The Alchemy Expert Who Keeps Correcting Everyone
“I see. So that’s the level you’re all at.”
Scoffs and annoyed sighs leaked out from various corners of the room. A few cultivators covered their mouths with fans, casting mocking glances in her direction.
“Well, well. What could a mere child possibly have to correct in a place like this?”
“Even if she is a guest, there should be some sense of decorum.”
Jin Wi had turned pale, pacing back and forth beside Baek Cheong in a panic. After all, he was the one who had guided this guest to the Elder, and now she was picking apart the lecture. His mind couldn't process how to handle the situation.
“T-that, Miss Baek... We are in front of the Elder...”
Jin Wi couldn't even finish his sentence, stammering helplessly. Then, Dan-gyeong, standing on the platform, pointed directly at Baek Cheong and spoke.
“If you are so confident, why don’t you come up here?”
‘Well, it’s my fault for speaking up anyway.’
Baek Cheong had gotten herself tangled in a troublesome situation, but she didn't think much of it. She slowly stood up, smoothed out her wrinkled robes, and walked forward with a calm expression. Dan-gyeong narrowed his eyes as he watched the child approach without a hint of hesitation. Seeing her unyielding demeanor, he realized she didn't look like an ordinary child.
“Tell me yourself—what exactly is wrong with this old man’s lecture?”
Dan-gyeong’s tone was openly insulting. The cultivators in the pavilion naturally shifted their gazes toward the platform. Baek Cheong gave a short, polite bow and slowly opened her mouth.
“The method of heat control you mentioned, Elder Dan-gyeong, is flawless if you are refining standard medicinal pills.”
“And so?”
“However, you taught the flow with the intention of capturing the herb’s inherent energy into the pill without losing a single point. From that perspective, there appear to be some errors.”
Dan-gyeong closed his mouth and listened intently to Baek Cheong’s words. She was young, yet sharp and intelligent, and clearly possessed a deep understanding of alchemy. The mocking atmosphere in the pavilion quietly dissipated.
“Your method of suppressing the heat on one side is certainly efficient for extracting the essence of the herbs. But if your goal is to preserve the herb’s inherent energy, the heat must follow the flow of the medicinal qi as it expands and gathers.”
“......”
“The flow of heat required for each herb is minutely different, and as the quality of the ingredients improves, failing to match that flow will cause the medicinal properties to be eroded by the fire.”
Her explanation was flawless. As he listened, Dan-gyeong’s expression grew increasingly rigid. The mockery that had filled the pavilion was replaced not just by silence, but by an awkward, heavy stillness. Several cultivators quietly lowered the fans they had been using to hide their smirks. Jin Wi stood to the side, staring at Baek Cheong in front of the platform with a dazed expression.
After a long silence, Dan-gyeong struggled to speak, chewing over her words. He kept his hands clasped behind his back, but the way his hands trembled beneath his sleeves was visible to everyone.
“...Who taught you such things?”
The bluster was gone from his tone. His voice trembled, barely managing to maintain formal etiquette. Baek Cheong bowed her head slightly once more.
“Grandfather Yakseon...”
A brief silence fell over the pavilion. There were many who called themselves Yakseon, after all.
“I was taught by Yakseon Gokcheon.”
But when the name of the widely acknowledged Yakseon was spoken, Dan-gyeong flinched involuntarily. Gasps of shock could be heard from all corners of the pavilion. Some of the external cultivators froze, their fans still clutched in their hands, while the Biun Sect disciples exchanged cautious glances among themselves. It was rare to find anyone, even those ignorant of alchemy, who hadn't heard of the prestige of Yakseon.
Though his cultivation realm was lower than Dan-gyeong’s, he possessed one of the top alchemy skills in the entire continent. He had long been whispered about among cultivators as a quasi-5th-grade alchemist. Furthermore, rumors had recently been circulating about his achievement in hand-crafting the Five-Element Pill, something no one else could produce. Since it was a heaven-defying pill that artificially boosted the limits of the innate O-yeong-geun, stories always followed wherever news of a quasi-5th-grade alchemist creating such a pill traveled. People speculated that perhaps Yakseon had already reached the 5th-grade level.
Dan-gyeong cleared his throat and asked the child again.
“...Which clan are you from, and what is your name?”
“I am Baek Cheong of the Yeonha Baek Clan.”
Upon hearing the name Baek Cheong, Dan-gyeong recalled the information that she was the child Yakseon Gokcheon cherished like his own granddaughter. While her reputation as the transmission disciple of the Pacheon Sword Sovereign was well-known, to an alchemist, the name Yakseon carried far more weight. Dan-gyeong’s eyebrows twitched, and he closed his eyes, realizing he had made an irreversible mistake by insulting her.
The cultivators who had been listening to the lecture turned pale, busy reading the room. They avoided eye contact with Baek Cheong, who was looking around, trying to avoid her gaze.
‘What’s going on?’
Baek Cheong was merely bewildered by the sudden change in atmosphere. To her, Yakseon was just her grandfather’s old friend. She only thought of him as someone who treated her kindly, like another grandfather. Of course, she knew he was a great alchemist, but she had never imagined he was at a level that would intimidate even a cultivator like Dan-gyeong—a future Peak Master of a great sect who was on the verge of reaching the Nascent Soul stage.
Soon, Dan-gyeong spoke again, his posture now cautious.
“...The young Daoist’s teaching is correct.”
He had reached the point of admitting the correction of a Qi Refining child in front of everyone. The cultivators listening to the lecture couldn't help but admire him. Many joined in, praising him for being a true Yakseon-level alchemist himself for acknowledging the truth.
‘No, that was my idea...’
