Refining the Mountains and Rivers

Chapter 324 – Demon Puppet Pill

In the third stage of the competition, once the final day arrived, the truth was that it didn’t matter much at all.

If there was someone that couldn’t refine 10 types of fourth-grade pills by this point, their strength wouldn’t be too high. Even if they managed to barely enter the fourth stage, they would only be able to serve as a foil. They would have no chance to compete for the championship.

Thus, the Southshine Nation officials were very relaxed. After two days of rigorous appraising, the top positions were basically determined and wouldn’t change much afterwards. As for the people who had yet to emerge, they were either eliminated or directly placed at the end of the rankings.

Behind the supervisory table, as Lord Hulun Hehe saw that the competition time was about to come to an end, he stood up and prepared to leave.

Every time the competition reached this point, there would be all sorts of strange and special characters popping up. They weren’t willing to admit their final defeat, or they acted crazy to gain sympathy. Some of them clung to him and begged for another chance to make something of themselves. Lord Hulun Hehe had already seen these things happen far too many times, so he didn’t want to waste even a single extra minute on them.

So walking away ahead of time was a good choice.

However, just as Lord Hulun Hehe turned around, a subordinate suddenly flew over. His complexion was strange as if he were a bit constipated, “My L…Lord, please judge this contestant’s pills to see if they qualify?”

Lord Hulun Hehe had an impression of this subordinate. He was someone with considerable attainments in alchemy. Could it be that this last remaining little fellow had placed someone like him in a conundrum?

With a bit of curiosity, Lord Hulun Hehe received the jade box. After opening it, he frowned and his face began to gradually darken.

Within the jade box, there were a total of 10 pills. Each one gave off a dark cloying feeling as if they were about to break apart at any moment.

That’s right, it was this feeling!

Fourth-grade pills…alright, let’s call these fourth-grade pills for the time being. But, Lord Hulun Hehe had never seen such pitiful fourth-grade pills before.

Each one barely managed to reach the cutoff line for being a fourth-grade pill. It was as if they would fall into the third-grade rank with a single light puff of air.

How could it be such a coincidence? Lord Hulun Hehe’s first thought was that someone had decided to use this as a form of protest against the competition! But he immediately suppressed that thought. There was no one who would dare do that.

“These pills, who refined them?”

The subordinate turned and pointed.

Lord Hulun Hehe calmly looked over. He was stunned for a moment and his face suddenly turned a shade of blue. If it weren’t for him being able to hide his emotions so well, he feared he would have started cursing out loud.

It was this bastard again!

He had fooled everyone during the Pill Furnace Pagoda round. Then during the second stage he had handed over a pill that barely qualified as a medium fourth-grade pill. Now, he was up to the same tricks!

This fellow was deliberately trying to create a sensation! How ridiculous!

But did he really think he could obtain attention by doing this? Lord Hulun Hehe restrained his anger and his gaze brightened. He stared at the ten pills within the jade box. He swore that as long as any one of these pills didn’t qualify, he would immediately eliminate this bastard.

After muttering to ten below his breath, Lord Hulun slammed the jade box closed and his complexion became even uglier. These half-dead pills were actually all fourth-grade, even if they were just a breath away from dropping down.

To have all of them in a similar state, this bastard definitely did this intentionally. Just what did he want? Just what was the plan behind all of this?! He wished he could stomp on this brat a hundred times, but the rules were the rules. Since he had put forth 10 pills that met the required standard within the time limit, no matter how angry he was, he couldn’t destroy the fairness of the competition just because of his own individual emotions.

“Consider him as qualified! Place him last on the ranking list!”

Lord Hulun Hehe left in a huff.

Qin Yu didn’t know that he was already a target of loathing in the eyes of many officials. After receiving the ice-cold reply that he had qualified, he was too busy to worry about the official’s attitude towards him. He quickly opened the official app.

As he thought, he was met with a mass of grayed out icons. If he had chosen to exchange before, then all the materials he received would have been wasted. Qin Yu’s finger quickly skimmed over the handphone, pulling up the materials in the storehouse that were available for exchange. Then, he felt his heart chill. It seemed that out of the remaining materials, there were none that he could scrape together for a pill recipe.

“Hahahaha! After 30 years of hard preparation, I was ready to soar into the skies, but in the end all I did was fail! I cannot even obtain a complete set of materials. So what if I enter the fourth stage now? It's over, this old man’s life is over! Heaven! Why must you be such a thief! Why are you so cruel to me!?” The person who screamed out loud was a fellow with an initial Nascent Soul cultivation. According to an average lifespan of 800 years, this fellow should still be considered young. But because of various reasons or maybe because he had suffered too much, he looked like an old mortal man in his 80s or 90s.

At this time, on his face that was withered like a dried orange, there was an expression of despair and craziness. “This old man may be defeated, but none of you will succeed either! I have 10 points that I will completely exchange for purple point grass, and none of you will be able to exchange for a complete set of materials. If I’m done for, the rest of you will be too!”

The roars still echoed out in Qin Yu’s ears. In the next moment, on the official app, the icon for the purple point grass rapidly darkened, turning a grayish-white color that indicated there was no more. Qin Yu’s lips twitched. He glared at that screaming man who was forcefully carried off by the officials and finally realized why this situation occurred.

Indeed, there were far too many petty villains in this world. If they didn’t feel good, no one else could either!

Then things were truly troublesome…would he really fail here?

His fingers subconsciously swiped over the official app. 10 points, he still had 10 points…

Suddenly, Qin Yu’s finger stiffened and he looked down with wide eyes towards the points section.

