Unexpected Guests (End of Third Update)

Closing his eyes as the book instructed, Xiao Han slowly steadied his mind. His exceptional Soul Perception continuously scanned the faint thread of Wood Power within his body.

It took over eight minutes to locate the Wood Power within him for the first time. Xiao Han let out a breath and opened his eyes. He extended a finger, lightly pressing it onto another Fire Port, and a very faint green current was slowly channeled in.

The moment the green current entered the Medicine Cauldron, the pale yellow flame inside seemed to undergo a chemical reaction, abruptly calming down.

At this point, even without Xiao Han controlling the flame, he could sense that the violent factor within it had been neutralized by the Wood Power. Moreover, due to the principle of wood feeding fire, the flame was now noticeably more enduring and easier to control than before.

But damn, this was way too troublesome. If he'd known, he would have just used the Demonic Flame for his first alchemy attempt!

Since Xiao Han had already suppressed the Demon Armor earlier, the Demonic Flame—being its accessory and underling—was now under his command. What uncontrollable violent flame? That wasn't even an issue, right?!

Still, Xiao Han knew that using Dou Qi to refine medicine was a necessary path for every beginner. No matter how much he complained inwardly, he had to obediently follow the steps.

After familiarizing himself with all this, the next step was learning to refine pills.

Before leaving earlier, he had asked Master Guni which pill formula was easier to practice. Master Guni casually picked the simplest pill from four first-grade formulas—the Qi Returning Pill—and gave it to Xiao Han.

Then it was simple. Xiao Han went to the Family Medicinal Herb Store and, using an extremely low internal price, bought this batch of herbs.

Honestly, Xiao Han's presence had made the Xiao Family much wealthier. If Xiao Zhan weren't busy handling family affairs every day, he might have already become a Dou Ling by now.

"One Small Lamp Grass, one Hook Fruit, one Qi Condensing Fruit, two dandelion seeds..."

After memorizing the quantities of the herbs in his mind, Xiao Han's Soul Perception gradually infiltrated the Medicine Cauldron, striving to control that relatively gentle flame.

With a flick of his finger, a Small Lamp Grass appeared in his palm. After a slight hesitation, Xiao Han tossed it in through the lid opening at the top of the cauldron.

The moment the Small Lamp Grass entered the cauldron, before Xiao Han could even react, the flame surged up. In an instant, the Small Lamp Grass turned into black ash, which was then expelled from the cauldron by its special mechanism.

"Damn!"

He knew alchemy wasn't easy, but he hadn't expected that the moment he threw the herb in, it would be gone on his first try.

"Again!"

Xiao Han refused to believe it. He tossed in another herb. This time, it didn't vanish instantly, but it didn't last ten seconds either before it was gone.

"Phew—"

Xiao Han sighed. He was drenched in sweat, partly because the cauldron had raised the room's temperature, but mostly because of the tension from his first alchemy attempt.

He flipped through the Alchemist's Handbook to find the reason. It said that temperatures too high or too low could cause herb extraction to fail.

After pinpointing the issue and stubbornly ruining over twenty Small Lamp Grasses, Xiao Han finally managed to grasp the temperature sweet spot for the herb and extracted the medicinal powder.

This was insane. In just this short time, he had burned through nearly ten thousand Gold Coins. No wonder people said alchemists were built on money.

After mastering the trick, Xiao Han worked for another two hours. He was planning to go big!

Though he had sat before the cauldron for two hours, for someone with an Earth Rank Low-Grade Technique like Xiao Han, this amount of Dou Qi consumption was barely a drizzle. With a single breath, he recovered all the lost Dou Qi.

With the Demon Armor and the Swallowing Spirit Technique—both major absorbers of Heaven and Earth Yuan Qi—even an ordinary Dou Grandmaster couldn't match his Dou Qi recovery speed.

But the two hours of work weren't wasted. Looking at the small, crystalline pile of medicinal powder floating inside the cauldron and the twenty Medicine Boxes beside him filled with powder, Xiao Han finally broke into a smile.

Practice makes perfect. Though he had lost twenty Small Lamp Grasses due to inexperience, he had successfully mastered the extraction technique. It was all worth it.

