People Must Never Lose Hope

At Fa Ma's command, the Gama Empire's once-every-eight-years Alchemist Competition officially began!

More than two thousand alchemists from all across the Northwest Continent immediately began heating their cauldrons and refining pills.

Blazing flames rolled up waves upon waves of heat, warping even the air beneath the immense heat.

The entire Royal Plaza was instantly filled with surging heat, like an illusion.

Every alchemist was enthusiastically taking part in the grand event. In contrast, Su Heng seemed rather languid and had yet to light his fire.

The second-grade Bone-Regenerating Pill was merely the preliminary test. Su Heng had no intention of wasting too much effort here.

After adjusting his condition slightly, Su Heng slowly brought his right palm close to the medicinal cauldron. The deep-blue Hundred Beasts Phosphor Flame instantly began burning fiercely within it.

The Hundred Beasts Phosphor Flame combined hardness and softness. Though it could not be used in battle, it was exceptionally effective for alchemy.

After training for some time, Su Heng could already control the Hundred Beasts Phosphor Flame freely.

When he needed it to be violent, it could be even fiercer than the Purple Crystal Winged Lion Flame. When he needed it gentle, it could be softer than the Peach Blossom Flame.

In only a little over ten minutes, Su Heng had refined all the medicinal ingredients. He did not repeatedly refine them to enhance their potency; once he confirmed that the ingredients would take effect, he stopped refining.

After all, this was only the preliminary round. There was no need to work too hard.

Just as Su Heng portioned out the refined ingredients and prepared to fuse the pill—

Bang!

A dull explosion interrupted his movements.

On a bluestone platform not far in front of Su Heng, a medicinal cauldron blazing with flames suddenly exploded due to its controller's mistake with the Dou Qi flame.

As the cauldron exploded, the pill being refined within was reduced to ashes, and a merciless red light lit up with a dazzling glow.

For alchemists accustomed to following formulaic procedures, having to make their own judgments was simply far too difficult.

The handsome face of the alchemist whose cauldron had exploded was charred black. His eyes were vacant as he stared blankly at the flashing red light.

After a long while, the alchemist cursed unwillingly as he walked off the platform and left the venue.

"Poor child."

Where there were people laughing, there would be people crying. That was probably the cruelty of competition.

Clang!

Half an hour later, a crisp sound of someone striking a cauldron rang out. Someone had already formed a pill!

Other than Su Heng, there could be no one else. He slammed his palm heavily against the medicinal cauldron, and the lid shot into the air under the force of Dou Qi. A round pill flew out.

Su Heng then slowly extended his hand and, with extreme laziness, caught the pill at precisely the right moment before giving it a cursory glance.

"Mm, a low-quality pill. Just right—not too much, not too little. This will do."

Su Heng raised his palm and pressed the button at the lower left corner of the bluestone platform. Looking at the pitch-black opening of the tester, he casually tossed the pill inside.

A few seconds later, a brilliant green beam shot into the sky. Though its intensity was ordinary, everyone in the plaza let out a cry of surprise.

The test had only passed the halfway mark. Many people were still refining medicinal ingredients, yet Su Heng had already completed the test and was ready to rest.

"Now I believe that guy really is a Fourth-grade Alchemist..."

When the little princess Yao Yue saw that the first person to complete the test was the heavily injured Su Heng, she was momentarily speechless. Her rage had turned into helplessness.

"Looks like Brother Su still has the edge over me!"

Not long after Su Heng left the venue to rest, Liu Ling became the second to form a pill and pass the test. However, compared to Su Heng, he was more than ten minutes slower.

As for Xiao Yan? Without question, he cut it down to the wire, submitting his pill only a few seconds before the hourglass was about to turn over.

Of course, among all the pills that passed the preliminary round, Xiao Yan's was of the highest quality.

Su Heng's Bone-Regenerating Pill, meanwhile, was of the lowest quality. It could be said that his pill had only barely surpassed the minimum standard.

As the saying went, sixty points was a pass; one extra point was a waste. Su Heng was precisely the sort of person who scored exactly sixty.

