Luck and Strength!

Time passed slowly. Then, at long last, a soft chime echoed through the space, like a tiny bell being struck.

After that sound came Gu Dao's aged yet forceful voice...

"The pill test is over. The medicinal herb test begins..."

The moment his voice rang out, the light screens covering everyone vanished, revealing each participant atop their respective testing platforms.

For a moment...

The entire space fell silent, and all eyes turned toward the people on the platforms.

The testers sent Dou Qi through their arms, moving the herbs and dividing them into clusters. Each cluster contained the herbs needed for one pill formula. At this moment...

Almost everyone had reached the stage of selecting the ingredients for their final pill formula.

Although useless herbs were mixed in, the total number had already been greatly reduced by the previous selections, so their speed was now extremely fast...

At the same time, streams of soul force hidden in the void began conversing.

"Who do you think will be the fastest?"

"That little fellow Gu Hua, probably. He only has thirteen herbs left—no, twelve already!"

"I think it'll be Gu Qingyang. You may not have noticed, but he previously assembled a formula that was only missing one herb. He wasted a great deal of time!"

"The champion will most likely come from among them. It's just a pity..."

"Gu Fang."

The previous speaker had not finished, but another stream of soul force completed the words he had left unsaid.

As soon as that name was mentioned, the discussion fell silent. On one hand, they lamented Gu Fang's failure. They had all seen his performance in the pill-testing stage.

If they competed fairly under equal conditions, Gu Fang would definitely have won!

On the other hand, Gu Fang's identity was special. He was the son of the clan chief, Gu Yuan. Even though they had reached the Dou Zun and Dou Sheng realms, they still had to be exceedingly cautious when it came to Gu Fang!

What they failed to notice was that, the instant the light screen vanished, Gu Fang, whose eyes had been tightly shut, shot forward.

In the blink of an eye, he arrived atop his own testing platform. The moment he steadied himself...

Gu Fang's Dou Practitioner strength erupted at full force, centered on himself.

At once, every herb before Gu Fang was blasted off the ground, scattering through the air like stars!

Gu Fang's actions puzzled the watching crowd...

"What's going on? What is Gu Fang doing?"

"Is he panicking and grasping at straws? But if they fall back down like that, won't they just become even more chaotic?"

The clamor did not disturb Gu Fang in the slightest. At this moment, he was fully immersed in the herbs. With his powerful soul force and talent...

Every movement of the herbs slowed to an extreme in Gu Fang's eyes. When everything had slowed to the limit...

The pill formula ingredients already arranged in Gu Fang's mind rapidly matched the herbs before him.

As the herbs reached their highest point and were about to fall, Gu Fang abruptly opened his eyes. His arms left afterimages and sonic booms in their wake...

As he struck herb after herb without the slightest hesitation!

The herbs Gu Fang sent flying traced arcs through the air before landing in a cluster. In just over ten seconds, Gu Fang had struck out more than thirty herbs.

Gu Fang's bizarre actions, along with his previous performance, drew everyone's attention!

The people below were confused, but the soul auras of the Dou Zuns and Dou Shengs who had been conversing earlier, previously as still as ancient wells, suddenly all trembled.

Even if they were not alchemists, their strength was there, and they had once undergone training for pill and herb tests.

They knew clearly...

The thirty herbs Gu Fang had seemingly struck out at random were actually the ingredients needed for the Fourth-grade Pill, the Beast Strength Pill!

Every single one was correct. Not a single mistake!

As they made their judgment, Gu Fang had already struck out the final supplementary herb needed to refine the Beast Strength Pill.

The first formula, Beast Strength Pill—ingredients complete!

"Monster!"

"Mad! He's completely mad!"

Everyone was utterly shaken, as though the scattered herbs before Gu Fang were not a disorderly mess at all, but merely the ingredients for a single pill formula.

He had not hesitated. The other useless herbs had not interfered with Gu Fang in the slightest. Everything had flowed as smoothly as clouds and water.

One had to know...

Selecting the ingredients for the first formula took the longest, because one did not know exactly what herbs were present, nor which ones were useless.

