He told me about some other districts while we walked. Meanwhile, the scenery around us slowly changed. Vines draped the sides of an enormous pyramid. Shops, greenhouses, and other alchemy related buildings lie scattered by the dirt and grass road.

Dirt filled in gaping cracks in the walls, making space for bushes and weeds to grow. All the buildings had the same motley brown color, and trees grew wherever they liked. Roots penetrated houses and cut off roads. The district looked like the ruins of an abandoned city.

Maybe these buildings were ruins, but they certainly weren’t abandoned. The district had an incredible concentration of ambient Qi. Unlike the other places in the school, everybody here let their auras run free. The Qi from thousands of people filled the earth and air, dense enough to tickle my skin. The Qi seeped into the plants, making them stronger and more potent.

All the better for me. A dozen points of mana drained out and I used the subjugate skill on the plants around me. I felt what they felt and I could control their every movement.

Every one of my skills were useful beyond belief. With subjugate, I only needed a stroll around the school grounds to make it my territory.

We strolled into the pyramid. Countless auras spilled out from within. I let my own aura leak, just enough to appear as a second stage cultivator. Er Yi(the name he gave me), blinked twice but said nothing.

I touched a vine clinging to the pyramid and forced my mana into it. The mana seized the vine before traveling to others. My mana used the vines as pathways and all of it came under my control.

Er Yi gave me an odd look but didn’t say anything. All he saw was me putting my hand on a vine. My mana and skills were invisible, he couldn’t tell what I was doing.

We walked through the pyramid’s worn hallways. The smell of stale pot invaded my nostrils.

“Do you think they’ll let us observe one of the classes?” I asked.

“Why?” he asked, “I didn’t skip class to go to another class.”

I raised my eyebrows, “I thought you said you didn’t have anything to do. Plus, you can smoke whatever you want here.”

“Fine, but why do you want to go?” he said.

“To learn more about the school.” I walked into an open room.

The professor let us sit in on the class, saying “Anybody who shares a love for alchemy is welcome here!”

An alchemy master plaque hung in front of his classroom, but his alchemy was filled with holes. I didn’t try to point them out. I was only there to look for promising students.

The students hunched over their cauldrons, frowning in concentration. One was only cutting a cactus, but sweat covered his face.

I saw a piece of paper next to him. It read, “Introduction to Conception Stage Medicine Schedule.”

My eyes widened. They had half a year of three hour classes, just for making conception stage medicine? How?

Then I remembered the sheer number of herbs they needed to memorize. It was easy for me because I was The Cultivator, everything came to me by instinct. In reality, it was almost too complicated to comprehend.

I knit my eyebrows. It took two years of this to get the “alchemy trainee” title. I could shorten that to two months if I were the one teaching.

Er Yi tapped my shoulder, “I gotta head back. Some point class students paid me to protect them.”

I’d seen everything I needed to see, so I left with him. We parted ways near the golden tower. He went into the tower, and I went to fetch my map from the shop.

I started towards a nearby restaurant when a clamor struck my ears. It was a mix of screams, laughter, and crashes. Students flowed from the tower and entered the nearby restaurants. They chatted among themselves as if nothing happened. They wore pendants like Er Yi, although the symbols on them were different.

One group of students approached another and started fighting. I stared at them, wide eyed. One of them flew into a lamppost. I thought the force would blow the post off the ground, but it hardly even shook.

My back arched forward as a foot struck me from behind. Clutching my map, I stabbed a foot into the ground to stop myself.

What happened to the manners of the high class? I ran past them to see what was happening in the tower. Two dragons coiled around the top the tower peered at the fighting students. One of them opened its jaws and launched a ray of light launched from it. I ducked through the front gate before I could see where it hit.

The first floor was a huge lobby with a few fighting students, but most of the noise came from above. I found a staircase and ran until I hit the floor with all the noise.

One kid finished his chicken and gave the person sitting next to him a casual uppercut. Bodies hurled across the cafeteria, while others ate calmly. It was almost surreal. Maybe it’s play-fighting.

Kids huddling in tight circles for shelter. Students stepped over bloody bodies littering the floor. Hm, definitely not play-fighting.

Everybody wore a pendant displaying a symbol. Most showed a line or point. Rarer were people with a cross symbol, although there were still more than ten of them. Triangle symbols were even rarer. I only saw two. Nobody messed with them.

While most lines and points huddled, some participated in the chaos. Some fought voluntarily, some not.

A student wearing a line badge came at me with balled fists. I frowned, everybody here could hit hard enough to smash a brick wall. It wouldn’t hurt, but I’d still get punted. Believe it or not, I don’t like being punted. A tuft of silvery white hair appeared in front of me, and the kid walking at me fell to the ground twitching.

Er Yi turned and grinned, “That was your free trial.”

“I didn’t need it.” I narrowed my eyes, “Now tell me. What in hell is going on?”