Monarch Of Time

Chapter 1051 Spreading the word

Old Lu finally raised his head and glanced at the old man, whose spotless azure robes gave him an ethereal look. Then, after a moment, he asked in a dubious tone

”Senior, you need my help?”

Nodding calmly, Shun Long helped the middle-aged man up and answered matter-of-factly

”I’ve been planning to find a few alchemists to help with my shop, and it would be best if they were all natives of Amber Dawn. I’m not well-connected in the city just yet, though, so I’ve been hoping the city guard could help spread the word for me. Of course, I’m going to compensate you all for your troubles.” Old Lu’s eyes widened in surprise, and for a moment, the armored middle-aged man didn’t know how to respond.

He just stared at Shun Long for a while, and after realizing that ’senior Han’ was serious, he clasped his hands and said apologetically

”Senior, I’d love to help you if I can, but I don’t think you understand how dire the situation in Amber Dawn is. Our city is facing a large shortage of high-level alchemists and formation masters, to the point where there are barely any rank 6 pills circulating in the market. This is why everyone was so excited when senior decided to open an alchemy shop here. But finding someone who would pass senior’s standards and would be of any help to you... I’m afraid there’s no one like that in Amber Dawn.” Old Lu lowered his head and stared at the ground beneath his feet, not daring to meet Shun Long’s gaze as he continued

”To my knowledge, there are only a handful of star-rank alchemists in the entirety of Amber Dawn, and all of them work exclusively for the major powers here. Our city guard is said to have two of those alchemists, while the assassin guilds have one each. But regardless of how influential senior may be, I don’t think you’d be able to convince any of them to work for you.”

Shun Long nodded calmly, tacitly agreeing with old Lu’s explanation, which made the middle-aged man that much more confused. He just couldn’t tell what the ’old man’ in front of him was thinking, prompting him to stay silent.

Either way, he’d said everything he needed to say. What ’senior Han’ decided to do with that information was up to him.

Of course, Shun Long had already guessed that much on his own. After all, it was impossible for a city led by a Sovereign, to not have any star-rank alchemists in its ranks.

But Shun Long wasn’t aiming for those star-rank alchemists, in the first place.

With his lips curving upwards, forming a crooked smile, he glanced at old Lu and continued

”That’s not an issue. What I’m looking for is not other star-rank alchemists, but Dao Kings who have comprehended the Dao of Fire. Their talent as alchemists is largely irrelevant. As long as they’ve passed the test to become gold grade alchemists, I don’t care much about the rest.”

At this point, old Lu could no longer follow the old man’s train of thought. He’d even started to suspect if ’senior Han’ was messing with him as a way to relieve his boredom. A master alchemist was looking to hire gold-grade alchemists for his shop?

The more he thought about this, the more confused old Lu became.

After all, any Dao King who had dabbled in alchemy even a little should be qualified to become a gold-grade alchemist, right?

Obviously, there was a huge difference between a talented gold-grade alchemist who could refine dozens of different pills and someone who had just barely reached that rank, but if the old man didn’t care about the difference in talent and skills...

”Then... if senior is not joking, I don’t mind spreading the word for you. I’m sure there are thousands of alchemists in Amber Dawn who would come running the moment they hear about this.”

...

A few moments later, the middle-aged man cupped his hands and bade Shun Long farewell, eager to get started with his task.

”Master, are you sure about this? Even if they are peak-stage Dao Kings, it’s going to take a while until you can turn them into star-rank alchemists. They are not going to be of much help to you until then. Isn’t it better to just hire a bunch of talented little brats and nurture them directly?”

Staring at old Lu’s disappearing figure, Little Black narrowed his eyes before he voiced out his concern.

The black dragon was already aware of what Shun Long was planning to do, but even for his master, Little Black was well aware of how difficult it would be to turn some random gold-grade alchemists into experts capable of refining star-rank pills.

At the very least, Shun Long would have to invest a lot of his own time while training them, and he was already stretching that thin as it was.

There was a reason the gap between a star-rank alchemist and a gold-grade one was so vast, in the first place.

Of course, Shun Long knew what Little Black was worried about, but there was no way around it. He had been planning to nurture a force of talented alchemists that would be loyal to him, and him alone, and to do so, he needed to find people he could trust.

He knew that with his current wealth, forget about gold-grade alchemists, he could probably poach even the star-rank alchemists under the city guard or the two guilds. However, those people wouldn’t be truly loyal to him. That would also be detrimental to his plan to take over the assassin guilds in the near future.

”It’s alright. I’m only going to choose a few people with good control of their spiritual strength and teach them the basics. It should only take a couple of months at most. As long as they reach the peak of the gold grade, it’ll all be worth it.”

With a satisfied grin, Shun Long didn’t say anything else and just made his way back towards the shop. From old Lu’s never-ending praise, it seemed that Fu Li had been doing quite a good job this past month or so.