Longzang

Chapter 605 The Dharma Protector Was Not Yet in Time
Human beings, summarizing the alchemy process, can summarize it into the following steps:
First, the medicinal materials are decomposed and purified; second, the different components of the medicinal materials are mixed in stages; then, the different components are refined to obtain a new structure (medicinal properties); finally, the structure is stabilized (forming the elixir).

However, this summary of everyday life has a premise: it excludes the factors of divine energy and fortune. If these two factors are added, everything becomes unpredictable.

Throughout the history of the concept of creation, there have been many instances of people suddenly being blessed with great fortune, with a batch of pills being successfully refined as soon as it was started, and each pill appearing as if it were tattooed.

The difficulty in refining the Great Sun Morning Glory Pill lies in the large size of the medicinal materials and the large size of the alchemy furnace. A cultivator's spiritual sense cannot sustain itself for long within the alchemical fire, yet the refining process is extremely lengthy.

This is a fierce fire alchemy, which is difficult to replenish with spiritual energy. The requirements for seven days of alchemy are even higher than those for three months of gentle fire alchemy. Even if the methods of water alchemy and cold alchemy are continued for three to five years, the requirements for spiritual energy are not this high.

With Xu Henshui's guidance, Wei Yuan corrected all the errors he pointed out, and also discovered seven or eight errors that Xu Henshui had not pointed out.

At this moment, the fire in the furnace roared, and the leaves of the Huiyang Grass inside gradually melted like ice. When it was half melted, Wei Yuan added the first batch of auxiliary medicinal materials, followed by the second and third batches.

After all the medicinal herbs were placed into the furnace in sequence and the main ingredient had melted, Wei Yuan used his Dao power to close the furnace lid and invigorate the alchemical fire.

The difficulty at this point lies in accurately grasping the situation inside the furnace, something even Wei Yuan struggles to achieve with his current spiritual sense, let alone Xu Henshui.

Xu Henshui mainly relied on practical experience, combined with the alchemical texts left by his predecessors, to make rough judgments and improve the accuracy of his control as much as possible.

Although Wei Yuan's physical body's divine sense was not sufficient, his divine sense was not limited to his physical body.

Thus, three figures appeared in the alchemy room. The two guards, Wen and Wu, sat to the east and west of the alchemy furnace, respectively, while Wei Yuan himself sat facing south. Long Ying cupped his hands to Wei Yuan and said with a smile, "This is my first time refining pills. I will try my best not to disappoint you, fellow Daoist."

Wei Yuan returned the greeting: "There's always a first time for everything, fellow Daoist, please have a seat."

"Very good." Long Ying flicked his sleeve and sat down in the south.

Subsequently, the four divine senses intersected and shuttled through the furnace, constantly scanning the interior and keeping all changes within the furnace under their control.

Amidst the smoke and fire of the mortal world, a massive, transparent alchemy furnace materialized, revealing all the changes within. Each time the four divine senses swept through the furnace, the situation inside was updated.

Thousands of ordinary people were already seated around the alchemy furnace. They were all exceptionally talented individuals with a keen interest in alchemy, and they were currently analyzing and learning together.

Wei Yuan heard a notification: "The fire in the furnace has not reached the optimal temperature, and some auxiliary materials are melting too slowly. You can add external true fire and spiritual fire to improve this."

With a thought, Wei Yuan summoned three Foundation Establishment warriors in the alchemy room. They sat cross-legged and began blowing on the Dao fire at the bottom of the furnace.

Half an hour later, the three of them exhausted their Dao power, and Wei Yuan replaced them with three more Dao Foundation Establishment warriors. In any case, there were plenty of Dao Foundation Establishment warriors, enough to keep replacing them.

A moment later, another reminder sounded: "The main material has too high particle size and contains large fragments. You need to increase the metal element immortal energy."

Wei Yuan immediately took out a wisp of Langya Divine Wood's aura, and then another reminder came: "Too many."

Wei Yuan returned half of it and then put it into the alchemy furnace.

