Pill Formula

Inside the room, Qu Ping'er sat upright at one side of a small round table of pale carved wood, quietly listening to Liu Zhengguang's ingratiating words from across the table. Seeing the unconcealed swagger on his face, she sighed softly to herself. Was this still the Senior Brother Liu who had once haunted her dreams? The Senior Brother Liu in her memories had been refined and elegant, warm and kind to others—the dream lover of Qingguang Sect's female disciples. She did not know when she had gradually begun to feel weary of him.

As she gazed at the face she had once considered the most handsome in the world, Qu Ping'er's gaze slowly shifted away. A plain, ordinary face quietly surfaced in her heart.

At the pool in the forbidden grounds, she had been naked, frightenedly clutching her clothes as she hid. Then she had stopped a man whose face was covered in nosebleed. At the time, that man had been so frightened by her that he spoke without thinking. His flustered appearance had been so foolish, and in the end, he had actually... actually been kicked down the mountain by her.

But how could that be her fault! He had been the only person there, so she could not help misunderstanding—and misunderstanding deeply enough to feel the urge to kill him. Had it not been for the peeping in the stone cave of the forbidden grounds, she did not know how long she would have continued to misunderstand him. Elder Hao's death, his silent sobbing, the blood he spat out in utter grief—every bit of it revealed the depth and sincerity of his feelings. How could a person like that possibly do something so filthy?

He had faced the Sect Master without the slightest fear, speaking bluntly in return. How many Qingguang Sect disciples could do that?

He had remained unruffled in the face of being cursed as trash. How many could do that? If not for Senior Brother Liu's palm strike, Qingguang Sect from top to bottom would probably still not know that he was the sort of person willing to remain obscure.

Faced with a melody sung throughout the world, he clearly knew she had composed it, yet he sought neither fame nor profit and turned a deaf ear to it. If she had not known, if she had not exposed him face-to-face, would he have kept hiding it forever?

When I saw you at the Spirit Stone mine, that helpless, miserable smile on your face—did you know how much my heart ached? When I heard you had been killed by the Demonic Path at the Spirit Stone mine, did you know that I cried for you countless times in the depths of night? Today, when I saw you quietly appear before me again without a sound, did you know how happy I was?

He actually lived here too. Could this be what they called fate? Thinking of the hand signals Yue Qianchou had made toward her downstairs, a faint smile appeared on Qu Ping'er's face. She had not taken in a single word Liu Zhengguang was saying.

Naturally, Yue Qianchou, who was eavesdropping outside the door, and Liu Zhengguang, who was speaking inside, had no idea what she was thinking. If Yue Qianchou truly found out, heh! The consequences would probably be too dreadful to contemplate.

Liu Zhengguang also noticed that his junior sister was somewhat distracted. He paused slightly, and his words naturally came to a halt, but Qu Ping'er remained lost in thought. A faint trace of annoyance appeared on Liu Zhengguang's face.

As the Qingguang Sect Master's direct grandson, his status was extraordinary. Which female disciple in the sect did not secretly harbor feelings for him? The woman before him had once been the same; he knew all of this. Yet he possessed lofty ambitions and devoted himself wholeheartedly to cultivation. Once he achieved success and fame, would those female disciples not be his for the picking?

Since when had Qu Ping'er gradually drifted farther and farther away from him? The unusual sparkle in her eyes when she looked at him had faded as well. At last, she had caught his attention. Comparing her with the other female disciples, she was strikingly the most outstanding.

The most outstanding female disciple had actually lost interest in him! This was undoubtedly a provocation to a man accustomed to standing high above all others. How could he endure it? Thus, he began taking the initiative to approach Qu Ping'er, only to find that the more actively he pursued her, the farther away she seemed to drift.

At this thought, the muscles on Liu Zhengguang's face twitched slightly. He drew a breath to steady his emotions, then picked up the lid of the teacup on the table and lightly tapped it against the cup. With a ding, Qu Ping'er was roused from her daze.

