Upon seeing my pill, the three Emperors who were serving as the competition’s judges barely reacted. From several meters away, all they could see was that the pill was, indeed, adorned with nine white rings, but since they had watched me concoct it, this didn’t exactly come as a surprise. So, I placed the pill into a jade bottle and handed it to the Pill King, who then delivered it to the judges for inspection.

Even after studying the pill more closely, however, all of the judges still appeared confused about what they were looking at.

The judge in the center seat cleared his throat. “Grandmaster Su, explain the effects of this pill that you have concocted.”

I cupped my fists and bowed my head in acknowledgement. “This is a Rank 1 Beauty Reviving Pill. It will return a person’s physical appearance to what they looked like when they were 20 years old. For a cultivator, this means returning to how one looked before entering stagnation. It tightens and whitens one’s skin, while also returning one’s hair color to its original vibrancy. These are only superficial changes, however. This pill does have some limited power to remove scars and unsightly blemishes, but it will not heal injuries or repair major trauma.”

The Emperors glanced at each other uncertainly.

Again, it was the judge in the center who addressed me. “This pill returns a person’s appearance to what it was when they were 20? Always? What role do the patterns play? What effect does enhancing the pill’s efficacy have? For that matter, what is this pill’s efficacy?”

“Please, forgive me,” I responded calmly. “I have not yet been able to fully study the effects of this pill, so I can only give approximate answers.”

The judge nodded hesitantly, accepting this statement.

“Due to how one’s cultivation base causes one’s body to reject external energy, the base Rank 1 Beauty Reviving Pill is only effective on Martial Disciples. Adding patterns allows the pill’s energy to overcome this rejection, and with nine patterns, this pill is effective on anyone up to Peak King. A Martial Emperor should be able to abolish their cultivation base to take advantage of the pill’s effects, but the moment they break through to Emperor once more, the pill’s energy will be expelled from their body, causing them to begin aging normally.”

The judges all cautiously bobbed their heads. This was how most pills with lingering effects worked, so nothing about my explanation surprised them.

“As for efficacy, the Beauty Reviving Pill will only be able to return a person’s appearance to that of a 20-year-old when it has an efficacy of at least 100%. If the efficacy is below this, the effects are reduced. An efficacy above 100%, however, no longer increases the potency of the pill’s effects. Instead, it causes these effects to linger, making it so that a person does not visibly age for an extended period of time. The pill in front of you has an efficacy of nearly 200%. While I cannot be certain without more testing, I believe that its effects will last for months—likely, years.”

What seemed to shock the judges more than anything was the notion that my pill had an efficacy of nearly 200%. So, before anyone could object, I reached into my storage bag and pulled out several pill bottles.

“Here are a few samples of pills I made during my experiments. I estimate their efficacies to range between 50 and 150%.”

The central judge accepted these bottles from the Pill King, but he simply placed them down on the table in front of him without examining them. “We will consider this information when evaluating your score. For now, let us see how your fellow contestants feel your pill can be improved.”

After bowing my head to the judges, I turned to face my peers. They, in turn, averted their eyes. None were willing to stand up and make suggestions for how my pill could have been improved, not even the Pill Lords.

As the seconds ticked by, tensions rose, and everyone began directing their gazes toward Mandakh.

Feeling the weight of the audience’s attention, a pained grimace crossed the man’s face as he stood to address me. “Grandmaster Su, I must congratulate you on concocting such an exceptional pill. It is amazing that one so young was able to create something so… unique.” Check latest chapters at Nov3lFɪre.ɴet

Mandakh took a moment to pause as he looked over at the pill bottles that were arranged in front of the central judge. “I cannot question your obvious skills, but I find myself wondering if your creation is not rather wasteful. You used 25 herbs to create a single pill, several of which were rather rare poison herbs that are difficult for our herbalists to cultivate. As far as I can tell, only the first 15 of these herbs were important. You should have been able to concoct a nine-patterned pill with these herbs alone. The main purpose of the other 10 seemed to be to allow you to create a ‘Perfect’ pill with a few extra points of efficacy. Is that correct?”

I nodded, patiently. “Yes, it is.”

Mandakh crossed his arms in front of his chest and frowned. “While concocting a Perfect pill is commendable, it is, generally, unnecessary. The effects of a pill’s first pattern are sufficient to deal with any lingering toxins. Using a few extra herbs to produce a slightly better pill might be viable at Rank 1, but if you use half a dozen extra Rank 4 or 5 herbs just to eliminate a few trace toxins, you will be wasting valuable resources that could be put to better use elsewhere. Similarly, while an extra 5 to 10% efficacy might be nice, it is hardly worth the cost of multiple herbs.”

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I cupped my fists and bowed my head. “Thank you for your insights, Brother.”

Mandakh flinched, annoyed that I had called him ‘Brother,’ but he graciously nodded to me before retaking his seat.

Honestly, I was somewhat thankful to the man. While I had zero interest in following his advice, his words had given me additional insights into how the people here viewed things such as toxins and efficacy. I didn’t agree with him, but I could see where he was coming from.

When no one else stood up to offer any further suggestions, the Pill King guided me off the stage.

After I returned to my seat, the remaining Grandmasters were brought on stage one after another, with each one demonstrating a newly developed recipe.

