"And then! The Empress just waved her hand once, and this huge tree popped straight up out of the ground!"
In the wide courtyard of the Goddess Alchemy Palace, a crowd of small disciples had gathered in a circle, listening raptly as sisters Xinjia and Xinhong told their story with relish. The two girls acted out every beat with wild gestures, keeping their senior and junior disciples hooked on every word.
The children's eyes shone bright as they listened to tales of Luo Qingyan's prowess.
The strength of a leader reflected the strength of her power base. The Goddess Alchemy Palace had always been pushed around before. From now on, they could walk the streets with their heads held high, without ever having to fear being bullied again.
"...Should we tell them to stop?"
Su Lin asked with a strained smile, glancing at Luo Qingyan. The two of them were in the main hall of the Palace, once used for buying and selling medicine. Besides the two of them, Bai Fanxian was there as well, checking on Mu Xia's condition.
"It's fine... Let the children have their fun."
Luo Qingyan smiled faintly. She turned and waved toward the little disciples peeking in from the doorway, sending them jumping in fright at being caught.
"You can relax too, you know."
"...Me?"
"I wasn't well before, and because of that, you and Mu Xia had to carry so much of the burden of running this Palace. But now, you don't have to worry about any of it anymore."
With that, she reached out and gently patted her disciple's head.
"...Thank you."
Su Lin, patted on the head, could not bring herself to refuse. She looked at her transformed Empress with a warmth swelling in her chest. She had no idea what had happened in that underground chamber, but seeing Luo Qingyan strong and confident again, just like the old days, was enough to satisfy her.
And all of it, she owed to this Lady Heroine, Bai Fanxian.
"Lady Heroine, how is Mu Xia doing?"
Su Lin could not help but ask the moment Bai Fanxian withdrew her hand from the junior disciple's wrist.
"Nothing serious... Two days of medicine and she'll be fine."
Bai Fanxian had used her Heaven Sense and her own pure qi to thoroughly examine the internal injuries Mu Xia had suffered from Huang Zhailong before answering. She pulled a pill from her sleeve, stuffed it unceremoniously into the girl's mouth, and forced her to swallow it with a push of qi, sending Mu Xia into a fit of coughing.
"Don't push your qi too hard for the next two days."
"I... Yes."
Watching Mu Xia looking perfectly fine now, Luo Qingyan allowed herself a faint smile. How could an internal wound inflicted by the "Intent" of a Sage-level cultivator possibly be "nothing serious"?
If it had truly been that simple to treat, she would have already healed it herself with the power of her Domain of Three Seasons Flora, without ever needing this lady's hands at all.
She had used her own qi to sweep through Mu Xia's body while patting her head. The lingering trace of Heavenly Sword Intent had, she guessed, been crushed to nothing by Lady Bai's own overwhelming Intent. As for the battered internal organs, they were already being restored by the medicine Mu Xia had just swallowed.
Nothing to worry about at all. Truly worthy of being called the Alchemy Empress!
By now, Bai Fanxian was starting to notice that Luo Qingyan was looking at her with the same starry-eyed gaze the little disciples had used earlier.
"Lady Bai, what should we do next?"
This form of address was something she and Bai Fanxian had already agreed on. If two "Alchemy Empresses" suddenly appeared at once, it would surely confuse both the Palace's disciples and outsiders alike.
Especially if word got out that this one had been Alchemy Empress ten thousand years ago.
So in front of others, Luo Qingyan addressed Bai Fanxian respectfully as "Lady Bai," the savior and benefactor who would help the Goddess Alchemy Palace rise to glory once more.
"You all went and exchanged those treasures for cash, didn't you?"
Bai Fanxian turned, asking about the reason the four of them had gone out earlier that day. Fortunately, word had spread fast. The moment Luo Qingyan had shown her face at the trading hall, the staff there had scrambled to send someone to appraise the treasures she wanted to sell, without delay.
The terrifying convenience of overwhelming power.
"Yes... We got quite a lot for it. It should solve the Palace's money troubles for several months at least."
Mu Xia and Su Lin exchanged glances, watching their Empress speak to Bai Fanxian with such deference, a small question nagging at them. Just who exactly this Lady Bai really was, neither of them could quite say.
But curious as they were, that was all it was. Anyone their Empress showed such respect to deserved even more respect from them. Besides, this lady had already done so much to help the Palace. She had to be a good person, surely.
"It's not just about solving the food problem. First, you need to get this Palace's business back on its feet..."
Bai Fanxian countered with a calm expression, gesturing at the empty state of the main hall.
"An Alchemy Palace... should at least have some medicine, shouldn't it?"
"Well, when you put it that way..."
Luo Qingyan did not know how to explain herself. Between the circumstances before and her own weakness, the Palace did not even have any medicine left to sell. Su Lin, seeing her troubled expression, hurried to speak up in her defense.
"Lady Heroine... The war cost us dearly. Many of the city's alchemy sects were ordered to hand over large quantities of medicine to the military. Our Palace was no exception."
"If that's the case, shouldn't they have compensated you for it? Then how did the Palace end up this deep in the red?"