Glancing at the system panel, Xiao Han noticed it still didn't display any alchemist data. It seemed he would need to successfully refine at least one pill before the system would acknowledge him.

Xiao Han immediately moved to the next step.

Taking a Hook Fruit from his Storage Ring, Xiao Han took a deep breath and tossed it into the cauldron, following the same procedure as before.

Though he had accidentally succeeded in extracting the Small Lamp Grass powder earlier, this time he wasn't so lucky.

One, two, three... nine, ten... twenty, twenty-two... thirty...

After failing thirty times in a row, Xiao Han's patience began to wear thin. He was starting to get irritable.

Even after flipping through Master Guni's notes and the Alchemist's Handbook several times, he still couldn't find the reason for his failures. It was driving him crazy.

"Twenty-five Hook Fruits left. If I fail again, I'll have to go back to the Family Medicinal Herb Store to leech more supplies."

With a slight sigh, Xiao Han set up the Pill Furnace again and began a new round of Hook Fruit extraction.

To prevent failure, he meticulously followed every step of the extraction process, from the intensity of the Dou Qi flame to the roasting time of the herb. He was extremely careful, allowing no margin for error. Under his relentless efforts, this extraction finally...

Failed again.

"Fuck! Your mom, asshole!"

Staring at the Hook Fruit that had once again turned to ash, Xiao Han burst into a stream of curses.

Furious, Xiao Han wanted to kick over this damn cauldron, but thinking of all the money he had poured into learning alchemy, he forced himself to calm down.

To be honest, it wasn't that he couldn't afford to lose these herbs. It was that after so many tries, he still didn't know why he was failing. How the hell was he supposed to play this game?!

Failure wasn't scary. What was scary was not even knowing the reason for the failure. That would break anyone's mentality!

Xiao Han now felt like a student stuck on a difficult homework problem, staring blankly at the formula in the textbook without understanding it, and unable to ask the teacher. It was incredibly frustrating.

"One more try. If it doesn't work, even if I have to owe a bigger favor, I'll go ask Master Guni what's going on!"

Taking a deep breath, Xiao Han quickly adjusted his mindset. His expression calmed, as if the furious person from moments ago wasn't him.

Honestly, when it came to pressure resistance, aside from Xiao Han—a regular on the solo lane in games, constantly griefed and cursed by teammates—the only young member of the Xiao Family who could match him was Xiao Yan, who had endured years of mockery and ridicule.

Once again, following the alchemy techniques in the book, he was meticulous, careful, and even more careful. He paid close attention to the flame's temperature changes, slowly roasting and peeling the skin off the Hook Fruit to extract the juice inside.

Carefully manipulating his Soul Power to separate it, Xiao Han's breath caught in his throat. After so many failures, could it be that he was finally about to succeed?

Just as Xiao Han was on the verge of completing the extraction, the flame inside the Pill Furnace suddenly erupted in chaos, surging toward the medicinal liquid within.

"Not good!"

Xiao Han's face changed drastically as he scrambled in panic.

Just as it seemed this extraction would also end in failure, an aged voice sounded from above Xiao Han's head, causing him to instinctively follow its instructions.

"Boy, infuse your Wood Attribute Dou Qi into the medicinal liquid to neutralize it, reduce the Fire Attribute Dou Qi you're channeling, and then use your Soul Power to peel it apart."

A miracle occurred! The previously turbulent flame quickly calmed down, and under the guidance of this voice, Xiao Han finally succeeded in extracting the medicinal liquid from the Hook Fruit.

"Woo-hoo!!! I finally did it!"

From a desperate situation to a glimmer of hope, from hope to despair, and at the very moment of utter despair, he broke through it all, shattering the curse of failure.

Xiao Han was moved to tears. It hadn't been easy—an Alchemist without a teacher was truly too miserable.

Wait...

Who was that speaking just now?!

Realizing this, Xiao Han instinctively looked up, and his scalp went numb, his eyes nearly popping out of his head.

A white, indistinct mass of something was floating directly above his head, like a malevolent spirit waiting to devour him, exuding an overwhelming pressure.

Not looking was fine, but the sight nearly made him blast out the Demon Armor and Demonic Flame within him.

"Gh... Ghost—aaaaah!!!!"