"Xiangxiang, can you make pills in an iron pot too?"
In a waterside pavilion within Tianxiang Pavilion, Gu Caiyi lay sprawled across a table, watching Yuxiang applying makeup before her.
Under the delicate rubbing and patting of the maidservant's slender hands, her already pretty face grew all the more dazzling.
At times, Gu Caiyi really couldn't fathom why Yuxiang, having clearly become an inner disciple of the Hehuan Sect, would still come to such a sordid place.
Yuxiang kept her eyes closed, letting the maidservant paint cosmetics onto her face.
"A pot? If it's an iron pot infused with spiritual ore, then of course you can make pills with it."
"Huh?"
Puzzled, Gu Caiyi asked in confusion, "Don't all you alchemists use cauldrons to concoct pills?"
"Hehe, that's just a common misconception."
Yuxiang chuckled softly. "The Dao of Alchemy is vast and profound. In terms of refinement methods alone, there are water refinement, fire refinement, blood refinement, living refinement, and many more.
"And when it comes to alchemical vessels, there's even greater variety.
"Because cauldrons can withstand sufficiently fierce flames, hold larger quantities of medicinal ingredients, and nurture the pills once they take shape to lock in more of their potency, cauldrons became the most mainstream alchemical vessel.
"In truth, however, pots, furnaces, food vessels, and flasks are also fairly common alchemical implements. I've even heard of demonic cultivators who use living human beings as cauldrons, employing the method of living refinement to forge Grand Human Dao Pills."
Gu Caiyi listened, utterly dumbfounded.
She had never imagined there would be so many intricacies to the Dao of Alchemy.
And from the unspoken implication in Yuxiang's words, there seemed to be far more to it.
"Then can the cheapest, lowest-quality iron pot from Wanbao Pavilion be used to concoct pills too?" Gu Caiyi still found it unbelievable.
Yuxiang was not familiar with it. "How low-quality is that kind of pot?"
"My Lady, that sort of pot contains only a trace of profound iron, barely able to trap the spiritual qi that escapes when steaming spirit rice. The retail price is one low-grade spirit stone."
The maidservant beside her answered the question.
"Ah!"
Her mouth opened slightly in surprise as Yuxiang opened her eyes.
"With an implement like that, surely you can't produce any good pills!"
"Exactly. That's why I was so shocked—I even started wondering if I'd wasted my decades of cultivation."
Through the smooth, clear glazed mirror, Yuxiang looked at Gu Caiyi sprawled on the table and asked curiously, "This person using a low-quality spiritual iron pot to make pills... it wouldn't happen to be that alchemist neighbor you mentioned last time, would it?"
Gu Caiyi nodded.
With a hint of wonder, Yuxiang said, "A mid-stage Qi Refining cultivator doesn't have much spiritual power to begin with. To concoct pills in a shoddy spiritual iron pot containing only a trace of profound iron means your neighbor is either exceptionally gifted in the alchemical dao, or his fundamentals are rock-solid, with an intimate knowledge of medicinal properties and precise control over the heat at every stage.
"Whichever of the two it is, if word got out, he'd be an alchemical seed that smaller clans and factions would scramble to recruit."
Gu Caiyi looked skeptical. "Is he really that impressive?"
"Mm, very impressive," Yuxiang nodded firmly—which promptly smudged her makeup.
Helpless, the maidservant had no choice but to start over for her.
"I spent three years tending fires in the Hehuan Sect's pill chambers, five years compounding herbs, and twenty years refining pills hands-on before laying a decent foundation. And that was only because I had a certain degree of alchemical talent, which made the sect willing to groom me along the alchemist path."
It was somewhat hard to picture such an elegant, quiet woman spending all those years tending flames and mixing ingredients.
Gu Caiyi only felt that her neighbor seemed genuinely remarkable.
He was in the mid-stage of Qi Refining, and though he owned a storage bag, his living conditions were visibly impoverished, with no faction backing or nurturing him.
Yet under such harsh conditions, he had forged pill-concocting skills that ordinary cultivators wouldn't even dare dream of.
"Still, Caiyi, there is one thing I think you ought to warn your neighbor about."
"What's that?"
"If circumstances allow, he should switch to a proper alchemical vessel! A shoddy spiritual iron pot severely affects the grade of pills once they form. On top of that, it's extremely prone to exploding. A single slip could leave him heavily injured, or even dead."
Why had cauldrons become the mainstream alchemical vessel?
Aside from the advantages Yuxiang had mentioned earlier, the greatest advantage was safety!
Even if a batch of medicine was ruined or the earth fire flared too high, a cauldron was unlikely to blow up.
"He's so poor, he probably can't afford any decent alchemical vessel."
Gu Caiyi pursed her lips, and then something suddenly occurred to her.
"Xiangxiang, don't you have a spare alchemical furnace?"
...
Days spent concocting Myriad Wonders Pills were always dull and tedious.
Or rather, any repetitive task tended to feel that way after doing it long enough.
Luo Chen, however, didn't feel that way!
The steady rise in proficiency and the predictable profits in spirit stones continuously drove him to persevere in concocting pills.
What was more, he had recently gained other forms of "entertainment."
