After the exhibition match’s results were announced, the Kings and Emperors who had gathered in the Hall of the Elders began to discuss how our team’s performance might be improved for the final competition. As I was only a young Martial Lord—not one of the elders—no one deigned to solicit my input. However, as I listened to everyone debate the merits of either sending Mandakh and the others on a Return or forcing them to spend more time in an alchemy workshop, I finally had enough.

I stood and walked to the open circle at the center of the hall, drawing everyone’s attention and forcing them to end their private discussions.

“Give the team to me,” I said, eyeing the gathered Rulers with as much weight as I could muster. “Give me the freedom to train the team as I wish, and I am confident that, in 10 years, I will be able to lead our Palace to victory.”

Thanks to the reputation that I had built up for both designing new recipes and teaching Pill Emperors how to properly concoct them, this statement wasn’t met with immediate dismissal. But at the same time, none of the Palace’s elders were willing to hand over complete control of our team based only on my say-so.

The elders had questions—a lot of questions—and I had to spend several hours detailing exactly what I planned to do to take everyone’s performance to the next level.

At the end of this question-and-answer session, several of the elders were still reluctant to let me dictate everyone’s training schedule—especially the young alchemists’ mentors. However, their objections were irrelevant. The only people whose opinions mattered were the Palace’s three urgamal, and they had already made up their minds.

Herb Sovereign Enkhtuya released a wave of wood qi, silencing the hall.

“The team will be handed over to Pill King Su Fang. If you wish to suggest ways to improve the team’s training, talk to Pill King Su Fang. His decision will be final. In 5 years, we will meet again to evaluate his results.”

I watched from the shadows as our team was teleported back to the Hall of the Elders.

While none of them appeared overly excited, they all held their heads high, proud of what they had accomplished. For the first time in millennia, the Palace of the Heroes Domain hadn’t placed last in an alchemy competition. They were too young to understand that, no matter how well they performed, the elders would never be satisfied. Even if they had placed first, the elders would still be questioning what could have been done better.

An hour later, servants visited the workshops of the five alchemists who had competed in the exhibition match, as well as those of the five most promising alchemists who had not been chosen to participate. Each of these ten young men and women was instructed to attend a meeting in the conference room deep within the mountain—the one with the U-shaped table.

When they arrived, they found me already seated at the head of the table. I instructed those who had competed in the exhibition match to sit to my right and those who hadn’t to sit to my left.

This caused several of the young alchemists to look at me with confused expressions, but that was all. I had helped each of them concoct a novel pill and gain an enlightenment, so they already had a basic understanding of my abilities. Therefore, no one was too surprised by my attempted takeover.

The only person who was truly upset was Mandakh. The moment I instructed him to sit along the right side of the table, he stormed out of the room to confront his mentor.

Mandakh’s mentor had fiercely opposed my plan to take control of the Palace’s alchemy team, but when Sovereign Enkhtuya made her decision, he fell in line. Once he did, I gave him a stern warning: Mandakh obeys my orders, or he is out.

This might have been a bit harsh, but considering the way the urgamal had talked about Mandakh, I was confident that they would support me.

Less than a quarter of an hour after he stormed out, Mandakh returned with a sullen expression on his face. His soul rebelled at the notion of being placed below me, but if he wanted any hope of joining the Temple of the Herb Saint, he had no choice but to bite his tongue and follow orders.

Once Mandakh was in his proper seat, I cleared my throat to gather everyone’s attention.

“After our performance in the recent exhibition match, the elders decided to grant me full authority over our team for the final competition. I will be in charge of your training, and you will follow my instructions. There are eleven people in this room, and we only need five. If you refuse to do as I say, I won’t hesitate to cut you from the roster. Understood?”

The five who hadn’t taken part in the exhibition match immediately nodded, while the five who had competed hesitated. They didn’t understand. In their minds, they had just achieved a great victory. Mandakh was the only one who seemed to have any inkling of how the urgamal viewed this ‘victory.’

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Once these five had a chance to discuss things with their mentors, they would understand. So, for the moment, I just glared at them until they bowed their heads.

“Good. Now, for the next two years, none of you will be leaving this mountain on a Return, and none of you will be spending much time in your alchemy workshop. Instead, I expect each of you to spend as much time as possible cultivating your souls.”

Reaching into my storage bag, I pulled out one sheet of paper for each of the 10 young men and women.

“Go to the Palace’s Soul Cultivation Library. I have already reviewed most of the books on offer. These are the ones that will suit each of you best. If you wish to pursue a different path, you may—how you cultivate your soul is no one’s decision but your own. However, if you don’t wish to follow the path I have laid out for you, talk to me first. I have reasons for choosing the books I did.”