What entered his eyes was a large number 7.

7 points! How could it be 7 points!

Qin Yu was puzzled and then angered. He had worked himself to the bone for three whole days to refine 30 sets of materials, and all he had to show for it were those ten fourth-grade pills.

Wasn’t it said that every pill would give 1 to 3 points? Yes, he acknowledged that his performance wasn’t too good, but at the very least he should have 10 points, right? What the hell were these 7 points then!?

Originally, he thought he had seen the light at the end of the tunnel, but then he fell into a miserable result where he couldn’t refine any pills at all.

As if that weren’t saddening enough, they actually stole his points from him.

Even if this was a competition held by the Southshine Nation and the officials all had deep backgrounds, so what? They still had to give him an explanation for this!

Qin Yu was filled with righteous indignation. He rushed towards an official that had yet to leave the field. It was just that at this time, he didn’t notice two cultivators standing far away. One of them looked on with bright eyes, turned around a little, and then a bright light flashed in front of them.

The official who Qin Yu caught was stunned for a moment. To refine ten different pills and only receive 7 points, he had never seen anything like this before.

The official saw Qin Yu’s angry expression and thought that he shouldn’t be lying. Otherwise, this person really wanted to die if he dared lie about something like this to a competition official.

“Fellow daoist, please wait a moment, I will immediately inquire into this matter for you.” The official took out his handphone and hurriedly contacted his superiors. At the same time, he asked for Qin Yu’s number.

“Right, participating cultivator no. 9527 has delivered 10 different types of pills but in the official app he has only received 7 points.

“No problem, I will wait. Please find out for me.

“Ah. Alright alright, I understand.

“I will deal with it.”

After hanging up, the official’s gaze fell on Qin Yu and revealed an icy coldness. “Fellow daoist, I have already inquired into the matter. The number of points is not wrong. In the third stage, you may indeed receive 1 to 3 points for every fourth-grade pill you refine. But fellow daoist, the quality of the pills you refined is too poor. After the appraisal committee reviewed the situation, they decided to deduct three points as a penalty.”

He had learned that the decision came from high up. It was clear this cultivator had caused some high-ranking official to be extremely unhappy with him. He certainly had to display an overwhelming sense of callousness and indifference towards this type of person. He needed to show that high-ranking superior that he would follow firmly in his steps, and that he was a loyal subordinate.

Qin Yu frowned. “I never heard a rule that a person’s points could be deducted.”

The official rolled his eyes. “Starting from today, there is.” He narrowed his eyes, a cold look on his face. “If you refuse to accept, you can make an appeal.” He turned and left, a faint laugh sounding out. “You’re just at this level but you still want points? You might as well exchange for an eternal night demon mushroom and eat it until you die!”

Qin Yu was stunned. He completely forgot this person’s cold indifference and disdain. His thoughts were racing…

Eternal night demon mushroom…eternal night demon mushroom…

He seemed to have heard this name from somewhere. Moreover, it was used to refine an extremely strange type of pill.

Qin Yu closed his eyes. The mark of the Primary Pill Collection within his mind reappeared. He quickly sifted through it and found what he needed: Demon Puppet Pill. Using the eternal night demon mushroom as a material, fuse one’s own blood within and temper three into one to form a pill.

After that was a long section introducing details about the Demon Puppet Pill. Finally, it mentioned that the Demon Puppet Pill could be used to summon a demonic path puppet, and the puppet’s strength would be dependent on the quality of the pill.

This was an extremely strange and macabre type of pill. Even in the Land of Divinity and Demons, there were few cultivators that refined it.

This was because the Demon Puppet Pill was of too little value and interest.

First was the refining difficulty.

To create the Demon Puppet Pill, one needed to refine three blood-fused eternal night demon mushrooms together as one. Those that had the qualifications to achieve this were alchemy grandmasters, and if an alchemy grandmaster casually refined some pills, the value of those pills would be much higher than a Demon Puppet Pill.

Next was the power of the pill.

The puppet summoned by the Demon Puppet Pill could only be maintained for an hour. Its strength was relatively weak: around the Golden Core level. With such strength, who would bother with it? Moreover, it required that one use their own blood.

The Primary Pill Collection included the recipe for the Demon Puppet Pill. But in the eyes of many people, it was only included to pad out the numbers.

Yet right now this Demon Puppet Pill that was used to pad out the numbers actually gave Qin Yu a ray of hope.

Although he had only casually glanced over the list, if he didn’t remember incorrectly, it should be there.

He quickly opened the official app. Indeed, in the corner, he found the common-looking eternal night demon mushroom.

This was an auxiliary material used only for a rare minority of extremely poisonous pills. Moreover, it could even be substituted with other materials, so that was why it was sitting here all alone. Even those vile alchemists who wanted to drag everyone into the abyss with them never thought of exchanging for it.

Eternal night demon mushroom, exchange price of 1 point, remaining amount of 7.

In Qin Yu’s eyes, this sort of coincidence was like a faint sense of divine intervention.

He had an extremely strong feeling that he could refine the Demon Puppet Pill. Moreover, it wouldn’t be a normal Demon Puppet Pill.

There was nothing else to say…

Grab them all!

Shua –

The points became 0. This proved that Qin Yu had obtained seven complete eternal night demon mushrooms.

He turned and walked away. He needed to hurry up and collect them.

Qin Yu didn’t know that his conversation with the official and his performance afterwards had all been caught by a button-shaped camera.

Moreover, this video wasn’t recorded, but was directly streamed to a mass audience.

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