Watching a bucket of nearly fifty jin of water glide smoothly out of the well at a steady speed, Luo Chen couldn't help grinning with satisfaction.
Attraction Art had achieved minor accomplishment, its proficiency reaching the Proficient rank.
The reason he had progressed so swiftly was thanks to the inspiration he had drawn from watching Gu Caiyi draw water back then.
There was actually no need to adhere strictly to the conventional training method for Attraction Art.
This spell could easily be integrated into every aspect of daily life.
From trivial matters like dressing and sweeping the floor to heavier tasks like hauling loads, casually unleashing spiritual power whenever he had a spare moment made him naturally more and more adept with Attraction Art.
At the Proficient rank, Attraction Art was already enough to comfortably wield that set of Jasper Saber artifacts.
Aside from Attraction Art, Luo Chen had recently learned two more spells:
Wind Riding Technique and Spiritual Eye Art.
He had achieved Entry rank in the former very quickly, likely related to his near-Perfect Carefree Wandering; in any case, he had gotten the hang of it within the time it took an incense stick to burn.
The latter had been somewhat more difficult.
Because it involved the delicate eyes and spiritual power was quite potent, a single lapse in concentration could easily blind someone.
Only after Attraction Art leveled up did Luo Chen dare to guide spiritual power onto his eyes.
Truth be told, before infusing spiritual power into his eyes, Luo Chen had harbored a few expectations.
"In an urban novel, this would easily count as a superpower—having X-ray vision wouldn't be asking too much!"
Yet when Luo Chen opened his eyes to gaze upon the world, he was utterly disappointed.
No X-ray vision.
All he got was a blinding glare, like staring into the sun, which left his eyes terribly sore after prolonged use.
A massive drawback!
Yet there was surely good reason why this technique was counted among the five essential foundational spells for Qi Refining cultivators.
Spiritual Eye Art: observe qi and perceive spirit, seeing through darkness and evil.
For low-tier cultivators, what endangered their survival was not their low realm or lack of powerful backing, but ignorance.
Provoking an enemy who appeared ordinary but possessed profound cultivation, failing to recognize a demon beast's territory, or running into a vengeful spirit on a night walk—any of these could easily cost someone their life.
The Spiritual Eye Art, however, was excellent at steering clear of such hazards.
Though it had its limitations, it at least let a cultivator know whom not to cross and where not to tread.
Sordid, corrupt places could be spotted at a glance, allowing one to stay well clear.
"Still, you can't just use this spell recklessly. If you look at someone you shouldn't and piss them off, you'll be in deep trouble."
A higher-realm cultivator inspecting a lower-realm one was fine, but a lower-realm cultivator scrutinizing a higher-realm expert was very likely to be noticed.
Prying eyes inherently invited misunderstanding.
Of course, "higher and lower realms" here referred to major realms—
such as Qi Refining versus Foundation Establishment, or Foundation Establishment versus Golden Core.
Within the same major realm, barring those cultivating special techniques, ordinary cultivators generally wouldn't detect someone peeking.
*Splash!*
Guided by his spiritual power, the bucket of water poured into a large water vat. Luo Chen channeled the Spiritual Eye Art and peered intently into it.
The Buddha said that a single drop of water contains forty-eight thousand living beings.
Modern biology also said water was teeming with microorganisms.
So why couldn't he, a dignified cultivator of the immortal path, see a single thing?
"This Entry-rank Spiritual Eye Art isn't even as good as a microscope."
After muttering a few complaints, Luo Chen looked at the thirty filled jade bottles before him.
This was the fruit of his half-month of labor: not only three successful batches of finished pills, but also leveling his Myriad Wonders Pill proficiency up to the Proficient rank.
Of the raw ingredients he had prepared before, twenty-five portions remained; concocting all of them would take nearly another month.
What Luo Chen was considering now was the timing of selling the Myriad Wonders Pills.
Gu Caiyi's mention of how Tianxiang Pavilion was exceptionally busy at the start of the month had brought an issue in his sales strategy to light.
"Selling only at the grand market saves more time for alchemy, but in truth, it earns less money."
Pills of solid quality rarely lacked a market.
Yet to establish a steady stream of revenue, one had to keep the pills constantly circulating in the market so customers would always notice them and be able to purchase them at any time.
Why were Qi-Nourishing Pills so popular among low-tier cultivators?
After all, Qi-Nourishing Pills were by no means the only pills capable of enhancing a Qi Refining cultivator's spiritual power.
The reason was that Spirit Herb Pavilion had Qi-Nourishing Pills for sale around the clock.
By flooding the market with enormous supply, they had aggressively squeezed out all competing pills of the same type.
Right now, Myriad Wonders Pill didn't have many competitors, but he still needed to take this factor into account.
He should push his production as high as possible, but ensuring that Myriad Wonders Pills always had a presence in the market was equally necessary.
"It's settled: I'll set up a stall three times a month from now on!"
Twice at minor markets, once at the grand market.
Luo Chen was only one man and couldn't be in two places at once; for now, this was the best he could manage.
Yet this plan was shaken the very next morning.
"A Tier-1 low-grade artifact, the Purple Cloud Bronze Furnace?"
Chapter 33