Elder Praxx strode past John and descended deep into a chamber below his mansion, in which a massive training room was located. Like this, John trained with Elder Praxx for the next week regarding many things, such as honing battle instincts, assassination arts, and much much more.
John's days were spent training with Elder Praxx, while his nights were spent cultivating and preparing to break through to the next realm, as well as exploring the sect when he could. For some reason, John felt his nerves become more and more taught, and so he became much more careful when looking around the sect for any and all clues.
Eventually, he realized that Elder Praxx was his best source of information, and that any further exploration was mostly useless. Slowly but surely, Elder Praxx was revealing more and more information to John.
By now, he had learned that the summoning was part of a rather large plan the sect had in place, but the plan was still vague, frustrating John slightly.
On this day, John found himself eating in the lunch district, taking a rare break from training with Elder Praxx.
'Whew, training with Elder Praxx is quite intense, although not nearly as intense as training with that crazy woman who calls herself my master. Still, this training is quite valuable, and I can feel my combat prowess continue to rise steadily.. Not only that, but Elder Praxx seems to be quite knowledgeable about assassination arts. With what he's taught me over the last few days, I'm sure I would be able to assassinate that merchant without him detecting me now.'
John took a bite of his meal, which was a large sandwich made with Core Formation beast meat, and a soup containing various expensive ingredients.
"Hmm, not bad. This sandwich is quite filling, while the soup is replenishing my expended Qi reserves quite nicely," John mused to himself out loud.
"Not bad, right? Although I prefer the tea here," a voice behind John snapped him out of his thoughts.
"Chase, we meet again," John replied with a smile as he turned to greet chase.
In this place he despised to the very core, Chase was the only person he could stomach to talk to without wanting to kill them. Unlike the others, he seemed to be quite laid back, and had no bloodthirsty or menacing traits about him.
"That we have," Chase replied with a smile on his face. "I haven't seen you in over a week. Where have you been?" Chase asked.
John finished his bite of food before responding. "I've been training with my master, as well as doing some sect missions. Right now is a rare break from training," John replied before taking another bite of his sandwich.
"Ah, I see. That makes sense."
Chase inspected John for a moment before his one eyebrow raised slightly.
"Your cultivation seems to have improved quite a bit since I last saw you as well. It seems as if you're at the Half-Step Meridian Forging realm, and are quite close to breaking through," Chase replied.
"Yep. I'm pretty close, and my comprehensions are more than enough, but the last hurdle is still a bit too much to leap over right now. I need to consolidate more internal Qi before I can push through and reach the Meridian Forging Realm," John confirmed.
"Hmm," Chase hummed while listening to John. "Then you should take this," he suddenly said as he stretched out his hand towards John.
On his hand rested a round red pill which contained four rings of blue that circled the exterior of the pill. The pill emitted a dense medicinal aura, as well as a potent vibrancy, causing John to widen his eyes slightly.
"And what's this?" John asked, although he had his suspicions.
"It's a Meridian Ascension Pill, but not the kind you would find just anywhere. I made this one personally, and can vouch for its efficacy. If you take it, you should instantly be able to push through to the Meridian Forging Realm," Chase explained.
John looked at the pill for a moment before he reached out and took it, as he refused to stand on courtesy when it regarded his cultivation.
"Thanks," John replied with a large smile on his face. "This will help a lot."
"I'm glad to hear it," Chase replied with an equally large smile, and he guestered to a nearby waiter to order some food.
For the next hour, John and Chase discussed various things about cultivation, the pill dao, and the Bloodfiend Sect, before they parted ways. John made his way back to his house on top of the mountain, and secluded himself in his room as he took out the pill Chase had given him.
His divine sense flared out with its strongest power, as he scanned every single millimeter of the pill for any irregularities. While he was not a pill expert, he had taken enough pills to know when some ingredients were out of place.
"Can't be too careful," John murmured to himself. "Even though Chase seems like a pretty nice guy, this is the Bloodfiend Sect after all."
After inspecting the pill for over an hour, John finally let out a deep sigh of relief as he confirmed the pill was safe to consume.
"I guess Chase really is an alright fellow," John mused. He prepared his state of mind and calmed himself before grabbing the pill and popping it into his mouth. The pill went down his throat and into his stomach, where it began to slowly dissolve.
The pill instantly began to fill John with incredible energy, elating him.
'It seems as if this pill truly is amazing. Chase must be quite the Pill Expert to make such a pill.'
Boom!
The doors to John's room suddenly burst open, surprising John greatly. Not wanting to waste any of the medicinal properties of the pill, John sent out a stream of essence Qi to wrap around it, isolating it from the rest of his stomach.
After doing so, John looked up at the opened door with frustration on his face, ready to yell at whoever just barged in. His face of anger quickly turned into surprise and confusion as he saw who it was.
"Chase? What are you doing here?" John called out.
Chase seemed to be out of breath, as well as in a hurry as he ran towards John and grabbed him by the arm.
"Don't ask me what's going on. Just follow me, okay?" Chase replied to John.
John carefully inspected Chase, who seemed to have something making him quite concerned. After a moment of hesitation, he nodded his head in agreement.
"Sure, lead the way."