Alone in my room, I concentrated on the dozens of vats that filled a cellar deep beneath the Plane of Earthfire, worried that all my efforts might prove futile.
During the third preliminary, I had been able to develop a Pain Numbing Tea in only a matter of hours. However, while that tea might have contained a few unique types of herbs, its fundamental design was the same as all the other teas that I had developed over the years. By relying on the various skills that I had mastered during my time in the Palace, I was able to intuit a working recipe relatively quickly.
These vats, though… These vats didn’t contain a tea—not exactly. It would be more appropriate to call their contents a ‘medicinal bath.’ For the past several days, I’d poured all my effort into perfecting the recipe for this bath, doing my best to squeeze out every last drop of potency I could. However, since I didn’t have much experience with how medicinal baths were supposed to work, my progress was interminably slow.
My only saving grace was that I had started off with a decent idea of what herbs to use in this bath. All I had needed to do was refine my idea, not invent something entirely new. Even with this, though, the mixture in these vats still wasn’t perfect—it wasn’t even close to perfect. I should be able to turn it into a working pill, but whether I would be able to use that pill to defeat Jon? I wasn’t sure.
Ideally, I would be using these last few hours to actually test my recipe, but I couldn’t do that. The Laws of my inner world weren’t yet complete enough for it to work properly, and showing my hand to everyone who was watching from the shadows was too great a risk.
I wouldn’t be able to attempt this recipe until I was standing on stage in front of a host of Spirits and Ancestors. The only way I could protect myself was by becoming so infamous that the continent’s various forces kept each other at bay. This was a rocky foundation to rest my hopes upon, but if push came to shove, it was the only chance I had.
Possibly, with a bit of luck, I might not even need these vats. However, after seeing Jon’s smiling face, I didn’t feel that ‘luck’ was on my side.
Upon leading my group through Jalari’s portal, I was confronted with the same sight as the previous day: Jon’s group on my right, the True Martial group on my left, the elders in front of us, and a stadium full of Rulers and Bloodline Tier cultivators encircling us.
Like before, all three of our groups were supposed to concoct their pills simultaneously. However, a glance at Jon told me that he was just as opposed to this idea as I was. So, we both led our teams off to the side and allowed the alchemists from the True Martial Domain to take center stage.
The elders might not have appreciated this, but we had been given three opportunities to concoct a pill, with no limit on how long each of these opportunities could take. So, holding off on starting our first attempt was technically within the rules.
Put on the spot, the alchemists from the True Martial Domain rallied and put on as good a performance as they could muster. By working together, they were able to concoct a rather powerful High-Purity six-patterned pill. During any other competition, this would have been viewed as an extraordinary success. However, during this competition, it meant that they had already been eliminated.
After concocting this first pill, the True Martial Domain’s alchemists didn’t bother to attempt a second or third one. They just packed up their tools and walked off the stage, ceding the floor.
I wanted Jon to head up next so I could see what he had in store for me, but before I could act, he was already holding out a hand, motioning me forward.
Going first was far from an advantage, but in the end, it wouldn’t make much of a difference. So, nodding to my group, I walked to the center of the stage. Once there, I reached into a special storage bag that I had requisitioned and pulled out a pill furnace that was so large it defied common sense.
Unlike a normal Ascension Pill furnace, this monstrosity didn’t just have one lower chamber, it had five, each of which was large enough to hold a full-sized demon horse. These five lower chambers each fed into a central, middle chamber. Then, this middle chamber fed into the small furnace that I had received from Ancestor Wong.
Upon seeing this behemoth, the elders looked as shocked as everyone else in the stadium. I was certain that they had already known about this furnace—nearly everyone in the Palace had been talking about it for months—but hearing about it was one thing, seeing it was something completely different.
I looked at my team one last time. Then, we split up, with each person heading to a different chamber.
During the group portion of the competition, I had made a perfect version of the most valuable Rank 6 pill available. How could I improve upon this performance? Also, I had made that pill entirely on my own, so what was the use of having a team of Emperors to support me?
These two questions had troubled me for a long time. However, once I realized the answer, it seemed so simple. If I couldn’t increase the value of my pill, then I had to reduce the cost of my ingredients. And, what was the most expensive ingredient in a Rank 6 Ascension Pill? The Peak Rank 5 demon beast.
