The Body Purification Pill wasn't anything special at first glance—just a chestnut-sized green pellet. To a keener sight, it glowed with a myriad of multicolored motes of Qi. The motes created an incredibly complex structure that contained a lot of Qi in it, while not glowing for kilometers like a cultivator's dantian.
The words Lin Chu told me when passing it rang again in my head.
"Lin Clan spends from 400 to 500 lesser Qi stones on a single outer disciple. That's 4 to 5 standard Qi stones. This medium-grade Body Purification Pill cost 80 Qi stones when I bought it from the alchemists of the main sect. It not only improves the user's body and speeds up cultivation at the early Qi Foundation stage, but also increases Qi reserves. Don't waste it."
Now I sat back in my room, ready to make use of the pill. The servants were already told to not interrupt me until I came out.
Right now, my body was still weak, mortal, and full of impurities and imperfections. Immortal cultivators had perfect bodies made from perfect materials and their own Qi.
When I digested this pill, a part of my impurities will be replaced with Qi.
"Well, here it goes," I said and swallowed it.
The effect was immediate.
I closed my eyes, focusing inward. The Qi from the pill was spreading from my stomach to the rest of my body, affecting everything it touched. My muscles cramped and my guts grumbled, but it wasn't painful. Just toxins going out the fastest way they could.
However, I saw that the pill's Qi was spreading unequally. With a thought, I nudged it to the untouched places. At the same time, I used the Qi from my dantians to even more enrich the purified parts of my body while I could.
It was an intense process, which required my utmost concentration. Which soon became harder to maintain. I was sweating bullets, and my body urged me to get rid of all the impurities in the most primitive way.
I was prepared for it. Without opening my eyes, I pulled the readied chamber pot closer and bent over it. A stream of vomit rushed from my stomach, smelling even worse than usual.
I ignored it, wiped my mouth with a sleeve, and went right back to the Qi in my body.
Which wasn't feeling better. The nausea passed, but now I felt like my meridians were nauseous instead. I looked downward, puzzled, and gasped.
The pill's Qi was worming its way into them.
It must've been the Qi boost Lin Chu promised, but this wasn't the way refined Qi should act. It was tearing my meridians!
From a glance, it wasn't going to actually harm me much, but it felt like the worst stomach bug of my life.
"Just bear this, Ru Yujin…" I muttered to myself, then leaned over the chamber pot again and dry heaved.
I saw part of the pill's Qi enter my meridians and through them flow to my stomach dantian. They merged, and my dantian rippled and deformed slightly. It looked as if it was reaching toward the stream of Qi coming from the meridians.
My phantom nausea diminished, but a new dread formed in my head as I realized what that meant.
The Body Purification Pill was made with badly refined Qi, and consuming it did something to my pure as snow Qi. The impurity of the unrefined Qi was contagious.
A flash of a memory of a dream appeared in front of my eyes—the traitorous son's Qi moving on its own like a dog let off its leash.
This was Qi deviation!
I reached for the pill's Qi in my body, but the harm was already done. The rest of the Qi didn't try entering my dantians, simply continuing the purification.
My own Qi didn't feel very different from before. I exhaled.
However, I knew that leaving Qi deviation untreated could spell terrible harm for me later down the road.
I KNEW it, even if Lin Chu and other cultivators could have been unaware.
Eventually, the purification of my body stopped. However, I didn't stand up.
My focus went to my Qi. I reasoned that if I could refine it once, I could refine it twice.
Right now, my Qi wasn't entirely impure, either. Just one percent impure. One percent of Qi deviation.
But that percent was spread over all the Qi in my dantians, which was already IN my body. The only way to refine it again was to bring it out… and pull it back in.
Which was what I did. I pulled a part of my Qi out of my body, set it free, then returned it to my dantian. I felt my soul connecting with it again, refining it. Almost a third of my Qi deviation was gone in an instant.
Then the Qi mixed with the rest of my Qi and the deviation spread evenly again.
I sighed.
No matter how many times I will remove a third of my Qi deviation, it will never become zero.
All I could do from this point was to keep it low. Because while now I was a master of my Qi, if my Qi deviation grew…
I won't even notice how my Qi will become a master of me.
Qi didn't have any mind or soul, but it had desires, and these desires will become my desires. Like the traitor from my dreams, I will think that I'm completely sane while doing things I'd never do in my right mind.
I spent many hours re-taming my Qi—not only on that day, but on the next one. It still didn't feel quite right…
But my time was limited. For the rest of the week, I prepared for war.