Nine Evolutions of the True Spirit
chapter-278

Naturally, no one would quit. Everyone could already tell the Mauve Moon Minor World was definitely the biggest reward of this year’s Alchemy Conference this time.

Furthermore, Yue Jiang-Rui and Lu Ping were in the Bet of Cauldron, so they couldn’t quit!

Great Ancestor Hong Ye nodded softly to Enlightened Master Qin, who gave a casual wave of his hand towards the blank space in front of him. The white clouds around the cultivators dispersed and they noticed that they were back on the central cloud.

“The battle pellets are not the final test. We will decide the winner in the next stage,” Yue Jiang-Rui announced coldly when he walked past Lu Ping, but this time, his normally cocky tone had changed to a serious one.

“Anytime,” Lu Ping answered, walking towards Li Mao-Lin. As Lu Ping gradually revealed his alchemical talent, Li Mao-Lin became increasingly polite towards him.

The Enlightened Master told Lu Ping about Li Xiu-Zhu’s disciple acceptance ceremony and invited Lu Ping to join them.

“Witness the ceremony? How rare. Witnesses are normally close friends and relatives to the teacher and disciple. I didn’t think this region shared such a custom too.”

Li Mao-Lin didn’t realize his reference to the North Ocean, and he answered, “It’s not really common around the East Ocean, but her teacher, Melodious Inn’s Enlightened Master Mei, practices the custom, so we can only follow her lead. Enlightened Master Mei is a strange person; she single-handedly founded Melodious Inn and has a good relationship with the Great Ancestors. She holds great power in Qian Yuan City.”

Enlightened Master Mei… so she must be the one hiding behind the folding screen that day?

At the inn, Lu Ping’s divine sense hadn’t detected anyone else behind the folding screen after Chilian Ying walked out, yet his instincts told him that he was being watched from behind the screen. No matter who the person was, she must be someone leagues above his capability, thus he promptly left without lingering.

The pellet for the fourth stage was the Essence Extension Pellet.

The journey of cultivation was akin to hiking on an endless mountain to reach the summit. At some point, the hikers would inevitably run out of energy and stop forever. In cultivation, that would be when the cultivators used up all of their potential.

Hence, in order to reach further heights, cultivators must focus on consolidating their foundation as much as possible before exhausting their potential. This was where the Essence Extension Pellets came into play.

These pellets aided cultivators to expand their heartspace and allow more room for Condensed Blood Beads to grow bigger and stronger. This would greatly consolidate the cultivators’ foundation and enable them to continue their cultivation journey.

Similar to the Seven-Striped Pellet, the Essence Extension Pellet required twenty-six pieces of 1000-year spirit herbs, but it was much more difficult to concoct. One could even say that it was the most difficult half-step Core Forging Realm pellet, and represented the highest form of alchemy below that of the Master Alchemists.

When the alchemists saw the pellet recipe, they quietly glanced at Lu Ping, each with their own thoughts.

It’s the Essence Extension Pellet! How lucky to have learned it before advancing to Core Forging Realm. This will play an important role for my breakthrough!

Lu Ping’s cultivation path was greatly focused on his foundation, which gave him his absurdly thick arcane energy and divine revelation. Hence, the Essence Extension Pellet was incredibly compatible with his chosen path.

Even though expanding his foundation would delay his breakthrough, it would be more beneficial to his future. Not to mention that Lu Ping couldn’t even wield his nascent weapons at will even with his absurdly thick arcane energy, so there was an imminent need for him to increase his arcane energy.

Lu Ping was brimming with excitement thinking about the benefits of the pellet, yet he remained outwardly calm.

This time, he didn’t take out the mid-grade cauldron from his interspatial ring. Instead, he took out a high-grade cauldron from another interspatial pouch, the one that Li Mao-Lin had passed to him on behalf of Chu Ting.

“He too has a high-grade cauldron?”

“He’s only using it now? How unexpected!”

“So this is why he was so confident about the Bet of Cauldron?”

The cultivators were surprised to see Lu Ping taking out a high-grade cauldron. Yue Jiang-Rui, Senior Martial Brother Qi, and Senior Martial Brother Ye were equally surprised. Unconcerned, Lu Ping ignored their exclamations and stares.

He talked to Lu Qin again and the Verdant Luan replied unhappily. Lu Ping nodded back with a smile. Then, Lu Qin spit out her Verdant Luan Fire again for him to use in his alchemy.

According to their origins, monsters were generally classified into four classes: top, upper, middle, and lower. Verdant Luan belonged in the middle-class, but because Lu Qin was a wind-and-fire dual-elemental, Lu Ping suspected she was no weaker than the high-class monsters. This was further proven by her refusal to absorb the Scarlet Ibis Fire—she thought of it as a low-quality fire.

Hence, her Verdant Luan Fire, which was almost like a high-class monster’s fire, seemed like a good match for his high-grade cauldron.

