After some refined ass kissing, and with the aid of some goodwill from having impressed the instructor, Dave was given access to the students' pill ingredient storeroom to practice pill refinement on his own.
"Hyehehe, sucking up to teachers is one of my favorite pastimes from high school. Teachers never stand a chance against my good-natured schoolboy charm. I can leave a polished apple on their desk with words alone."
His dorm room was located at the far end of one of the dormitories, reminiscent of a modern room from earth, small, cramped, but in the style of an old Chinese building. It was a single room which suited him well as no one would interfere with his experiments. His only roommate was the single window pointing directly into a grove of bamboo so he couldn't see anything outside. Laid out on a desk he had a giant tome on the subject of pill refinement open and he was cross referencing it with his knowledge of chemistry.
"Epidemium, more commonly known as horny goat weed, ginseng, black ginger, maca root, deer antler powder, gorilla bone shards. If my intuition is correct I should get something veeeery interesting if I refine this into a pill successfully. With the power of my meth lab ability that should be a piece of cake."
[Skill activation: Meth lab]
The miniature pill refinement cauldron went through the motions of lighting itself under his ghetto shaman control. Dave maintained the fire with one hand while carefully adding ingredients with the other. The multicolored smoke inside coalesced and hardened into a tiny blue pill under his supervision.
"Success!"
Not a moment sooner had the refinement ended than someone nearly kicked down the door and stormed in. Dave nearly had a heart attack, he fumbled the pill in the and managed to catch it before it fell on the dusty floor.
"Brother Dave, I have found you!" Bing Feng shouted, "Studying and refining pills in your leisure time? I would have expected no less. Impressive! Impressive!"
Dave let out a turgid breath stained with stress and placed the pill safely on his desk. "Bing Feng, how did you find my room? I never told you where it is."
"Hahaha, Dave, there may be seven Bing Fengs in the Ethereal Soul Sect, but there is only one Dave, and that's you! The elders told me at once where to find you."
"Doesn't that violate some kind of privacy laws? I never consented to having my information shared with third parties."
Bing Feng narrowly avoided getting into an argument amount privacy law as he shot forward and stared intensely at the little blue pill. "Brother Dave, what is this! Another essence bolstering pill!?" Dave not wanting to let him go unlectured launched a different rant in place;
"Hehe, it turns out I have a talent for the practice of medicine as well. No surprise there as it's only another branch on the grand oak of science. Maybe I inherited it from my estranged grandpa who was some kind of doctor, I heard, what was his name again? I think he was Japanese… Shiro… something? Whatever. I don't need to remember his name to have inherited his talent. If anything he's the one who should remember my name once I become famous. Hmmm, I think he's dead actually, not that I care. He can watch me from heaven, is what I would say if I was a mindless believer of religion. That old man is dirt and grass now and nothing more, hahahaha."
"Ah, a riveting and disrespectful tale of your ancestry. More importantly, tell me, I must know! If that pill is a medicine what effect does it have!?"
When Dave was about to explain to him all the intricacies of the pill, including potential side effects when he caught himself on the verge of making a grave error, realizing that someone like Bing Feng would surely run around shouting news of it to anyone willing or unwilling to listen.
"Let's just say it's a type of heart medicine, hehehe. Although I had to make some modifications to refine it with the ingredients available. It's a very popular medicine back home."
"Heart medicine?! That's beautiful, beautiful, I say. A pill to cure the sickness of the heart, an organ most delicate and difficult to heal."
Speaking of which, I haven't actually tested the pill yet so I can't say for sure it does what I think it does, this blue miracle pill of mine, Viagra.
"Why don't you try the pill Bing Feng. If you have any sickness in your heart it might cure it."
"Wahahaha! Brother Dave, my heart is like the winter solstice, strong like an ox and tough like a well done steak. It would be wasted on me. Wasted!"
If I can't use Bing Feng as a guinea pig I might as well hold onto it for now, in fact I'll make some more just in case. I can slip it into someone's drink later to verify that it works, heh, only a harmless little prank. First I need to get rid of this guy, there's no way I can concentrate and refine pills while he's screaming in my ears.
Dave's face distorted into a greedy and lecherous grin. "Bing Feng, you look busy. I'm sure you have better things to be doing than loitering around in my dorm room. What was it you came here for?"
"Right, right, right. I came here to greet you and officially welcome you as a fellow disciple of our beautiful Ethereal Soul Sect. I know how hard it can be for new students to be all alone and confused, so I want you to know Dave! I am here for you! I am thinking of you! You.. are.. my.. FRIEND!!! AAAAHH!!"
"Good god will you calm down. People will think there's a mass murder in progress if you keep screaming like that."
Bing Feng wiped tears from his eyes. "Forgive me brother Dave. My emotions ran high with the passionate fire of our friendship. Hahahaha, my break is almost over now so I have to get back to my training. See you later!" And with that Bing Feng sped off without as much as closing the door behind him. Dave grumbled as he got up and did it himself.
It doesn't hurt to have some friends. But why did it have to be a bald, sunburnt monk that became obsessed with me. Sigh. Where have the cute girls gone? In times like this I miss hanging out with Liu Yan… and even Fang Xiu Hua. That redhead may be a stone cold bitch but with two of them I felt like a harem protagonist.