Having handed in his answer early, Su Heng found a shady spot by the edge of the venue, leaned against the wall of the plaza, and fell asleep.

His soul strength was constantly leaking away, and Su Heng could never resist the urge to sleep.

However, before participating in the test this time, Su Heng had taken two Soul-Nourishing Pills. After a short nap, he recovered his spirits.

While he had been napping, the preliminary test was successfully completed, and several hundred alchemists were mercilessly eliminated.

Looking at the plaza, where only a little over a thousand people remained, Fa Ma, president of the Alchemist Guild, prepared to begin the second round of testing.

"Alright, since everyone has completed the test, let us begin the second round."

"Move your fingers and press the small red button at the lower left of your bluestone platforms."

Su Heng, who had already returned to his own bluestone platform, had discovered this button while idly inspecting his surroundings.

Hearing Fa Ma's words, Su Heng pressed the little red button without hesitation.

As the button was pressed, the massive bluestone platform gave a faint tremor. A neatly arranged pile of medicinal ingredients and a scroll containing a pill formula slowly rose from the smooth stone surface, replacing the ingredients used earlier to refine the Bone-Regenerating Pill.

Seeing these ingredients, a powerful sense of familiarity surged into Su Heng's heart. He knew that he had this one in the bag again.

Just as Su Heng was rejoicing, Fa Ma's aged yet deep voice rang out.

"This pill formula is an orthodox formula, one that our Alchemist Guild created only after exhausting manpower and spending several months on it."

"The second round requires you to successfully refine the pill according to this formula."

"The ingredients before you are likewise only sufficient for two attempts. Once you use them all up, that will mean you have failed."

"You may now examine the pill formula."

Pill formulas inscribed using soul strength required time to read and memorize, so Fa Ma had deliberately reserved time for the contestants.

While everyone carefully read the pill formulas in their hands, Su Heng tossed his formula aside and laughed so hard that he nearly doubled over.

He knew this was somewhat impolite, but he simply could not hold it in!

The Windstride Pill, a third-grade pill, allowed its user to become highly sensitive to the wind-element energy between heaven and earth for a short period of time and borrow that energy, thereby increasing their movement speed.

It was practically giving away points. Su Heng truly could not keep a straight face anymore; he felt like he was bullying people.

To put it bluntly, Su Heng had eaten more Windstride Pills than all these alchemists had refined combined.

As for the little trick the Alchemist Guild had hidden in the pill formula, Su Heng naturally saw through it at a glance.

The formula provided by the Alchemist Guild contained an additional ingredient called Thick Earth Ganoderma.

This ingredient had been deliberately added to disrupt the balance of the medicinal ingredients. If one followed their formula and added the Thick Earth Ganoderma, the cauldron would definitely explode.

Su Heng picked the Thick Earth Ganoderma out of both sets of ingredients and directly burned them to ashes with a single burst of flame. He then glanced speechlessly at Fa Ma in the guest seating.

Fa Ma, who possessed powerful soul perception, naturally saw Su Heng's actions clearly.

"I never expected this little fellow to truly be a Fourth-grade Alchemist. He spotted the problem with the formula at a glance and even destroyed the Thick Earth Ganoderma. He is expressing his dissatisfaction with us."

"Otto, you have taken in a fine disciple!"

Fa Ma naturally did not take such a minor matter to heart. He was sincerely delighted that the Gama Empire had produced such a young genius.

After destroying the Thick Earth Ganoderma, Su Heng lit the Hundred Beasts Phosphor Flame and began refining pills.

The Windstride Pill was one of Su Heng's favorite pills to use. Now that the Alchemist Guild was giving him two sets of ingredients for free and letting him keep the finished pills, Su Heng naturally intended to be a little more serious.

After igniting the Hundred Beasts Phosphor Flame, Su Heng slowly brought his left palm toward the other fire port of the medicinal cauldron. A pale-green flame instantly flared to life as it neared the opening.

"Two-colored flames!"

"What? He actually possesses two kinds of flame?"

Seeing the green and blue flames rising from Su Heng's medicinal cauldron, waves of astonished uproar instantly erupted from the audience seating in the rear.