Unlike my Beauty Reviving Pill, none of these recipes were entirely novel. They were simple six-pattern extensions of somewhat obscure and seldom-used pills, like the recipe for the Saber Aura Pill that Emperor Chan had given me. Still, even though I didn’t have any foreseeable need for something like a Guandao Hunting Pill, which allowed a person to perceive any guandaos within a 100-meter radius, I jotted them down in my journal for future reference.

That said, while these recipes were capable of creating six-patterned pills, none of the Grandmasters had either the affinities or the expertise that was needed to concoct such a thing. Three of them ended up with four-patterned pills, with only one person concocting a five-patterned pill.

Once the Grandmasters were done, the Lords were brought on stage, and the first two Lords, like the Grandmasters who came before them, both concocted Rank 3 pills—a Chain Control Pill and an Arrow Prediction Pill. The first of these was a five-patterned pill, and the second was a six-patterned pill.

This made me slightly chagrined. If I had used Emperor Chan’s recipe and made a decently high-quality five-patterned pill, I likely could have squeaked by into fifth place, which was all I needed to do to gain access to better herbs. Instead, I had gambled on the possibility that the judges would value the uniqueness of my Beauty Reviving Pill.

When the third Lord stepped forward, the crowd burst into murmurs, with everyone seeming confused as to why she hadn’t been brought up last. When the Pill King revealed that this was because she would be concocting a Rank 3 pill, instead of a Rank 4 pill, the murmurs only intensified. When she then proceeded to concoct an eight-patterned Congealing Flames Pill, the reason she had chosen to concoct a Rank 3 pill was obvious.

The final Lord did concoct a Rank 4 pill, but since it only had four patterns, it wasn’t enough to match up to the woman who had gone before him.

As if by some unspoken agreement, after each of these competitors presented their pills, the only one who stood to critique them was Mandakh.

Overall, there was nothing particularly wrong with anything that Mandakh said, but at the same time, it was all rather inane. Based on the way each of the competitors smiled as they accepted his suggestions, I could tell that they either didn’t agree with the man, or they already knew everything he was saying.

The only exception to this was the woman who had made that eight-patterned pill. Mandakh had even less to say to her than he had to the others, but she responded to his every word with blushes and effusive praise. There was a falseness to this behavior, but Mandakh either didn’t notice or didn’t care.

After the final Martial Lord returned to his seat, the Pill King emcee retook the stage.

“Our final competitor will be Pill Lord Mandakh, who will be concocting a Rank 4 Fertile Fields Pill.”

As Mandakh stood up, I blinked. From the way everyone had been acting, I was expecting Mandakh to be a rather talented Pill King. Instead, even though he had advanced his cultivation base, he was still just a mere Lord.

Really, this did make sense. The man had only recently advanced to Martial King, so it was unreasonable to expect him to already be making highly-patterned Rank 5 pills. Still…

After greeting the judges, Mandakh walked over to the workbench and laid out twelve different herbs, all of which were connected by a powerful sympathetic bond. Then, he took out an impressive-looking furnace that was inscribed with Rank 6 formations and got to work.

While Mandakh’s reputation had become somewhat grating over the past few days, as I watched him work, I had to admit that he had the skills he needed to back up this reputation. He had both an extremely high wood affinity and an excellent fire affinity, giving him solid control over both the medicinal energy of most of the herbs that he was using, as well as the flames of his furnace.

Additionally, even though Mandakh was still young—not even 50—it was clear that he had spent many long hours cultivating his soul, giving him a qi vision that was capable of spotting minute irregularities in the structure of his herbs’ medicinal energy.

My only criticism was that, while Mandakh was capable of spotting these irregularities, he wasn’t too skilled in fixing them. He massaged these problem spots with his soul and intent, much the same as I had done several lifetimes ago, but half the time, this only made the problem worse.

In the end, Mandakh was able to condense a seven-patterned Rank 4 Fertile Fields Pill, placing him far above any of the other competitors.

After passing this pill to the judges, he turned around to face the critiques of his peers. However, no one said a single word. I felt the urge to stand and offer him some advice on how he might be able to fix those irregularities, but I didn’t. Everyone’s contented smiles made it clear that, while giving advice here was possible, it wasn’t welcome—not by Mandakh, and not by the judges.

With no one standing to offer any critiques, the Pill King gestured for Mandakh to retake his seat. Then, he walked to the center of the stage.

“I hope that this has been a learning experience for all of you. During the last four competitions, our Palace has placed last in each of the three main divisions—alchemy, herbalism, and mixed. We have only barely saved face by doing well in the martial arts division. Because of this, over the past two thousand years, we have only been able to send 4 alchemists to compete for a spot in the Temple, and none were successful.”

The Pill King took a deep breath as he slowly scanned the room. “Yes, you are competing against each other for a spot on our team, but never forget that the real goal is to defeat the other two Palaces. If even one of you can earn a high-ranking position in the Temple, it will elevate our Palace as a whole. So, please, work together to make this dream a reality.”

The Pill King paused for several seconds before continuing, “The honored Emperors will determine the final scores for this competition over the coming days. This information will be given to each of your mentors. Dismissed.”