Sect Leader’s Rise to the top! - Chapter 71

The Alchemy furnace was brought over within minutes and placed in front of Kai. The furnace itself looked like a small, bronze-colored pot.

“Considering the price tag, I thought it would be bigger…”, Kai thought to himself while inspecting the furnace.

[Qi-Detection]

[Low-Tier Alchemy Furnace] [Grade-2] [Qi:988]

“The Qi in this thing is actually pretty good. Most [Grade-2] items barely have over 100 Qi”.

Kai was pleasantly surprised. The furnace was only a few steps away from being considered as [Grade-3] by the system. If Kai ever figured out a way to increase the Qi inside of items, then he would have another high-grade object that he could use to create a D-Rank manual with.

Kai took the furnace and wrapped it in a small piece of cloth, then tucked it into his arms. He thanked the middle-aged man and left immediately. Kai didn’t want to waste time and decided to leave before the middle-aged man had a chance to change his mind.

A few moments after Kai had left, the smile on the middle-aged man’s face vanished. He sighed and turned to face a dark corner in the room.

“You can come out now…”

When he said this, a woman’s figure slowly walked out of a well-concealed door. If Kai was there, he would have recognized her as Mei Lee, the woman who had helped him buy his building.

“So that’s the young man you mentioned?, the one who you suspected to be a powerful Internal cultivator?…”

“Yes, Uncle…” said Mei Lee in a nervous voice.

“Well, there is no doubt about it…he is an internal cultivator. Also, the amount of vitality I sense from him tells me that he must be quite young…”

As the middle-aged man spoke, he slowly walked back to his crafting table.

“I’ve heard that he has some sort of history with that Qin family as well. The fact that he survived an encounter with that crazy family is impressive in and of itself. His survival means that he is either very powerful or he has powerful backing.”

The middle-aged man took a seat and continued working on carving the glowing stone before he spoke again.

“…And now it seems there is an alchemist in his camp as well. He seems to be the person we’ve been looking for…I believe you know what needs to be done, Mei?”

“Yes Uncle, I understand…”, Mei Lee said solemnly as she bowed her head again.

“Good, then all that is left is to show him the benefits of being on friendly terms with our Lee family…”

Outside the building, Kai was completely unaware of what the Lee family was plotting. He had a feeling that they wanted to ingratiate him to them for some unknown reasons, however, he wasn’t too worried about this.

“If that man is the most powerful figure in the Lee family, then I should be fine…”

Kai had been getting good at gauging his opponent’s strength even without using Qi-Detection. Based on his prior observation of the man’s Qi, Kai figured that the middle-aged man hadn’t crossed over to the Foundational Establishment stage yet. At this point, Kai was confident in fighting anyone below the Foundational Establishment Stage if he used all of his skills to the fullest.

Kai was leaving the Lee family’s auction house in a good mood when he suddenly remembered that he was still missing the alchemy ingredients to make the pills.

He had already scoured the open market and could not find a single ingredient that he needed. When Kai thought of this, he remembered the clerk from the alchemist store who had invited him to the ‘Pill Association’.

At the time, joining an organization hadn’t interested him but now that he was out of options, Kai was willing to listen to their proposal. “An association revolving around Alchemy should have access to a lot of alchemy ingredients right?…”, Kai quickly headed back to the alchemy store with this thought in mind.

When Kai arrived, it was nearing sunset. He walked into the store and was greeted by the same clerk.

“Mr. Kai, you’re back. Has your companion reconsidered the association’s proposal?”. The clerk left the counter and walked over to Kai with a beaming smile.

“Ah, well…Yes, but we have a few questions first…”, Kai remembered that he had told the clerk that he was just a liaison to an alchemist so he decided just keep going with it.

“That is fantastic news!, however, I may not be the best person to answer your questions. Please come with me, I will take you to my master’s workshop”.

The clerk quickly locked up the store and lead Kai to a carriage parked in a nearby alleyway. Kai followed the man into his carriage and they headed off to another location within the Gold district. When they arrived, Kai noticed that the building’s exterior looked very modest despite being in an affluent area. If someone wasn’t actively looking for the building, it would be completely overshadowed by the surrounding buildings.

The clerk opened the small wooden door and a sudden smell of medicine, more pungent than at the store, wafted by Kai’s nose.

Kai was led into the basement where he saw a frail old man busily tending to a massive flame. On top of the flame was an even bigger alchemy furnace. Kai estimated that this one was at least 10 times the size of the one he had just received from the Lee family’s Craftsmaster. Kai wondered how astronomically expensive this huge furnace would be as he followed the clerk into the room.

“Sir, I’ve brought the person that I mentioned in my letter. He has some questions for you…”. The clerk spoke nervously and with his back hunched.

“…” the old man simply nodded but made no other sound and didn’t even turn around. He was clearly more focused on tending to the large flame.

Kai wondered why they would make a flame in this large but enclosed space, but then quickly realized that the fire was not making any smoke which piqued his interest. The flames were obviously not normal so Kai made a mental note to ask about it later.

The clerk bowed his head and hurriedly left after gesturing for Kai to take a seat. Kai sat down and inspected the old man who had a mixture of white and grey hair. his arms were extremely skinny, to the point where Kai thought the man was malnourished.

“We’ll then young one, sorry to keep you waiting. What questions might you have for me I wonder?”. The old man’s voice was rough and gritty but also pleasing to the ears.

When their eyes met, Kai felt a completely different pressure than when compared to the Lee family’s Craftsmaster.

“This guy is the real deal….”, Kai thought as he subconsciously straightened his back.