As it turned out, Monk Peacock was indeed far more professional than Wei Yuan. Through an entire set of elaborate procedures, Wei Yuan had extracted fewer than a thousand strands of karmic luck from the thirty thousand-plus refugees. Yet by simply erecting a statue for people to worship, Monk Peacock had enabled Wei Yuan to reap over three thousand strands of karmic luck.
Judging by past experience, the karmic luck that could be contributed had essentially been squeezed dry. The vast majority of the rest possessed no karmic luck to speak of. As for the tiny minority who harbored karmic luck but refused to yield it, Wei Yuan had no intention of chasing after theirs either.
Experience showed that the karmic luck from this handful of people was both meager and troublesome to obtain. Rather than obsessing over the paltry scraps on them, it was better to bring in a few more batches of refugees.
The thirty thousand refugees were merely the first batch; the main contingent behind them was still on the road. After Wei Yuan walked the cultivators through the procedure once, everyone grew familiar with it. Going forward, they could manage it themselves without needing Wei Yuan to supervise in person.
Thus, Wei Yuan found himself with nothing to do again and began pondering how to keep himself occupied. The Smoke and Fire of the Mortal World was exceptionally reliable when it came to finding tasks for the Creation Immortal Venerable, promptly pointing out that hoarding too much karmic luck served no purpose. The best approach was to find ways to expend it, keeping only the highest grade and most quintessential karmic luck.
Take human azure qi, for instance: plentiful yet far from potent, and prone to dissipating over time, it needed to be used without delay. Human karmic luck did indeed disperse—which made complete sense. If, say, the refugees realized that the promises Wei Yuan painted could never be realized, their karmic luck would scatter.
Originally, the method of expending karmic luck had been to use Xu Wenwu as an intermediary, but now a single Xu Wenwu could not possibly consume so much azure qi. In the end, Wei Yuan exchanged a large volume of records regarding karmic luck from the Hall of Merits, browsing through them himself while copying them into the Smoke and Fire of the Mortal World to seek a solution.
The more information stored within the Smoke and Fire of the Mortal World, the more references the mortals had to draw upon. Consequently, their responses grew faster, and their accuracy increased substantially.
After analyzing the vast trove of data, the Smoke and Fire of the Mortal World concluded that the best ways to expend karmic luck were: first, cultivating Dao Foundations; second, pill refining; and third, nurturing immortal flora.
Wei Yuan agreed with the first two points, but his instincts told him something was off about the third.
However, a ten-thousand-man Dao Foundation training cohort had just concluded, and there were currently not enough new Body Casting cultivators. The rogue cultivators who had rushed to Qingming and were awaiting the next session numbered only a few hundred.
Mulling it over, Wei Yuan noticed that Xu Henshui's state of mind had been stable recently and that he had plenty of free time on his hands. He therefore decided to pursue alchemy, testing his martial uncle's mental fortitude in the process.
When Wei Yuan arrived, Xu Henshui was originally aloof and dismissive. But the instant he heard that Wei Yuan wanted to refine pills, his enthusiasm surged ten-thousand-fold. He eagerly asked what pill Wei Yuan wished to refine this time, assuring him that anything below the Scenery Command realm was available. It didn't matter if Wei Yuan didn't know how; Xu Henshui could teach him, guaranteeing full mastery.
The Dream Immortal Master had assigned Xu Henshui a long-term task: to teach Wei Yuan alchemy, with opportunities to comprehend ancient immortal recipes granted according to the results of his instruction.
Xu Henshui had long known that the Smoke and Fire of the Mortal World was Wei Yuan's dharma idol—nominally a dharma idol, yet practically indistinguishable from a true mindscape world.
However, regarding the matter of the Dream Immortal Master imparting ancient recipes, he had actually made quiet inquiries to his own immortal ancestor, as well as the monastery head, True Monarch Danming.
Both sides had offered similar explanations: although it took place inside Wei Yuan's mindscape world, the Dream Immortal Master clearly had little to do with Wei Yuan himself. One possibility was that a wisp of residual soul left behind by the immortal who originally created Qingming was hiding within the Smoke and Fire of the Mortal World, seeking a worthy inheritor so that the immortal's Dao path would not be severed.
With even his own immortal ancestor saying so, Xu Henshui naturally had implicit faith in the Dream Immortal Master.
Wei Yuan had also done his homework before coming. Since karmic luck had to be used, ordinary pills certainly would not do. He said on the spot, "The Great Sun Morning Splendor Pill."
Xu Henshui's brows knitted instantly, then slowly relaxed. "This... isn't out of the question, but it's rather difficult. If you have time, I can teach you right now. Though the medicinal herbs for this pill are a bit costly, they aren't scarce."
"I certainly have time."
