Chen Xian returned to his residence carrying a shoulder pole laden with heavy medicinal herbs. The sun had already climbed above the treetops.
"Custom Flying Boat still isn't ready. I need to hurry up and reach the Seventh Layer Dao Disciple so I can learn the Sword Control Technique... Walking everywhere all day really isn't cutting it."
He wiped the cold sweat from his forehead, feeling as though his old bones were about to fall apart.
He casually dropped the pole in the courtyard with a dull thud.
Looking at the baskets of herbs, he chuckled. "Tang Yu's still too young. This may be my first time refining pills, but I've got a cheat on my side."
Still, Chen Xian didn't rush to start refining.
The morning was the best time of day, so cultivation had to come first.
He pushed open the door, went inside, and sat cross-legged on the bed.
He took the box holding the Consciousness Returning Pills from his Jade Ring, opened a bottle, and poured out one pill.
The pill was pale purple all over, exuding a cool, refreshing fragrance. Just smelling it made him feel clear-headed and refreshed, and his concentration sharpened.
"As expected of a second-grade pill. It has medicinal effects just from the smell." Chen Xian took a deep breath and nodded slightly.
This pill had been specially refined to nourish Dao Consciousness and protect the sea of consciousness. It was already beyond the category of first-grade pills.
Its price was also three times higher. One Qi Induction Pill cost only ten Contribution Points, while one Consciousness Returning Pill cost thirty.
A bottle held ten pills, for a total of three hundred Contribution Points!
He had bought ten bottles in one go. Even with the Inner Sect's twenty-percent discount, they had cost him 2,400 Contribution Points. And after factoring in the five-percent fee for exchanging Dao Silver for Contribution Points, he had spent over 2,500 Dao Silver.
Ordinary cultivators simply couldn't afford Consciousness Returning Pills. When it came to cultivating Dao Consciousness at the third Dao Disciple realm, they basically had to grit their teeth and slowly make progress. Only someone as filthy rich as he was now could afford such extravagance.
"My thanks to the Qian Family head for his generous gift."
Chen Xian shook his head with a smile. Qian Yue really was a walking treasure chest.
He needed to turn that five hundred thousand taels of Dao Silver into cultivation as soon as possible, then give the Qian Family head a big surprise!
He cast aside all distractions and began to cultivate.
As soon as the Consciousness Returning Pill entered his mouth, a cool medicinal force shot straight toward his Spirit Platform.
Chen Xian felt a refreshing coolness spread across his sea of consciousness, and his whole body grew calm. He formally entered a state of cultivation.
He closed his eyes and focused, drawing all his awareness inward. He inspected his Sword Bone and condensed his Dao Consciousness.
For ordinary Dao Disciples, cultivating Dao Consciousness was like widening a dry riverbed by force. Every step forward came with pain, as if their sea of consciousness were being torn apart.
In the past, after cultivating for half an hour, his head would ache so badly that he had to rest for fifteen minutes.
But with the Consciousness Returning Pill's help, his parched, aching sea of consciousness felt as though a handful of ice-cold spring water had been poured into it, greatly easing the pain.
His Dao Consciousness, once sluggish and heavy, also grew remarkably light under the pill's influence.
Time flew by in silence. One hour, then two...
His Dao Consciousness coursed through his meridians and flesh like a long dragon, probing every gap in his body. Now, even inspecting his Xuanyun Sword Bone wasn't as difficult as before.
Only after he had used up a whole bottle of Consciousness Returning Pills did Chen Xian suddenly open his eyes. A flash of light gleamed in the darkness and vanished.
"Three hundred and eighty breaths!"
Chen Xian slapped his thigh in excitement.
Twice as fast! His cultivation speed had nearly doubled!
Before today's cultivation session, he had struggled to maintain his inner vision for even fifteen minutes. Now he could keep it up for half an hour and still have strength to spare.
At this rate, in three or four days at most, his Dao Consciousness would be condensed enough to sustain inner vision for a thousand breaths without dispersing. He would break through the bottleneck to the Seventh Layer Dao Disciple in one fell swoop.
"Seventh layer... Once I reach the seventh layer, I'll be able to learn my first Dao Art, Sword Flight."
This cultivation session had lasted from morning until night.
Chen Xian looked up at the moon outside the window, his eyes brimming with anticipation.
As a grand-uncle-master in the Sword Sect, he'd inevitably become a laughingstock behind his back if he couldn't even fly on a sword.
His cultivation was over, and it should have been time to sleep. But when Chen Xian looked at the heap of medicinal herbs in the courtyard, it felt as if hundreds of monkeys were scratching at his heart.
"Sleep? Eighty is the perfect age to go all out!"
