A Larger Share of the Soup, Dragoncry Charcoal Is Expensive

At the manor's southeast corner lay an open space surrounded on all four sides by vast water reservoirs. In the very center stood a massive red-copper cauldron.

Essence Food was brewed here. The moment Pang Long announced that Essence Food would be prepared, everyone was immediately stirred up.

More than ten people came together before the cauldron.

"Remove the lid!"

At Pang Long's command.

Li Xian and the other guards climbed the wooden ladder to the top of the cauldron. The cauldron stood over ten feet tall, and its body was immensely heavy.

It had four handles, and the rim was thick enough for several people to stand upon.

Once they had found their footing, Li Xian bent down, gripped the lid with both hands, and looked toward the others.

After exchanging glances, they nodded and began exerting force together.

"Rumble..."

The lid shifted by half an inch, its heavy groan echoing through the surroundings.

Including Li Xian, there were five people lifting the lid. Yet even with all five working together, they could only barely raise it a little.

Its sheer weight was truly astonishing.

"Inner Qi can be regarded as a form of strength. If you channel Inner Qi out and wrap it around a heavy object before lifting it, you can save a great deal of effort."

"But this thing is huge, thick, and heavy. My Inner Qi cannot wrap around it, so lifting it takes all my strength."

Clenching his teeth, Li Xian exerted every ounce of strength he had and raised the lid another three inches.

The lid was square. Seeing how hard everyone was struggling, Pang Long shouted, "Bring ropes!"

No sooner had he spoken than a guard threw over a yellow rope with all his might. Pang Long caught it, snapped it like a whip, and lashed it toward the lid.

With a sharp smack, the rope wrapped around the lid. Pang Long flicked his wrist again and pulled back.

He actually tied a knot in midair, binding the lid firmly in place.

"Fine skill!" Li Xian praised.

With a smile, Pang Long passed the rope to the other guards. "Pull with all your strength. Work together and remove the lid."

And so it became like a tug-of-war. Li Xian and the others lifted from atop the cauldron, while more than a dozen guards pulled below.

With everyone working as one and after expending the strength of nine oxen and two tigers, they finally managed to remove the lid.

It smashed onto the snow, shaking the ground three times over.

Li Xian's hands and feet trembled slightly, a normal result of overexertion.

"Just opening the cauldron is already this troublesome."

"When I was still a menial servant, I never had the chance to come into contact with such things."

He could not help feeling sentimental. The last time Essence Food had been brewed, Li Xian had waited outside the manor, hauling fresh water back and forth.

Times had changed, and this time, he could finally have a share of the soup.

"Be careful with your movements."

"This is Dragoncry Charcoal. A piece no bigger than your palm costs one tael of silver."

"If you damage it, it will be deducted from your wages according to manor rules. Keep your hands and feet light."

Once the cauldron was opened, it was time to arrange the charcoal.

The charcoal was placed beneath the cauldron. This Dragoncry Charcoal was cylindrical, its surface riddled with hundreds of tiny holes.

A single piece could burn for a long time and gave off tremendous heat. Its flames possessed penetrating force, making it a commonly used fuel for brewing Essence Food.

When it burned, it made a whooshing sound, like the breath of a giant dragon. Hence the name, Dragoncry Charcoal.

"One tael of charcoal costs one tael of gold." Li Xian clicked his tongue.

It seemed that anything connected to Madam Wen was outrageously expensive. He now understood the words "spending money like flowing water" far more deeply.

About a thousand pieces of charcoal were arranged into a shape broad at the bottom and pointed at the top. Then Pang Long started the fire.

The blaze surged fiercely, scorching the air until it twisted. The flames produced by the Dragoncry Charcoal were extraordinarily strange, pale yellow laced with purple. Though they burned fiercely, they clung tightly to the cauldron's walls.

At a glance, it looked as though a layer of flaming patterns had been cast over the cauldron.

After that, Li Xian and the others were finally done with their work. Pang Long went straight into the inner courtyard, and when he returned, he carried four chunks of meat.

The meat was a peculiar grayish-brown.

One was large and three were small. The large piece was about the size of three fists, while the smaller ones were only about the size of a little finger joint.

Once the cauldron had been heated until it was scorching hot, Pang Long tossed the meat inside, producing a sizzling sound.

