The first seventh-grade pill the young man finally refined sent the entire Pill Gathering into an uproar. Then, under everyone's gaze, he looked solemnly up at the pill lightning overhead.
"Hiss! Rumble!"
A silver thunderbolt plunged straight toward the medicine cauldron before him. The pill lightning carried a destructive aura, seeking to destroy the pill born within.
Seeing the thunderbolt descend, the young man's expression grew grave, yet he remained confident in his pill.
"Boom!"
Under everyone's watchful eyes, the lightning's radiance faded, and a rich medicinal fragrance wafted from his medicine cauldron. The crowd cheered at the sight, and a faint smile appeared on his face.
"It's done!"
The young man opened the medicine cauldron before him. A perfectly rounded pill lay quietly inside. He took it out and raised it for the surrounding spectators to see, almost as though showing it off, before sitting down cross-legged.
He had already brought his talent fully into play. He knew he lacked the ability to contend for the championship, but reaching this point was enough to satisfy him.
His success seemed to inject the surrounding alchemists with a shot of adrenaline. Following the appearance of the first seventh-grade pill, several more alchemists completed their pills in succession. Without exception, every alchemist who finished at this stage had reached the seventh tier.
Not every alchemist enjoyed such good fortune, however. During this process, several failed because of fluctuations in their condition and were eliminated from the competition entirely. Two others saw their pills fail to survive the pill lightning and crumble into powder, leaving them utterly devastated.
By now, only twenty people remained on the Floating Stone Platform!
Xiao Yan swept his gaze over the other alchemists among those twenty and noticed that even the lowest-ranked Alchemist Badge on their chests belonged