Bai Fanxian remained skeptical. She understood it had been an emergency, but under normal circumstances, the authorities would never simply take medicine without paying for it.
"That part... was my own fault."
"Empress!"
Seeing the ghost of a smile and the look in Luo Qingyan's eyes, Bai Fanxian understood at once that something must have happened.
"The medicine I refined ended up making the King's condition worse... so I was punished for it."
"Hmph! It was all because of Wild Bloom! They were the ones whispering in the King's ear, egging him on. And they used that excuse to send us alchemy sects straight to the front lines..."
Mu Xia, furious enough to grind her teeth, felt tears well up the moment she thought of the sisters they had lost to the war. They now rested, honored, at the martyrs' cemetery.
She wished, more than anything, that they could have lived to see the Goddess Alchemy Palace rise to glory again...
"...He dared punish you?"
The instant she pictured King Jongliean's near-death face, Bai Fanxian's temper flared. The abrupt shift in mood, sparked by seeing one of her own bullied, sent Luo Qingyan scrambling to hold her lady back before she could storm straight to the palace and drag King Jongliean out of his sickbed.
"We can't blame the King alone for this... It happened while refining medicine in front of the public. On top of that, several factions were putting pressure on him. Getting off with only that much punishment was already lenient..."
"But that was torture!?"
Mu Xia, who had thought the punishment unjust all along, felt her eyes brim with tears.
"Little one... I nearly killed the city's king. They had every right to have me executed on the spot, if they'd wanted."
Luo Qingyan comforted her beloved disciple so gently that Mu Xia finally began to calm down. Bai Fanxian, who now understood the origin of the wounds she had seen on Luo Qingyan's body at their first meeting, voiced the question that had been on her mind.
"Are you even certain the cause really was your medicine?"
"...That..."
Luo Qingyan bit her lip. Even as a peak Tier-5 alchemist, soon to reach Tier-6 now that she had broken through to Ancient Sage, she still could not say for certain whether what happened "that day" had truly been her doing.
But the image of King Jongliean coughing up a great pool of blood, nearly dying after taking her medicine, was still burned into her memory.
"Never mind... Let's focus on what we should actually be doing right now."
Bai Fanxian decided to set her anger aside for now, saving the reckoning for once everything was clear, and turned to matters of greater importance.
"What would that be?"
Su Lin asked, curious.
"How many people in this Palace can currently refine medicine?"
"Every disciple of the Goddess Alchemy Palace can refine at Tier-1!"
"It's the very first thing our Empress teaches every disciple the moment they join."
Both Mu Xia and Su Lin answered Bai Fanxian with obvious pride. The two of them were already Tier-3 alchemists themselves, close to reaching Tier-4 any day now, thanks to their own recently surging qi.
"Is that so."
Even Bai Fanxian was surprised. Compared to her own era, not every disciple of the Goddess Alchemy Palace could refine medicine back then, especially not the many outer disciples. Unless a child had been personally handpicked by Bai Fanxian herself for showing promise, they generally needed to reach at least peak Grandmaster, if not Sage, before they could even begin.
The times really had changed...
Bai Fanxian mused to herself.
"Well then, that makes everything a good deal easier."
.
.
.
The next morning, the Palace disciples, having rested a full day, could all feel the changes in their bodies. Both their strength and their qi had noticeably grown. But more importantly, they had begun to grow accustomed to the "pressure" of beings stronger than themselves. This was something Bai Fanxian had emphasized above all else. In a life-or-death situation, if these children could do nothing but tremble and freeze in place, then all their training would mean nothing.
"What are we doing today?"
Xinjia and Xinhong, having grown up quite a bit after yesterday's ordeal, asked Su Lin, who wore a puzzled expression but had likewise come to wait.
"Well..."
"The Desert Trading Hall has arrived!"
"The Seven Gems Trading Hall is here with a delivery!"
"The seed shop..."
"The Black Iron Foundry has delivered the alchemy cauldrons!"
Before Su Lin could even answer, the usually quiet front gate of the Goddess Alchemy Palace erupted into chaos. When they opened the gate, it looked as though an entire caravan of goods was arriving in one long line. Mountains of raw materials, some she had seen before and others she had not, herbs, animal parts, and enormous quantities of seeds, piled up into small hills.
And most notably, hundreds of low-grade alchemy cauldrons were being carefully carried in, one after another.
Just looking at it all, anyone could tell it must have cost a fortune!
Su Lin was one of the few who knew exactly how much money they had made from selling those treasures. And she could say, with total certainty, that nearly every last coin of it had already been converted into these raw materials!
Thankfully, they had kept enough aside for food. Otherwise, the little disciples in the Palace would have starved to death within a month, without question!
What was Lady Bai even thinking...
Su Lin turned back to look at Bai Fanxian, a small, knowing smile playing at the corner of her mouth, and felt an inexplicable chill run down her spine. Tang Yeye and the Dragon Queen, watching from behind the gate, could only sigh at the innocence of these sisters, so excited over something they had never seen coming.
None of them had any idea...
...that a hell factory was about to open its doors!