A Brief Calm

The moment Meng Tangtang and her group returned to the Jingyun Sect, Lin Cheng sensed it instantly.

With the last shred of worry in his heart set aside, he threw himself completely into alchemy.

As for whether the outside world would fall into chaos due to the destruction of Beast Taming Mountain, that was none of his concern.

Come to think of it, he was just a lowly sweeping servant.

No matter how one looked at it, these matters were not for him to fret over.

After several days of unremitting effort, Lin Cheng had successfully raised his Alchemist rank to the Yellow Grade.

At this level, wanting to improve rapidly again would be extremely difficult.

Host: Lin Cheng.
Alchemist Rank: Yellow Grade, One Star.
Proficiency: 0/100,000.

Once an alchemist reached the Yellow Grade, each rank was divided into three stars.

What Lin Cheng needed now was to continuously refine pills to increase his proficiency; once it reached a certain level, he could directly upgrade his Alchemist rank.

Furthermore, refining different pills at different levels yielded different amounts of proficiency.

In short, one should refine pills corresponding to their level.

Otherwise, it would be twice the effort for half the result—thankless work.

Moreover, the proficiency required for each subsequent level increased tenfold.

The difficulty had increased significantly.

Before that, Lin Cheng had refined almost all the sub-Yellow Grade medicinal herbs he obtained into pills, and more than half of them were of the Pill Pattern grade.

These were primarily of three types: spiritual energy recovery, injury healing, and power bursts.

He had pills covering everything from the First Rank to the Ninth Rank.

In total, there were about ten thousand pills.

Over five thousand were of the Pill Pattern grade, while the rest were all of a quality nearing the Pill Pattern level.

Any single one of them, if taken outside, would trigger a frenzy of bidding.

Yet here with Lin Cheng, they were just tossed into random bottles and thrown into a corner of the Library Pavilion, waiting for Meng Tangtang to take them away the next time she visited.

After all, over seventy percent of those low-grade herbs had been scavenged by Meng Tangtang and several elders.

Since they had helped him raise his Alchemist rank and grind proficiency, he would consider these worthless trinkets as payment.

Lin Cheng did not pay much mind to it.

He tossed the items there and promptly forgot about them.

The refinement of Yellow Grade pills was the most important matter moving forward.

It concerned the improvement of his own cultivation, so he could not afford to be careless.

However, refining pills alone had its benefits; he could utilize his full cultivation, allowing the power of heaven and earth to shroud the area as waves of invisible flames erupted.

It was far more effective than using earthly fire.

Both the speed and the quality of the pill refinement were vastly superior.

It was precisely because of this that Lin Cheng could refine ten thousand pills in a mere two or three days; had he used something like earthly fire, it would have been impossible.

"Master, I'm here!"

After refining ten batches of Yellow Grade True Spirit Pills in one go, with over fifty percent reaching the Pill Pattern grade, Lin Cheng nodded in satisfaction and was just about to take a break.

Meng Tangtang's voice rang out from outside the Library Pavilion.

Lin Cheng had no choice but to pause for the moment.

It was strange; he didn't know what had gotten into her lately, but that girl Meng Tangtang had been running over to his place every few days.

She acted as if it were her own home.

While it helped relieve his boredom, it also left him slightly helpless; with her here, he couldn't refine pills properly.

As for that fellow Xiao Jin, after the initial novelty of having a master wore off, he had long since hidden away, nowhere to be seen.

At the end of the day, she was his disciple, so Lin Cheng couldn't bring himself to treat her coldly.

"What is it?"

"Master, I brought your favorite Roasted Bamboo Chicken and Jade Dew Wine!"

As Meng Tangtang entered the room, she caught sight of a mysterious figure shrouded in gray mist, exactly the same as the one she had seen during his epiphany.

She didn't think much of it, assuming it was just her master's hobby.

Ever since her epiphany in the Mist Forest, where she inadvertently witnessed her master's care and painstaking efforts, Meng Tangtang had been training much harder, running to the Library Pavilion every single day.

With the support of her innate constitution and the Yin-Yang Emperor Scripture, her strength improved by leaps and bounds.

She estimated that in another two or three months, she would break through the late stage of the ninth rank, taking her one step closer to the legendary Innate Realm.

