I entered the Hall of the Herb King’s Assignment Hall and walked straight to the desk for the servants.

The attendant barely glanced at me. “Yes?”

“Hello, what do I need to do to register as a Disciple Alchemist?”

The attendant froze. I heard some snickering from the servants who were hanging out on the room’s benches, but I didn’t pay it any mind. I just patiently waited for my answer.

The attendant cleared his throat. “To become a Disciple Alchemist, you must prove that you are capable of concocting Rank 1 pills. You may purchase a batch of 50 sets of Rank 1 training herbs for 200 gold. To become a Grade 1 Disciple Alchemist, you must use these herbs to concoct pills with a total value equal to that of the herbs themselves, 200 gold. To advance to Grade 2, your pills must be worth a total of 2,000 gold. For Grade 3, 8,000 gold.”

Compared to the Hall of the Herb Lord back in Proud Eagle City, these terms were excessively harsh. I had to both pay four times as much for my herbs and concoct pills worth four times as much gold. This was bad enough, but only having 50 sets of herbs to work with, instead of 500, made the test far more brutal.

A large part of this discrepancy likely came from a Hall of an Herb King wanting to hold itself to a higher standard than that of a mere Lord, but the difference in numbers was still stark. When I remembered the issues involved with concocting pills in this domain, however, it made more sense.

An alchemist ‘had’ to use moon spade qi to concoct Moon Spade Attunement Pills. It seemed likely, then, that herbalists needed to use moon spade qi to grow the herbs that were used in such pills. This would limit both the number of people who could grow the necessary herbs and the number of alchemists who could turn those herbs into pills, driving up the price of both. After all, if the people in this domain were evenly split between nine different weapons, how many talented alchemists could there possibly be for any given one?

As I considered this, I reached into my storage bag, withdrew 20 large gold coins, and placed them on the counter. “I understand, thank you. Please give me one batch of moon spade training herbs.”

How much did I want to show off?

There were still nine months before the end of the year. At that time, this Hall, like the one in Proud Eagle City, would host a competition, and the winners would be allowed to join—or, at least, attempt to join—this domain’s Palace of the Herb Sovereign. The only difference was that, as this was a Hall of a King, it was allowed to send three people from each Rank instead of just one.

So, by the end of the year, I needed to be able to credibly claim that I was one of the Hall’s three best Disciple Alchemists. And even though it wasn’t entirely necessary, it would probably be best to target first place, both to better position myself for entering the Palace and to ensure that nothing could go wrong.

This gave me a simple plan to work from: Grade 1 Disciple Alchemist now, Grade 2 in three months, Grade 3 in six months, and best Disciple in the Hall in nine months.

With this plan in mind, I booked a room in the Hall’s Alchemy Annex and got to work concocting pills.

High-Purity Rank 1 Moon Spade Attunement Pill, 72% Medicinal Efficacy. Value: 20 gold.

At over 95% efficacy, the value of Rank 1 Attunement Pills shot all the way up to 90 gold. At less than 50% efficacy, they were next to worthless. Between 70 and 75% was the sweet spot. Not too valuable, while also not requiring me to hand over too many pills when paying off the cost of the training herbs.

After sprinkling in a few pills at around 65% efficacy and one pill with 79% efficacy, I had a dozen pills with a combined value of 240 gold, more than enough to earn me a spot as a Grade 1 Disciple Alchemist.

I didn’t rush to turn these pills in immediately, however. Doing so too quickly would only raise eyebrows, and there was no reason to take any more risks than I already had. Instead, I stayed in my rented workshop and focused on my work. I still had dozens more sets of herbs, and there were several experiments that I wanted to perform on them.

In general, concocting Attunement Pills was no different from concocting any other type of pill—they didn’t rely on any specialized skills. To make them, an alchemist only needed access to a special type of qi. So, while the herbs needed to make Attunement Pills were formed from a unique type of energy, I could reasonably assume that any of the lessons I had learned about other types of herbs would transfer to moon spade herbs, and vice versa.

This was important because what I really wanted to do was figure out how the hell I had concocted a Perfect pill during the Hall of the Herb Lord’s end-of-year competition.

Somehow, I had used the Three Thousand Flames Fire to stitch together five random herbs to create a type of pill that was entirely unknown to me. Sure, Body of Stone Pills and True Body of Stone Pills were rather common Rank 4 pills that temporarily increased the natural toughness of a person’s skin. But I had never read about an ‘Enhanced’ True Body of Stone Pill, and I had certainly never heard of “Qacha’s Strengthened Enhanced True Body of Stone Pill.”

The specifics of the pill that I concocted were not important, however. What mattered was the process that had allowed it to be made in the first place. That pill had been made under rather unique circumstances, but they were circumstances I should be able to replicate.

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After gathering my thoughts, I ran over to the Hall’s shop floor and purchased the two most expensive sets of Moon Spade Attunement Pill herbs available. Then, upon returning to my workshop, I turned one of these sets into the best two-patterned pill that I was capable of.

This gave me two solid reference points for what Moon Spade Attunement Pills were supposed to look like. One for what high-quality herbs looked like before being turned into a pill, and one for what they looked like after. The condensed, crystallized medicinal energy of a pill was less than ideal for my purposes, but it was the best option available to me.

Back at the end-of-year competition, having references like this hadn’t been necessary because I hadn’t been concerned about what kind of pill I was creating. I was just shoving herbs together in the way that made the most sense. If I wanted to create a specific pill, however, then I needed to ensure that the medicinal energy conformed to the ideal shape of that pill—as much as I could, at least.

