Chapter 96 - You’ve Already Got Me Already (6)
“There’s no need,” Leng Ruoxue said and forcefully dragged Elder Qiu away. This old man has to change his habit of encouraging people whenever they go on stage to compete.
“What’s wrong with this old man? Why does his face look so awful?” Leng Qingtian asked in puzzlement when he saw the two of them walking out of Liu Yan’s room in the corridor.
“I asked him not to pressure Liu Yan, so I didn’t let him speak,” Leng Ruoxue explained.
“This old man is just too nervous,” Leng Qingtian said understandingly. The elders of the various academies were very concerned about their academy’s results.
“Yes.” Leng Ruoxue nodded in agreement.
“Grandpa, rest early!”
“Okay.”
There was only one round for the semifinal and final on the second day. Each person would concoct two kinds of pills, and they would obtain the final total score.
After the semifinal in the morning, Liu Yan still entered the final with second place.
The final in the afternoon attracted many families. The Alchemist Association of Lunar Capital also sent a vice president to serve as a judge to show how much importance it placed on the competition.
“Hey, have you heard? Liu Qing, who was first in the semifinal, is the beloved disciple of one of the vice presidents of the Alchemist Association,” someone below the stage said softly.
“Really? Then won’t he win for sure? This isn’t fair to others, right?” another person commented.
“There’s no such thing as absolute fairness in this world. Power, status, and fairness all exist. But I don’t think the people of the Alchemist Association would dare to be blatantly biased in front of everyone, right?” Another person joined the discussion.
“Why are there so many people all of a sudden?” Leng Ruoxue asked in bewilderment when she saw the audience full of people.
“The finals are open to ordinary people, but only three hundred are allowed,” Leng Ruohan explained. The finals of the other competitions were open to ordinary people except for the spiritualist team competition. This was the usual practice for every competition.
“I see. But aren’t they too noisy?” Leng Ruoxue said worriedly. This kind of competition required full concentration, and it might affect the competitors’ performance if it was too noisy.
“Don’t worry. They will quiet down once the competition officially begins,” Leng Ruohan said.
Sure enough, everyone was silent when the final officially began. All their eyes were on the three people competing on stage.
In addition to Liu Yan and Liu Qing from the Rising Dragon Academy, there was another student from the Lunar Shadow Academy named Li Yuan. The three of them were Alchemists, and the pill that all of them selected to concoct was the replenishing spirit pill. The replenishing spirit pill was an intermediate pill that had to be mastered by Alchemists and was also a very common pill. It was mainly used to recover spiritual power, so the demand for replenishing spirit pills was very high.
In order to concoct good pills, besides the alchemist techniques, controlling the flame was also very important. Moreover, the mental strength of alchemists had a decisive effect on the quality of their pills, mainly because the mental strength required to concoct pills was very high. If the mental strength was not enough, there was no way to finally form the pills, no matter how well the prior steps were done.
“What pill does Liu Yan want to concoct?” Elder Qiu asked in bewilderment as he watched Liu Yan take out medicinal herbs one by one from his ring. Liu Yan had already completed one kind of pill and was preparing to concoct a second one.
“Spiritual essence pill,” Leng Ruoxue said indifferently.
“What? Spi-spiritual essence pill?” Elder Qiu’s jaw almost fell off from shock. Only a Master Alchemist could concoct spiritual essence pills. Wasn’t that ridiculous!
“T-this is too ridiculous!” Elder Qiu was fuming.
“Not necessarily!” Leng Ruoxue said. She had known that this would be Elder Qiu’s reaction, so she didn’t tell him in advance. In fact, Liu Yan had looked for her last night and told her that he wanted to concoct spiritual essence pills, but he was a little nervous because the success rate had always been low. She encouraged Liu Yan to do as he wished without needing to think about the results. It seemed that Liu Yan took her words seriously.
“Elder Qiu, Liu Yan will still be in the top three even if he fails the concocting. But he will be first if he succeeds!” Leng Ruoxue reminded.
“That’s true.” Elder Qiu calmed down after hearing what she said. Alas! It seems I’m really old now. I just can’t keep up with the boldness of youth!
On the stage, Liu Yan threw the medicinal herbs into the furnace according to the steps and carefully controlled the size of the flame. After the medicinal herbs melted, he began to purify them. When the medicinal liquid of only the size of a baby’s fist was left and could no longer be purified, he began the final step of condensing the pill…
Everyone’s eyes were focused on Liu Yan, especially the judges on the stage, as the other two people had already completed their pills. They all stared at Liu Yan without blinking. If he really could concoct spiritual essence pills, he could be promoted to Master Alchemist.
Liu Qing and Li Yuan also stared at Liu Yan because Liu Yan’s performance determined their fate.
After a while, Liu Yan finally completed the last step. Everyone’s hearts, including his own, jumped to their throats when he opened the pill furnace.
When he saw the three pure white pills in the middle of the furnace, the joy in Liu Yan’s heart was indescribable. It was a success!
“Yes! We did it!” Elder Qiu exclaimed excitedly.
Leng Ruoxue looked indifferently at the three competitors and the judges with varying expressions on the stage, taking in their thoughts.
The three competitors were all Alchemists, but Liu Yan concocted spiritual essence pills. This was enough to show that Liu Yan’s strength had already surpassed the alchemy genius Liu Qing of the Rising Dragon Academy. But Liu Qing was also the disciple of a vice president of the Alchemist Association, so she really looked forward to the judging panel’s evaluation.
This time, the evaluation took much longer than the previous evaluation. The judges on stage were discussing softly, and the audience below the stage were whispering among themselves.
After nearly an hour, the judges’ score was out. Liu Yan and Liu Qing tied for first place. The reason was that the success rate of spiritual essence pills was too unstable and couldn’t be used as the only basis for evaluation, so Liu Yan’s strength currently couldn’t be determined. If he wanted to determine his level, he had to go to the Alchemist Association.
