"Shu Changsheng, we will now question you on your answers in the major examination, as prescribed. Please explain all the essential points in detail. This is an important basis for judging whether your cultivation has borne fruit."
The first to speak was a middle-aged female cultivator in her forties or fifties. She was one of the Incense Accumulation Sect's first disciples and had now entered the Hall of Affairs as an administrative elder, qualified to take charge in her own right.
Such talent was not yet enough to found a sect, but she was more than capable of overseeing part of an existing sect's organization, as she did now.
What Li Ling valued more, however, was their knowledge of the Incense Path, which would allow them to pass on the flame and perpetuate his lineage of teachings.
The middle-aged female cultivator asked, "You claimed in your answer sheet that you discovered an unidentified material which, when blended according to a secret formula, could accelerate the release of an incense's properties and scent?"
Shu Changsheng said, "Correct. Every incense has its own rate of release, whether burned with a flame, left to smolder, or simply allowed to give off its natural scent. However, the secret blending formula I discovered can accelerate this process, achieving an effect similar to stimulating it with Dharma Power. I named it Fragrance-Releasing Powder."
The middle-aged female cultivator said, "Please demonstrate it here."
Servants brought several samples of incense: Cloud-Producing Incense, Spirit-Communing Incense, and a completely new Mind-Clearing Incense whose formula Li Ling had revised in recent years.
Shu Changsheng took a prepared packet of powder from inside his robe, blended it separately with each incense, and poured the mixtures onto the gold leaf inside the incense burners to heat them over an indirect flame.
Sure enough,