Fen Lin, or Lin Fen as he picked up from Yu Xiang over the years, was a beastfolk of small stature, barely reaching Yu’s chest on the rare occasions he bothered to stand straight instead of slouching over the nearest scroll. Two gray furred feline ears were placed atop his head, surrounded by a smooth mane of similarly colored hair that normally reached his shoulders but which were currently gathered in a ponytail. A matching tail rested curled around his waist.

Metal grey eyes were placed on a far too pallid face, proof of his unwavering dedication to the study of alchemy and pill making and that he’d been ignoring Yu’s constant nagging about spending at least some time in the sun.

His appearance, like that of many cultivators in higher realms, tended towards an androgynous beauty, although he had obviously started with an advantage in that regard, and as he stood bent over a scroll with his ears pressed against his head and a focused glare twisting his face he looked the picture perfect image of a dedicated scholar.

With smooth and graceful steps Yu Xiang snuck behind the oblivious catfolk and with a forceful motion stabbed both of his index fingers in Lin Fen’s sides.

The studious catfolk let out a decidedly embarrassing yowl, jumping in surprise and almost touching the low ceiling.

As he returned to the ground Lin Fen turned around with a snarl on his lips delivering a kick aimed at Yu’s face.

“Yu Xiang, you sneaky son of a dog! You almost gave me a heart attack!” A flurry of kicks, punches, and other bodily strikes followed the first, every single one either being deflected or missing entirely even as Yu Xiang laughed himself silly.

The racket of battle quickly diminished and was instead replaced by the sound of panting as Lin Fen ended his onslaught, a glare still directed at an amused Yu Xiang.

With a shit-eating grin firmly planted on his face, Yu patted Lin Fen on his back. “Come on Lin, there’s no need to get so worked up over a harmless prank between friends.”

The disgruntled catfolk seemed to not agree with the taller teen as his glare only gained in intensity, his feline ears twitching in annoyance.

With an exaggerated roll of his eyes, Yu Xiang lifted a hand, a pouch held tightly in his fist, and presented it to his friend.

“Fine fine I’m sorry.” he said completely unapologetically, “Here, I got you some herbs for your studies.”

Lin Fen’s glare subsided as he snatched the pouch from Yu’s hand, moving with inhuman speed as he cleared the laboratory’s workbench from the assorted clutter.

With his expression set into an interested frown, he opened the pouch, carefully handling each herb.

“The leaves and stems are all bent...” Lin whined without raising his head. “Couldn’t you have been more careful while carrying them around?”

Yu Xiang could feel the studious cultivator pouting even without seeing his face, and he huffed in amusement as he answered the rhetorical question. “Well, excuse me for not being super careful while I was in the middle of a forest. I was a bit busy trying not to get myself gutted by angry spiritual beasts.”

Lin let out a grunt of acknowledgment then promptly started ignoring him as he got to work on the spiritual herbs.

Yu Xiang was no expert when it came to Alchemy and Pillmaking, as a matter of fact, he was at the very best an amateur and even then only in the theoretical parts, but he had taken the available courses provided by the sect.

Well, to be completely honest, he’d been dragged there by an uncommonly headstrong Lin Fen, who had found his lack of interest in such a cornerstone of the world of cultivation personally offensive, and had taken upon himself the duty of cramming at least some of the basics into his brain.

But even then, as Yu watched the catfolk cultivator at work, he could only speculate as to the reasons behind his actions.

With peerless skill born from years of practice and endless studies of hundreds of scrolls, Lin Fen unsheathed a long knife from his left sleeve then started carefully cutting the spiritual herbs apart.

First, he sliced the high grade spiritual grass, separating the roots from the rest, then he carefully peeled the blades from the stem. A deft movement of his knife carved away the spiked inflorescence at the top then he finished by finely chopping up the stem while leaving the nodes whole and untouched.

He repeated this process for every single grass plant, with only minor variations for reasons Yu could only guess at.

His current theory was that certain parts of the plants were carrying different amounts of spiritual energy and that by separating said parts from one another you could stop the herbs from moving said energy while keeping it contained and stable.

Once he finished cutting up all the spiritual grass Lin opened one of the many cupboards that could be found all around the workshop, from which he retrieved various crystal jars. He filled the jars with the various parts of the spiritual grass, making sure not to mix any of them, then put the now full containers in another cupboard.