I looked around at each of the young alchemists. “In two years, I will evaluate the strength of everyone’s soul. At that time, the two people with the weakest souls will be cut from our roster—no matter your cultivation base or your skill in alchemy.”

I had promised the elders that we would be able to achieve a first-place finish in the final competition between the Western Island’s three Palaces. Fixing everyone’s soul cultivation was a solid first step in making this happen, but it was far from enough. After all, Jon’s blessing made him an exceptionally difficult opponent.

Even considering Jon’s ability to copy the blessings of others, the man’s biggest advantage was that his blessing empowered him whenever he was ‘challenged.’ I didn’t even need to say anything. No matter what else I might or might not do, if I took part in the final alchemy competition, Jon’s blessing would give him some kind of boost that would help him defeat me.

If I wanted to ensure my victory, I needed to take care of this. So, I connected to an avatar in my inner world.

“System, I want to make it so that Jon’s blessing doesn’t empower him when I challenge him.” The source of thɪs content is nοvelfire.net

Cost cannot be calculated at this time.

I had been expecting this response, but it had been worth a shot.

“Then, make it so that his blessing doesn’t register implicit challenges from me. Make it so that I have to directly challenge him before his blessing will activate.”

Cost cannot be calculated at this time.

“Alright. What about making it so that his blessing just doesn’t trigger from the upcoming alchemy competition? It can still give missions and rewards as normal. I just don’t want it to empower him during the competition.”

Cost 10,000 credits.

That was better, but it was still too expensive.

“What about if it didn’t empower him for the upcoming competition unless he was challenged directly? Just make it so that he won’t get a boost simply because people are competing against him.”

Cost 60 credits.

That was still more than I wanted to spend, and I would need to ensure no one on my team said anything that Jon’s blessing could interpret as a challenge, but it should be good enough.

“Purchase.”

Purchase confirmed.

That would help us win, but what about the reward?

“System, if I defeat Jon during the upcoming competition, and if his blessing ends up giving me a skill, I want it to give me the ability to create synthetic sympathetic bonds.”

Purchase confirmed. Cost 5 credits. 1,177 credits remaining.

That might have been a waste of 5 perfectly good credits, but I wanted that skill, and this seemed like the best way to acquire it.

Purchases complete, it was time for me to face the next big issue: learning to concoct a pill that was actually capable of defeating Jon.

Like the exhibition match, the final competition between the three Palaces was, ultimately, about which team could produce the most valuable pill. And for this kind of competition, the weapon-based pills that I had recently been developing were less than ideal.

The main advantage of the recipes that I had developed, and the reason that most of our alchemists had used them during the exhibition match, was that they were ‘complete.’ With more common nine-patterned recipes, the inclusion of several additional herbs made concocting even low-patterned versions significantly more difficult. With these ‘complete’ recipes, however, once the medicinal energy was properly configured, it would smoothly advance all the way from a one-patterned pill to a nine-patterned pill. All an alchemist needed to do was use the power of their soul to keep the bursts of energy in check.

The problem with these pills was that they weren’t as valuable as other pills of a similar Rank and pattern count. A Rank 5 Nine-Pattern Rain of Spears Pill was only worth about half the value of a Rank 5 Nine-Pattern Qi Gathering Pill. They were still worth several times more than most eight-patterned pills, making them viable for use during the exhibition match, but if everyone were making nine-patterned pills, a high-quality Rain of Spears Pill would inevitably end up in last place.

I couldn’t be sure how powerful an alchemist Jon would become, but I could make a few basic assumptions.

Only Martial Emperors would be allowed to participate in the final competition, since anyone who advanced to Martial Sovereign wouldn’t be allowed to join the Temple. So, none of the competitors would have access to a Sovereign’s ability to break the world, meaning no one should be able to concoct Rank 7 pills.

Therefore, the best possible pill that anyone would be able to create would be a Perfect Rank 6 Nine-Pattern pill with 200% efficacy. Would Jon be able to concoct such a thing? Maybe not, but I had to assume the worst.

If we both concocted absolutely perfect pills, the winner would be determined by the type of pill that we created. So, I needed to learn to create a perfect version of the most valuable Rank 6 pill on the market.

Back on the Nine Rivers Continent, figuring out which Rank 6 pill was the most valuable would have been difficult. Here on the Central Continent, the answer was simple. At Ranks 4, 5, and 6, there was one type of pill that was worth far more than any other.

I knocked on the door of Emperor Chan’s workshop, and after he let me inside, I got straight to the point.

“Teach me how to make Ascension Pills.”