Once in front of our chambers, each of my teammates took out the carcass of a different Peak Rank 4 demon beast. Mine was a water-based beast, Mandakh’s was wood-based, Lau CoiHung’s was fire-based, and those of our two companions were metal and earth. Each of these had been purchased from the black market at a rather exorbitant price, but even then, their combined price was still less than that of a proper, Rank 5 demon beast.
After placing these carcasses in our respective chambers, we all activated a series of formations simultaneously, destroying the beasts’ remains and freeing the wu they contained. Then, I motioned to the group, and we each began carefully feeding the energy of our beasts into the middle chamber of the furnace, creating a clockwise swirl.
Wood feeds fire. Fire produces earth. Earth bears Metal. Metal collects Water. Water nourishes Wood. In this manner, the energy that we fed into the central chamber unified and increased in potency with each rotation.
As the energy of our spiral neared its zenith, I looked to my left. “Mandakh, take over.” Then, I jumped to the top of the behemoth construct.
From here, concocting our pill was nearly identical to what I had done the previous day. First, I tossed the necessary herbs into my furnace. Then, once everything was purified, Mandakh and the others fed the gathered wu into the medicinal energy.
This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
With everyone helping me, things moved quickly, and less than an hour after we had started, I extracted a gleaming, marble-sized pill from my furnace. It looked identical to the one that I had concocted the day before. This pill might not be enough to win the competition, but this pill—and the process used to make it—was sure to cause a stir across the entire continent.
After placing our creation in a jade bottle, I set the bottle aside without turning it in to be judged. Then, I packed up my over-large furnace, led my group off to the side, and motioned for my opponent to take the floor.
Giving me a polite nod, Jon walked forward alone, not bringing his teammates with him.
He didn’t walk to the middle of the stage, though. Instead, he stepped in front of the elders and cupped his fists—without bowing. “Pardon, elders, but I would like you to reconsider the rules of this competition. Limiting us to Rank 6 pills is somewhat unfair, is it not? After all, with the way things stand, my team might as well give up. Your rules preclude any possibility of our victory.”
Jon’s words—and his disrespectful tone—caused a stir amongst the watching crowd. However, the elders remained as nonchalant as ever, clearly having expected this provocation.
“You may concoct whatever pills you wish,” announced Jalari. “However, if they are not Rank 6, then Elder Yargui will judge their merits by her own standards. Even if you concoct a Rank 7 pill of surpassing value, it may still lose to Alchemist Su’s Ascension Pill. Is that understood?”
Jon grinned. “Of course, Elder. Thank you for your indulgence.”
Walking to the center of the stage, Jon took out a standard-sized workbench. Then, he laid out a collection of eight different herbs. Seeing this, the audience broke out into confused whispers. I, however, could barely control the laughter that bubbled up within me. I had known Jon had a secret weapon, but this…
Five Rank 3 herbs—one from each of the five basic elements—and three “useless weeds.”
As Jon reached toward his storage bag one last time, I knew exactly what he was about to reveal: a kilogram of solidified blood from a Rank 3 fire chicken.
When Jon pulled out this final ingredient, proving my guess correct, the faintest giggle escaped my lips. Jon was planning to compete against me using the recipe for a Rank 3 Strengthening Pill—the exact recipe that I had submitted to the Dao when I had acquired my Rank 3 enlightenment in beast alchemy. Jon was planning to defeat me using my own damn pill.
I couldn’t help but find this situation humorous, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t in danger. I might have invented this recipe, but that was back on the Nine Rivers Continent. Here, on the Central Continent, the rules were different.
After laying his ingredients out in front of him, Jon closed his eyes and waved his hands over them, causing them to shimmer with an ethereal light. Then, as the lights of the nine herbs brightened, they twisted in upon each other, joining together into a united whole.
Many in the audience were confused by this, but by now, it was a sight that I was intimately familiar with. Jon was using the blessing that he had copied from Mandakh to join the herbs together with a sympathetic bond.
Once this bond was complete, Jon shot me a smirk and tossed everything into his furnace at once.
Half an hour later, to everyone’s surprise but my own, Jon revealed his creation. After having been boosted by a host of unknown blessings, this pill was encircled by nine patterns, and I was certain that it had an efficacy of 200%.
