The Origin of the "Stamina Potion"

Using Wei Sijian's access card, Shen Qian smoothly swiped open the door to the "Apothecary Storage Room" and walked inside.

What greeted him was a low-temperature cold storage room. Even with his strengthened physique, the chill that rushed at him still made him shiver.

The storage room was not large, less than twenty square meters. Various potions and pills were arranged in the refrigerated cabinets along both walls. What made Shen Qian's eyes light up was that these potions finally had written labels, so he was no longer completely in the dark.

"Body Tempering Potion?"

Shen Qian noticed that one of the refrigerated cabinets was filled entirely with all kinds of Body Tempering Potions. There were even ones suitable for Intermediate Martial Artists and Advanced Martial Artists.

Shen Qian's breathing grew heavy for a moment. A bottle of Body Tempering Potion for an Intermediate Martial Artist had to be worth at least several hundred thousand...

So Shen Qian extended his sinful hand.

Two seconds later, the sinful hand withdrew.

...There was actually a fingerprint lock!

Come on, this was an internal laboratory of the Martial Arts Bureau. Did it really need such tight security?

Too speechless to complain, Shen Qian tried them one by one...

Fine, they all had fingerprint locks!

Abandoning his wicked intentions, Shen Qian thought it over carefully and decided the odds of getting Wei Sijian to open the refrigerated cabinets for him were not high. The man was only slow-witted, not actually stupid.

Just as Shen Qian shook his head and prepared to turn around and leave, the corner of his eye suddenly caught a small porcelain bottle forgotten in a corner. Because of the lighting, it could only be clearly seen from Shen Qian's current angle.

Shen Qian crouched down and picked up the little porcelain bottle.

"Origin Fusion Pill."

A small label was pasted to the bottle. Other than that, there was no additional information.

He gave it a light shake and heard a crisp clinking from inside the porcelain bottle. Clearly, the pill was still there.

This was Shen Qian's first time seeing a medicinal pill named with the word "pill." Even by intuition alone, this one probably was not cheap.

He searched with his wristband but found nothing useful. Shen Qian simply stopped bothering himself and walked out of the storage room with the porcelain bottle, returning to Wei Sijian's side.

"Old Wei, what's an Origin Fusion Pill for?" Shen Qian asked when he did not understand.

Annoyed by Shen Qian's interruption as he flipped through his notebook, Wei Sijian still answered, "It's used when advancing to Martial Artist. It fuses origin energy."

Used when advancing to Martial Artist?

Shen Qian froze. The textbooks did not seem to mention needing pills to assist one's advancement to Beginner Martial Artist!

He would ask Liu Simin later. She was at least a fifth-rank Beginner Martial Artist, so she had been through it...

"Then how much does this sell for?" Shen Qian asked again.

"I don't know. But a low-grade pill like this probably isn't worth much," Wei Sijian replied casually.

Hearing that it was not worth much, Shen Qian no longer felt burdened. At least he had not come away empty-handed.

"Then I'll take this Origin Fusion Pill?" Shen Qian asked.

"Mm." Wei Sijian did not even look up.

After sweeping his gaze around the laboratory again and confirming there was nothing else to mooch off, Shen Qian placed the access card on the table and prepared to leave.

Before leaving, Shen Qian glanced at the things on Wei Sijian's experiment table. His mouth opened, but in the end, he said nothing and headed for the door.

Wei Sijian remained completely unresponsive.

He pressed the door-open button. As the automatic doors slid apart, Shen Qian's humming gradually faded, and his body froze in place.

Outside the door stood four young people in white coats—three men and one woman—looking at Shen Qian in confusion.

After the two sides stared at each other for a moment, one of the male students asked, "Who are you? Why are you here?"

Damn... These four looked sharp. They clearly were not bookworms like Wei Sijian.

Shen Qian forcibly swallowed back the words "Take a guess," because he noticed that the short-haired girl had already reached for her wristband, while the other two were shifting to either side, clearly intending to block his path.

