wonder how they’re all doing. I hope they’re all doing well, especially Brian and Jessica.

I saw Hui Ming waiting outside through a dull window and stopped reminiscing. “Sorry, I got caught up in something,” I put my hand on a doorknob, cold as mint, and twisted.

Light flooded in. I squinted and walked out, closing the door behind me. Hui Ming, who was looking at me expectantly, gave me a small wave.

The rest of my estate was also covered in trees. I was walking into my own paradise, where everything was under my control. A sigh of content escaped my lips.

The wind rustled the tree leaves. The rustles sounded like soft drizzling rain, as if there was a waterfall off in the distance.

We walked to the front of the estate, where a runty gate stood. A gate was supposed to be powerful and intimidating. This one was a wet rat, shivering in the snow. It had done well to survive so long. I stopped, staring at the gate for half a minute.

Hui Ming fidgeted with her dress. “Master? What are we doing?”

“Just a small project. Let’s start by destroying this gate.”