A smile appeared on Liu Zhengguang's face as he said gently, "Junior Sister! Everyone in Qingguang Sect knows how I feel about you. Could it be that you still do not know?"

After a brief hesitation, Qu Ping'er nodded gently. This time, she had only come out alone with Liu Zhengguang after her grandmaster Lu Wanqian persuaded her. Before they left, her grandmaster had made it very clear that he hoped she and Liu Zhengguang would become cultivation companions. Pressured by her grandmaster, she had originally prepared herself to yield. What else could she do if she did not yield?

Within Qingguang Sect, there were some things that a mere disciple like her simply could not decide for herself. Yet no one could have imagined that she would encounter Martial Uncle Yue here, even though he should have been dead long ago!

"Bastard! So he really wants to seduce my girl. He can even say such nauseating words of confession—I'm furious! My dear Immortal sister, for the sake of the Cultivation World's next generation, you must hold your ground!" Yue Qianchou gritted his teeth outside the door and cursed inwardly without end.

Seeing that Qu Ping'er seemed unmoved, Liu Zhengguang frowned and reached out to take out a long, narrow jade slip. "Junior Sister! Take a look at what this is."

Qu Ping'er reached out and accepted it, turning it over and over as she examined it. Confused, she said, "It looks very ordinary! Neither long nor short; I cannot see anything special about it."

Yue Qianchou's expression changed outside the door. If he had not considered that he could not defeat Liu Zhengguang, he would have dearly loved to kick the door open right then and see what that pair of adulterers were doing inside. His thoughts had gone astray as he cursed inwardly, Liu Zhengguang, don't tell me you even pulled out the thing used to carry on the family line! Damn, how shameless! What he heard next finally made him breathe a sigh of relief.

"Junior Sister! This jade slip is no ordinary item. Have you heard of the Pill Sect of the Cultivation World three thousand years ago? Inside are pill formulas painstakingly gathered through the heart's blood of countless generations of the Pill Sect!" Liu Zhengguang said.

"Ah! Pill formulas!" Qu Ping'er cried out as she stared at the jade slip in her hand. "Is it the Pill Sect that relied on alchemy to sit firmly as the Righteous Path's foremost sect for countless years? Wasn't it said that the Demonic Path had joined forces to destroy them three thousand years ago? How could their things possibly have fallen into your hands?"

It was no wonder Qu Ping'er was so astonished. In the Cultivation World, pill formulas were the most precious things of all. A single fine pill formula was enough to stir up bloody storms. Absorbing the spiritual energy contained within Spirit Stones could indeed increase one's cultivation, but for those whose cultivation had reached a certain level, Spirit Stones were of little use. Fine pill formulas were different. Once fine pills were refined, swallowing a single pill could equal a year of bitter cultivation—or even several years.

For cultivators, crossing from one level to another was often as difficult as ascending to heaven. It was like Yue Qianchou needing a Foundation Establishment Pill to advance from the Qi Refining stage into the Foundation Establishment Realm. Although Foundation Establishment Pills were precious in the Cultivation World, their refining formulas could be found in nearly every major sect. But what about pills for crossing the Core Formation stage, Nascent Soul Realm, and Tribulation Transcendence stage?

Though every sect had its own secret formulas and treasured them like priceless jewels, their effects after consumption probably depended on each person's luck. It seemed that only a very, very small number of people with good fortune succeeded. From this, one could see how precious fine pill formulas were in the Cultivation World; they were absolutely no less valuable than a fine magical treasure.

The Pill Sect had been a cultivation sect that specialized in this art. It was said that once its disciples reached a certain level of cultivation, after taking pills, their chance of breaking through could reach as high as thirty percent. Do not underestimate that thirty percent. If Qingguang Sect had one hundred Nascent Soul Realm cultivators, and thirty percent of them could break through into the Tribulation Transcendence stage, what would that mean? That would be more than thirty additional Tribulation Transcendence stage cultivators! Such odds were something the major sects did not even dare dream of.