Early the next morning, well before dawn, Luo Chen crawled out of bed.
Outside, a thick mist hung in the air. If one listened closely, an occasional beast roar could even be heard echoing from within the Million Mountains.
None of that concerned him, however.
Today—and for the days ahead—he was going to be very busy.
First came sorting and processing the various medicinal herbs.
Most of the herbs bought from the rogue cultivator stalls had been crudely handled; some were not even dried yet.
He spread them out across several winnowing baskets, ready to take them outside to dry once the sun came up.
Then came the jasper lotus seeds.
They had to be peeled. Only the kernels were needed; the skins absolutely could not be used.
By the light of an oil lamp, Luo Chen peeled them one by one, stopping only when his eyes grew dry and strained.
"I wonder if this will make me nearsighted?"
"Then again, I'm a cultivator now. Surely cultivators don't get myopia!"
By the time he finished processing the large pile of lotus seeds, the sky had fully brightened.
After soaking the seeds in diluted blood from a Scarlet Sun Chicken, Luo Chen carried the winnowing baskets outside into the sun.
Living on the edge of the outer city was somewhat unsafe, but it had its perks—namely, a generous amount of usable space.
When refining Fasting Powder, one step produced a particularly pungent odor. Refining it in a crowded area would almost certainly draw complaints.
When Old Daoist Chen tanned talisman hides at home, neighbors had lodged multiple complaints against him. He had only managed to smooth things over by slipping a few good talismans to the stewards.
Luo Chen had no such worries.
The jade yam needed to be diced, with a portion sliced and set aside for refining Fasting Powder.
Luo Chen was not the type to put all his eggs in one basket.
During the initial attempts at refining the Myriad Wonders Pill, many failures were to be expected.
In fact, complete failure and losing his entire investment was entirely possible!
After all, his proficiency had only just reached Entry level.
Under these circumstances, his original source of income could absolutely not be cut off.
The worst-case scenario was losing every cent, in which case he could at least rely on the proceeds from Fasting Powder to sustain himself and stage a comeback.
By the time he finished processing the jade yams, it was already noon.
Time to eat!
Feeling the hunger in his belly, Luo Chen curled his lip.
They all said cultivators didn't partake of mortal grains, but when hunger struck, one was still hungry!
Washing his hands, Luo Chen entered the kitchen.
He scooped a small bowl of translucent grains from the rice vat and dumped them straight into a small pot without washing them.
This was spirit rice, after all—one spirit stone could only buy ten jin!
He couldn't bear to rinse it, fearing it might wash away some of the spiritual energy.
Approaching a hidden compartment beside the kitchen, he pressed it. An opening appeared in the floor, revealing a cramped underground cellar roughly three feet square.
Hanging inside was nearly half a beef carcass!
Tier 1 demon beast yellow ox!
This stuff was expensive too, costing around one low-grade spirit stone for ten jin.
The reason Luo Chen had over a hundred jin of meat was not gluttony; beef was one of the main ingredients for Fasting Powder.
One jin of meat, combined with suitable amounts of ginseng, angelica, and various other herbs, yielded five bottles of Fasting Powder, which sold for one spirit stone!
He always bought in bulk whenever possible since buying in quantity was cheaper, keeping it preserved with ice blocks.
Looking at this half-carcass of beef, Luo Chen swallowed hard.
With a kitchen knife, he sliced off a scant two liang of meat, then retrieved some ordinary vegetables from the ice cellar.
He washed the meat and vegetables thoroughly, diced the greens, sliced the beef paper-thin, and tossed it all into the pot.
Add firewood!
Light the fire!
Forming hand seals and chanting an incantation, after about two breaths, a small fireball appeared in his palm.
"Go!"
*Whoosh.*
The kindling in the hearth caught instantly.
"Smooth this time. Incidents like when I first crossed over and blew up the hearth with a fireball should never happen again!"
Luo Chen smiled faintly, feeling rather pleased with himself.
