021 Pills and Long awaited Rematch

Liam and Ralph instantly started heading over to the second building. The Alchemy guild, it felt like a different world entirely from the rune foraging guild. The Alchemy guild reminded Liam of the Market outside, there was no order, people were constantly shouting and going in and out of the building.

Inside he could see that it also looked a lot like the market. There were people sitting on little blankets selling their pills. As soon as he entered Liam started hearing people shouting from across the room.

"Pristine qi gathering pill for only 100 credits!"

"Three good poison resistance pills for only 30 credits!"

"5 pristine soul pet enchantment pills for only 250 credits!"

People were throwing out the pill name, quality and price, trying to find themselves a buyer.

"On the first floor, you can only find pills of the first tier and you can only go above to the second floor if you're within the top 10 000 outer court disciples. Want to go and take a look at the pills there?" Ralph explained to Liam.

"Sure, but what's that good, pristine, and other words that they are calling out?" Liam asked Ralph as they were going up the staircase.

"I'll show you in just a moment. We are allowed on this floor, not that we have the money to buy anything, but as something to look towards, something to strive to achieve." Ralph said as there were considerably less people on this floor, Liam also noticed that there were a lot of inner court disciples on this floor. The inner court disciples wore a dark green robe, instead of the white one the outer court disciples we're given.

"Pills are divided into tiers, but the same pill in the same tier can have a drastically different effect and price. When alchemist create pills, before the final process pf compressing all of the materials into a pill, they need to burn out the impurities without burning the medicinal part, and without exploding the alchemy furnace. It is a very difficult process." Ralph explained very briefly how pills were made.

"Depending on how much impurities are in the pill, the quality of the pill will differ. If the pill is up to 60% clean, it is common. From 60 to 80% clean it is good, from 80 to 95% it is perfect and from 95% up it is pristine." Ralph finally explained how the quality system worked for the pills.

"Look at this pill for example." Ralph pointed to a pedestal with several, similar looking pills.

Poison resistance pill 2 tier, removes any poison bellow the 7th human realm, and inhibits poison attacks for the next 5 hours.

pristine quality 97%, price: 5000 credits

perfect quality 83%, price 2200 credits

good quality 69%, price 1500 credits

common quality 43%, price 200 credits

"Why is the price so different?" Liam asked Ralph.

"The full effect that is labeled above is only true for the pristine quality pills, for the others they would have a drastic difference. Some people think it is actually worse to take a common quality pill than to continue without a pill because of the impurities."

Liam looked at the pills, the first one had an almost perfect circle form, a nice consistent green color and a beautiful shine. As the quality went down, so did these properties. The common pill had a rough shape and a lot of dark marks all over it, it looked dull and Liam imagined it smelled bad.

"Ralph, I think it's getting pretty late. Let's look at the first floor briefly and then go home." Liam said to Ralph before he started heading down the stairs.

Liam walked around on the first floor, seeing if anything would grab his interest.

"5 credits for a bottle of 5 qi gathering pills!" Liam heard someone shout.

"Only a single credit per bottle? This man must be insane." Liam rushed towards where he heard the man.

"Are you the guy's who's selling pills for only a single credit each?" Liam asked.

"Yes I am. But you must buy them in a bottle of five." The young boy that looked around the same age as Liam said to him.

"Are you and outer court disciple as well?" Liam asked.

"Of course. Now do you want to buy them or not?" The boy looked a bit annoyed, he thought Liam was just wasting him his time.

"Why are you selling them so cheaply?" Liam asked the boy.

"Because they are all at 58% or 59% clean quality but I can't brand them as good pills and now no one wants to buy them. I have run out of money to buy materials because of those bastards that keep taking my salary." The boy said annoyed. "Anyway, I am sure I can make the next batch good quality. I will give you a discount on those if you buy these."

"How many bottles do you have and what are the effects of your current pills?" Liam asked the boy another question.

"I have three bottles, each with 5 pills. and they help you gather more qi for a whole hour, but then you have to spend a bit refining the impurities or they will cause you problems." The boy asked honestly.

"Okay, deal. I will take all three bottles. What's your name by the way?" Liam liked the attitude of the kid and he would like to get to know him. If he wasn't becoming an alchemist, he would sure need a friend who's one. With all the uses pills had, Liam did not want to have to go bankrupt just to buy a few pills.

"Peter." The boy said.

"I'm Liam."

Liam was really happy and wanted to go right into using the pills.

Over the course of the next week, nothing really important happened. Liam already used half the pills to cultivate and now he had 41 dark blue drops, so he was only missing a very small amount. The reason he stopped his cultivation for now, it was the only thing that was being talked all around the sect. It was the day, Kyle, Leader of the Flaming faction challenged Owen, Leader of the Cursed faction for first place within the Outer court.

For the past week, where ever you go, that was the only thing you would hear being discussed. And both sides were heavenly matched.

Some said Kyle will win, being the disciple of Elder Mo, who knows what he has been taught. And there had to be a reason for his confidence of challenging the Cursed Leader.

While others were certain that Owen would win. They still remembered how in the first two months, the underdog, Owen took the whole sect by surprise. He rose through the ranks fast and he dominated every opponent he faced. They still remembered the day Owen challenged Kyle for first place. It almost sent shivers down their spine. On that day, Owen used his Shadow element to completely dominate and beat down Kyle. It was his amazing show of strength that made the Cursed faction one of the top three, even though Owen is from a commoner family.

The day of their rematch finally came. Liam, Ralph and Aria were in front of the arena, trying to get in along with everybody else. This fight was so big, even some inner court disciples came to watch. Liam was getting pretty bored, waiting in line, but then he saw someone.

"Peter!" Liam called out to him. It was the same kid he bought those pills from. Peter was alone so Liam called him over.

"Hey, if you're not waiting for anyone. Want to sit with us?" Liam asked him.

"Yes, if you don't mind of course." Peter said timidly. He was a very shy kid, when he wasn't talking about alchemy.

"Who's this?" Aria asked.

"This is a friend Liam made at the alchemy guild." Ralph responded for him.

Now the four of them entered the arena and found a place to sit. The fight was taking place in the biggest arena the school had, it could fit more than a hundred thousand people, so there wasn't too much of a problem with finding space to sit down. The only downside, because of the massive size of the arena, the two figures that stood inside of it were like little ants.

"Today we have the long-awaited Rematch Between two faction leaders!" The commentator started off. " We have on the left side, the challenger, Kyle Burn. Facing off against the defendant of the first-place title Owen Sullivan!"

The crowd went wild, everyone was excited to see the results and someone even made a betting system for who would win and it seemed even the bets were evenly matched. No one knew what was going to happen.

"Start" The commentator began the match, but none of the two figures moved.

"I could have broken through to the sixth human realm and then beat you, but I wanted it to be fair. Beating someone a realm bellow me is no fun." Kyle said to Owen with a smile. It finally seemed like the fight was going to begin.