The Strange Flame Rekindles in Battle Through the Heavens

Chapter 38 Refining Blood Clotting Powder

After returning to the Xiao family, Xiao Yan headed straight for the back mountain. Upon reaching the summit, he pulled out an iron chain from a hidden patch of grass and began climbing down it. When he reached the end of the chain, he pushed off the mountainside with his feet, landing on a platform.

Upon reaching the spacious platform, Xiao Yan finally breathed a sigh of relief. After all, he was about to become an alchemist, and he was quite excited. Alchemists were national treasures of the Dou Qi Continent, like giant pandas, with unparalleled status and prestige. If Xiao Yan had stayed in Wutan City, becoming an alchemist would have been enough to easily bring down the Jia Lie family and the Aoba family.

Xiao Yan looked at the two storage rings on his left hand, a smile appearing on his lips. He was now richer than the entire Xiao family. Don't underestimate these low-level storage rings; only his father, Xiao Zhan, and the First Elder each had one, yet he possessed two.

Xiao Yan stroked one of the storage rings, flicked his finger, and a red medicine cauldron nearly half a meter wide appeared in his hand. Xiao Yan weighed it and found it was quite heavy.

The medicine cauldron is dark red all over, with two ferocious snake heads carved on it. The surface of the cauldron is also painted with magical beast carvings, which are so lifelike that they look like living things.

Xiao Yan looked at the medicine cauldron from left to right and found that it was exactly the same as the medicine cauldron Xiao Yan had in the original novel. However, this was normal, since these medicine cauldrons were mass-produced and not unique.

At this moment, the medicine aging material transformed into a wisp of white light and floated out of the ring, then said calmly, "A two-mouthed cauldron is just right for a novice like you."

"Two cauldrons?" Xiao Yan scratched his head, somewhat puzzled. Although he knew it was a two-cauldron, he wasn't quite clear on the intricacies of it.

However, with Yao Lao's explanation, Xiao Yan still understood some knowledge about medicine cauldrons. At this point, he couldn't pretend to know what he didn't, because refining medicine was no simple matter; even the slightest mistake could lead to immediate failure.

After understanding how to use the medicine cauldron, Xiao Yan immediately asked, "What should we do now?"

"Hehe, since you possess a different kind of fire, there's no need to transform it through the fire pit anymore. You can just summon the different kind of fire and put it into the medicine cauldron," the old medicine master said with a smile.

Xiao Yan obediently summoned the strange fire within his body, and was about to send the black and white flame in his palm into the medicine cauldron when Yao Lao's voice rang out.

"Your Yin-Yang Dual Flames are composed of white and black flames. If used together, they are just ordinary strange flames, but if used separately..."

"Does the teacher mean to use the two flames separately and directly use the white flame to refine medicine?" Xiao Yan asked in confusion.

"Hehe, didn't you test it before? Using a single white flame to refine medicine can increase the healing effect of the pills, improve their quality, and even have some unexpected benefits," the old medicine master said with a smile.

Xiao Yan extinguished the flame in his hand, and with another wave of his hand, a ball of white flame appeared in his palm. This ball of white flame exuded vitality and smelled refreshing.

Xiao Yan sent the ball of white flame in his palm into the medicine cauldron, and asked Yao Lao with a smile, "Shouldn't we now infuse this flame with the wood element power within our bodies?"

"Hahaha! You know quite a lot. Other alchemists naturally need this, but you don't. Your strange fire seems to be specially designed for alchemy. To be honest, if I had to choose, I would definitely choose the Yin-Yang Twin Flames instead of the Bone Spirit Cold Fire. Now you just need to put the medicinal herbs into the cauldron to refine them," the old alchemist said with a laugh.

Hearing the old doctor's rather envious voice, Xiao Yan smiled and recalled the formula for the Blood Clotting Powder in his mind.

"Blood-Coagulating Powder: One Blood-Coagulating Herb, one Vitality Fruit, and two Poppy Flowers."