A cloud of green smoke rose from the cauldron. Li Xian took a hard sniff and found it extremely choking.

"Don't smell it!"

"This stuff is poisonous."

Pang Long warned him. Li Xian froze, then immediately retreated three steps, keeping away from the fiercely burning cauldron.

"Commander Pang, was that Snow Demon Monkey meat you just put in?" Li Xian asked curiously.

"That's right." Pang Long nodded.

"The Snow Demon Monkey is much larger than that. Why not cook all of it together?" Li Xian asked.

"It can't be cooked." Pang Long pointed at the Dragoncry Charcoal. "Everything has to take cost into account."

"In principle, every part of a Snow Demon Monkey can barely count as [Essence Food], but... the only meat truly suitable for stewing is the patch on the back of its neck."

"Everything suitable has already been thrown in."

"Commander Pang, please explain further." Li Xian was eager to learn. He felt that this talk of "cost" had not been fully explained, so he humbly asked for guidance.

Pang Long did not truly understand it either, but he had heard Madam Wen explain it before, so he repeated her words. "As long as one is willing to put in the effort, the poison in demon flesh can always be removed, allowing it to be brewed into Essence Food for consumption."

"It all depends on whether it is worth it. Demons like the Snow Demon Monkey emerge in winter and lie dormant in summer. They enjoy eating human livers and gallbladders, and their whereabouts are unpredictable. Of all their flesh, the meat at the back of the neck contains the weakest poison."

"Brew it for two days and two nights, and the poison can be completely removed."

"However, the poison in the other parts is several times stronger. They need to be brewed for six days and six nights before the poison can be removed and they can be consumed as Essence Food."

"That would be far too uneconomical. Burning Dragoncry Charcoal for six days and six nights would consume charcoal worth more than ten thousand taels."

"Besides, the Snow Demon Monkey is not particularly valuable Essence Food. Its effects are limited, so there is no need to spend such a fortune on it."

Li Xian quietly committed this to memory. So martial artists also cared about cost and value for money.

He looked at the copper cauldron burning before him and silently estimated that this batch of Essence Food alone was worth over a thousand taels of silver.

Martial artists—Bone Recasting martial artists... the expenses involved were truly beyond imagination.

I am nothing more than a mere guard right now...

At this rate, there is truly a gulf as vast as heaven and earth between me and the First Martial Realm's [Essence Consumption].

This gap was not something that could be bridged through bitter training alone.

It required opportunities, luck... all manner of things. Li Xian felt like a frog at the bottom of a well, seeing the vast blue sky above, yet the well was a thousand fathoms deep. To become the frog that escaped it was no different from trying to climb to the heavens.

After half an hour of dry heating, Pang Long began directing the menial servants to shovel snow, sift snow, and transport snow.

The sifted snowflakes were crystalline and translucent. Once poured into the cauldron, they sizzled and turned into splashes of water. As more water gathered, it became scalding broth.

It boiled amid the blazing fire and was rapidly consumed. To avoid being boiled dry, they could only keep sifting snow, carrying snow, and pouring snow.

They constantly replenished the water, maintaining a dynamic balance and keeping the contents of the cauldron boiling.

The evaporating vapor carried away the poison from the flesh.

With snow covering the ground everywhere, it would be a waste not to use it.

Whenever Essence Treasures were brewed, water was the greatest consumable.

It had to be added continuously and in huge quantities, without pause for even a moment. Otherwise, the Essence Food would be scorched dry and lose its potency, making all the hard work for nothing.

Great heaps of silver would flow away.

There were many water sources around One Accord Manor. Within three miles stood several mountain lakes, water veins, streams, and rivers.

These were all factors Madam Wen had carefully considered before establishing the manor.

"Transporting water takes a long time, and accidents can easily occur along the way, causing the supply to run short and all efforts to fail at the last step."

"Brewing Essence Food in icy, snowy weather can greatly reduce water consumption."

"But it increases charcoal consumption."

"It increases costs while improving efficiency. Conversely, brewing Essence Food during the heat of summer saves charcoal but increases the demand for water. That lowers both costs and efficiency."

"Each has its own advantages and disadvantages. It depends on how one chooses."

Li Xian pondered the workings of the manor.

Perhaps one day, he too could manage a manor of his own?

It was still far away, but there was never any harm in learning ahead of time.