Chapter 78: Pill Refining (Part One)
Our Discord Server: https://discord.gg/PazjBDkTmW
You can buy coins here to unlock advanced chapters: https://gravitytales.com/coins-purchase-page/
Not long after, Guan Yu and Chen Feng came running over, each carrying a bag of spiritual herbs. Yue Qianchou took them and weighed them in his hands, asking, “Are a hundred portions enough?”
“Enough.” “Plenty.”
Yue Qianchou directly poured the spiritual herbs into his storage bag, then threw the two cloth bags back to them with a smile, “Keep growing spiritual herbs. Just wait for my good news!” The two were so excited they wanted to say some flattering words, but he had already disappeared.
Returning to the small house in Mulberry Grass Garden, it wasn’t dark yet, but Yue Qianchou immediately went to sleep. He had to prepare for the next day. He slept until before dawn, hearing Furong rustling as she got up. Knowing she was going to work, he also woke up to help.
Furong couldn’t refuse his kindness. The two of them were just like before – one carrying a pole, the other holding a ladle, swaying as they left Mulberry Grass Garden. They didn’t know that not far away in the darkness, Elder Lan was staring at them with a face as cold as frost.
When the two had worked until dawn was breaking, Yue Qianchou waited at the entrance to the inner garden of Mulberry Grass Garden. After people began coming out of the garden in twos and threes, Yan Zixia also emerged. The two tacitly left Mulberry Grass Garden and walked toward the small river.
Furong, busy in the garden, watched their figures and bit her lip, unconsciously raising her hand to touch the half of her face that had been disfigured.
After the two had walked quite a distance along the small river, Yue Qianchou looked around and, seeing no one, chuckled, “Zixia, did you find out about the Azure Light Sect matter?”
“Mm!” Yan Zixia nodded, “I asked Aunt Lan. The Azure Light Sect disciples coming here has nothing to do with you. They came to deliver invitations, inviting Floating Immortal Island to participate in the ‘Demon Extermination Assembly.'”
“Demon Extermination Assembly? What’s that for? I’ve never heard of it,” Yue Qianchou asked.
“Aunt Lan said it’s an assembly led by Azure Light Sect, apparently preparing to establish an organization specifically for eradicating the demonic path. Aunt Lan didn’t tell me the specifics,” Zixia said.
“Led by Azure Light Sect? Heh! This Azure Light Sect is really jumping higher and higher. When did it become their turn to lead in the cultivation world?” Yue Qianchou shook his head and laughed.
Yan Zixia admitted, “Azure Light Sect has been very aggressive in recent years. Last year they even came to our Hundred Flowers Valley to cause trouble.”
“What happened?” Yue Qianchou asked curiously. “From what I know, although your Hundred Flowers Valley is neither righteous nor demonic, it can’t be considered part of the demonic path! What was Azure Light Sect doing causing trouble in Hundred Flowers Valley?”
Yan Zixia frowned, “Azure Light Sect’s sect master’s grandson, Liu Zhengguang, was… was ambushed and injured while staying at an inn we run in Hundred Flowers Valley. They came to demand an explanation from us.” When she got to the end, her face actually turned slightly red.
From what Yan Zixia said, he knew what had happened. The one who ambushed Liu Zhengguang in Hundred Flowers Valley last year was none other than himself – he had castrated that guy. But this really wasn’t something he could say openly. Yue Qianchou laughed awkwardly, “Your Hundred Flowers Valley probably isn’t so easy to bully either!”
“Naturally. Our Hundred Flowers Valley casually sent out a few elders, explained the reasoning clearly, and didn’t Azure Light Sect obediently retreat?” Yan Zixia said this with no small amount of pride on her face.
The two chatted and laughed as they reached the pill refining chamber in the cave. As usual, Yan Zixia took out a small pile of ordinary spiritual herbs for common pills from her storage bag. Yue Qianchou scratched his head and smiled, “I’m afraid these things won’t be needed today.”
Yan Zixia asked curiously, “You’re not practicing today?”
