Zhanxian (Immortal Executioner)

Yang Chen’s figure once again appeared within the Li Lou Village at that same remote corner, still sitting motionlessly. In front of him was, as before, a crude, plain, white cloth. The only different thing was that on the white cloth, there was no longer a medicine bottle, instead there were just two big words:

“Concocting Pills”

Yang Chen simply hadn’t gone towards the side of the magma lake to find those people. Since half a year had already passed, if anyone was still waiting for him there, he would only be an idiot. Moreover, those people were in all likelihood capable of very quickly obtaining the news that Yang Chen had already returned to the Li Lou Village.

As long as Yang Chen was in the village, he did not have to worry about those people not coming for him. Usually people weren’t like Yang Chen, who was able to sufficiently prepare for them, since one could only stay within the Immortal Falling Well for a few years. Li Lou village was the entrance and exit to the road one had to take in order to go into the Immortal Falling Well; Yang Chen did not believe that they would not stop here.

The people within the market rapidly discovered that Yang Chen had appeared again. Compared to the first time, his cultivation had increased from the middle of the qi layer to the peak of the qi layer. But in the eyes of those numerous foundation stage experts, this was not something to make a fuss about. What they were most interested in was Yang Chen’s accomplishments in pill concocting.

A lot of people were disappointed seeing that he had no pills, and instead the two words ‘concocting pills’. This stirred the emotions of countless people. This time, Yang Chen’s actions could be understood very easily. He had already used up the ingredients he had brought from the surface, so naturally he was unable to concoct any more pills, but he still wanted to improve his pill concocting level, therefore he had substituted selling pills for concocting pills for people, since it allowed him to obtain spirit essences as well as the ability to use other people’s drug ingredients to improve his own skill he was hitting two birds with one stone.

“Can you refine all kinds of pills?”

A voice echoed within Yang Chen’s ears. Hearing this, Yang Chen who had closed his eyes to rest while waiting for customers to drop in, opened them and in front of him the two legs of a person appeared. That person was wearing black colored, embroidered boots, seemingly extremely luxurious.

Yang Chen didn’t raise his head to look at the person in front of him, he merely closed his eyes again and quickly replied:

“All pills at the qi layer can be refined.”

A lot of people were paying attention to the surroundings here, hearing Yang Chen’s reply, they felt relaxed. This was only normal, if Yang Chen had opened his mouth and began to claim that he could refine all kinds of pills, that would be a very strange thing.

But following this reply, Yang Chen once again opened his mouth, which immediately caught the attention of everyone.

“Second grade!”

These were two short words, but they increased everyone’s expectation again. Second grade pills, even if it were qi stage pills, they could also be used by these foundation stage cultivators. Not to speak of others, the yang qi pill was the most common example of this.

“Can you also refine the yuan cultivation pill?”

The person in front of Yang Chen asked again, not willing to give up.

This time Yang Chen didn’t reply directly, instead he faintly nodded and after pondering for a brief moment, he said:

“I can.”

“Is that one also at the second grade?”

The person in front of him couldn’t help but feel pleasantly surprised, he didn’t kept on standing, but rather squated down, coming to almost the same height as Yang Chen and asked with his voice full of expectation. This time Yang Che clearly saw the appearance of the other person, but he was not someone Yang Che recognized. He was not too old, but was dressed in embroidered clothes, apparently he was quite wealthy.

“That one is also at the second grade!”

This time Yang Chen did not take too much time to ponder over this, he directly nodded his head. The yuan cultivation pill was a pill used by foundation stage cultivators to recover their spirit power. Generally speaking, once a person reached the initial foundation stage, he was capable of refining this pill.

After Yang Chen finished speaking, the entire market went silent. A second grade yuan cultivation pill. They had never heard about such a thing before. A great majority of pill concocting masters who could refine a second grade yuan cultivation pill were at least at the JieDan or YuanYing stage. Why would these high level pill concocting masters be willing to waste their time on a yuan cultivation pill? They would rather use their time to concoct more pills of higher grades.

The medicinal properties of a second grade yang qi pill were already comparable to a normal yuan cultivation pill, so how would the second grade yuan cultivation pill perform? This question was surging in the minds of all those people, but nobody said anything.

Gulp…

The person wearing the embroidered gown in front of Yang Chen could not help himself from swallowing his saliva, he once again asked very prudently:

“Can you also refine foundation stage pills?”

“I do not dare to guarantee!”

This time Yang Chen did not discuss too much, he just gave a simple answer.

“Those ones also at the second grade?”

This time, nervousness could be heard in the voice of that embroidered gown wearing person. As for the other people within the market, they had already stopped the work within their hands and all of them were concentrating their spiritual awareness at this small corner, afraid to miss even a single word.

“Refining them once will not be a problem.”