"Very well, follow me." Xu Henshui led Wei Yuan into his pill chamber, lit a stick of refreshing incense that aided divine sense, and began his explanation.
To enable Wei Yuan to grasp the material as quickly as possible, Xu Henshui had spared no expense; that incense alone was far from cheap.
The explanation went on for half a day.
The primary ingredient of the Great Sun Morning Splendor Pill was Huiyang Grass. The problem was that once mature, a single blade of Huiyang Grass grew a full three zhang tall, with thick stalks and hefty leaves—hardly a grass at all, but practically a tree. Even after being processed through the secret techniques of the Monastery of Creation, it was still seven to eight chi long. Consequently, refining it required a massive pill furnace of fifteen chi.
The refining process was exceptionally prolonged. At Xu Henshui's current skill level, it took seven days; an ordinary alchemist required fifteen days, and Xu Henshui estimated that Wei Yuan would likely need more than twenty days.
A typical qualified alchemist of the Monastery of Creation would produce around ten pills per cauldron, each worth fifty thousand taels of immortal silver. Xu Henshui produced a slightly higher yield, frequently turning out several premium pills with pill veins. Thus, a single batch of his was worth a million taels of immortal silver, while the herbs for an entire batch cost roughly sixty to seventy thousand taels of immortal silver.
Speaking up to this point, Xu Henshui naturally couldn't resist boasting about himself. He explained that the Monastery of Creation had a tacit standard: an alchemist's caliber was judged by the multiple of the finished pills' value compared to the raw materials.
Generally speaking, a tenfold return was considered an outstanding disciple, sevenfold was the standard level, and if one could only manage a tearful fourfold profit, they were likely on the verge of being expelled from the Monastery of Creation.
Those who could consistently maintain between fifteen to twenty times over the years, like Xu Henshui, were true geniuses, possessing a glimmer of hope to vie for future monastery head. Only those who could steadily exceed twenty times were regarded as geniuses among geniuses, becoming official candidates for monastery head under evaluation by numerous sect seniors. By that standard, Xu Henshui still fell just a bit short.
Back when True Monarch Danming was still a minor alchemist, his returns had consistently remained above twenty-five times for years, with more than half the pills in each cauldron bearing pill veins. At his peak, he had even set a record of sixty-eight times, unmatched for a millennium. Consequently, on the very day he broke through to Scenery Command, the previous monastery head stepped down voluntarily to yield the position to him. True Monarch Danming thus became monastery head at the age of one hundred and seventy.
According to Xu Henshui, the price of the Great Sun Morning Splendor Pill was somewhat inflated, mainly because many people treated it as a disguised longevity pill. Some venerable cultivator patriarchs who couldn't afford orthodox longevity pills used this as a substitute for their concubines or mediocre younger kin. If successful, it could extend one's lifespan by several hundred years—even longer than orthodox longevity medicines.
Even for Xu Henshui, refining this pill called for great caution. He spent two days preparing: procuring the medicinal herbs on one hand and readying the pill furnace on the other, while also taking out an ancestral alchemy manual for Wei Yuan to study over those two days.
The so-called ancestral manual was actually a jade tablet that originally recorded an ancient recipe. Previous patriarchs of the Monastery of Creation had utilized the blank spaces to record numerous recipes and insights for breakthrough pills, preserving the entire refining process of each recipe through Dao rhymes.
Xu Henshui held nothing back, and Wei Yuan did not stand on ceremony either, duplicating every single pill recipe—not even letting the fragmented ancient recipe slip by.
Two days later, the alchemy officially began. First came the mock refining. Xu Henshui refined a batch on his own first, then guided Wei Yuan step by step through a batch.
The so-called mock refining meant brewing a preparatory batch using a recipe with similar medicinal properties and an identical refining process to familiarize oneself with the steps. Even so, the ingredients for a mock refining of the Great Sun Morning Splendor Pill still cost five thousand taels per cauldron.
A day later, the mock refining was complete. Based on the results, Xu Henshui was projected to produce eleven pills, two with a single vein, requiring eight days of refining. Wei Yuan, on the other hand, produced four pills, one with a single vein, requiring fifteen days.
Judging by the mock refining, Wei Yuan's return was around fivefold, putting him right on the verge of being expelled from the Monastery of Creation. Xu Henshui felt quite consoled and could not help smiling. In his eyes, this was what Wei Yuan's true standard ought to be; those previous successes had surely been sheer dumb luck.
Throughout the mock refining process, Wei Yuan made more than seventy mistakes, large and small. After Xu Henshui pointed out and corrected each one, he brought out the genuine ingredients. Each occupying a separate pill chamber, they commenced the official refining of the Great Sun Morning Splendor Pill.
Chapter 601