Elder Orta

"You look confused, did it not strike you odd that if the test was so hard that it was near impossible to pass, then why are there so many alchemists in the guild?" Asked the older man.

Collin turned towards the man and was going to answer his question but stopped when he saw Valeria laughing. He had heard one of his former clansmen say that the worst thing a man can experience is a woman laughing at them, while he was sure this wasn't the same circumstance as what the clansmen meant, Collin still didn't like it. Valeria stopped laughing after being stared at by Collin for a few moments, but her face still had a smirk on it.

"Never thought about it, I have always heard that the test was very difficult to pass. But thinking about it now, I would guess if everyone thought it was almost impossible to pass, it would reduce the number of people who only want to join the guild for reasons other than learning alchemy."

Collin's answer brought a brief smile to the older man's face before he spoke.

"My name is Cyndrel Orta, I am the elder in charge of the Camis city branch of the Alchemist's Guild, you may address me as Elder Orta."

Elder Orta walked past Collin and deeper into the room before he waved his hand a table and several chairs appeared. Giving a nod to Collin and Valeria to signal for them to sit down, another wave of a hand and a jar of green liquid and three cups appeared on the table. Collin knew what it was the moment he saw it, alchemist tea. For as long as there have been alchemists there has been alchemist tea. Drinks made from various and sometime exceptionally rare spirit herbs and other ingredients slowly brewed into a drink to share with other alchemists. The strength of the tea, the effects of the tea, and the flavor of the tea are all things that alchemists use to judge each other's tea, either bringing bragging rights or mockery.

After the tea was poured the room was filled with a sweet medicinal smell. Collin stared at the light green colored tea confused at what he should do. As an elder in charge of a guild branch, Elder Orta should have a cultivation around the peak of Core Foundation at the very least or more than likely he should be Nascent Soul realm. If this tea was made with Foundation Establishment rank ingredients it could injure Collin if he drank it, if it had Core Foundation rank ingredients it would be fatal to drink, anything stronger and the medicinal properties would be enough to kill several hundred 6th layer Qi Condensation cultivators. The thought of the medicinal properties rampaging throughout his body wasn't pleasant to Collin since as an alchemist he knew what would happen, he would scream in agony shortly before he burst into flames just before his body exploded.

"You won't die if you drink it, the tea is Qi Condensation rank."

Valeria said, Collin didn't miss the joy in her voice as he was pulled out of his thoughts. After looking at Valeria for a moment, and seeing an even brighter smirk on her face, Collin looked at Elder Orta who seemed to be paying more attention to his tea than him or Valeria. Taking a drink of the tea, Collin felt a massive amount of energy enter his body. It was several times the amount of energy of a spirit gathering pill, but it also had something else mixed into it. Fire energy, exceptionally pure fire energy. To Collin it felt if he drank the entire cup, it would be the same as an entire bottle of fire pills. The energy was far purer then and far gentler than the pills he had, but the fact that this tea had fire energy meant that Elder Orta knew he was an Alchemic Cultivator.

It wasn't hard for Collin to figure out how he could have found out, there were only a hand full of people that knew he was a cultivator and one of them was sitting at the same table, Valeria. Almost all cultivators prefer to keep the specific cultivation method they use from others to limit enemies protecting themselves from attack or exploiting weaknesses in the cultivation method they are using. This is even more true when it comes to cultivators that take alternative paths. Alchemic Cultivators for example have certain poisons that can cripple their cultivation, but since Alchemic Cultivators are not that common and the materials are rare and difficult to process, it rare to have this poison to use when fighting Alchemic Cultivators.

Collin couldn't help but give Valeria a glare, but he was interrupted by Elder Orta.

"She didn't tell me. When she said she was mentoring someone to join the guild, I believed she was only trying to find some poor fool that would just barely pass the tests, wasting the guild's time and resources, just so she could lessen her punishment. So, when she brought you here today, I used my divine sense to gently scan you. You're not the first Alchemic Cultivator I've met, and the tea only took ten minutes to make."

"I would have told him, if he had asked." Valeria said before taking another sip of her tea.

"If it makes you feel better, do you really think knowing you're an Alchemic Cultivator puts you at a disadvantage if the Alchemist's Guild wants to kill you? Do you really think we would waste the time to make poisons to deal with you?"

It in fact did not make Collin feel better to be reminded that the guild could destroy him at will. It also didn't make him feel good that he was scanned deeply enough for Elder Orta to observe his Alchemic Pill Dantian without him noticing the intrusion.

"You gave me quite the surprise. You used all the materials you were given and three of the four pills you were required to make were not only high-grade they were very close to being perfect-grade. The mid-grade pills were close to high-grade as well.

You were also not stressed when you made your pills, like you have made them hundreds of times or more. You're far better than most of the people that have applied from Camis city in the past several years. What's even more surprising is that Valeria says you only became a cultivator about eight months ago.

By the way you are correct. We let everyone think that the tests are almost impossible to pass so only people who are truly interested in alchemy take the tests. If you wish, you could think of it as the first of three tests to determine who the guild will nurture and those we don't."

After swallowing some tea, Collin was going to ask a few questions, but was interrupted when Elder Orta began speaking again.

"So, now that you have become a member of the Alchemist's Guild, do you plan to return to the Monten clan? I imagine that if you did you would be welcomed with open arms, you won't be able to reclaim your position as young master but would easily be granted a high position, or even be allowed to form your own branch of the Monten clan."

The Elder kept speaking and asking questions but never stopped to let Collin answer. And while someone knowing he was from the Monten clan was disconcerting for a moment, Collin didn't find it odd that the Elder in charge of a guild branch would know who is who in Camis city, especially since Collin was to be the next head of the clan. He did find it amusing when Valeria seemed shocked at Collin's former background.

After ten minutes of the Elder speaking, Collin heard Valeria's voice in his head, telling him to just sip his tea and smile. She didn't really need to tell him that, as a former young master of a powerful clan, he had met many people and that included several extreme talkers. Since he left the clan the most talkative person he had to deal with was the red-haired women at the inscriptionist shop, but she would at least let Collin speak a bit before continuing to talk.

An hour, Collin had to sit there and listen to Elder Orta speak almost non-stop for an hour before he was excused so he could go home and refine the energy from the tea. But before he left Valeria asked him to come to the shop tomorrow, after agreeing, Collin began to think of what had happened today as he walked home.