He glanced at his panel. Fireball Art, at the Proficient level, had jumped from 268/300 to 269/300!
He only practiced three spells in total right now: the Water-element Cleansing Art, the Wood-element Entanglement Art, and the Fire-element Fireball Art.
Among the three, Fireball Art had the highest proficiency.
There was good reason for this.
At first, he had simply found cultivation novel and exciting, casually lobbing fireballs for fun.
He had tested the spell's effects: slow cast speed, high energy consumption, but undeniably immense power!
As long as it hit the target, it could melt gold, dissolve iron, and incinerate bones to ash.
Provided it hit, that is!
For an ordinary cultivator, casting Fireball Art took at least three breaths from forming seals to chanting.
In three breaths, an enemy could kill them a hundred times over.
Luo Chen had been much the same at the beginning, and each cast consumed a tenth of his total spiritual power.
Only then did he realize why low-stage cultivators rarely relied on spells in combat.
They either used Dharma artifacts or talismans. Both were swift, cost little energy, and packed a punch no weaker than spells.
Once he understood that, he lost interest in low-grade spells like Fireball Art.
Yet as he used Fireball Art to light fires during alchemy and his proficiency rose, he came to realize spells were not entirely useless after all.
Take now: the energy cost remained a tenth, but the casting time had shrunk to under two breaths.
And that was only at the Proficient level.
What if it reached Perfect?
What if it reached Grandmaster?
So whenever an opportunity arose to use Fireball Art, he would almost always cast it once or twice.
Every bit counted!
Amid these wandering thoughts, the rice in the pot was nearly ready.
Catching the fragrant aroma, Luo Chen fished a piece of pickled radish out of the pickling crock.
A large bowl of claypot beef rice, brimming with spiritual energy, an enticing palette of red, green, yellow, and white, paired with a few slices of sweet, sour, and crisp pickled radish.
Sitting beneath the eaves, basking in the sun and feeling the cool breeze off the creek, he dug in heartily.
This was Luo Chen's favorite part of every day!
Without the pressure of survival or the pursuit of immortality, a meal like this every day would truly be paradise.
Alas, Luo Chen had no choice. He was a man with a system; even in the pitch-black night, he was destined to shine!
...
"Fuck, why does this thing stink so bad?!"
The man destined to shine clutched his chest, hunched beside the creek, dry-heaving non-stop.
He hadn't expected the fire hound whips bought from Hundred Herbs Hall to reek so vilely during special processing.
Fashioning a face mask, Luo Chen gathered his courage and resumed handling the fire hound whips.
Peeling back the outer membrane with his hands and applying a special extract, he chanted under his breath:
"It doesn't stink. It doesn't stink."
"It's spirit stones. It's all spirit stones. Delicious, fragrant spirit stones!"
The moment he finished processing one whip, he bolted to the creek.
"*Blegh!*"
Processing raw ingredients was grueling and time-consuming, but there was zero room to cut corners!
In fact, it was even more critical than the technique during the refining process itself.
It was simple logic: no matter how flawless your formula, how exquisite your hand technique, or how top-tier your cauldron, if the ingredients themselves were flawed...
...the outcome was sealed.
Just like erecting a tall building—if the foundation was compromised, everything else was moot.
Spending seven full days, he brought every raw ingredient through primary and deep processing to as close to perfection as possible.
Luo Chen also found time to brew several batches of Fasting Powder, shaping them into pills and bottling them up.
He did not intend to sell them this time, however.
He planned to wait until the Myriad Wonders Pills were refined and sell them together.
For the coming period, that iron pot containing trace spirit ores would be scrubbed clean to refine the Myriad Wonders Pills.
Standing before the stove, Luo Chen solemnly tied on an apron.
He bowed reverently toward the soot-blackened kitchen rafters. "Lord Guan from back home, Taishang Laojun, and local Pill Sage, bless me with success on my very first pot!"
Pot open!
Fire up!
Chapter 5