Having finished dealing with the grass he returned to his work table, picking up one of the less common spiritual herbs. With a focused stare, he examined his chosen specimen, briefly checking one of his scrolls before nodding to himself.

As he got ready to cut away at the spiritual herb Lin noticed Yu Xiang’s unusual interest in his work and after a moment of deliberation decided to share his wisdom with his usually meatheaded companion. He raised the spiritual plant to Yu Xiang’s eye level who immediately focused on his hand.

“This is called a Burning Pine Flower.” He began lecturing with his chin raised high. “It gained its name from the shape of its leaves which resemble pine needles and its common usage in lower grade fire related medicines and elixirs.”

A movement of his perfectly sharpened knife cut away the plant’s roots.

“Can you tell me why I did that?” He questioned with raised eyebrows.

Yu Xiang nodded with a confident smile as he shared his earlier musings. “It’s to keep the concentration of spiritual energy consistent. If you didn’t cut the plant apart the spiritual energy inside it would keep circulating until it became even through its entire body, which would mean you’d need to find another higher graded plant if you wanted a higher concentration of spiritual energy.”

Lin Fen blinked slowly, pleasantly surprised at Yu’s thorough answer.

Yu Xiang gave him a mock glare as he saw his reaction. “Hey! I’ll have you know that I did listen to those courses you made me attend.”

Lin chuckled softly before schooling his face into a haughty sneer. “Well, that explains why your answer was so lacking then! You should’ve spent more time researching in the hall of knowledge instead of gallivanting like a muscle brained fool!”

The reincarnator rolled his eyes as his feline companion fell into a fit of giggles at his own antics.

“All joking aside.” Continued Lin Fen after regaining his composure. “While your answer was technically right, you’re missing some crucial information.”

Yu Xiang raised an eyebrow in silent inquiry, prompting the diminutive cultivator to continue.

“While it is true that by isolating certain parts of the plants you can preserve a higher concentration of spiritual energy, for an alchemist that comes second to the attunement of said spiritual energy.”

Lin Fen raised his free hand and pointed at the brownish reddish plant in his hand.

“For example, most of this Burning Pine Flower, as the name might give away, has spiritual energy attuned to fire...”

His hand moved, now pointing at the cut off part.

“While the spiritual energy in its roots was predominantly of the life and earth attunement.” His gaze briefly settled on Yu, who nodded to signal he was still following him.

“If I didn’t separate the two they would’ve started to intermingle and weaken each other until one of the two attunements ended up completely suppressed, leaving the winner weakened and much less useful to an alchemist such as myself.” Lin Fen finished by sending his impromptu student a questioning look, encouraging him to ask any questions he might have.

Yu Xiang took him up on his silent offer. “But what exactly makes attunement so important? Isn’t the amount of spiritual energy that can be crammed into a pill the most important thing?”

The young alchemist shook his head. “That might be true for normal low grade cultivation aids, but simply shoving higher grade spiritual energy rich plants with different attunements into a pill furnace is just going to end up in an explosion, as the different attunements fight for supremacy.”

“I guess that makes some sense.” Mused the taller teen.

As Yu Xiang ruminated over the new information Lin Fen resumed his processing of the spiritual herbs, interrupting his friend’s contemplation every time he started on another plant to explain its properties.

By the time they were done the sun had already begun to dip towards the horizon.

The two cultivators tidied up the workshop a bit before leaving, making sure to put their preserved spiritual plants in the appropriate sealed and warded containers. After all, they didn't want some greedy outer disciple to get any stupid ideas.

The two walked down towards the residential district in companionable silence, simply enjoying the late evening's cool air. Suddenly Yu Xiang perked up as he remembered something, and started going through his pouches.

"Damn, I almost forgot to tell you!" Said the green eyed cultivator as his companion gave him a questioning look. "Check what I found today."

Yu Xiang raised a dirt filled pouch towards Lin Fen's head, a single glowing flower sprouting from it.

The burgeoning alchemist looked at it with a confused expression for a moment before his spiritual senses brushed against the spiritual plant, informing him of what exactly he had in front of him.

Trembling hands clutched Yu Xiang's arms as Lin eyed the herb with a far too intense stare.

Meanwhile, Yu let out an 'ah' of realization as he came to the conclusion that he probably should've waited for the next day before showing Lin Fen his discovery.