When the picture was completely parted, the three black-outfit men walked in instantly. Zheng-Fu would not wait outside either, so he followed the three men. After everyone was in, the picture started to shutā¦
The room that Zheng-Fu went into was big. It stored many types of herbal plants. Not only that, but the place had many medicines mixing cauldrons in there. There were also alchemists stationed at each cauldron ā¦
*These are alchemists!* Zheng-Fu was startled to see those alchemists in there. They all wore robes that showed that they were from the Association of the Alchemists. Everyone was chained and had black-outfit men by their sidesā¦
*So, the abducted alchemists were placed here.*
"Hurry! Just make your medicines!" All of a sudden, Zheng-Fu heard a voice coming from a platform on his left-hand sideā¦
The man on the platform was ugly and scary. He was up on the platform and ordered the abducted alchemists to make medicinesā¦
Clomp! Clomp! Clomp!
Zheng-Fu and the three black-outfit men continued to walk along the way without trying to pay attention to anything. But then the ugly man noticed them and saidā¦
"What are you guys doing here!?"
"Respecting the leader of the medicine room. We got injured, so the boss told us to come here to heal our wounds, sir!" One of the black-outfit men said while cupping his fists to pay respect to that ugly man with modestyā¦
"Got injured!?"
"How did you get injured?" The ugly man askedā¦
"Respecting the leader of the medicines room! We got attacked by the troop of the owner of In-See City, sir!" The guy said in a very polite voiceā¦
"The troop of the owner of In-See City!?"
"Is that so? Then just go fix yourselves!" The ugly man got startled for a minute then came back to his normal state of mindā¦
Zheng-Fu continued to look around the room carefully. He could detect that many people were hiding in that place. Those people were probably at the fifth or sixth levels of the Foundation Building stage. He also knew that the leader of the medicine room was at the eighth level of the Golden Core stage. They were not too much for Zheng-Fu to take care ofā¦
Thud!
The three black-outfit men finally walked into a room within that medicine room. It was not a big room and it had a long counter in it along with medicines shelves behind the counterā¦
"Whoa!"
"Who did this to you guys? How come you're badly injured this way?" An elderly man who wore a green robe walked out slowly and askedā¦
The elderly man who just walked to Zheng-Fu and the group was also chained. However, there was no one who guarded himā¦
"Respecting Elder Gim! We got attacked, so we need some pills to get ourselves healed, sir!" One of the black-outfit men said while showing the utmost respect to the Elder who was completely different from those alchemists outside of the roomā¦
"Oh, is that so? Come! Let me see!" The elderly man reached his hand to check the pulse of the manā¦
Grab!
"This is very severe! Wait for a moment. I'll get something for you." When the elderly man finished his sentence, he turned back to the shelves of the medicine to get one of the medicine bottles. He took out a few pills for the manā¦
"Thank you, Elder Gim!"
Then the other two got the same pills. Once they got their medicines, they walked out of the room instantly. So, it was now Zheng-Fu and the elderly man alone in the roomā¦
"What about you? Are you badly injured too?" The elderly man asked while smiling at Zheng-Fuā¦
Zheng-Fu was startled by the elderly man's words. It was like the man knew something about himā¦
"Respecting Elder Gim, I'm not badly injured like them. I'm someone in your position!" Zheng-Fu did not say anything back much. He was trying to be directly indirectā¦
"Is that so?" The elderly man said while stroking his beard and smilingā¦
"That's right! If you're with those men, you can call them in to get me. But if you're like me, could you help me please?" Zheng-Fu did not want to waste the time. So, he tried to be as direct as he could in an indirect wayā¦
"I am like you. And what is it that I can do for you?" The elderly man continued to check Zheng-Fu while smiling at himā¦
Zheng-Fu could feel the strange energy from outside. They probably thought that Zheng-Fu was in the room for far too long. So he knew that they would come in to get himā¦
"I would like you to tell them that I need to be hospitalized in this room!" Zheng-Fu said and rushed to use the technique to make him feel weak. Now his face started to turn paleā¦
Bang!
All of a sudden, the door was flung open. Several black-outfit men came into the room and looked at the elderly man. Then they looked at Zheng-Fu who was lying on the ground with a pale face. It looked like he was going to dieā¦
"What happened?" One of the black-outfit men askedā¦
"His meridians got injured severely. I need to heal him immediately!" The elderly man started to act panic as wellā¦
Then the elderly man rushed to pick Zheng-Fu up and led him to the examination room. The elderly man got this special room to himself because he was an alchemist with a green robeā¦
The black-outfit men were still in the room. They looked at Zheng-Fu and Elder Gim with suspicious eyes. But since Zheng-Fu's face really got pale and Elder Gim seemed to look honest, they started to believe in the actsā¦
"Then we're not going to get in your way. Just go back to take care of him!" One of the black-outfit men said and led the rest out of the roomā¦
*Click*
When Zheng-Fu saw that everyone was gone, he started to release the special technique to get back to normal. His pale face began to have some color on it as if nothing happenedā¦
The elderly man looked at Zheng-Fu with wonder. He had never seen something like this before. He had never seen someone who could pretend to be dead in a short time and come back to normal without using any medicines at allā¦
"Thank you for helping me, sir!" Zheng-Fu said while cupping his fists to pay respect to the elderly man with utmost modestyā¦
"It's alright!" Elder Gim replied and smiled at Zheng-Fu. Then he started to think while looking at Zheng-Fuā¦
Zheng-Fu could guess what Elder Gim was thinking about, so he said, "You probably wonder who I am!" Zheng-Fu then smiled back at Elder Gimā¦
"What!?"