A Rank 3 Strengthening Pill that was capable of improving the body of any cultivator up to the level of Martial Sovereign. How much would such a pill be worth? In the future, not much. It wasn’t actually that difficult to concoct, after all. However, at the moment, it was probably the only pill of its kind in existence.
Jon didn’t hesitate. He tossed the pill into a jade bottle, then handed the bottle to an attendant, sending it off to be judged. Officially, he still had two more opportunities to concoct a pill, but handing this pill over signaled that he and his team were done.
Jon had already gone all out. He didn’t have any other cards worth playing.
The infuriating man looked at me with a faint smirk. “What do you say, Fang? Ready to admit defeat.”
Watching that attendant carry Jon’s jade bottle over to the elders, I closed my eyes. I had hoped that things wouldn’t come to this, but, well, I couldn’t say that I hadn’t been expecting it.
“Mandakh,” I said, “come with me.”
Walking to the center stage—to the workbench that Jon had left abandoned there—I reached into my inner world and began pulling out herbs. Wild Sage’s Root, Fiery Lion’s Mane Mushroom, Yellow Dragon Jujube, and several other Rank 4 herbs. Enough to complete two full elemental cycles.
Then, I took out five “useless weeds.”
And finally, after only a second of hesitation, a one-and-a-half-kilogram block of dried hawks’ blood.
I would have preferred to use chicken blood for this. As Jon had just demonstrated, I had already proven that fire chicken blood had clear strengthening properties at both Rank 1 and Rank 3. Unfortunately, though, my inner world didn’t have any Rank 4 fire chickens. The closest I had were the hawks on the Plane of Woodfire. So, that was what I had to use.
“Mandakh, you’re up. Use your blessing to bind all this together as best you can.”
He looked at me, worried. “What… is this?”
“No idea,” I said, honestly. “I don’t even know for sure if it’ll work. This is just the best recipe that I could come up with in the time I had.”
With a shaky nod, Mandakh reached out and, like Jon, forced the herbs to start glowing. The only difference was that the glow Mandakh created was about three times brighter than Jon’s. This was partly due to these being more powerful herbs, but it was also because Mandakh was using a true blessing, not some cheap copy.
The moment the glow of the herbs unified, I scooped them up, tossed them directly into my furnace, and got to work.
Concocting a pill based on nothing but a tea—a bath—recipe was difficult. The recipe was only enough to indicate that the medicinal energies would work together. It didn’t tell me anything about how these energies should be structured.
Still, using the knowledge I had gained from my enlightenments on beast alchemy, I had a relatively good understanding of where everything was supposed to go. So, I just shoved it there and melded everything together as best I could, leaving pockets of toxins behind to complete the structure wherever necessary.
By the time the final herb slotted into place, the energy in my furnace looked like an unholy monstrosity. I tried tightening it to imbue it with a pattern, but this only caused a strain that threatened to break the entire structure apart. So, instead, I bore down on the energy with my soul and forced it to condense into a pill.
Mid-Purity Rank 4 Unnamed Pill, 48% Medicinal Efficacy, 0 Patterns. Value: —
This was, quite frankly, awful. However, the quality of my pill was of little importance. What mattered was what came next.
System Alert: A novel pill recipe has been created.
Rank 4 Unnamed Pill. Would you like to submit this recipe to the Dao?
“Yes.”
Submission successful. Contribution confirmed. Calculating… Reward: 50% discount for the next purchase below 1 credit.
Note: Rank 4 pill recipes will no longer qualify you for further discounts.
I sat down on the bare stone floor of the stadium just in time for my mind to be assaulted with new revelations. Once this enlightenment was over, I looked down at the pill that still rested in the palm of my hand and shook my head. Then, before anyone knew what was happening, I clenched my fist and ground the pill into a fine powder.
Trying to use the blood of a hawk to replace that of a chicken? How foolish.
Having already concocted two pills, I only had one last chance to get this right. Standing, I looked over at Mandakh. “Let’s try that one more time.”
He looked at me, concerned, but I didn’t care. I reached into my storage bag, knowing exactly what I needed.
This time, the process of concocting my pill was as smooth as butter. The recipe I was using still wasn’t perfect, but I now knew what I was creating, and that changed everything.
High-Purity Rank 4 Tendon Strengthening Pill, 139% Medicinal Efficacy, 8 Patterns. Value: —
This wasn’t quite as good as I might have hoped, but it was good enough.