Yue Qianchou embarrassedly pulled out several spiritual herbs from his storage bag and threw them on the ground. Having spent so much time in Mulberry Grass Garden, Yan Zixia was no stranger to these spiritual herbs. She couldn’t help but exclaim in surprise, “Heart-Guarding Orchid, Vajra Fruit, Gold-Mixing Grass… These are spiritual herbs for refining Foundation Building Pills!”
“That’s right. I’m going to refine Foundation Building Pills today,” Yue Qianchou said, staring into her eyes to see her reaction.
Yan Zixia frowned, “Where did these spiritual herbs come from? Did you… steal them from the garden?”
“Steal them?” Yue Qianchou said gloomily, “Do I look like that kind of person? Besides, even if I wanted to steal them, the spiritual herbs in the garden aren’t mature yet! Otherwise, I wouldn’t need to wait another three years.”
“Then where did they come from?” Yan Zixia pressed.
Seeing her interrogate him so thoroughly, as if she didn’t trust him, Yue Qianchou felt slightly displeased. He waved his hand, “Anyway, they weren’t stolen. I’ll explain to you later. Right now, the most important thing is to refine the Foundation Building Pills. I really need them.”
Yan Zixia also heard the displeasure in his words. She bit her lip and put the spiritual herbs she had just thrown on the ground back into her storage bag.
The mechanism under the pill furnace was opened, and surging earth fire immediately blazed beneath the furnace. The chamber instantly became red-hot, and the temperature rose immediately. Yue Qianchou cleared his mind of distracting thoughts, adjusted his emotions, circulated his true qi, and waited quietly for the pill furnace to preheat.
Today’s pill refining was different from usual. Previously, although Yan Zixia had brought quite a few spiritual herbs, they were all the same ordinary herbs for refining common external injury medicines. Today he was refining Foundation Building Pills – not only were the spiritual herbs precious, but he also had to refine nine different herbs together, unlike before when he refined just one type. This also had high requirements for divine sense control ability.
Last night, Yue Qianchou had memorized the refining method and steps from the pill formula jade slip until he knew them by heart. He silently recited them fluently in his mind without error, and couldn’t help feeling a bit excited.
The pill furnace was almost preheated. Standing beside it, his face hurt from the heat. Yue Qianchou quickly threw the nine spiritual herbs into the pill furnace, circulated his true qi, and struck the furnace lid with a palm from the air. The lid closed with a “bang.”
Not daring to hesitate, his divine sense quickly entered the pill furnace, controlling the steaming heat to rapidly separate the nine spiritual herbs. Before long, the spiritual herbs in all nine positions had been refined into paste, suspended in nine air currents and rotating in mid-air. After stabilizing, his divine sense guided the air currents to rush toward the ‘Impurity Cleansing Grass’ paste in the center, struggling to divide it into eight portions and slowly drift toward the eight surrounding spiritual herb clusters.
Suddenly, the eight large and eight small paste clusters in the furnace began to shake. Yue Qianchou thought ‘This is bad!’ – controlling sixteen clusters with his divine sense at once was really a bit too much. As the divided ‘Impurity Cleansing Grass’ spread farther apart, his divine sense finally lost control. All sixteen paste clusters fell together onto the red-hot furnace bottom and instantly turned to ash.
It was over! A complete set of Foundation Building Pill spiritual herbs was completely wasted. Yue Qianchou withdrew his divine sense and opened his eyes with regret. He struck the furnace lid with a palm from the air, the lid bounced up, and a cloud of black ash sprayed out and scattered. He could smell a burnt odor through his nose and mouth.
Yan Zixia, who had been watching from the side, naturally knew he had failed. Feeling somewhat sad for him, she comforted him, “Qianchou, it’s okay. After all, very few people succeed on their first attempt at pill refining.”
Yue Qianchou shook his head with a bitter smile. When it came to spirit pills at the level of Foundation Building Pills, unlike other low-level spirit pills, they absolutely could not contain impurities, or it would definitely affect the pill’s medicinal efficacy. Foundation building was already difficult enough – if you added a Foundation Building Pill with poor medicinal effects, it could really make someone cry. The function of ‘Impurity Cleansing Grass’ was precisely to remove impurities from pills. The step of fusing it with other spiritual herbs was absolutely necessary.
