102 Disciple (1/2)

”The right way?”, both Ivan and Serge looked at her questioningly.

”Yes. Of course, even though I call it the right way, that is only from my perspective.”, she smiled slightly. ”As you know, the medical essence shouldn't come into contact with the outside air, since it would lose it's potency otherwise.”

”Yes, that's the reason one uses one furnace for the full process since it is inadvisable to transfer the essence from one pill furnace to another.”

Miss. Klein nodded. She seemed to be satisfied with the answer Serge had given. ”That's right. But if one uses mana spheres, who says one can't merge them, if one has multiple.”

As soon as she said that, both of them understood. If it was possible to merge these mana spheres without reducing the potency of the medical essence then wouldn't they be able to heat up the herbs separately, making the process much more efficient?

”It sounds great, but I'm sure it can't be that easy or everyone would use that method.”, Ivan said doubtfully.

”You are correct. It isn't easy. Not only does it require a high mana capacity, but also a great amount of control. Not to mention the ability to multitask even more than for normal pill refining. Besides that, it requires a lot of practice to be able to merge the different mana spheres.”

Ivan thought about what she had said, but felt that that shouldn't be all the reasons, because if it only required practice and strength, while providing such a huge advantage then shouldn't more use it?

Miss. Klein's next words confirmed his suspicions, ”But that isn't the real problem. The real problem is that the improvement it offers is too small compared to what one has to invest. Low-grade pills have only a few ingredients, so it is still not that hard to use this method, but an increased effect of a few percents, just isn't worth it. Might as well just make a few more pills after all the ingredients are cheap and easily available.”

”Then what about the higher grade pills? Their ingredients are worth much more and are more difficult to process, so shouldn't the effect be worth much more then?”

”That's right. But don't forget that not only does the ingredients get more difficult to process, which would require more focus on each ingredient, but there also many more ingredients.

So with the increase of the grade, while the effect of using the mana sphere method would increase, the difficulty would increase even more.”

”But doesn't the difficulty of processing the herbs would increase independently from the method used? And with the mana sphere, one would be at least be able to treat them separately, making it easier.”, Serge made a valid point.

”Theoretically you are right. But sadly the reality is that one can't split one's focus infinitely. Sure it can be trained but only to a certain degree. There is still a limit to what the body and soul can support. That's why many see the technique as one that has many benefits, but in the end, limits one growth because once one has reached a certain pill grade, one would be unable to progress with it.”, after saying that she looks a bit dejected. It seemed like she too had reached the end of her ability to progress.

”Is there no way around it? There should be one or you wouldn't have said that it is a much better method than using a standard pill furnace.”