On the other hand, Senior Martial Brother Ye’s fire bird was already circling around the cauldron, while he carefully observed the spirit herbs in the cauldron. In a sudden move, he decisively pulled down his hairpin, ignoring his messy long hair.

He crushed the hairpin into dust and blew it towards the bottom of the cauldron. The fire bird quickly directed its fire to the dust and immediately, the fire became more intense, with waves of heat spreading out from his cloud room.

Not far away, Senior Martial Brother Qi was also doing his best, with the fire fox spinning its tails like a windmill. As he made a few hand signs, the fox twisted its tails together to combine the flames into a stronger blaze. Gradually, the alchemy was stabilized, and he wiped the cold sweat off his forehead.

Yue Jiang-Rui appeared focused on his alchemy. The fire burning at the bottom of his cauldron was made up of nine different flames, a clear sign that he was well prepared. But from time to time, he would furtively glance towards Lu Ping’s cloud room, revealing that his attention wasn’t wholly undivided.

After using the purification technique, Lu Ping took out a bottle, which released a light fragrance that filled the nostrils of every alchemist and cultivator.

While they wondered what the smell was and where it came from, Enlightened Master Qin and the other Master Alchemists’ expressions abruptly changed and they looked in Lu Ping’s direction.

“This little junior has quite the treasure trove that even I’m a little envious of him now.” Great Ancestor Hong Ye smiled as he watched Lu Ping adding several drops of purplish sticky liquid into the cauldron.

Yan Wu-Jiu looked a bit unpleasant. “What a waste, to use it on half-step Core Forging Realm pellets.”

Senior Martial Brother Qi and Senior Martial Brother Ye were still wondering what Lu Ping was up to, but Yue Jiang-Rui’s face had changed drastically and he exclaimed, “Amethyst Bee Royal Jelly!”

The Northern League had prepared two cauldrons of ingredients for each alchemist. In Lu Ping’s first cauldron, he succeeded in concocting four pellets. However, he couldn’t help but sigh in his heart—if he had used the Azure Spirit Fire, he could definitely make at least five pellets.

Initially, Lu Ping was still a little pleased with his achievement, a forty percent success rate was already excellent given that this was his first time concocting the Essence Extension Pellets. But when he looked around, he realized that the five alchemical geniuses and the young monster alchemist were unmoved by his results.

A moment later, the alchemical geniuses from Violet Charm Pavilion, Thunderous Wind Island, and Sky Cleaving Sword Sect had all finished their alchemy at the same time. In their first cauldron, they also concocted four pellets like him.

Lu Ping was surprised but quickly recalled that they were from the major sects. They had obviously practiced concocting pellets like this before, so he naturally couldn’t beat them.

Yue Jiang-Rui also concocted four pellets. He stared gloomily at Lu Ping but didn’t say anything, instead turning to recover his arcane energy and prepare for the second cauldron.

On the contrary, Senior Martial Brother Qi and Senior Martial Brother Ye only concocted two pellets each. They looked despondent but quickly roused themselves to concoct the second cauldron. This was a rare opportunity for them to practice their alchemy. It wasn’t easy to gather two cauldrons of spirit herbs for the Essence Extension Pellets, not to mention that they could keep the pellets for themselves.

Lu Ping pretended to recover his arcane energy and used the chance to look at Ning Shi-Ze, Zhou Chuang, and the young monster alchemist. He watched as they concocted five pellets each in their first cauldron.

As expected of the Grandmaster Alchemists’ disciples, their alchemy was really incredible. Yet, Lu Ping didn’t think he would be weaker than them if he used the Azure Spirit Fire.

He knew that his success was only possible with the help of the Amethyst Bee Royal Jelly, but he reminded himself that it was his first time concocting this pellet.

For some reason, Enlightened Master Qin had announced that the fourth stage was the final one, so this was their last chance to showcase their alchemy. Hence, they would have to give their best efforts.

Ning Shi-Ze, Zhou Chuang, and the young monster alchemist were hesitating. After a moment, Zhou Chuang took the lead and brought out a spirit-gathering chassis which had three high-grade spirit stones and several mid-grade spirit stones on it.

The cultivators exclaimed when they saw the chassis, not because of the high-grade spirit stones, but the bean-sized spirit fire burning at the chassis center.

“This is a heaven-and-earth spirit fire!”

Amidst their exclamations, Zhou Chuang took the fire and placed it below the cauldron. Immediately, the cauldron burned intensely and evaporated the cloud room.

“Mystic-class, low-grade, Million Bone Phosphorous Fire. It’s only born in a graveyard.”

Lu Ping’s insight now was much better than before; he could identify the spirit fire in just a glance.

The appearance of the heaven-and-earth spirit fire shocked the alchemists. Ning Shi-Ze gritted his teeth and quickly took out a jade box from his interspatial belt. He opened the jade box and took out a golden pellet covered in flames. However, the fire from the pellet was restricted by a silver seal that formed a net around the pellet.

Some knowledgeable alchemists sucked in a deep breath of cold air, exclaiming, “A Golden Core of an Enlightened Master with a fire-element cultivation method.”