For an alchemist, fully controlling a single flame was already extremely rare. To simultaneously control two or even three kinds of flame, one had to be a Fourth-grade Alchemist.

Now, no one doubted any longer that Su Heng was a Fourth-grade Alchemist.

The Green Nether Flame possessed both fire and wood attributes and could enhance all Beast Flames of the same level. With the Green Nether Flame's enhancement, the Hundred Beasts Phosphor Flame became much more efficient at both refining ingredients and fusing pills.

Within the medicinal cauldron, the ingredients rapidly broke down beneath the Hundred Beasts Phosphor Flame's embrace, turning into a mass of viscous liquid.

However, this time, Su Heng intended to repeatedly refine them until they were pure rather than hastily fusing the pill.

Just as Su Heng was wholly focused on refining the ingredients, a loud explosion rang out from nearby.

A Third-grade Alchemist had mixed Thick Earth Ganoderma into the other ingredients, and his cauldron exploded without suspense.

Had it been before, Su Heng might have warned every alchemist present that there was something wrong with the Thick Earth Ganoderma and told them not to mix it into their pills.

But today, he truly could not be bothered with these people whose cauldrons were exploding.

It was not because he feared that, after warning them, someone might compete with him for the championship. Rather, Su Heng simply lacked the energy now and could not be bothered to shout a warning in public.

Without Su Heng's warning, the sounds of exploding cauldrons immediately rose one after another. Most people caused the Thick Earth Ganoderma to fuse with the other ingredients while refining it, and then all the ingredients exploded into a cloud of black smoke.

Questioning a pill formula required great courage and resolve. Some traditional alchemists placed too much faith in the orthodoxy of formulas, so no matter how often they failed, they found it difficult to attribute the problem to the formula itself.

They would only believe that they had made a mistake somewhere in controlling the heat or refining the components.

And those with such a mindset were undoubtedly doomed to suffer a crushing defeat in this test.

Of course, there were also people like Su Heng who already knew the standard answer. One such person was Yan Li, vice president of the Cloud Empire's Alchemist Guild!

At this moment, Yan Li had taken an Appearance-Restoring Pill and disguised himself as a seventeen-year-old youth in gray robes.

Su Heng had discovered him the moment he took his seat, because Yan Li was directly behind him, very close by.

Su Heng could clearly sense Yan Li's powerful soul strength, something no seventeen-year-old youth could possibly possess.

And in Su Heng's memories, the only person with such strength at this moment was Yan Li, vice president of the Cloud Empire's Alchemist Guild.

Having lived two lives, Su Heng's memories of this world were mostly concentrated in its earlier period, before the Misty Cloud Sect's destruction. He remembered little of what Xiao Yan did after going to the Central Plains.

However, Su Heng still remembered the Alchemist Competition clearly, so he immediately noticed Yan Li's existence.

At this moment, Yan Li was smugly and leisurely refining his ingredients.

Although Yan Li also sensed that Su Heng nearby had some ability, he also detected Su Heng's soul injury. Thus, Yan Li did not take Su Heng seriously at all.

At this moment, Yan Li looked around the arena and found the Gama Empire's contestants blowing up their cauldrons in all sorts of ways. He became so smug that he actually shouted in public.

"The people of the Gama Empire really are trash! They cannot even see through such a simple trick. It seems the champion of this Alchemist Competition will belong to our Cloud Empire!"

"Wahahaha!"

Yan Li's laughter echoed throughout the entire plaza. His punchable manner made nearly every Gama Empire alchemist want to rush over and beat him up.

But the fact was that everyone's cauldrons were exploding, and the other party was not wrong.

Besides, this was the Alchemist Competition. If they started fighting after being mocked, it would only make the people of the Gama Empire seem unable to accept defeat.

Su Heng knew Yan Li's fate. He would be defeated by Xiao Yan, then smashed into dust by the Gama Empire's Dou Emperor experts. It could be said that this was the final glorious moment of his life.

As the saying went, let a dying man have his moment.

Su Heng had originally been too lazy to bother with the man, but unfortunately, Yan Li's bluestone platform was too close to his.

