Ye Chong was so efficient at it that even Shang got surprised, "Ye, I never knew you have such talent! You are such a skillful cleaner. Well, that means even if we got out one day, you could be a good maid and you could earn decently to pay for your living and our fuel! Mhm, apparently being a maid is not just for anyone and it certainly requires some standard of skills."
Ye Chong ignored the artificial intelligence again as he took a glance at the room, which had become spotless and refreshing. Technically he just discarded whatever that looked useless to him and a majority of them turned out to be clothing. Like for Pete's sake, who would buy these many clothes? Won’t she feel inconvenient of changing into different clothings constantly?
Without hesitation, these grimy clothing were all thrown.
Seeing how the room got all tidied up, spick and span, Ye Chong was satisfied, though he did accidentally "over-clean" a few pieces of floorings as they were too dirty… He wiped the specks to a bin.
The next few days passed under the Lunatic Guan’s signature giggling and mumbling. She did not regard Ye Chong in a bit.
Well Ye Chong was not in a rush as there were simply too many things he could do to kill time. Meditation alone could already consume a huge portion of his hours, since his talent to this was much more measly than most of the people. In spite of that, he kept it up, after working hard for so long, he made some breakthrough a few days back finally - he started to feel that wave of oddity faintly wafting around him.
This was more than encouraging to Ye Chong. After witnessing the unique battle style conducted by these pilots from the sanctuary, he had always believed in how mental training was the root of their existence.
His mindset was right after all. The starting point was correct but the path was rockier than he thought. The actuality of mental training was a more complicated concept. These so-called mentalists had been chosen way back when they were a child for their outstanding mental and physical conditions. They were trained in a group of 10 each. They grew up together as they trained together to build the rapport. And they would become the true elite of combats!
Nevertheless, Ye Chong did not expect to get fully immersed in the boundless world of mentalist, neither did he wish the expertise could provide him aid of any kind during battle. He only wished that it could at least help him to ease his pain whenever that symptom came raiding him. If it could do that, it would be godly helpful and Ye Chong would be thanking God.
Other than the daily meditation session, there were other things to do as well. Ye Chong was not the meddling kids who would go digging some graves, peeling some masks, he had much better things to do like getting familiar with the Guardian. He had been restlessly trying to get along with this miniature mech the past few days because he understood the fact well enough that only with the continuous bonding between the pilot and the mech itself would bring out the best in each other. The Guardian was just like the treasure of infinity, which never failed to give Ye Chong new surprises.
Dagger for No.2. It was a rather stupid item name for a great pair of daggers like itself. It did not even look like a proper noun of naming without the capitalization, even though this silly name represented a transcendent pair of daggers. Numerous discussions were conducted between Ye Chong and Mu yet they failed to determine the concept behind the production of such kind of dagger, which was mind-blowing enough for Ye Chong to praise how Gu Shaoze was a genius. The sharpness of Dagger for No.2 was much higher than the Blue Winter which the tip had been imbued with Do Kun stone. The one pity was… the fact that it was too small to do anything significant on a mech, unless the fatal spots were aimed at first or it would still be a mosquito’s bite on an elephant. The other catch was it was tricky to pilot the miniature under the unique monochromatic vision, and Ye Chong was attempting to get used to it.
In addition, Ye Chong also had to invest a few hours of his day on getting some hands-on practices on the bones he got from the grandfather, just to prevent regression in his skills.
Judging by the routine he had day by day, sometimes Ye Chong wondered if he could even squeeze a few minutes on alchemy, which justified the fact that he was acting so patiently despite Lunatic Guan’s consecutive absence, simply because he did not have the leisure to even figure it out! Out of the blue his life felt all fulfilling and meaningful. The biggest fortune of his life at the moment was probably Shang had switched places with Mu once again as his time was up. When Shang left and Mu came, it felt like a silent night, holy night - all was calm, all was bright.
This was exactly what Ye Chong thought especially being mentally tortured by Shang’s lecture. Ever since he had a glance at Lunatic Guan he was as if overdosed with aphrodisiac. "Aphrodisiac?" The alien term to Ye Chong was then defined by Shang, claiming that it was a kind of chemical which would induce simulation of a certain kind of hormones in human body within a short period of time.
The definition sounded horrifying to Ye Chong, wondering when Shang did his chemistry studies. What left Ye Chong such a deep impression was actually how Shang was "reacting" towards Lunatic Guan after that. He would be praising Lunatic Guan solemnly and endlessly like her best worshipper, lines and lines of classic cheesy, cringe-worthy expression of love he called them came rolling like inferno of his libido he said. It was impressive for he never repeat the said adjective or noun… but it was menacing at the same time. On top of that, regularly he would "advise", "recommend" or "suggest" Ye Chong to approach Lunatic Guan whenever he could, though the tone sounded like how a person who would also "advise" the old lady during a robbery. It was fortunate that Ye Chong had such a calm personality, he almost snapped under the uninterrupted chain of agony. One could imagine his machine jamming!
It was absolutely a horror! If anyone who acted like Shang after consuming this namely "aphrodisiac", then this said chemical would be the most fearsome drug in history of humankind!
The relieving fact was Shang had a strong accuracy of time as he gave away his space right at that moment, though with a heavy heart that made him sing some goosebumps-giving poems he said. Ye Chong gave a deep sigh of relief upon hearing Mu’s monotonous line again.
Shang might had left, but Lunatic Guan had just arrived.
"Hmmmmmmmmmmmm."
The glass hung in her right hand as Lunatic Guan leaned against the door with her face reddened from the alcohol. Ye Chong immediately paused his routine as he set his glance of indifference upon her.
