Rise of the Alchemy God

Chapter 128: Attracting Xiang Hua's Attention

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For a moment, Xun Wei thought he was seeing things, but as hard as it was to believe, there were indeed three pills already prepared in that vial.

Even he had decent alchemy skills, so he knew that creating those pills in such a short time was a feat that not even someone at his level could achieve.

For a moment, he thought Ethan was cheating, but he knew well that with the examiner present, it would be nearly impossible to do so.

Not to mention it would be pointless, since one would have to do it again a second and even a third time to win the competition.

There was no way that a figure like the alchemy master would fail to notice someone cheating, especially not multiple times.

From their reactions, Xun Wei could tell that they had seen Ethan refine those three pills, which meant that his skills were so great that he could accomplish such a task.

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'Where in the world did this guy come from?'

He clenched his fists, refusing to believe that the masked boy was better than him.

But neither Ethan nor the others seemed to care about his inner turmoil.

Ethan continued at the same speed with the following pills.

In another five minutes, he prepared another batch of three pills.

This time, he only needed to make one pill, not a batch of three like some of the others, but he still managed it with the limited materials provided.

Seeing this, the elder couldn't help but nod approvingly.

It wasn't difficult for an expert alchemist to create more than one pill with the materials provided, even when only one was required.

At their level, their mastery of using the right amount of refining materials was good enough to avoid wasting the remaining materials in the process.

Even Yan Mei and Xiang Hua could do such a thing with low-grade Level 1 pills.

Of course, they weren't at Ethan's level, who had done it with a high-grade pill.

The examiner, the more he saw Ethan refine, the more he appreciated his abilities.

He had already classified him as someone at the level of an experienced alchemist.

His knowledge of alchemy and this display of skill were enough to classify him as such.

While he was having these thoughts, he also noticed Tan Chi, who had just begun refining his second pill.

In the first ten minutes, Tan Chi refined a batch of three mid-grade Level 1 pills that were listed on the exam.

As soon as he finished, he immediately moved on to the next pill without wasting a second.

'This boy's abilities aren't bad either,' the examiner thought, pleased to see that there seemed to be more talented participants this year compared to previous years.

The examiner thought he had already seen the extent of Ethan's abilities, but he quickly realized that wasn't the case.

This was because, over the next 20 minutes, Ethan continued to refine pill after pill without stopping, each time producing a batch of three pills, whether required or not.

The shocking thing was that after two more pills, his speed increased even further, bringing his refining time from five minutes down to three for each pill.

At this pace, he managed to refine five different pills in 20 minutes, bringing his total to six pills, four of which were of high grade.

With this amount, he practically had victory in hand, but he still had 30 minutes left.

Six of the pills on the list had already been refined, and only four were left.

During the exam, materials were provided for all ten pills, though they knew that most of the materials would go unused since it was unlikely anyone could produce that many pills in one hour.

Perhaps masters and grandmasters could manage it, but surely no one below their rank could.

Even Ethan knew the remaining pills were a bit problematic due to their production method.

He couldn't produce all four remaining pills in half an hour.

The Level 2 pill alone would take at least 20 minutes to produce, let alone having time to make the other three.

After producing his sixth pill, he paused for a moment to contemplate the next ones he had to make and finally made his decision.

At first, he intended to try producing the Level 2 pill, making it barely a low-grade one, but then, after reconsidering, he realized he had no reason to do so.

His current goal was to secure a spot among the three who would take part in the tournament.

To do that, he only needed to keep winning the matches until he obtained one of the three spots.

Currently, there were seven participants, and after the first round of matches, their number would drop to four.

Then he would only need to win one more match to secure one of the three spots, without needing to go all out to be the very best.

In the competition, to be completely eliminated, one would have to lose two consecutive matches.

If he won the first two, and then lost the third, he would still secure one of the three available spots on his own, without needing to do anything else.

The first three losers of the competition would have to face each other again, with the addition of Xun Wei, and the two winners among them would then have to compete for a chance to participate in the next rounds of matches.

So, in the second round of the competition, four participants would compete against each other for the three spots that would allow them to enter the tournament.

According to this arrangement, the one who had been spared from participating in the first round of matches might seem disadvantaged, but that wasn't the case.

In fact, many would have liked to be in Xun Wei's position, as it allowed them to observe how everyone else refined pills and get a better idea of their next opponent's abilities.

For a few seconds, Ethan decided to refine the remaining pills under Level 2.

In half an hour, he would easily be able to refine them, so he wasted no time and got to work.

Meanwhile, the other participants, who had yet to compete, seeing that the masked boy, who had been like a crazed machine producing pill after pill without stopping, had paused for a moment, thought he had finally grown a bit tired.

But both the examiner and Xiang Hua could tell that he wasn't tired at all.

Someone at his cultivation level wouldn't get exhausted just from refining pills for 30 minutes.

It would take a lot more to exhaust someone at the third stage of cultivation.

By now, Xiang Hua had dropped her previously disinterested attitude and was watching this participant with much more interest.

Up to this point, she hadn't taken anyone too seriously because she could gauge everyone's level, and no one was skilled enough to pose a problem for her.

So, she had continued the competition knowing she would secure the first spot for the tournament.

Although only being in the top three was enough to earn the chance to participate in the tournament, it didn't mean she didn't care about being the best.

On the contrary, as a direct disciple of the sect master, she intended to come in first place in every competition.

Finishing second or third was not an option for her.

Building a reputation for herself meant bringing honor to her master.

She had no intention of being defeated by anyone.

Therefore, seeing a participant with such a high level of skill put her on guard.

She knew he would definitely be a troublesome opponent to face.

'As long as he can't refine Level 2 pills, I should be able to beat him,' she thought, confident that the two of them would eventually face each other.

She was aware of Yan Mei and Xun Wei's skills, and like the others, she believed they had bright futures as alchemists.

However, at the moment, neither of them was on her level, so she wasn't concerned about them.