Eternal Cultivation of Alchemy
chapter-2170

Pill Fusion was a skill that would be good to have, but not necessarily one he would need for most of his life. For someone like him who could easily form pill clouds with his talent, gaining the necessary energy for the pill without having to fuse multiple of them.

Still, Alex was more than happy to learn something new. It had been so long since he had learned something that wasn't a skill or a pill recipe.

Since the day he formed the first pill cloud back before the mad immortal kidnapped him away, this was the very first thing he had learned.

He got ready to learn the technique, only to be told that there was no technique at all.

"No technique? So do I do it manually?" Alex asked.

"Of course," Silvermist said. "Were you expecting a technique?"

"I was," Alex said. "But I suppose it makes sense that I should be able to do it with just the understanding of what it is."

Silvermist nodded. "Do you want to see me make one before you give it a try yourself?" he asked.

Alex nodded. There was no harm in seeing his master at work.

Silvermist pulled Bloodstone back out as well and took two of the pills Alex had just made prior along with 16 others. He placed the pills inside the cauldron and began pouring his Qi to move it around.

Alex frowned a little. There was no fire, no heat. He should have expected as much, but alchemy without fire was still an unusual event to witness.

The lid was open, so Alex could see the multitude of colors that flashed around the cauldron. His Demon Eyes could see every little instance of Qi, and what he saw befuddled him.

It was not the energy from the pills that was overwhelming there, but rather his master's Qi. Divine Qi was in a league of its own, and Alex's eyes were overwhelmed with colors, mostly green and blue.

He focused beyond the colors and finally saw the pills as they were pulverized within the cauldron, their energy escaping from them. Silvermist waited until all of the energy was out of the pills before pulling the powder together to form a big lump.

The Qi around the powder slowly converged on it, pushing it from all sides, making it more and more compact. It happened slowly, but only because Silvermist wanted Alex to see all the details clearly.

Once the pill was of a certain size, he let it be and focused on the energy instead. He gathered it all with his Qi and began focusing it together, compressing it so that it retained its density even after it was let go of.

Alex knew a similar technique that he hadn't ever had the chance to use, one he learned from Senior Yang. It was a technique to compress lower-grade Spirit Stones to turn them into a higher-grade one.

That was how Senior Yang had done all of the incredible things he had managed to do while living in a place with no Qi at all.

What he saw before him reminded him of that exact technique.

'The essence of it is similar,' Alex thought. 'Forge a higher grade of energy with your own Qi and Intent, and force it to remain that way forever.'

He understood the concept easily.

Silvermist then used a pill formation technique when the energy settled into a stabilized state, and then created the new pill. Alex looked at the pill, but Silvermist didn't give him much chance. He brought it out and placed it on a pill tester immediately, waiting for it to show the number it had reached.

The pill tester revealed the new pill had a harmony of 92%.

"Oh, only 92%?" Alex said in surprise. "I would've assumed it was going to be much higher."

"I wanted to show you this so you don't rely on the pill's quality in terms of its harmony. What Harmony shows is just how much of the pill is filled with energy, not necessarily how good that energy is. The only thing you can rely on is your experience as an alchemist. The instincts you will grow as you become a better Alchemist."

He handed the pill over to Alex for him to test. Alex grabbed the pill and the very first thing he noticed was the weight. It was heavier than a normal pill, and not a natural amount at that. It felt heavier than two pills would be together, as though the weight had been enhanced along with the energy.

It also felt very solid to the touch, not soft at all like regular pills did. He felt the aura surrounding it and that too was much stronger. He understood what his master meant now by the energy of the fused pills matching pills that had a few pill veins.

"Do you think you can do that?" Silvermist asked.

Alex nodded slightly. "I think I understand the gist of what I must do. Everything else will depend on how few mistakes I make," he said, taking out two pills of his own.

He brought out Memory, and unlike his master, he did not open the lid. He did not have that sort of ability to enhance energy in a pill while having it remain open.

He quickly manipulated the two pills until all of the energy within them was released into the cauldron, filling it up very quickly. Memory was of a small size at the moment, so there wasn't much room in there at all.

Alex focused on the powder at first, bringing it all together to form a single sphere. Once made, it was about the size of an eyeball. Now, he needed to compress it to the size of a thumbnail.

He pushed against the powder from all sides with his Qi and found it remarkably easy. It was no different from hammering down metals to compress them.

The pill remained at the size of the thumbnail once Alex was done with it. As nothing but a simple physical matter, they were easy to push together. Compared to that, the energy released from the pill was going to be much, much more difficult.

He gathered the energy together before him and compressed it slowly at the center of the cauldron. He pushed against the energy, not just with his Qi, but also his Intent.

He needed to do the work on both fronts to make this happen. The energy shrunk more and more, condensing to become about half the size they previously were.

Alex frowned a little at that moment. 'How much am I supposed to compress?' he wondered. He had genuinely no idea how much energy could fit into the pill he had formed.

'Better be safe than sorry,' he thought and compressed it a little more. More and more he compressed it until he was certain it would work. He pushed his Intent onto the energy to remain that way even after he left to go.

He slowly pulled back his Qi and was relieved to see that the energy did not immediately expand back to its original size.

Since he had successfully prepared both the powder sphere and the energy, all that was left was for him to use the single technique.