Chapter 44: Grade One Spiritual Elixir

Treasure Pavilion—after many days, Du Long and Xia Qinglian once again arrived at this gold-spilling den, a place that made ordinary people hesitate at its threshold. The two had come straight here from Lingyun Mountain, not even stopping by home.

The clever young attendant, unoccupied at the moment, saw them enter and hurried over with an eager welcome. “Young master, what precious items do you seek at Treasure Pavilion today?”

Du Long smiled and nodded, quite happy to have this sharp-witted attendant accompany them. He came with a clear purpose and, wasting no time on aimless browsing, declared, “I’d like to buy three sets of spirit herbs for refining first-grade spirit elixir. The last time I checked, the price was six hundred and thirty gold coins, wasn’t it?”

“That’s correct! Each set for a first-grade spirit elixir costs two hundred and ten gold coins, so three sets total six hundred and thirty,” the attendant replied, smiling brightly.

“Good. Here are seven hundred gold coins. Please handle the transaction for me,” Du Long said simply, handing over his last seven banknotes.

“Certainly, young master! Please wait in the lounge for a moment while I complete the procedures,” she replied with delight, quickly leading Du Long and Xia Qinglian to a nearby lounge.

Before long, the attendant returned, bearing a bundle and a pouch of coins. “Young master, here are your three sets of spirit herbs for the first-grade elixir, and seventy gold coins in change.”

Du Long accepted both bags without ceremony. He opened the herbal bundle to confirm the contents, but didn’t bother to count the gold in the other pouch. He simply stood, bid farewell to the attendant, and left with Xia Qinglian.

The sharp attendant watched their departing figures, quietly musing, “This young master must be buying herbs for some alchemist. To know an alchemist—he’s truly a fortunate one.”

After returning home and having dinner with his parents and family, Du Long and Xia Qinglian each retired to their own chambers. Du Long barred his door and climbed into bed.

Sitting cross-legged, he focused his mind inward to his dantian space, quickly locating his Firecloud Cauldron at the center of his qi vortex.

Originally, he had stored the cauldron in his Serpent Ring’s space, but the spirit of the ring—a beautiful woman—had advised him to keep the cauldron in his dantian, nurturing it with the true fire of his core.

Trusting her implicitly, Du Long placed the Firecloud Cauldron in the heart of his qi vortex, side by side with the flames, letting the cauldron be continually nourished by his inner fire.

With a thought, the Firecloud Cauldron appeared in his left palm. With his right, he opened the bundle from his bedside and swept all the herbs into the cauldron’s internal space.

The cauldron was perfect for storing spirit herbs, preserving their potency and preventing loss—an ideal place for such treasures. Of course, he could never reveal to outsiders that he possessed a spatial storing device.

Immersing his mind in the cauldron’s space, he began sorting and arranging the herbs. Alchemy demanded meticulous care; even the smallest mistake could be disastrous. He needed every detail in place to minimize errors during the refining process.

He ran the recipe for first-grade spirit elixir through his mind, reviewing every important step and precaution. Only when confident did he begin channeling his inner fire into the cauldron space.

Controlling the flame, he practiced varying its temperature with his will—a warm-up before true alchemy. Only when he felt he’d mastered the flame did he start feeding in the auxiliary herbs, beginning his first attempt at refining pills.

With a sudden puff, a herb called Icy Heart Grass was instantly reduced to ash within the flames. Unperturbed, Du Long swept the impurities away from the cauldron space and fed in another Icy Heart Grass.

Such mistakes were only natural in herb refining—Du Long was long accustomed to them.

This time, he controlled the heat perfectly, extracting a pale blue liquid from the Icy Heart Grass, then continued roasting out impurities with a steady flame, before adding the next auxiliary herb.

Of the nine auxiliary herbs, he made mistakes with five. Though similar to the common practice herbs, these spirit herbs had subtle differences only a true alchemist could sense.

Such things can only be comprehended, not taught—a core tradition among alchemists.

Time passed. After five failures, Du Long finally achieved success with all nine, producing nine swirling clusters of brilliantly colored elixir liquid, each one beautiful under the fire’s glow.

Now came the main stage: refining the primary herb for the first-grade spirit elixir. Without hesitation, he cast a hundred-year Silver Ginseng into the flames, enveloping it at the temperature he deemed perfect, just as he would with wild ginseng.

With a sharp pop, the Silver Ginseng was instantly reduced to ash. Every herb had a critical point—beyond it, combustion would destroy everything. Most herbs allowed you to slowly test the fire to find this point, but not the Silver Ginseng.

If you tried to slowly find the critical point, the medicinal liquid inside wouldn’t be forced out quickly enough, causing it to congeal with impurities and ruin the herb.

Staring at the ashes of the Silver Ginseng—a herb worth over a hundred gold coins—Du Long felt a pang of regret. But he forced it down, banished the impurities, and tried again with another Silver Ginseng.

Learning from failure, he lowered the flame a little this time and quickly enveloped the second Silver Ginseng.

A soft sizzle—this time, the ginseng withered rapidly, but just a bit too quickly. A large amount of liquid was forced out. Realizing the heat was still slightly high, Du Long adjusted the fire lower, and the flow of liquid slowed to a proper rate.

Soon, the process was complete. The Silver Ginseng was now a dried stick, quickly ejected from the cauldron, leaving behind a cluster of milky white liquid, bubbling as impurities were released.

He began cooling the flame and observed the liquid, halting the cooling at the optimum temperature and holding it there until all impurities had been expelled.

With the hardest steps done, Du Long gazed at the ten clusters of pure elixir liquid, no more impurities in sight. Following the recipe’s instructions, he combined the nine auxiliary elixirs with the primary one in order, then suddenly raised the flame.

The milky liquid shifted between green and blue with each new addition. When the last auxiliary liquid was added, Du Long increased the heat further. The mass of elixir boiled violently, all the liquids undergoing a rapid transformation under the intense fire.

From a swirl of colors, the liquid settled into a bright, pure white. Du Long then gradually lowered the flame, drawing it slowly away from the glowing liquid.

As the temperature dropped, the once roiling mass quieted, shrinking to half its size. Finally, when the flames withdrew completely, a still, luminous white liquid remained before him—the standard form of a first-grade spirit elixir: radiant and white.

He exhaled long and slow, opened his eyes, and produced a jade bottle, into which he carefully poured the elixir before sealing it.

Du Long had no idea what sort of miracle he had just accomplished.

Throughout the entire Haotian Empire—no, across the whole Star Continent, perhaps even this world—it was unheard of for someone at merely the Qi Vortex stage to succeed in pill refinement.

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