Using these two references, I sorted through the batch of training herbs and pieced together the most ideal sets of herbs possible. Then, I heated up my furnace and fed it the best set that I had been able to find.

The first step, melting the herbs’ physical shells, presented no problems. Then, when it was time to purify the medicinal energy, I paid no heed to the normal rules of this continent. I sent out strands of moon spade qi and utterly annihilated every trace of toxin I found.

This step was slightly trickier. My low moon spade affinity made working with moon spade medicinal energy more difficult than it should have been, but by leaning heavily on the strength of my soul, I was able to get it done. While these herbs were different from what I was used to, they were still just Rank 1, after all.

Next, I repositioned the medicinal energy of the three herbs such that, when pressed together, they would combine to form a proper Moon Spade Attunement Pill. It looked mostly correct, but with all the toxins having been burned away, there were several notable gaps in the final shape.

Unlike the pill that I had made in the end-of-year competition, this pill only contained a single type of medicinal energy, so I didn’t need to find a way to merge opposing elements. I just needed to fill in the missing sections.

Reaching into my inner world, I pulled out a strand of the Pale Moon Fire, sent it into the furnace, and wrapped it in pure pill qi. Then, I tore off small slivers of flame and used them like putty to fill in the gaps between the separate bundles of medicinal energy.

This seemed to have an effect, but it was limited. I needed to do more.

Focusing, I studied the areas where the spirit fire butted up against medicinal energy. The medicinal energy looked like fraying strands of delicate threads, and the spirit fire just looked like a lump of clay with threads stuck into it at random angles.

Using my pill qi, I reached into the spirit fire and carved it into a mimicry of the medicinal energy that it was connected to. The result wasn’t perfect, and even if it were, this spirit fire bridge would never be as potent as true medicinal energy, but it was good enough.

The discrete bundles of medicinal energy began pulling together into a cohesive whole, and as they did, I used my pill qi to help shape the result. Two quick bursts of energy later, I was ready to condense the energy into a pill, but something stopped me.

Looking closely at the delicate strands of medicinal energy reminded me of a thought that I had in my previous life. Medicinal energy was a type of talisman—a type of writing—and if it was writing…

I focused on the ability that I had gained after Jon’s death: Infuse Intent (Written, Rank 4)

After arriving in the Hall of the Herb King, I had tried using this skill when writing a couple of basic notes, but it didn’t seem to do anything. The skill hadn’t come with an instruction manual, and I had no idea how it was even supposed to work. I could have asked the System, but I hadn’t considered it important enough, and I had other things on my mind.

Now, though…

I felt a tug on my mind as I stared at the medicinal energy, and without being fully aware of what I was doing, I pushed on the energy with my soul—with my intent.

As thoughts of my practice with the crescent moon spade flitted through my mind, pale moonlight seeped out of my soul and entered the medicinal energy. As this was the first time that I had experienced this sensation, it seemed to drag on forever. In reality, though, after only a fraction of a second, the medicinal energy had absorbed all the moonlight it could. When I tried to add more, I felt a sensation similar to magnetic repulsion.

Not wanting my efforts to go to waste, I flexed my will and forced the medicinal energy to condense into a pill. Then, I took it out and examined it.

Perfect Rank 1 Moon Spade Attunement Pill (Tainted), 91% Medicinal Efficacy, 2 Patterns, Effective Rank: Low Master. Value: 15 gold.

A ‘Tainted’ pill. What exactly did that mean?

‘Moon Spade Intent’ wasn’t a normal part of an Attunement Pill. So, would my ability register any pills that contained it as ‘Tainted,’ no matter what? Would it tell me that pills were ‘Tainted’ even if the intent was beneficial?

I couldn’t know without more testing, but more to the point, I couldn’t even know what that intent did until someone consumed one of these ‘Tainted’ pills. I considered paying someone to do this for me, but aside from any ethical concerns, I worried that I wouldn’t be able to truly understand what the pill did without experiencing its effects firsthand.

After reminding myself that I was only a few months into this timeline and that an early death might actually be a good thing, I took out my cultivation spade and tossed the pill into my mouth.

A surge of moon spade qi poured into my body. I almost felt as if I had my back pressed directly against the Soft Moon Fire. I could see why someone would be willing to pay a premium for such a pill. If a Martial Master consumed one while in the Sharp Crescent Sect’s cultivation chamber, they would be able to advance an entire level in minutes.

Shortly after this rush of energy began entering my body, however, a sharp pain shot through my chest. Then, a blow from the side of a shovel slammed against the back of my knees.

I tried to look around, to see what was happening. I tried to dodge. But there was nothing to see. There was nothing to dodge.

The twin prongs of a crescent moon stabbed deep into my biceps.

A wooden staff slammed against the side of my head.

All I could do was take Healing Pills and try to remain conscious.

After six full hours of being repeatedly tortured by all the damage that a crescent moon spade could inflict upon a person, the effects of the Attunement Pill finally wore off, and I could only be thankful that I hadn’t been able to infuse that pill with an even more powerful intent.

I stared at my pill furnace.

That experience had been painful—far too painful—but…

I took out another set of herbs and began concocting a second pill.

That first experience had been painful, but I had learned from it. Now, I needed to discover what I had done wrong. Would imbuing a pill with intent always result in torture, or could I ‘intend’ for it to do something positive? I intended to find out.