And Yan Li's endless shouting and yelling was truly driving Su Heng up the wall.

Su Heng's soul body was already injured, weakening his ability to control his emotions, and Yan Li's shrieking was genuinely disgusting.

It felt like someone suddenly yelling beside you just as you had fallen asleep or were sleeping soundly. The anger was completely impossible to suppress.

In the end, Su Heng decided to make him shut up for good!

"The dignified vice president of the Cloud Empire Alchemist Guild, Fourth-grade Alchemist Yan Li, took an Appearance-Restoring Pill and came to compete in the Gama Empire, yet you still dare spout such nonsense. Do you truly think the Gama Empire has no one capable of seeing through your tricks?"

Su Heng turned to look at Yan Li and spoke coldly.

The moment those words were spoken, the entire venue was shocked.

Even Yan Li was startled. He believed his disguise to be flawless and impossible for anyone to expose, yet Su Heng had completely seen through it after merely looking at him a few times.

With his secret exposed, Yan Li's mind was thrown into chaos. The ingredients in his medicinal cauldron exploded violently as his soul strength fluctuated intensely.

"Ha! Feeling guilty? Looks like I was right, wasn't I, Vice President Yan Li?"

While refining pills, Su Heng looked coldly at the panicked Yan Li and laughed lightly as his cauldron exploded.

"Y-you are talking nonsense! What evidence do you have that I am Vice President Yan Li of the Cloud Empire? It is obviously you people from the Gama Empire who cannot accept defeat!"

Yan Li shouted furiously. At the same time, he took three red pills from his Storage Ring, intending to immediately destroy the evidence that could prove his identity.

His actions were extremely concealed, and he moved very quickly, but before Dou Emperor experts, he was still far too slow.

Fa Ma, Hai Bodong, and Jia Xingtian had long sensed that something was wrong with Yan Li and had kept their eyes fixed on him. The instant Yan Li moved, Hai Bodong acted.

Before Yan Li could even summon flames from his palm, his entire right arm had already been completely frozen.

A burly ice-blue figure seemed to teleport to Yan Li's side and lightly removed the three red pills from his already frozen right hand.

"Make him take these red pills, and you will have your answer."

Su Heng knew that the matter was now over. If Yan Li had not been loudly shouting beside him, he could have lived another two days. Unfortunately, those who sought death would surely find it.

Hai Bodong pried open Yan Li's jaw and fed one of the red pills into his mouth.

Although Yan Li struggled frantically, he was merely a Dou Spirit facing a Dou Emperor. Everything he did was utterly futile.

The moment the red pill entered his mouth, the youthful face of the teenage-looking Yan Li suddenly began to twitch violently.

At the same time, the sound of stretching bones came from within his body. In an instant, young Yan Li's body abruptly grew much taller.

In less than a minute, the tender seventeen-year-old youth had transformed, to everyone's stunned disbelief, into a cold-faced middle-aged man.

The Alchemist Competition prohibited anyone over thirty from participating. Looking at Yan Li's current appearance, no one would object even if someone said he was forty.

The consequence of openly breaking the rules was naturally being swiftly "escorted" out of the venue.

As for Yan Li's fate after leaving the venue, that was not something the audience inside needed to worry about. They only needed to serve as eyewitnesses and prove that Yan Li had violated the rules.

More importantly, those who came to watch the Alchemist Competition were not only from the Gama Empire. There were also plenty of people from neighboring countries, so it was impossible to claim that the Gama Empire had framed him out of thin air.

"Little fellow, how did you know he was disguised?"

Fa Ma, who had entered the venue together with Hai Bodong, slowly walked over to Su Heng and asked softly.

"Because I have refined Appearance-Restoring Pills before, so I could tell."

Su Heng made up a seemingly flawless excuse. After all, he could hardly say that he had read the script.

Fa Ma accepted this explanation without reservation. Given Su Heng's ability, it was entirely reasonable that he had refined Appearance-Restoring Pills before.

"Little fellow, thank you."

Fa Ma slowly nodded and thanked Su Heng. The greatest threat to the entire Alchemist Competition had been eliminated just like that.