Xiao Yan flicked his finger lightly on his storage ring, and a dark red Blood Coagulation Grass appeared in his hand. He then tossed the Blood Coagulation Grass into the snake's head mouth on top of the medicine cauldron.

The Blood-Coagulating Grass turned to ashes the moment it came into contact with the strange fire, and was expelled from the medicine cauldron by a special device inside.

Xiao Yan blinked, unsurprised by his failed attempt at alchemy. Although he could control the flame's temperature at will and knew the required temperature for refining the Blood-Coagulating Grass, he lacked a thermometer. Therefore, there was no other way but to continue experimenting to gain experience.

Xiao Yan lowered the temperature of the flames in the medicine cauldron by a few degrees, then took out another Blood Coagulation Grass from his storage ring and put it into the cauldron. The Blood Coagulation Grass turned to ashes again upon contact with the flames. Xiao Yan lowered the temperature of the flames again, and continued to try. After sacrificing dozens of Blood Coagulation Grasses, the Blood Coagulation Grass finally stayed quietly in the flames.

Through the icy mirror surface of the medicine cauldron, Xiao Yan carefully observed the Blood Coagulation Grass inside, which was constantly writhing in the flames. However, Xiao Yan did not immediately begin refining the Blood Coagulation Grass; instead, he began to slightly increase the temperature of the flames. As the flame temperature rose, the Blood Coagulation Grass turned into black ash after reaching a certain critical point.

Watching the Blood-Coagulating Grass turn to ash, a smile appeared on Xiao Yan's lips. He took out another Blood-Coagulating Grass from his storage ring and put it into the cauldron. This time, the Blood-Coagulating Grass did not turn to ash; it remained quietly in the flames. Before the Blood-Coagulating Grass was refined, Xiao Yan began to lower the temperature of the flames. When the temperature reached a certain critical point, the Blood-Coagulating Grass also turned to ash.

Whether refining medicinal herbs or melting elixirs, the flame temperature cannot be too high or too low, otherwise it will fail.

With the temperature of the Blood-Coagulating Grass as a reference, Xiao Yan quickly found the temperature range of these two medicinal herbs after paying the price of more than a dozen Vitality Fruits and a few poppy flowers.

Once everything was ready, Xiao Yan divided the flame in the medicine cauldron into three, each burning at a different temperature. He then took out a Blood-Coagulating Grass, a Vitality Fruit, and two poppies from his storage ring and threw them into the three burning flames respectively.

Under the burning of the strange fire, the Blood-Coagulating Grass was refined into a white powder, the Vitality Fruit was refined into slightly blackish fine particles, and the Poppy Flower was refined into a light red liquid.

Seeing that all three medicinal herbs had been refined, Xiao Yan knew that the most important step had arrived: to fuse the three different herbs together. Because the three herbs required different temperatures, the alchemist needed to control the temperature of any point of the flame, a task that only an alchemist with sufficiently high soul perception could accomplish.

However, this most difficult and important step was incredibly simple for Xiao Yan, because not only was his soul perception powerful, but his control over the strange fire was also superb, without the slightest hint of awkwardness, and he didn't seem like someone who had just obtained the strange fire.

Xiao Yan first controlled the liquid extracted from poppy flowers to envelop the pure white powder, causing the two to fuse together, forming a light red, viscous liquid. He continued to nurture this liquid until it transformed into a dark red paste. After the two were completely fused, Xiao Yan began to increase the temperature of the flames surrounding the black particles extracted from the Vitality Fruit.

Seeing this, the old apothecary nodded with satisfaction, thinking to himself, "My disciple's talent in alchemy is truly unprecedented! His control over flames is not like that of a novice, but rather as skillful as that of an old hand."

The black granules extracted from the Vitality Fruit eventually burst open under the ever-increasing temperature, and clumps of dark powder slowly drifted into the pale red paste, making the latter's color even deeper.

After Xiao Yan had completely incorporated all the black powder, he extinguished the flames in the cauldron. He opened the cauldron lid and took out the newly refined Blood Coagulation Powder. Looking at the large lump of deep red paste in his hand, a smile appeared on Xiao Yan's lips.

(End of this chapter)