Soon afterward, Tang Wuchen, Gu Ningyun, and the others opened their pill furnaces one after another.
Yet none of them produced anything like Ming Yun's grand spectacle, with fragrance spilling in every direction.
A disciple below the platform who knew nothing about pills could not help asking, "Are Tang Wuchen and Gu Ningyun going to lose? Why isn't any pill fragrance escaping?"
"Exactly. Even if the other junior disciples didn't make as grand a show as Ming Yun, at least some pill fragrance escaped. But those two..."
Someone with impure motives had long been jealous of Tang Wuchen's background and talent. From below the platform, he sneered, "Maybe his well of talent has run dry. Those first two rounds probably exhausted everything he had.
"After all, some people only look as noble as a clear breeze and a bright moon. Who knows whether they have any real ability beneath that exterior?
"See? The moment he started refining pills, didn't he give himself away?"
The Medicine Gate disciples had not wanted to argue, but his remarks truly went too far. One junior disciple snapped, "Who are you? Do you even understand pill refining?
"When too much medicinal fragrance escapes, the medicinal potency drains away with it. Our senior brother merely sealed all that potency inside his pills.
"Pretending to understand something you know nothing about only makes you a laughingstock.
"And are all you Heavenly Dawn Sect disciples this ill-mannered?"
The junior disciple's words drew quite a few sidelong looks toward the man.
The male cultivator immediately felt he had lost face. He cast a sinister look at the junior disciple. "A mere Foundation Establishment Realm disciple-who gave you the nerve to challenge me?"
With that, he flicked a strand of spiritual qi from his hand, sending it straight toward the