War of Attrition

"Is the report confirmed? Did Lin Fan really deliver another full thousand High-Grade Superior Pills to the Azure Elixir Hall?" the Chief Steward asked, his voice low and hoarse with barely suppressed fury.

A black-clad scout standing in the center of the hall bowed his head and answered respectfully. "Chief Steward, it's absolutely true. Lin Fan went to the Azure Elixir Hall himself this morning and delivered all one thousand High-Grade Superior Pills. With that stock in hand, the hall was packed again today. Most of Commandery City's high-ranking martial artists flocked there to buy pills, while business in High-Grade Pills remains dismal at every Ten Thousand Treasures Hall branch."

Silence fell over the council hall.

The managers standing along either side of the hall wore troubled expressions. They had spent a fortune buying up the High-Grade Spiritual Materials circulating in Commandery City, regardless of cost. They had meant to choke off Lin Fan's supply of ingredients and force him to sell his pills to the Ten Thousand Treasures Hall first.

Never had they imagined that Lin Fan would seem entirely unaffected. He kept producing great batches of High-Grade Superior Pills, strengthening the Azure Elixir Hall's position and putting the Ten Thousand Treasures Hall on the defensive once more.

An older branch manager stepped forward, his brow deeply furrowed, and offered his assessment.

"Chief Steward, I've looked into it. Lin Fan didn't buy the ingredients for this batch at our Commandery City Medicine Market. He went to the Azure Wave Medicine Market, five or six hundred li away, and bought them himself. By my reckoning, Lin Fan has only just entered the Early Bright Force Realm, so he can't have much more than three hundred strands of Inner Qi. A round trip at full speed over that distance must cost