Even the fastest others had needed seven or eight minutes to finish selecting the first formula's ingredients. But for Gu Fang...

Twenty-six seconds were enough to complete the first formula's selection!

Clatter, clatter. All the herbs fell back to the ground, and Gu Fang let out a long breath.

At the same time Gu Fang exhaled, those circling streams of soul force also seemed to release a breath.

Without realizing it, those peak figures of the continent had already immersed themselves in this ordinary test. Their hearts were now filled with shock.

A thought that they had never dared entertain before slowly emerged in their minds.

Perhaps he could do it. Even if there was not much time left, perhaps Gu Fang could accomplish it!

If he truly could, it would be nothing short of a miracle!

"With only six herbs left, Gu Qingyang needs at most twenty seconds. The little fellow has no chance anymore."

Just as everyone was stunned, a completely flat voice suddenly rang in their ears.

At those words, the experts all sent their soul perception toward Gu Qingyang.

Afterward, they immediately made their judgment.

They agreed with that person's words.

Twenty seconds. Gu Fang still needed the ingredients for two pill formulas. Even if they were simply laid out for him to pick up, the ingredients for two formulas would take around thirty seconds!

He truly had no chance left.

Yet just as they agreed, Dou Qi suddenly surged from Gu Fang's body. This time, however, Gu Fang did not stomp the ground. Instead, he bent down and thrust out his palm.

Whoosh...

After compressing in Gu Fang's palm, Dou Qi instantly howled toward the herbs in the front left!

Rustle, rustle...!

A faint sound of herbs rolling rang out. Then, under everyone's gaze, more than ten herbs rolled together, their branches and leaves tangling into a clump before piling into a cluster.

Gu Fang's action startled the Dou Zuns and Dou Shengs who had been communicating through soul force. Yet Elder Han, hidden in the void, suddenly burst into laughter.

He turned toward Gu Nanhai beside him.

Dou Qi surged from his body. Swinging down his arm, he slammed a blow onto Gu Nanhai's shoulder. "Beautifully done! As expected of my foremost disciple!"

Elder Han had not held back. That full-force blow made Gu Nanhai bare his teeth in pain.

Yet even so, Gu Nanhai's gaze never left the herbs before Gu Fang—more precisely, the cluster of herbs Gu Fang had pushed out!!

Gu Nanhai could not believe there could be such a coincidence in the world, but reality was simply that unpredictable. It had happened just like that! The herbs swept out by a single strike were all ingredients needed for the same pill formula.

After that strike, Gu Fang, who was still undergoing the test, released another long breath and sank downward. Force rippled out, sending all the herbs flying up once more...

The instant the herbs left the ground, Gu Fang moved like a hunting cheetah. Both hands swung at once, sending five herbs flying directly onto the previous cluster.

"Fourth-grade Pill, Purple Heart Barrier Breaking Pill—ingredients complete!"

Gu Fang's inner murmur and Gu Dao's muttered words rang out simultaneously. Gu Dao froze in place, while the other two immortals and the clan chief stood with their mouths slightly open.

Even with their level of strength, having witnessed the rise and fall of countless geniuses, they had never seen anyone accomplish such a thing.

They had not even heard of it!

"Luck is also a part of strength. The rest will be interesting."

Gu Dao murmured softly, but just as his words fell, Elder Han's soul force moved over. A message followed...

"To attribute success to luck may be fine for others, but I refuse to accept it when you say that about my disciple!

"From the start of the pill test, my disciple had already sensed and understood the properties of the herbs, then roughly classified them according to their effects. And while selecting the ingredients for the first formula earlier...

"He blasted all the herbs into the air. Although he did not directly act on the second formula's herbs then, he had actually made subtle adjustments!

"That was what created the scene you saw earlier!

"To accomplish all this...

"Relied entirely on strength!

"The gap between the others and Gu Fang is far more than the little bit you can see!"

Elder Han's words made Gu Yuan and the other three blink lightly. At that very moment...

Two crisp voices rang out one after the other. "Reporting, test complete!"

Those two voices naturally belonged to Gu Fang and Gu Qingyang.