Elder Gim was surprised to hear that. He did not know how Zheng-Fu knew what he thought. He had not said anything or made any kind of gesture to show thatā¦
"Yes! You don't look like one of those men out there."
"Of course. I'm not one of them. What about you? Are you being abducted?" Zheng-Fu asked while looking at the chains on his anklesā¦
"That's right!"
Elder Gim nodded slightly while answering Zheng-Fu's question with a sad face. He did not want to be there, but had to because he did not know how to fight the cultā¦
Zheng-Fu looked around the room and thought that it was kind of mysterious. He did not know who built this place. It seemed to be impossible for someone to build this room because the walls were thick and hard. The room was also filled with some kind of energy ā¦
"Those alchemists out there were also abducted." The elderly man said while looking out of the roomā¦
"Do you know why they abducted so many alchemists?" Zheng-Fu asked out of curiosityā¦
"I have no idea! All I know is that they force those alchemists to make some kind of super pills or something." The elderly man said while taking out a medicine formula that he also received and gave it to Zheng-Fuā¦
Grab!
Zheng-Fu took the formula and checked the formula in detail. He crinkled his eyebrows the minute he read that piece of paperā¦
"This isā¦!"
Zheng-Fu's hand shook out of shock because the formula in his hand contained a formula that looked almost exactly like the formula that he came up with at the test at the Association of the Alchemistsā¦
It was just that some of the ingredients of this formula were slightly different from Zheng-Fu's. However, Zheng-Fu thought that the outcomes were maybe almost the sameā¦
"Do you recognize this formula?" The elderly man asked Zheng-Fu out of curiosity. He asked because he saw Zheng-Fu's stunned gestureā¦
The elderly man did not think that Zheng-Fu could understand the formula. He thought that only alchemists could understand the medicine-making processā¦
"Nā¦nā¦not at all, sir! I was only shocked to see the information in this paper. It's very complicated." Zheng-Fu rushed to deny the question. He just said that he was shocked to see the informationā¦
"I think so. You're not an alchemist. How would you understand it?" The elderly man took a long exhale, feeling relievedā¦
"So, how long have you been abducted, Elder Gim?" Zheng-Fu asked while looking at the elderly manā¦
"How long? I guess it should be around a year!" The elderly man answered the question while making a strange facial expressionā¦
"A year!"
*That's the time that I was asleep, unconscious. So, Elder Gim was already here the first time that I came to this place?* Zheng-Fu calculated the time frame of the abduction of Elder Gim. It was the time that he attacked the place to save the daughter of the owner of In-See cityā¦
"I'll get you out! Let me cut off those chains for you!" Zheng-Fu said while cultivating his energy to his hand and prepared to hit the chains. But thenā¦
"Wait!"
The elderly man asked Zheng-Fu to stop the hit. He looked fearful and said, "You can't just cut off these chains because they were magical chains. If you don't get rid of the magical power, the chains will explode if you cut them" Elder Gim said while showing the side of the chains that got sealed by magicā¦
"What!?"
Zheng-Fu stopped his action immediately. He did not realize that the chain would be sealed with magic. Now he looked at the magical seal closely because he had never seen oneā¦
"That's why everyone looks so scared. So, it's because of the magic on their chains. And do you know how to destroy this magical seal?" Zheng-Fu asked the elderly man so he knew the right way to helpā¦
"I have no idea. But I saw that the leader of the medicine room got a hold of a crystal ball that gives out purple lights all the time. That crystal ball might be the thing he uses to control the magic!"
"A crystal ball!?"
"That's right!"
The elderly man nodded to respond to Zheng-Fu, which made Zheng-Fu crinkle his eyebrows instantly. That was because the leader of the medicine room was in a place that was hard to get into. It was not easy to get to him. Zheng-Fu thought if he made any mistake, he might blow a chance to help his mother for goodā¦
"But it's not easy to get to the leader of the medicine room. How could I get the crystal ball from him?" Zheng-Fu said while feeling sadā¦
"Let me take care of that! But even though I can get close to him, his energy level isā¦"
"That won't be any problem. Just lure him to get close to you as much as possible." Zheng-Fu cut off the elderly man and showed him that he had some good ideas to deal with the problem...
The elderly man was surprised to see Zheng-Fu's confident gesture. But he thought that if Zheng-Fu could get in here this far, he must be really good. The thought made him feel relievedā¦
"Alright! Let's do that. I hope you can pull this through. If there's even a tiny mistake, we won't make it out. But even though I've just met you, I feel like I can believe in you. I hope I'm right." The elderly man said while making a determined facial expression at Zheng-Fuā¦