Death... and me

"There isn't any copy of this available. At least, not that I know of."

Old Worm's excited expression quickly returned to its usual emotionless state.

"I guess that's to be expected. Anyway, I believe this is also part of the things you don't want to talk about, right?"

Roan nodded.

"Indeed. However, I don't mind sharing it."

It was then that Sister Orb's voice resounded.

[The cauldron is part of the Soul Gem Dimensional Realm. If you go too far away from it, the cauldron will be automatically teleported back into the Alchemy Workshop.]

Roan was surprised by that.

'Well, I guess I don't need to be afraid of it being robbed then.'

Old Worm didn't hear Sister Orb's voice. Instead, he took a few items out and immediately started concocting. He wasn't the type to talk much to start with. Since Roan said he could allow the use of the cauldron, Old Worm accepted it gladly.

Roan took the opportunity to watch Old Worm's concocting process. It turns out that Old Worm was already a Heaven Middle-Level Alchemist. Hence, the pill he concocted was several times better than Roan. At first, Old Worm had some trouble controlling the cauldron. After all, he never had such a precise cauldron in his life. But as time passed, he became more proficient at it.

Of course, he also took the opportunity to teach Roan about the concoction process of Heaven Level Pills. Even though Roan didn't have the cultivation necessary to make them, it wouldn't be bad to know how it was done.

Finally, the first pill that Old Worm was satisfied with came out of the cauldron.

"Impressive! Using Rerqol Flame to concoct is quite annoying due to its chaotic state. However, I simply don't need to care about the temperature anymore. Making this Anti-Umbral Energy pill was a lot easier."

Roan had seen the pill before. It was incredibly costly and hard to concoct. It was the same pill that Tiria used to deal with the Umbral Energy in her body before Rean appeared.

'No wonder Tiria said it was too hard to get these pills. They are at the Heaven Level, after all.'

Old Worm then put the pill in a bottle before turning to Roan.

"There will be some times where I will need to borrow this cauldron of yours. Do you mind?"

Roan shook his head.

"As long as I can watch the concoction process."

Old Worm didn't mind that. Since he took Roan as an Alchemist Disciple, showing his techniques would make no difference.

"Good. Let's start with your own practice now."

Roan and Old Worm then spent the next few days in the Hut. However, Old Worm still asked Roan to use the normal cauldrons. After all, an Alchemist's level was also determined through their control of the fire. If Roan wanted to become a higher ranked alchemist, he couldn't rely on that cauldron alone.

Back on Malaka's side, she was called over by Mia. Now that the war was over, Mia wanted to restart Malaka's training. As always, the girl tried to find some excuses, which turned out to be useless.

"You had your breakthrough to the Core Formation Realm not too long ago. To be honest, it was a lot faster than myself, so I'm afraid of your cultivation going berserk. You will stay here to cultivate with me for the time being so that I can make sure you are doing well."

Malaka could only follow Mia's training schedule and hope for her master to let her go soon.

As for Calina, she began to revise everything Roan taught her in the last war. She often fought against the other sisters of the sect as well as the Inner Sect Rankings.

Of course, after the war was over, both the Outer and Inner Sect's members decreased a lot. From the 1000 Inner Sect Members, only 689 remained. The number of girls in the Blue Orchid District, which was already low, decreased as well. In compensation, the remaining level of cultivators increased. The weak died, and the strong survived. It was that simple. The same thing happened in all the other sects and the Royal Family.

Calina decided that she wouldn't go out for the next few months until she digested everything she learned.

Time began to pass as everyone did their own things. And just like that, another half a year passed in a flash. As mentioned before, the Core Formation Realm needed a lot more time to cultivate. The only advantage was that Rean got a self-sustained Rank Three Spirit Stone income, so the twins' cultivation wasn't too slow. Of course, the Spiritual Energy Level upgrade in the Soul Gem System also helped a little.

