RNM, refund our money!
Waaaaah, Little B, you know me.
However, a highly accomplished monk from a certain Great Forest Temple had just purchased 100,000 Low-Grade Spirit Stones from the Azure Dragon Merchant Association.
Lu Ping chose A without hesitation.
[You chose A.]
[You bowed respectfully, saying, "Your subordinate will certainly complete the task," but inwardly you were thinking, "You're an expert!"]
These people who play with capital are truly ruthless.
[They treated all the cultivators in the city like leeks, harvesting them without even blinking an eye.]
[Liang Yishou seemed somewhat confused about what the two of you were trying to do.]
[However, Liang Yishou is indeed a "good partner," so keep your doubts to yourself.]
[The first round of official matches begins.]
[The Azure Dragon Merchant Association has drawn an opponent who is a team from a small alchemy Aristocratic Clan.]
[You and Liang Yishou step onto the battle platform.]
[The commentary's voice was amplified through the Formation Technique, spreading throughout the entire venue.]
"Oh? This is the Azure Dragon Merchant Association Azure Dragon Merchant Association Team. It seems they've given up this year, sending two relatively unknown players."
"Liang Yishou, a veteran Alchemist of the Azure Dragon Merchant Association, has achieved nothing in the past century."
"As for this Lu Ping... he seems to be from the Central Region. Hmm, he's not important..."
[The audience burst into laughter.]
[A bumpkin from the Central Region dares to take the stage in Baodi City?]
[You ignored him and went to your seat.]
[The match begins.]
[You and Liang Yishou select the medicine step by step.]
[This time you avoided the uncommon and poisonous herbs, and properly selected a few common medicinal materials.]
"Open the furnace!"
[The two opponents simultaneously ignited their inner fire.]
[Your alchemy is progressing slowly; in fact, the furnace fire fluctuated several times, indicating you're struggling a lot.]
[Your Divine Sense has been focused on Liang Yishou beside you, and also on your two opponents.]
[Compared to two months ago, Liang Yishou has indeed made considerable progress.]
[Half an hour later.]
[Liang Yishou, sweating profusely, slapped open the lid of the cauldron, and a fragrant Detoxification Pill fell into his hand.]
He let out a long breath and inserted the Pills into the array's core.
[A faint White Light rises over your side.]
[White alchemical energy spread forward along the Array Patterns of the Great Expansion Alchemy Formation.]
[After half an incense stick's time, the Poison Pill on the opposite side also took shape and was inserted into the array's core.]
[The crimson aura of the elixir spreads towards you along the Formation Technique's Spirit Veins.]
[At this moment, Liang Yishou's white aura had already crossed the midline between the two sides.]
[The two collided, and the Array Patterns began to flicker.]
[Although Liang Yishou's Detoxification Pill was of average quality, its strength lay in its stability, effectively blocking the opponent's poison.]
[Meanwhile, the opponent's Detoxification Pill was about to be completed.]
[With a flick of your wrist, you lifted the lid of the cauldron and frantically flicked the dark purple Poison Pill into the Formation Technique.]
[Boom!]
[The purple aura of the elixir flowed along the Spirit Veins, advancing forward in an unbroken stream.]
[The purple qi collided with both sides' defensive lines.]
[Then they began to breach the defensive line, eventually reaching the edge of their position.]
[If they had gone just an inch further, the poison would have entered their bodies.]
[But the opponent's Detoxification Pill is still a little short.]
The two men exchanged a glance, then dejectedly raised their hands.
"The Li Lineage concedes defeat."
[A completely uninteresting clash of weaklings.]
[A chorus of boos erupted from the stands.]
"RNM, refund my money!"
"What a lousy competition, so drawn out!"
"Those two newbies are really lucky, they actually ran into someone even weaker!"
"It's just luck. They'll definitely show their true colors next time they face a strong team!"
[You listened to these mocking remarks, and walked off the platform with a blank expression.]
[The Azure Dragon Merchant Association Team successfully maintained their "useless and rookie" persona.]
Your odds are as stable as a rock.
[That night, you returned to your cave abode.]
[You produce the intelligence gathered by the Azure Dragon Merchant Association from various teams today.]
[The main force of the Heavenly Pill Pavilion is a young man named Xiao Han, who is rumored to be the closed-door disciple of a certain reclusive old monster.]
[Today, it only took the time it takes for two incense sticks to burn to severely injure the opponent.]
[Over at Ten Thousand Treasures Tower, there's a veiled female cultivator named Ye Hongshan, who is extremely ruthless in her use of poison.]
[He directly crippled the opponent's Alchemist cultivation with a Poison Pill.]
These two teams are the true seeded teams.
[Please isolate these two profiles separately.]
The selection process will continue for the next few days.
[You thoroughly implemented Yan Xuanyao's "survival of the fittest" tactical guidance.]
[Second match, against a second-rate sect.]
[You deliberately feigned a fire control error, causing black smoke to billow from the Pill Furnace, drawing laughter from the entire audience.]
[Liang Yishou was terrified and desperately tried to refine Detoxification Pill to stay put.]
[Just one second before the enemy's poison gas was about to breach the defenses.]
[You, drenched in sweat, conjure a Poison Pill and smash it into the core of the formation.]
[The poison gas attack nearly forced the enemy to retreat.]
[The third match, facing the City Lord's Manor.]
[You deliberately picked the wrong main ingredient when choosing the medicine, causing a stir of lamentation from the commentators.]
"Lu Ping doesn't even understand basic pharmacology! He put Fire Dragon Fruit and Iceheart Grass together; he's going to cause an explosion!"
[In the end, you forcibly neutralized it with several auxiliary ingredients, creating an extremely ugly and Poison Pill.]
[Thanks to this ugly pill, you once again "luckily" passed the test.]
Every time, you win by the narrowest of margins.
[Every time, it makes the gamblers who bet on you to lose beat their chests in despair.]
"Just a hair's breadth away! Just a tiny bit more and these two useless pieces of trash would have been eliminated!"
"This is weird! Did these two bribe the Great Expansion Alchemy Formation?"
[A retail investor, blinded by greed, smashed the Jade Slip containing the betting odds to pieces on the spot.]
"I bet everything I had on the City Lord's Manor's team, and I still lost to a single ugly pill!"
["This is a rigged operation! There's definitely something fishy going on! RMN! Refund!"]
[Several city guards maintaining order dragged the troublemaker away without hesitation.]
[Your odds, due to deliberate manipulation by the bookmakers and frantic reverse betting by retail investors, have skyrocketed to 1 in 100.]
[Until the semifinal roster is announced.]
The Azure Dragon Merchant Association Team was prominently featured.
[And your opponent in the semifinals is none other than the championship favorite, the seeded team from the Heavenly Pill Pavilion.]
Yan Xuanyao pushes open the Stone Gate to your cave abode.
[He spun the Fire Jade Gallbladder in his hand with incredible speed.]
"We'll fight Heavenly Pill Pavilion tomorrow."
He's staring at you.
"The odds are already full. Tomorrow, go all out and beat them to a pulp."
[Options pop up.]
[A: I will listen to the leader obediently and promise to do my best tomorrow and not let them down.]
[B: She tilted her head back at a 45-degree angle, glanced at him out of the corner of her eye, and snorted coldly: "Are you trying to teach me how to do things?"]
[C: Slams his hand on the table, shattering it, and shouts, "Today, Lu, am going to earn my money standing up!" He demands an immediate re-signing of the "Joint Control and Profit Distribution Agreement for the Event," explicitly stating that the bookmaker's profits must be split 30/70—30 for him and 70 for you.]