Yang Chen didn’t reply directly, instead he gave just this one statement. However, this already explained everything clearly. Refining once was not a problem, so this meant he couldn’t guarantee a second refining.

“What is the cost you demand?”

The embroidered gown wearing person asked for the cost without the slightest hesitation. A first grade foundation stage pill was able to increase the rate of success in building the foundation by ten percent, but ten pills did not guarantee success completely, only compared to one pill would they still slightly increase the chances. But a second grade foundation stage pill, perhaps that could increase the chances by fifty percent, maybe seventy percent or maybe it could help one directly succeed in building their foundation. Every cultivator above the foundation stage clearly understood this detail.

“The ingredients will be self provided!”

Yang Chen continued without batting an eyelid.

“Five thousand spirit essences or one thousand catties of middle grade spirit stones.”

As soon as he finished saying this, Yang Chen suddenly remembered something: The mountain god whom he had beheaded, there were still some spirit stones left on the inside of his shrine, he hadn’t gone to receive them, he could easily visit there when he returned. Since he had a deal with the mountain god, he had no reason not to accept the remuneration.

Yang Chen’s words caused everyone in the market to suck in their breath. Ingredients had to be provided by the customer, nobody had any problem with this condition, but the price of five thousand spirit essences or one thousand catty of middle grade spirit stones, that was certainly a very high price. The only people on the scene who had this much money within their qiankun pouches, were the ones who had spent at least five years within the Immortal Falling Well.

Not to mention other things, just preparing these drug ingredients would require a huge amount of spirit stones. A large enough amount of Profound Yang Fruit, matured until a given year would already require several hundred catties of low grade of spirit stones, and to refine second grade foundation stage pills, only one would naturally not be sufficient. For an above average success rate they would require at least fifty Profound Yang Fruits. And that still did not consider other, assisting ingredients; that would make people faint. If Yang Chen’s cost was added on, then this second grade foundation stage pill’s cost was comparable to the cost of several hundred first grade foundation stage pills.

But a higher number of foundation stage pills did not mean a higher chance of success. Generally speaking, as long as it was more than ten pills, even if they succeeded in building foundation, the foundation they built would be very different from an ordinarily built foundation. But just taking two second grade foundation stage pills was enough to ensure success and these problems wouldn’t exist.

Everyone in the market place had turned silent, similar to the person sitting in front of Yang Chen. The person wearing the embroidered gown hesitated for a long time, then he suddenly clenched his teeth as if he had formed his resolve and asked Yang Chen:

“What ingredients do you want and how much time you will require?”

Yang Chen would naturally not push away business knocking on his door. Using other people’s ingredients to increase his pill concocting skills while also making a profit of spirit stones and spirit essences, why would he not do it?

As long as he was in the Li Lou Village, even if a piece of straw moved in the wind, in this small village it could not escape his senses. Within the Three Purities Secret there was a minor skill which could divide the Spiritual Awareness into extremely fine threads, which would then disseminate in all directions, examining the activities of people in all directions.

This method was merely a simplified version of the method to divide the spiritual awareness, but it could probe the surroundings without these people even noticing it, so Yang Chen gave it the name Spiritual Awareness Threads. Compared with releasing his entire Spiritual Awareness, it would use only some of it and it would be secret, so it would not give rise to protest from other people. It was the most suitable method for Yang Chen to keep an eye on Li Lou Village at the moment.

Since Yang Chen’s Spiritual Awareness was higher than his cultivation by more than one realm, he was already able to divide his Spiritual Awareness. But currently Yang Chen did not want to train his own primordial spirit. Yang Chen’s current cultivation was really low, so a primordial spirit would only burden the pace of his cultivation.

When Yang Chen released his spiritual power threads, he suddenly thought of a problem. Since a qi layer cultivator like him could take this step, then how could it be impossible for the Greatest Supreme Elder? In all likelihood, the entire Heavenly Court or at least the area of a thousand miles radius surrounding the Tusita Palace must have been under the control of the Greatest Supreme Elder, then how could the rebellion of the Heavenly Court succeed? Could it be that the Greatest Supreme Elder himself intentionally or unintentionally helped it?

Thinking about this point, cold sweat broke out on Yang Chen’s whole body. If it was like this, then wasn’t there some inside secret related with the fall of the Heavenly Court?

This thought flashed in his head and then immediately died again, Yang Chen didn’t think about this anymore. Regardless of whatever secret was hidden within the Heavenly Court, it was not something a trifling qi layer cultivator like him should or could care about. Thinking a lot about it would be of no help, as well as increasing his worries, maybe it could even affect his mind. What he currently had to do was to properly play the role of the talented pill concocting master.

That’s right, the experience of Yang Chen’s previous life had taught him that no matter if it was the world of mortals, the spiritual world or the immortal’s world, a pill concocting master, especially a high level pill concocting master, was the most sought after person. Unless there was a life and death enmity, nobody would dare to offend a high level pill concocting master.