The entire alchemy process involved various fine-tuning steps, sometimes with strict requirements on the timing of Wei Yuan's intervention, which even Wei Yuan found somewhat tedious.

He was busy like this, completely lacking Xu Henshui's composure and elegance.

On the seventh day, three long laughs came from the alchemy room next door, followed by the faint appearance of heavenly music, the fragrance of elixirs, and a beam of light that even broke through the roof.

The alchemists throughout the entire alchemy academy were alarmed and rushed to the entrance of the alchemy room to await the congratulatory gift.

A moment later, the door to the alchemy room opened, and Xu Henshui walked out with a smile amidst the swirling fragrance of pills. Twelve pills danced around him, five of which shimmered with a faint silver pattern.

Ordinary Sunrise Pills can increase the chance of breakthrough by half a percent, while those with pill patterns can increase the chance by ten percent. The price has also jumped from 50,000 Immortal Silver to 150,000.

Xu Henshui's batch of pills not only had two more pills, but also two more pills with complete pill patterns, making the entire batch worth 1.1 million immortal silver. Moreover, because of Xu Henshui's reputation as a famous alchemist, his pills would have an additional 10% price increase, making it 1.2 million immortal silver.

The value of this batch of pills has slightly exceeded twenty times the cost, making it Xu Henshui's masterpiece in recent years. No wonder he looks so healthy.

There were some strange noises coming from the adjacent alchemy room. Xu Henshui glanced at it and said, "Wei Yuan needs some more time. Let's not disturb him for now. He might be able to produce six pills in this batch. For his first time refining a spiritual herb of the Great Sun Morning Glory Pill level, the fact that the furnace didn't explode is already a testament to his exceptional talent."

The group of alchemists nodded in agreement. Their cultivation was insufficient; none of them had even refined the Morning Glory Pill yet, so they were naturally unqualified to comment on Wei Yuan. Furthermore, the most common cause of furnace explosions in fire-based alchemy was that every alchemist had experienced such an event a few times. Just as they were chatting and laughing, a sudden boom echoed from Wei Yuan's alchemy room. The roof was blown off, and a plume of black smoke shot ten feet into the air! Within the smoke, the furnace lid was flung far away, landing dozens of feet away.

Xu Henshui wanted to slap himself. Of all the times he had to say something about the furnace exploding, and his jinx really came true. But perhaps Wei Yuan's furnace exploded a little too violently?

The alchemists rushed over and pushed down the walls of the alchemy chamber to rescue the people. An explosion of this magnitude could severely injure even those with weaker constitutions.

The alchemy room was filled with smoke and soot, the huge alchemy furnace lay overturned on the ground, Wei Yuan was covered in soot and his robes were tattered, and the floor was piled with miscellaneous items. Among the miscellaneous items, however, there was a glimmer of precious light, and there were quite a few good things.

Clearly, Wei Yuan's robes and storage magic items couldn't withstand the damage and were destroyed again. As for his physical body, its strength far exceeded that of the robes; it only accumulated a little dust.

Seeing that Wei Yuan was alright, Xu Henshui felt a huge weight lifted from his heart. However, he rubbed his eyes and seemed to see a red figure rummaging through the pile of debris, but he couldn't quite make it out. In the short time it took to rub his eyes, the figure had vanished.

Seeing the crowd of alchemists watching, Wei Yuan felt a little embarrassed and said, "Uncle Xu, your alchemy furnace is a bit small and can't hold so many pills."

When pills are formed, many pills will repel each other, so the size of the pill furnace must be appropriate. If it is too small, it is easy to explode, except for pill furnaces with the properties of mustard seed and Sumeru.

But many alchemists looked at them strangely, thinking, "How many pills did you produce in this batch? You still think such a big alchemy furnace is too small?"

As Wei Yuan tidied up the clutter scattered on the ground, he picked out several dark, unremarkable pills from among them. Xu Henshui scanned them with his divine sense and knew that Wei Yuan was picking up fully refined pills, which were considered finished products. He nodded secretly in approval.