He got off the bed and carried the Standard Bronze Pill Furnace he'd wheedled out of Tang Yu into the courtyard.
He hadn't dared try it inside the house.
If the furnace really exploded while he was refining pills, it might blow off the roof and make him a laughingstock.
The courtyard was spacious, so even if it blew up, the blast would be smaller.
He set the pill furnace down beside the herbs.
First, Chen Xian spread open a yellowed sheet of paper: the Spirit-Guiding Pill Recipe he had obtained along with the furnace.
The Spirit-Guiding Pill was the most basic first-grade pill, but it was also hard currency in the cultivation world.
There were no so-called spirit stones in this world, so the Spirit-Guiding Pill served much the same purpose.
It could aid daily cultivation and speed up the absorption of Qi. It was practically a blue potion cultivators could use to replenish their Dao Power during battles.
That was why almost every Pill Master started by learning to refine the first-grade Qi Induction Pill.
Chen Xian had no master, so naturally he started from the beginning.
He followed the recipe and sorted through the herbs one by one.
He needed five Origin Spirit Leaves and five Bitter Cold Grasses as the main ingredients, along with a single Sweet Blood Vine to balance their medicinal properties.
This was Chen Xian's first time seeing the first two herbs, but he was familiar with a derivative of Sweet Blood Vine!
It was the ingredient he used to make Rattan Blood Sugar for his candied hawthorns.
"No wonder Qi Induction Pill powder mixes with syrup. The auxiliary ingredient comes from the same source. I stumbled into the right answer by accident." Chen Xian muttered to himself.
He pressed one hand against the formation slot on the side of the pill furnace and slowly poured in Dao Power.
"Hum—"
When he felt that no more Dao Power would go in, Chen Xian pulled his hand away. The Bronze Pill Furnace trembled slightly, and the scarlet formation carved into its base instantly glowed red.
The pill furnace had a fire formation built into it. No firewood or charcoal was needed; it ran entirely on Dao Power, while Dao Consciousness controlled the size of the flames.
Before long, a dark red flame rose inside the furnace. It flickered like a phantom, seeming almost unreal, yet radiating genuine heat.
Following the recipe, Chen Xian first heated the furnace for fifteen minutes.
Curious, he reached out and placed his hand against the furnace wall.
Strangely, its exterior felt only faintly warm. Yet through the gap in the furnace mouth, he could see the air inside wavering and warping from the heat.
"So this thing's basically a pressure cooker, trapping all the heat inside."
Chen Xian grew more cautious as he muttered to himself. "No wonder they can explode. If the furnace can't take the pressure, it really is no different from a bomb."
Once the dark red flames inside gradually turned orange-red, Chen Xian began adding the herbs one by one according to the recipe.
In went the first Origin Spirit Leaf.
Through his Dao Consciousness, Chen Xian sensed the emerald-green leaf quickly wither in the high heat.
Then, a trace of sparkling, translucent green medicinal liquid, faintly glowing, was forcibly "squeezed" from its veins and floated in the center of the flames.
As time passed, the tiny drops of medicinal liquid gradually drew together and coalesced into a single mass.
The withered leaf turned completely to ash and fell into the furnace's ash chamber.
"Now that's amazing." Chen Xian watched, dazzled.
According to the proper method, each herb had to be refined repeatedly for fifteen minutes, thoroughly removing its impurities to obtain the desired essence.
Fifteen minutes, then thirty...
What had been an interesting process at first soon grew tedious. Chen Xian counted on his fingers, waiting so long that he kept yawning.
"If I refine them one by one, it'll take until the cows come home!"
Chen Xian stroked his beard. "Since the medicinal liquids all have to be kneaded together in the end, why not throw them all in at once and save myself the trouble?"
Looking at the six remaining herbs that hadn't gone into the furnace, his unorthodox ideas began to stir again.
He decided to go for it.
Chen Xian scooped up all six remaining herbs and stuffed them into the furnace mouth.
The herbs slid into the furnace and were roasted by the flames, crackling and popping—not the furnace itself, but the herbs.
Chen Xian congratulated himself. As expected, the furnace hadn't exploded!
But the steady flow of fire inside had been blocked by the mass of leaves and stems.
The flames hadn't extracted any medicinal essence. Instead, they had dimmed somewhat.
"Not enough heat? Then I'll crank it up!"
Chen Xian's eyes widened. He pressed his hand against the furnace, and Dao Power surged from his body into its formation like floodwaters bursting through a dam.
"Boom!"
The flames inside the furnace instantly changed from orange-red to dazzling white, and their intensity surged.
But the next moment, Chen Xian's expression changed.