In his previous life, when Yang Chen had become a Great Principal Golden Immortal, because he had been a fire attribute cultivator, he could barely pass for a sixth grade pill concocting master. But even after ascending two times, if he could still only reach the sixth grade, then he could be considered as trash among trash. Not to mention the Greatest Supreme Elder who could casually take out a ninth grade pill, even compared ordinary pill concocting experts who had ascended he was still worse by far.

In this life, Yang Chen however had a great opportunity, not only did he have the top grade Profound Spirit Furnace, but he also had the Greatest Supreme Elder’s pill concocting method. Just these two things were already sufficient to allow Yang Chen to have the potential to become a top grade pill concocting expert. Let alone these two things, he also possessed the Yang Mountain Medicine Garden, which had thousands of spirit medicines and furthermore he still had the experiences from his previous life, so he knew where to find more, better suited flames. He had even participated in the pill concocting processes of some high grade pill concocting masters; when all of these factors are added together, they provided the right conditions for him to become one among the highest grade of pill concocting masters.

Having this status, he could increase his value in the sect more and more and at the same time he could create an illusion against his potential enemies. A pill concocting master generally had mediocre fighting strength like Zhu Chen Tao of the Pure Yang Palace. As long as he possesses this status, other people will involuntarily take him lightly, making it easy for Yang Chen to confuse the enemy.

Yang Chen was assigned a cabin for pill concocting. That person who wore the embroidered gown took a room close by and began to guard Yang Chen, not allowing other people to interfere with him.

The person with the embroidered gown looked rich and overbearing, and provided sufficient ingredients for fifty to sixty first grade foundation stage pills. Yang Chen reckoned that the person with the gown was probably close friends with a youngster in his clan or sect, whom he had to be trying to help break through to the foundation stage, therefore he was spending such large amount of money.

Refining the foundation stage pill was not much of a problem for Yang Chen, he did not lack the skill or a good pill furnace, as long as he could ensure that his Spirit Power could persevere or could be replenished, this was not an issue at all.

The Profound Spirit Furnace could easily take tens of Profound Yang Fruits and refine them into a medicinal liquid which would afterwards be mixed with other ingredients and slowly begin to form shapes. This was a sustainable process, ordinary pill concocting masters would take at least half a month’s time to refine foundation stage pills, but for Yang Chen it would not be that long. With the Profound Spirit Furnace and Geocentric Flame, everything had become much simpler.

Though a lot of people were paying attention, not many of them dared to use their Spiritual Awareness to probe. If not because they could anger Yang Chen if their probing agitated him, then the fact that, if they were not cautious and accidentally destroyed the elixirs, the person with the embroidered gown at the door would not be very courteous towards them.

After five days, a burning smell arose from Yang Chen’s room. The heart of the person outside of the door tensed, he was aware that this meant that Yang Chen had failed, but he had no other choice than to put up a bold face and continue. He had tried almost everywhere, but Yang Chen was the first person he had run into who could fulfill his wish. For the person who wore the embroidered gown, each day felt like an entire year.

With complete patience, the person wearing the embroidery kept on waiting for twenty more days. The other people of the village also started to remain inside of the village. Even if they went out to hunt spirit beasts, when they returned they would directly come to the area near Yang Chen’s room to take a look at the situation.

A few days after he started, a sweet fragrance began to float out of Yang Chen’s cabin. The smell was extremely clear, just one sniff could give a huge shock to everyone’s minds, as if it was an all cure potion. Moreover, the fragrance began to be more and more dense and very quickly spread throughout the entire village.

At the current day nobody had left the village, everyone was hovering around Yang Chen’s room waiting for him. The person with the embroidered gown was bitterly waiting on the outside, hoping to see the outcome. Every day he would keep on scuttling and pacing around. But without Yang Chen’s permission he didn’t dare to go in or probe with his Spiritual Awareness.

Finally on one day, when the medicinal smell had reached it’s peak, they could soon clearly hear Yang Chen shouting inside of the room and then the medicinal smell suddenly disappeared without a trace, as if it had been absorbed by something.

Creak.

Yang Chen opened the door of his small room and came out with an exhausted expression spread across his face. He looked at the person in the embroidered gown, whose face was full of expectations, smiled and held out his hand:

“Do you have a jade bottle, because I don’t have one here.”

“I do! I do!”

The person wearing the embroidered gown hurriedly nodded and then hastily fished out a jade bottle from his qiankun pouch, threw away whatever was inside and gave it to Yang Chen.

Two pure white pills slowly flew towards the jade bottle and entered it. After cautiously stuffing the cork, Yang Chen gave the jade bottle to person wearing the embroidered gown and said:

“Fortunately, I did not humiliate myself!”