Rean was inside the Formations' Test Field in the Soul Gem Dimensional Realm. He had been studying the Circuitry Formation Articles while he also got to learn normal formations from Droman. Circuitry Formations were a fusion of both Electrical Components and the cultivation world's Formations. Naturally, knowing the Circuitry part was far from enough.

In front of Rean, there was a big box with one of its sides open. Inside, one could see three boards with quite a few cables passing everywhere. Obviously, those were Rean's first Circuitry Formations. At the bottom, there were Spiritual Stones that offered the power necessary for those boards to work.

Other than the Electrical Paths on the board, Rean could also see many tiny runes. The circuitries often ended in a junction with a ton of layered runes before new circuitry started on the other side. However, there were many empty spaces where the circuitry ended and began. They just so happened to be of the same size as the other parts where runes could be found. Obviously, runes were supposed to be inserted there.

"Alright. The empty spaces will be for Droman to work with. I still can't make a lot of the runes of the Router Formation at my level. Too bad this is just a simulation. I will need to start building it again once I go outside."

[What are you complaining about? Thanks to the Test Field, you could reach this state without losing a single material during trials. You should be happy that you have such an option. Everyone else can only do trial and error while spending fortunes with mistakes.]

Rean had to admit that Sister Orb was right.

"Okay. Anyway, I can't go further than it now. If I want to build a Router Formation on my own, I'll need to reach the Earth Peak-Level Formations Master. Rank"

Rean had advanced into the Earth High-Level Rank. However, the runes for the Peak-Level also depended on the person's cultivation. Once again, Rean's cultivation was lacking, just like his Blacksmith profession.

Rean pondered a bit and finally concluded.

"It's decided. I'll bring this project outside for Droman to take a look at. This should be enough to be considered something that I created as well."

Other than training Rean, Droman also supervised the Communication System Project. Sure enough, the Imperial Family loved the Router version 1.2, which they began to implement straight away. There was a description of the things necessary for that Router, and one of them just so happened to be the Lightning Beads of the Lightning Sect.

The Imperial Family soon found out that Zafa Bank had a contract with Dalamu and Lightning Sect, taking their copyrights. That being said, even the Imperial Family couldn't demand those Lightning Beads. They had to buy it if they wanted to use it.

Of course, the Imperial Family Formation Masters immediately started to look for a replacement for the Lightning Beads. They were quite confident of doing it since their level was on par or even higher than Droman's. In the end, they really did find a few candidates that could be used in the place of the Lightning Beads.

Unfortunately, those candidates were even more expensive! Unless they decide to create something new like the Lightning Beads themselves, they could only buy the ones available.

The Imperial Family wasn't the only one. The Router Formation was quickly made public, so many countries surrounding the capital began to build their Router Formations. One must remember that the Imperial Family already allowed them to build the normal communication formation. It's just that something like the Router Formation still didn't exist at that time.

That being said, the Lightning Sect began to receive a massive amount of orders for Modified Lightning Beads. They even considered changing the name of the Lightning Beads since it wasn't a bead anymore. After talking to the Dalamu Sect, they ultimately decided to call the new version 'Data Storages.' Well, that was Rean's idea anyway.

The versions 1.3 and 1.4 quickly followed in the next months, increasing the demand for Data Storages even more. Dalamu then began to get the focus of the other countries because of the 'Copyrights' contract. A term that almost no one had heard before. They really began to make a fortune. Rean also got his own share of the profit thanks to that. Too bad that this kind of deal still couldn't give Rank Four Spirit Stones. That's where his self-sustained Rank Three Spirit Stone income came from.

Rean quickly recorded everything about the Circuitry Router Formation that he created and left the Soul Gem Dimensional Realm. Soon after, he exited his room and went to the Formations Hall.

Droman stopped coming out from the sect at some point. Instead, he taught many new Formation Masters of the sect, who did that for him. That also allowed Zuan to go back to his seclusion. Now that the Router Formation reached the Imperial Family, kidnapping Droman became useless.

"Oh! You finally came to visit me. I have some good news for you."