However, as he watched, Xu Henshui's expression changed. Why was this going on and on?

In the end, amidst the astonished gazes of the alchemists, Wei Yuan selected a total of twenty-eight pills, which corresponded to the number of constellations.

Then, Wei Yuan took out a pill that was noticeably larger than usual, wiped away the ash with his sleeve, and a beam of light shot into the sky! This pill actually had three purple pill patterns on it!

Xu Henshui could hardly believe his eyes. A three-pattern pill could already be called a Xuan Dan, which could increase the breakthrough probability by 30%. This one alone was worth a million immortal silver!
Wei Yuan continued to wipe the ash off the pills. This ash was also pill ash, which could block spiritual energy and divine sense; without wiping it clean, the quality of the pills inside couldn't be seen. As each pill regained its radiance, even Xu Henshui eventually became numb.

Wei Yuan refined the number of stars in one batch, producing one pill with three patterns, which secretly corresponded to Ziwei, three pills with two patterns, which secretly corresponded to Qisha, Pojun, and Tanlang, and seven pills with one pattern. The rest were ordinary pills.

This batch is worth over three million taels of silver, exceeding the initial investment by sixty times, rivaling the value of the legendary Danming Zhenjun back then.

At this moment, Xu Henshui realized that Wei Yuan was right; there were indeed twenty-eight in total, and the furnace couldn't hold them all.

Actually, before the furnace exploded, Wei Yuan's alchemy room was quite lively.

Wei Yuan's main body and three Dharma forms each guarded a direction, while the seven Dao Foundations below set fires and the six Dao Foundations above were exposed to cold winds. A total of seven layers of immortal spiritual energy were added, each layer requiring the input of Qi at each pill-forming node, for a total of three times, amounting to over a thousand strands of azure Qi. Then the pill furnace exploded.

Meanwhile, chaos reigned amidst the everyday life of ordinary people. Harboring a vague, inexplicable malice towards the Creator Immortal, the Crouching Dragon and Phoenix Chicks vehemently criticized the numerous errors in the alchemy process, citing over thirty mistakes of varying degrees. They argued that if they hadn't made these errors and had used a larger furnace, they could have obtained the required Heavenly Dipper number.

Another author, Wolong Fengchu, pointed out that the prescription itself has problems and seems to have room for improvement.

Wei Yuan initially took them very seriously, but upon investigating the backgrounds of these promising young talents, he discovered they had absolutely no experience in alchemy, yet they readily claimed the pill formulas were flawed. Therefore, Wei Yuan marked these young talents and placed them under close surveillance.

Although this batch of pills encountered numerous problems, the harvest was enormous, exactly what Wei Yuan urgently needed.

That evening, Bao Yun looked at the three-patterned Xuan Dan on the table, her face showing both worry and joy.

At midnight, Feng Tingyu returned from the mountain and saw two Morning Glory Pills on the table as soon as he entered the room.

She twitched her nose, and before she could even think, the pill was already down her throat. Then, a look of confusion crossed her little face: What did this medicine taste like again?

The next moment, the weather in the azure sky suddenly changed, and a sudden burst of pure lightning tribulation descended from the sky, leveling Feng Tingyu's residence to the ground.

Amidst the thunder and fire, a young girl was reborn, her skin as white as snow.

However, the tribulation lightning was fierce, and she was unprepared; her robes had long since turned to ashes. Fortunately, the physical bodies of the disciples of the Bright King Palace were comparable to magical treasures, so the robes were merely decorations. While enjoying the body tempering from the thunder and fire, Feng Tingyu was still puzzled: why had the heavenly tribulation suddenly arrived?
At this moment, Wei Yuan was already refining the second batch of Great Sun Rising Pills, completely absorbed in the moment, and unaware of this matter. If he had known, he would have at least come over to provide close protection.

Xu Henshui left Qingming before dark, saying he was going back to his home mountain to retrieve something. Wei Yuan knew from this that his senior uncle's Dao heart had indeed run into problems again and still needed tempering.

(End of this chapter)