My Informative Cultivation Life

Chapter 18: Chapter 18 Is This Pill Fragrance?

Yang Ji walked deeper into the cave and soon came across a pair of stone doors.

As soon as he pushed them open, a wave of heat hit him.

The air inside was distorted by the high temperature, and the red waves of heat were clearly visible.

This was a sealed stone chamber, only as big as a single room.

The source of the high temperature was the cluster of red flames in the middle of the stone chamber, as large as a millstone, rising half a yard high, burning fiercely without a whiff of black smoke, the flames very pure.

Yang Ji cast his gaze over them, "Heart of Earth Fire, containing a trace of spiritual power."

Spiritual power!

Yang Ji's eyes lit up. Although it was not a Spiritual Fire, this trace of spiritual power was much stronger than the flames produced by low-level fire attribute techniques.

"If that's the case, then let's begin refining," he said.

With a touch to his Storage Bag, a palm-sized pill furnace of ancient design appeared in his hand.

Once spiritual power was injected, it quickly grew to half a yard tall and landed with a boom on top of the Earth Fire, enveloping all the flames within the furnace.

"You have begun Alchemy, preheating the furnace."

Seeing this message, Yang Ji's heart thrilled and he immediately felt steadier.

Indeed, alchemy was like cultivation, also accompanied by information display.

The first step was to preheat the furnace, and as soon as the entire furnace was heated up, the refinement could begin.

Alchemic refinement is a patience-requiring task. While waiting, Yang Ji took out a thin Pill Recipe and studied it.

The Pill Recipe for Spirit Enhancing Pill recorded the required amount of each Spiritual Medicine, the order of adding them, and the temperature needed for refining the medicines.

The correct ratio of each Spiritual Medicine is needed to form a pill.

And the temperature is key to refining the medicines. Too fierce or too gentle a heat won't do; it has to be just right.

Yang Ji studied it for a long while.

A stick of incense passed quickly by.

According to the Pill Recipe, after preheating the furnace for the duration of one incense stick, he could start the refining process.

Yang Ji put away the Pill Recipe and with a slap on the furnace lid, opened a small aperture and swiftly added a stalk of Spirit Enhancing Herb.

A hissing sound, and a scent of charring spread out; the Spirit Enhancing Herb was destroyed, the temperature too high, preheat failed.

Huh?

Too high a temperature?

Wasn't it supposed to be the duration of one incense stick?

Yang Ji's mind raced, and he instantly thought of a possibility.

Could it be because he was using a different type of flame than the one used by the writer of the Pill Recipe? Maybe the recipe's author hadn't used Earth Fire?

At this moment, staring at the inside of the furnace, "The temperature is too high, 300?."

If 300? doesn't work, then try again and find the right temperature.

Yang Ji was not discouraged and prepared to attempt again.

Outside the stone chamber, Huo Yuan, who peeped through a crack, smelled a scent of burning and immediately felt secretly thrilled, thinking:

"I thought he had some skill, but he can't even manage the preheat."

"Heh heh, does he really think alchemy is that easy just by copying others?">

"The Pill Recipe only describes the general process, but there are countless minor details in actual practice. Any small mistake could ruin the medicine."

"This kid thinks he can become an Alchemist just by recognizing a few Spiritual Medicines? He still has much to learn."

Huo Yuan's small eyes gleamed with smugness, and with his hands behind his back, he returned outside the cave with a proud demeanor.

Clearly, he believed the young man inside the stone chamber was no longer worth his attention.

Inside the stone chamber, Yang Ji continued to try.

"Furnace temperature 250?, hiss~ Spirit Enhancing Herb destroyed, preheat failed, temperature too high."

"Furnace temperature 200?, Spirit Enhancing Herb begins to slowly melt, preheat successful, optimal temperature."

"So the optimal preheat temperature for refining Spirit Enhancing Pills is 200?. Rather than preheating, it's more accurate to say the temperature needed for melting the first Spirit Enhancing Herb is 200?," he realized.

Yang Ji was delighted. After destroying two Spiritual Medicines, he had finally taken the first step, and he had also made preliminary improvements to the Pill Recipe.

He then controlled the flame through the secret door at the bottom of the furnace, keeping it steady at 200?.

Because the temperature of "200?" would be clearly displayed upon a glance, as soon as the temperature rose or dropped even slightly, he could immediately make fine adjustments through the secret door.

With the temperature constant, the Spirit Enhancing Herb melted slowly without evaporating its potency.

Once it was all melted, Yang Ji slapped the lid of the furnace and added another Spiritual Medicine.

As soon as he added it, a message displayed, "Green Leaf Herb rapidly melting, 2% potency evaporated."

Seeing this, Yang Ji hurriedly lowered the furnace fire until it stabilized at 180?, and the melting of the Green Leaf Herb became stable and gentle.

At this point, Yang Ji made further modifications to the Pill Recipe, recording the melting point of Green Leaf Herb.

Refining the Spirit Enhancing Pill, a lower grade Spirit Pill, wasn't too complicated.

There was no need to fuse two or three types together to form new medicinal liquids.