"Yi…Yi…Ye." Her words were unclear, "Ye my boy you… you are so *hiccup* patient… so uncomplaining… I’m impressed… no wonder your master had such expe-expectation on you. Well… Very well… Let the good old sister grant your wish…" Her head swung uncontrollably as she fell upon the door and went all the way down to the ground she sat.
…? Ye Chong’s expression suggested otherwise.
"Little Ye! You!" Glared at Ye Chong upon seeing his doubtful eyes, Lunatic Guan mumbled, "Ye my boy, don’t tell me… you think I’m… I’m… *hiccup* drunk? Hmph… Let me tell you, Little Ye. I’m not… I’m not drunk! Let me give you a pro… proper lesson today!"
…
Settled down, Lunatic Guan pondered a little. Seriousness began surging through the drunken face of hers as her speech became clearer - a rare sight it was indeed. "The chemists, or some called the alchemists… they were not the one who played with the flasks right from the beginning, most of them happened to be botanist formerly. They researched on plants and had discovered a variety of attributes on these beautiful babies. Mhm, it’s a very intriguing study indeed! However, as the timeframe for a plant to complete its growth was too long, it brought up a lot of problems for them to conduct the research effectively. Thus, these researchers, driven by their curiosity and impatience, started trying various methodologies to condense the growth timeframe of a plant. And that was how the chemists showed up. Until today, botany is still the most widely used field of study in alchemy."
Ye Chong was certainly all ears and surely he did not notice how the ever-drunk face of Lunatic Guan had turned all fair - her eyes were crystal-clear, lustered with wisdom as the features defined her shocking beauty with that gleaming face of hers.
"Then, people realized it was possible to reduce the growth timeframe through alchemy for living things other than the plants. As they ventured deeper into the unknown, their research was recognized. They started getting known by the people for being the explorer, the developer to new species. Then the field of alchemy was diversified, professionalized and began heading into the vision of humanity!"
Her tone was embedded with a hint of pride, which was surprising to Ye Chong for it was far-fetched to imagine a lunatic like Guan could have such emotion… Perhaps, Lunatic Guan was not as simple as she appeared currently before… Ye Chong laughed at the thought - "like tell me anyone who had a simple background and managed to enter the Orbits!"
"So…" Lunatic Guan carried on, "there are a number of branches of studies in the alchemy. Well, we are humans after all. We can’t simply involve ourselves in every field available. Other than the difference in branches of expertise, there are still many methods that are unknown to people to distinguish the grouping between chemists. Since you are technically my student, you should be aware of this. Mhm, everything regarding this is stored inside the processor at Room No.5 and the password would be 37254. Go check it out if you are interested. Being an occupation having rich history as dated long time ago, there are laws hidden within the field and rules which are unwritten to outsiders, which is something you need to work on. Or else… Heh! You could picture what would happen if you conduct the taboo, be it an accident or an incident. Hmph!" The tone fell coldly.
Ye Chong nodded, expressing his understanding.
"For starters, learn about botany. The research of botany is most fruitful and mature!" Lunatic Guan searched through her body for a moment, she found nothing as she stopped and pondered with her head tilted. "Oh, silly me!" she muttered as she withdrew a chip of size of a thumb right from her chest. "Grab!" She tossed it to Ye Chong.
Lunatic Guan "tossed" the chip too gently, the chip was too light to fly far enough to Ye Chong. It was falling and Ye Chong launched himself to grab it right before it hit the ground.
"Oh?" Lunatic Guan’s eyes flashed slight peculiarity as her eyes scanned through Ye Chong, "Eh, my Little Ye, you ain’t bad you know! I never knew you were quite capable of things despite that puny body of yours. Yes, yes, sister myself would be relieved even if you were to head out alone. Hehehehehehehehe! Little Ye, you know! You~could~always~come~to~me~ So I could have an actual test on your s-t-a-m-i-n-a! The exercises! If you know what I meant, hehehehehe!" sneered Lunatic Guan, covering her mouth which uttered a tone of ambiguous chemistry.
"Stamina?" Ye Chong shook his head as his reply came seriously, "My stamina is good enough. No test is required!"
…
Psh!
Lunatic Guan had lost control after trying very hard to inhibit her laughter, as she sat on the ground and burst out laughing. "Ahahahahahahahaha!" The chain of laughter rang throughout the room. "Hehehehehehehehe!" Ye Chong could not compute the rationale behind this long laughter… "Mu." He knew it would be very inappropriate if he asked out loud, so he asked Mu in his mind instead, "Is my stamina that bad?"
"Hmm…" Hesitated Mu, "Probably the foe had better vitality, although the chances are less than 1%!"
"Hah…"
It took quite some time before Lunatic Guan lost her breath, as she tapped her chest, gasping for air. 3 minutes lapsed and she finally calmed down.
"Hah."
"Okay, this chip contains the illustrations of common herbs. Although most schools do not demand their students to memorize all of this, you are my student and you should not be all cheap and secondary of course! Memorize the entries, every-single-of-them. I’ll be testing you in a few days. If you got it wrong, heh! No doubt, punishment awaits! And that would be very, very memorable to my Little Ye."
Ye Chong shuddered for some reason.
"Also!" she spoke on, "this is only a side quest, but you better be doing it. You would be collecting the actual herbs as samples based on the listing in the illustrations. Yes, the plant searching device would be at Room No.2, fifth from the left on the third row. You would probably need that. The instruction is there. It is simple, just a glance and you'll get it. So stop bothering me with that! Okay… that’s probably… it? I want to see actual samples for all entries on the illustrations after 5 days. Alright, save the nagging. That's it." Lunatic Guan waved as she seemed a little irritated somehow.
"Tata! Zzz…"
She ignored Ye Chong after that. Lunatic Guan leaned against the door and began sleeping soundly.