Baek Cheong listened to the praises from the corner of her eye, chewing on her frustration. The result was created by adding Yakseon’s theory to the nonsense she had come up with, yet her own contribution was nowhere to be found. But she couldn't exactly blurt it out in front of everyone. She had no choice but to watch as her idea was credited to Yakseon.
* * *
Once the lecture concluded, the atmosphere inside the Danjeongnu shifted to center around Baek Cheong. Alchemists approached her one by one, introducing themselves and showering her with praise for her talent.
“This old man also takes your teaching to heart, young Daoist.”
“It is an honor to meet the favored child of the great Yakseon here.”
“If you would just take a look at the pills I’ve refined, I would repay the favor for the rest of my life.”
The praises and greetings were endless, and soon, a full-scale gift offensive began. Each of them was busy pulling out precious herbs they had kept in their pouches and thrusting them toward Baek Cheong. A handful of thousand-year-old Red Sun Herb, a stalk of Cold Moon Flower, and a couple of roots of Blue Jade Herb followed one after another. As expected of alchemists gathered at the Alchemy Peak, the quality of the herbs they offered was no small matter. However, each gift came with a request—to look at their pills or to mention them to Yakseon.
‘No, what is all this?’
Baek Cheong tried to refuse the herbs, but the alchemists insisted that refusing would be against the proper path, leaving her no choice but to accept. Once her arms were piled high with herbs, she had no choice but to quietly tuck them into her Jeomuldae. A part of her thought that since she had received such precious spiritual herbs, she could just use them for her own alchemy back at the clan.
Jin Wi stood beside her, staring at Baek Cheong with a dazed expression. In his twelve years of life, he had never seen a scene where alchemists lined up to offer herbs all at once.
“Senior Jin Wi, let’s go.”
Unable to endure the gift offensive any longer, Baek Cheong tugged slightly on Jin Wi’s sleeve. Jin Wi finally came to his senses and led Baek Cheong out of the Danjeongnu. The gazes of the alchemists followed them for a long time, but Baek Cheong didn't bother looking back. However, she did have a desire to watch how other alchemists refined their pills while she stayed at the Biun Sect.
Jin Wi hesitated for a moment but followed Baek Cheong’s lead. Soon, the two moved straight to another alchemy platform within the Alchemy Peak. The platform wasn't as crowded as the Danjeongnu, but the aura exuded by the alchemist demonstrating on the platform was not light.
“He is a Golden Core alchemist with authority within our sect,” Jin Wi whispered in a small voice.
Baek Cheong nodded quietly and watched the demonstration.
‘An alchemy method that reduces herb waste, huh...’
The alchemist continued to place herbs into the furnace one by one and raised the fire. However, his technique for handling the herbs was somewhat lacking. He failed to preserve the herbs completely, and some of them turned to ash inside the furnace.
‘Ugh.’
Baek Cheong moved her lips without realizing it.
“That’s so frustrating.”
It was another whisper that leaked out very quietly. However, the cultivator in front of the furnace was also a Golden Core alchemist. There was no way he wouldn't hear the words muttered by the young child. The Golden Core alchemist stopped his hand movements. The atmosphere inside the platform flowed exactly as it had at the Danjeongnu.
“...Why don’t you come up here? Show us yourself what is so frustrating to you, young Daoist.”
Baek Cheong walked forward with a bitter expression. Again, it was her own fault, so there was no room for excuses. She stood in front of the furnace and bowed her head politely.
“Shall I refine a pill and show you?”
“Yes, let’s see what you can do.”
Baek Cheong displayed the alchemy skills she had honed. The Five Elements Taiji Alchemy Method was like a secret technique, so she couldn't display it in front of everyone. Besides, it wasn't a situation that required her to use her full strength. She precisely matched the heat to the flow of the herbs as they expanded and gathered. She carefully monitored the inside of the furnace with her Divine Sense, adjusting it so that not a single bit of the herbs was wasted. At the moment the essence was fully released, she gathered the Wood-attribute energy and compressed it without a single deviation. Soon, the pills were neatly formed inside the furnace.
They were the same Top-grade Spirit-Gathering Pills for demonstration that the Golden Core alchemist had prepared. However, the number of pills was different.
“...You’ve refined two more.”
The Golden Core alchemist looked inside the furnace with trembling hands. He had only managed to make ten Top-grade Spirit-Gathering Pills with the same ingredients. But the child before his eyes had refined twelve Top-grade Spirit-Gathering Pills without wasting a single bit of the same ingredients.
“......”
Silence descended upon the platform once again. Soon, the Golden Core alchemist asked for the source of her teachings in a trembling voice. The same scene that had unfolded among the cultivators repeated itself. As soon as he heard the same answer, the Golden Core alchemist showed the same behavior of admitting his own errors. The scene where other alchemists flocked to Baek Cheong’s side to offer herbs was also repeated exactly.
Baek Cheong accepted the herbs with her hands, quietly moved them into her Jeomuldae, and let out a small, bitter sigh.
‘It’s happening again.’
She visited one more sect faction with Jin Wi, but the result was no different. Every alchemy method she saw had frustrating aspects, and because of her unintentional muttering, she was called out in front of everyone to prove herself, gave the same answer about being taught by Yakseon, and repeated the situation of receiving herbs from alchemists and tucking them into her Jeomuldae.
‘The alchemy of the Biun Sect is nothing special.’
After looking around for a long time, Baek Cheong let out a small sigh. Despite being a great sect, the level of their alchemy was low. She felt that even some of the users on Mumyungbang were better.
“Senior Jin Wi.”
“Yes, Miss Baek.”
“Why don’t we stop looking at alchemy and go to the talisman side?”
Jin Wi nodded and waved his hand. Clouds created by his Cloud-Riding Technique gathered at their feet. Soon, the clouds rose slowly and headed toward Jebu Peak.