Fighting was not an option either. This was the Martial Arts Bureau, and he might not even be able to beat them...

After his thoughts raced, Shen Qian made a decision. He immediately smiled and said, "Hello, I'm Wei Sijian's friend."

"Senior Brother Wei's friend?"

The group exchanged glances, muttering inwardly. Senior Brother Wei actually had friends in Jing City?

No, Senior Brother Wei actually had friends?

Seeing that they still had no intention of making way, Shen Qian could only sigh helplessly. You forced my hand...

It was time to show them what real skill looked like!

Shen Qian turned around and walked back into the laboratory, heading straight for Wei Sijian, who was still bent over his experiment.

Without any courtesy, he picked up Wei Sijian's notebook and said disdainfully, "What a mess. Full of mistakes and omissions!"

"What did you say?" Wei Sijian looked up and asked with a frown.

Behind Shen Qian, the people who had followed him in looked at one another, unable to understand what he was doing.

"I said you were wrong. You were wrong from the very beginning." Shen Qian made no effort to hide his contempt as he casually tossed the notebook onto the table. "Keep researching like this, and even after another ten years, don't expect any results!"

Wei Sijian trembled with anger and protested, "Then tell me, where am I wrong?"

"If I'm not mistaken, you're trying to improve the formula for the 'Body Tempering Potion,' right?" Shen Qian said blandly.

Yes, this was the confidence that let him come back and show off in front of everyone.

When Shen Qian had flipped through Wei Sijian's notes earlier, he had already sensed something familiar. After thinking it over carefully, once he set aside all those formulas, were not the herbs listed there the formula for the Stamina Potion?

It was not merely similar. It was exactly the same.

The only difference from the system was that Wei Sijian's formula looked more like a draft. Compared to the system's finished formula, the quantities of many supplementary herbs were still being explored.

Moreover, the biggest difference was that Wei Sijian had not yet figured out what to use as the main ingredient...

The main ingredient currently sitting in his experimental vessel was another spiritual herb whose name Shen Qian did not know.

Actually, when Shen Qian first saw what was recorded in the notebook, he had been greatly surprised. He also came up with an immature yet highly plausible guess...

The system's formula for the Stamina Potion had most likely been copied from Wei Sijian's notes. The system had merely perfected it.

There were two reasons. On the one hand, the system had just shown Shen Qian, right before his eyes, its freeloading ability to "expand the knowledge base." On the other hand, the title page of Wei Sijian's notebook had already named the formula in advance...

That's right, it was the "Stamina Potion."

Could there really be such a coincidence in this world?

"So what if I am?" Wei Sijian stared at Shen Qian, waiting for him to continue.

"The Jing City Medical Association promised to donate a huge sum to the institute, but they demanded an improved formula for the 'Body Tempering Potion.' After the teacher agreed, he had Senior Brother Wei lead the research into improving the formula," the short-haired girl interjected.

So that was it...

Shen Qian suddenly understood, finally piecing together the rough sequence of events.

"Tell me already. Where exactly am I wrong?" Seeing that Shen Qian had remained silent for so long, Wei Sijian could not help urging him again.

The other young people in white coats also stared at Shen Qian curiously.

Setting personality aside, they knew perfectly well how accomplished Senior Brother Wei was in the field of medicine.

He was the kind of genius who often angered their teacher half to death, yet their teacher could not bear to slap him to death...

And yet Shen Qian had criticized Wei Sijian's meticulously researched formula as worthless. No matter how they heard it, it sounded like empty boasting.

Shen Qian also realized at this moment that Wei Sijian was definitely no ordinary person. At such a young age, he could directly lead the improvement of the formula for a bestselling potion—something many so-called experts likely could not accomplish.

"Say it already!" Seeing Shen Qian still lost in thought, Wei Sijian was practically going mad.

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