Furthermore, in terms of combat prowess, Meng Tangtang was now no less capable than an average late-stage ninth-rank practitioner.

In the half-month since returning to the sect, Meng Tangtang had dragged the elders out for sparring every day; she had challenged almost everyone in the sect, including the Grand Elder.

She didn't even spare those at the seventh or eighth rank.

It was truly maddening. In the last few days, many elders would dodge and weave the moment they saw Meng Tangtang, not even daring to step forward to greet her.

They were genuinely terrified.

Losing was one thing, but if they managed to win by even a single move, they would be latched onto, dragged out of bed in the dead of night to spar.

Although many elders possessed profound cultivation and didn't strictly need sleep, this couldn't go on forever.

With no other choice, they collectively petitioned the Grand Elder to intervene. It was only after Old Lady Xu stepped in that Meng Tangtang finally quieted down for a while.

"Master, Elder Zhang Feng and the others are so mean! They actually went to the Grand Elder to badmouth me. Now, whenever they see me, they act like they've seen a ghost. It's too much!"

Meng Tangtang began to complain again.

This wasn't the first time. Every time he saw this girl pouting and listing the faults of those elders, Lin Cheng couldn't help but feel amused.

Did she really have no idea why those elders were avoiding her?

It was because she was too mischievous, constantly harassing them.

If it weren't for the fact that she was young, had no malicious intent, and always brought valuable gifts whenever she visited, she would have been chased out of the Jingyun Sect long ago.

A Young Sect Master couldn't just disturb the peace every day, could she?

However, every time those elders wanted to sternly refuse, they would see Meng Tangtang looking pitiful, holding out Pill Pattern-grade pills and gazing at them with wide, expectant eyes.

And so, under the dual assault of cuteness and bribery, these old men and women would eventually crumble and surrender.

There was no helping it; they had to compromise.

Pill Pattern-grade pills were just too tempting!

No one knew where this girl got them from.

These pills, rumored to be incredibly precious and one-of-a-kind, were as worthless as sugar cubes to Meng Tangtang.

She had handfuls of them.

Little did they know, every time Meng Tangtang came over, Lin Cheng would casually give her a pile of pills he had refined.

These low-grade pills were useless to him anyway.

He might as well give them to his disciple to play with; after all, the meat stayed in the pot, and it wouldn't leave the Jingyun Sect's circle regardless.

In the end, if the Jingyun Sect grew stronger, he would benefit too.

At the very least, he wouldn't be bothered by every trivial matter, only needing to show his face or take action for major events.

Most of the time, he just needed to hide in the Library Pavilion and sign in peacefully.

Having someone else handle the trouble—wasn't that great?

Lin Cheng certainly thought so.

After Meng Tangtang finished her grumbling, Lin Cheng pointed casually at the pile of bottles and jars in the corner and said in an indifferent tone, "These are all things your junior brother refined when he was bored. If you don't mind them, take them."

"Your junior brother is going into seclusion to cultivate, so there won't be any more next time."

These were all the remaining pills. Unless something unexpected happened, Lin Cheng generally wouldn't waste his energy on such trifles.

His main goal was pills of Yellow Grade or higher.

Only that level was barely of any use to him.

Meng Tangtang had been waiting for this exact sentence; her eyes lit up instantly!

Those were all Pill Pattern-grade divine pills.

Only someone at her master's level could be so indifferent, piling them in the corner like trash.

Although it was a pity that her junior brother wouldn't be refining pills anymore, having these was enough to pay off that group of old men and women!

Meng Tangtang thought happily.

However, when she saw the mountain of bottles and jars piled in the corner, she froze, her mouth slowly falling open in disbelief.

"This is way too much!"

She was stunned by her master's extravagant display.

The pills she had received before probably wouldn't even amount to the scraps in this pile!

"Wow, I'm rich!!" Meng Tangtang's eyes sparkled like stars.

She couldn't help but clench her small fists!

Looking at the mountain of pills before her, she made a silent vow in her heart.

Hmph, so you all hide whenever you see me!

So you all talk behind my back!

Do you want pills?

Pill Pattern grade ones!

I won't give them to you even if you beg!

I'll make you bastards drool with envy!

This time, Meng Tangtang decided she wouldn't go knocking on those elders' doors; she would make them cry and scramble to beg her instead!