Trying a Mid-Grade Pill

Lin Xuan had already gained a preliminary grasp of how to use the Blue Light Spots. However, whether this was their entire secret or merely the tip of the iceberg, he decided to continue exploring.

He poured out a pill from a jade bottle. This was not a Waste Pill, but an excellent Marrow Cleansing Pill he had obtained from Zhou Yan.

Waste Pills could be purified, so could a low-grade Marrow Cleansing Pill also be further purified and upgraded?

Lin Xuan wanted to give it a try!

It had to be known that every spiritual medicine in the Cultivation World, including the Marrow Cleansing Pill, was divided into four grades: low-grade, mid-grade, high-grade, and top-grade.

The grading of spiritual pills was mainly determined by the impurities they contained. There was no real difference in the materials used. The more impurities there were, the more scattered the useful essence became, and the worse the effects after taking it.

High-grade pills, on the other hand, were the opposite. They contained fewer impurities and more concentrated essence, so their effects after consumption were far more apparent.

Of course, the higher a pill's grade, the more difficult it was to refine.

Generally speaking, pills with impurity content exceeding seventy percent were called Waste Pills. Low-grade pills contained roughly fifty percent impurities, mid-grade pills thirty percent, high-grade pills ten percent, while Top-Grade Pills contained vanishingly few impurities—only two or three percent.

For tens of thousands of years, the Cultivation World had been searching for ways to reduce the impurities in pills. Yet countless grandmasters and brilliant minds had labored painstakingly, with little to show for it. Today, among the various spiritual medicines of the Cultivation World—Marrow Cleansing Pills, Foundation Establishment Pills, Foundation Pills, Nine-Turn Pills, and so on—low-grade pills still made up the majority.

Lin Xuan now wanted to take it one step further. Since the Star Sea could purify Waste Pills into low-grade pills, could it also purify low-grade pills into mid-grade ones?

Theoretically, it should be possible. Lin Xuan sat cross-legged, holding a snow-white pill in his hand as he gathered the Blue Light Spots within his dantian.

After more than a month of practice, especially after breaking through to the second layer of the Spirit Movement Stage, his cultivation had increased greatly. Circulating the Blue Light Spots through a full grand cycle no longer felt awkward or unfamiliar.

Still, Lin Xuan did not let down his guard. What he was attempting today was something new. He released all his spiritual sense, guiding the light spots through his meridians before concentrating them all on the Marrow Cleansing Pill in his hand.

After entering the second layer of the Spirit Movement Stage, every aspect of Lin Xuan's abilities had multiplied. Besides his spiritual power, his spiritual sense had also strengthened considerably. Before, he could only observe changes on the surface of the Marrow Cleansing Pill. Now, he could see through it and into its interior.

The Marrow Cleansing Pill was magnified several times within his mind, every detail visible. From the outside, it had appeared completely white, but now Lin Xuan discovered wisps of black matter tangled together with the white portions inside. Those were the impurities.

What he needed to do was expel these useless things.

The Blue Light Spots passed through his skin and entered the pill. Previously, Lin Xuan had had no way to observe this process. All he could do was control the speed at which the blue light flowed.

Now, however, with his enhanced spiritual sense able to enter the pill, he could further study the precise process of purification.

Lin Xuan controlled the speed of the light spots while observing closely.

After entering the pill, the light spots flowed within it. White represented essence, while black represented impurities. Whenever the blue light encountered essence, it passed straight through without the slightest obstruction. But when it encountered impurities, it pushed them outward a little. During this process, the blue light also consumed energy.

Lin Xuan watched with his own eyes as a black clump of impurity moved forward a short distance each time it encountered a Blue Light Spot, until it was finally pushed out of the pill. In this way, the impurities were reduced by a little.

So this was how purification worked. Lin Xuan nodded inwardly. His understanding and command of the blue light had deepened once again.

"Since my spiritual sense can enter the pill, can I control the Blue Light Spots inside it?" Another thought sprang into Lin Xuan's mind. The light spots moved chaotically within the pill, making purification inefficient. If he could control them and gather them together, purification would become much easier.

Lin Xuan began to experiment.

To control light spots that had left his body, he needed to attach his spiritual sense to them. The principle was not difficult; it shared the same underlying approach as the Object Manipulation Technique. Yet actually doing it was fraught with difficulties.

Unlike physical objects, the light spots were formless and intangible. A high-level cultivator might have been able to control them, but Lin Xuan's cultivation was only at the second layer of the Spirit Movement Stage. Although his spiritual sense was much stronger than before he broke through the bottleneck, it was still far from sufficient.

After exhausting the strength of nine oxen and two tigers, he managed only to make the Blue Light Spots tremble once.

Lin Xuan wisely chose to give up. It was still too much of a strain. He would try again once his cultivation realm had improved.

So Lin Xuan refocused his attention and spiritual sense on controlling the flow speed of the Star Sea within his body, continuing the purification.

This process was not smooth sailing either. Soon, he encountered a new problem. Compared with Waste Pills, low-grade pills contained fewer impurities, but those impurities were more tightly entangled with the essence. In other words, separating them required consuming more blue light energy.

As time passed, an hour later, the Star Sea in his dantian had shrunk to one-third of its original size, nearing the warning line. It could no longer send blue light outward.

Once the blue light stopped, the impurities that were nearly expelled from the pill bounced back and returned to their original state. Moreover, they became even more tightly fused with the essence.

The pill also changed from pure white to a faint black.

Lin Xuan opened his eyes and looked at the ruined pill in his hand, a thoughtful expression appearing on his face. Although this experiment had not succeeded, he had still gained quite a lot from it.

First, his spiritual sense could enter the interior of a pill, giving him a certain understanding of the purification process. This would bring immeasurable benefits in helping him better master the blue light.

Second, the blue light that entered a pill could still be controlled. It was only that his cultivation was not sufficient yet. Once his spiritual sense became strong enough, controlling the flow of blue light inside a pill would make purification far more efficient.

So-called experience was accumulated continuously through attempts. Besides practice, one also needed to be good at summarizing. Every time Lin Xuan conducted an experiment, whether it succeeded or failed, he would analyze it in depth.

It was precisely because of this attitude, coupled with his boldness and meticulousness, that he had gradually uncovered the secrets of the Blue Light Spots from an initial state of complete ignorance. His mastery and understanding of them had grown ever deeper.