It was simply a matter of melting down each Spiritual Medicine completely and then, based on a specific proportion, conducting a fusion reaction before condensing and dividing the pills.

After melting two Spiritual Medicines, Yang Ji realized that finding the optimal melting point was all that was needed for the so-called mastery of melting ingredients.

At this moment, he looked directly at the remaining five Spiritual Medicines [Luoyun Herb, melting point 160?... Flowing Cloud Flower, melting point 155?. Ziye Vine, melting point 100?.]

Knowing all the melting points like the back of his hand, Yang Ji began to melt them one by one.

In the end, he obtained seven pools of medicinal liquid.

Yang Ji then followed the Pill Recipe, keeping a certain proportion.

But in the end, these seven pools of medicinal liquid just wouldn't fuse together.

Yang Ji was perplexed and looked closely [The proportion of the medicinal liquid is incorrect and cannot be fused. The proportion of Luoyun Herb liquid is too low.]

The proportion of the medicinal liquid is too low? But I had divided it according to the Pill Recipe...

Suddenly, he slapped his forehead and had a revelation.

Of course! The Luoyun Herb recorded in the Pill Recipe was fifty years old, but the one he had melted was forty-nine years old.

Even a one-year difference meant the contained medicinal strength was completely different. Following the proportions in the Pill Recipe was definitely not going to work.

Even the fruits on the same tree aren't all equally sweet or sour, let alone Spiritual Medicines of the same age differing in strength due to various growth conditions.

No wonder they say alchemy is difficult.

The first difficulty lies in melting. If it weren't for the Golden Finger assisting, allowing me to see the temperature inside the furnace and the melting points of the Spiritual Medicines at a glance, how could I control the flame so handily for melting?

If it weren't for the assistance of the Golden Finger, any slight discrepancy between the age of the Spiritual Medicine being melted and that recorded in the Pill Recipe would render the so-called optimal degree of heat useless.

If the forging followed the heat stated in the Pill Recipe, the heat would either be too fierce or too weak, and it would require fine-tuning throughout the process.

No wonder they say it takes three to five days to forge pills; it seems that time is spent adjusting.

The second difficulty is the proportion of medicinal liquids.

Although the Pill Recipe comes from countless trials and the proportions are based on experience, the strength contained in each Spiritual Medicine is different. Adhering rigidly to the recipe's recorded proportions certainly won't work.

Similarly, this requires continual attempts to fine-tune the proportions, which is also time-consuming.

Who knows how much Spiritual Medicine will be lost in the process.

After this round of forging, Yang Ji had an enlightening experience.

The Pill Recipe is just a rough guide; it seems that actual practice requires flexibility.

At this moment, he prepared to melt more Luoyun Herb and place it into the Pill Furnace, but just then, the information display changed [Due to incorrect proportions, the seven medicinal liquids started to react adversely, the medicinal properties changed, and the liquids were ruined.]

With a bang, a white smoke suddenly rose from the Pill Furnace as all of the medicinal liquids combusted at once.

Seeing this scene, Yang Ji shook his head and sighed. What a pity; that was more than two hundred Spirit Stones wasted just like that.

However, he quickly recovered, cleared the Pill Furnace, and began to forge again.

With the first trial under his belt, the second attempt was much faster.

After a series of movements as smooth as the flowing of clouds and water, he melted all seven Spiritual Medicines in the time it takes an incense stick to burn.

This time, he disregarded the Pill Recipe and looked directly at the medicinal liquid [Optimal fusion ratio, Spirit Enhancing Herb 100%, Luoyun Herb 95.2%, Green Leaf Herb 94.02%... Ziye Vine 50.01%.]

Seeing this, Yang Ji couldn't help but exclaim in his heart, what a fine job! How could such precision to the thousandth decimal be possible without the intervention of a Nascent Soul True Monarch, who else has such formidable Divine Sense to split the ratios so finely?

Even with Yang Ji's Golden Finger, which allowed him to see the proportional data in real-time, he had to be extremely careful to remove the excess medicinal liquids to achieve such accuracy.

The operation consumed quite a bit of his mental energy.

It's no wonder alchemy requires a strong soul awareness; he now understood this point.

Although the process was complex, the result was very satisfying to him.

The seven kinds of medicinal liquids had fused into a new pool of blue liquid and had begun to react.

The next step was to cultivate the warmth until the liquid's reaction became sufficiently viscous, at which point it could be divided into ten equal portions by size.

The final step was to turn the pills.

By channeling Spiritual Power into the Pill Furnace, the divided Pill Embryos would slowly begin to rotate along the walls of the Pill Furnace, and only then could a smooth, well-formed Medicine Pill be obtained.

Time slowly passed.

Once the ten pills inside were fully formed, Yang Ji slapped the Pill Furnace.

Boom!

A soft boom echoed, and a thick Pill Fragrance immediately wafted up.

Just as he opened the furnace, Huo Yuan outside the cave perked up his ears, looking surprised and wondering,

"This... this seems to be the sound of Pill Qi rushing through the furnace?"

Soon after, a Pill Fragrance shot into his nostrils, and in an instant, his eyes widened.

In disbelief, he said,

"Is this... Pill Fragrance? He succeeded?"

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