Chapter 84: The Life Sucking Beast
Once Mo Wuji finished refining the ingredients and began fusing the medicinal essences together, Yan Qianyin was sure that his skill at refining ingredients was not any lower than hers. The purity of the refined product definitely hit around 85%. What's more, Mo Wuji was only a Tier 1 Mortal Pill Refiner. Someone with such terrifying potential definitely could become an Earth Pill Refiner.
Thinking of Mo Wuji's talent in cultivation, Yan Qianyin sighed once again. He was fated to waste his talent in pill refining, because no Earth Pill Refiner could reach that level just by talent in pill refining alone; talent in cultivation was equally important. This was also why there were so few pill refiners.
Perhaps her words really had some effect on him, because after listening to Yan Qianyin's speech, Mo Wuji's movements became more fluid than ever. There were zero problems up to the point when the medicinal essences were about to completely fuse together.
Minutes later, the fusing was finished. Mo Wuji breathed a sigh of relief. In the past tens of attempts, not once had he been able to even start condensing the pills, which was what he was about to embark on next. Spiritual energy began to course through his hands as he initiated his hand techniques on the purified and fused medicine essences, but even before he had the time to start the pil condensation, the spiritual ingredients suddenly went "Boom", and a smell of charred material wafted through the air.
A disappointed look appeared on Mo Wuji's face as he halted the pill condensing process, staring at Yan Qianyin for answers. He could still identify the core problems after his previous failures, but now, without further guidance, he had no idea what went wrong. Yan Qianyin sighed, staring back at Mo Wuji and asked, "Aren't you curious what caused your failure at refining a Tier 2 Mortal Pill?"
Mo Wuji nodded silently, thinking to himself: You don't say?
"You are the most talented pill refiner I've ever seen. From the start to the end, I never saw a single mistake in your refining techniques." Yan Qianyin replied. "The problem doesn't lie with the pill refining process, but with the pill flames instead. You are using firestones for pill refining, this in itself already makes pill refining much harder as compared to using normal flames. On top of that you chose the poorest quality firestone, red firestones, which not only give a low temperature, but is also unstable. As a result, the fusing process of medicinal essences was still incomplete."
Believing that she would continue to give him a further explanation, Mo Wuji quietly listened to Yan Qianyin's speech. As expected, she added on further, "Pill Master Ju and Pill Master Shi were able to refine the Tier 3 Mortal Pills that you saw, only because Pill Master Ju was an infinitesimal gap away from becoming a Tier 4 Earth Pill Refiner, and as Pill Master Shi had your help to barely succeed. Most importantly, their cultivation levels were greatly superior than your current state, hence allowing them to infuse spiritual energy into the pill flames to facilitate the fusing process. While you, if I'm not wrong, are only in the initial levels of the Channel Opening Stage. Even the Tier 2 Pill Refiners of the lowest cultivation levels would be at the more advanced levels of the Channel Opening Stage."
So it was an issue with my cultivation level...
Mo Wuji lamented to himself. When he failed previously, didn't he consider that it was because his level of cultivation was too low? As it always seemed as though as his spiritual energy could never reach his desired levels when combining it with his hand techniques for the fusing process.
"So pill refining must progress parallel with one's cultivation?" Mo Wuji asked again impatiently.
"Not necessarily, some expert pill masters are still about to produce top tier pills even with their cultivation sealed up. But this sort of pill refiners are an endangered species, and even for them, they wouldn't have gotten to their level without a certain level of cultivation." Hearing Yan Qianyin's explanation, Mo Wuji answered back, "it's not that I don't want to go with you, but at my current standard, there's no way that I'll be able to make the Ephemeral Life Pill."
Hesitantly, Yan Qianyin pulled out an orange coloured rock, "I have an orange firestone here. The temperature of its flames are markedly higher that the red firestone, and is comparable to other earth fires, thus you'll likely be able to refine a batch of Ephemeral Life Pills with it. However, I only have one of it, so you can't do any trial and error with it first. If you're willing to take the risk, we'll depart now. But remember, once the Life Sucking Beast has been disturbed, you'll only have one chance to refine the pills."
After speaking, Yan Qianyin was unsure if Mo Wuji would agree, hence she added on, "If there's any skills there, I'll let you have first pick. Even if there aren't any, and we manage to survive, I promise that I'll give one skill to you."
"Okay, I'll go with you." With the guarantee that he would get a skill either way, what was there to hesitate about? He could already cultivate, so once he had a skill, at least he would be able to fight back if he met with any incidents.
Yan Qianyin's eyes glimmered with appreciation, "Junior apprentice Mo, you didn't disappoint me. I'll lead the way, so let's go now."
...
An hour later, Yan Qianyin stopped at the perimeter of a gorge.
"Is this the place?" wondered Mo Wuji as he looked towards her while carrying a large pill furnace on his back. This gorge was filled with lush greenery in every corner. Every spiritual herbs here was much more valuable than anything that he had used in the past, even the density of spiritual energy was high,
Nodding her head, Yan Qianyin agreed, "Yes, this is it. Once we enter this gorge and head forward for 60 meters, you will be able to see the living habitat of the Life Sucking beast."
"But there's still so much life energy around here...."
Yan Qianyin cut Mo Wuji off in the middle of his sentence, "Did you think that the area where the Life Sucking Beast lived at would be devoid of all life? Even a rabbit does not eat the grass around its home, what more of the Life Sucking Beast. The beast usually chooses a location richest in life and spiritual energy to settle down at. And from a certain perspective, a Life Sucking Beast can also be considered the king of that area."
Upon ending her speech, and with a pat to her waist, a blade appeared out of nowhere into the hands of Yan Qianyin. She gave Mo Wuji a signal through her eyes, and cautiously entered the gorge.
"Senior apprentice Yan, is it because the Life Sucking Beast can find areas with the densest life and spiritual energy that there's so many people that want to capture the Life Sucking Beast?" Mo Wuji asked softly as he followed behind Yan Qianyin.
She answered Mo Wuji while trekking forward, focusing as hard as she could to do so, "It's only one of the minor reasons. There is a better way to use the Life Sucking Beast, as its body is full of life energy. This sort of life energy encompasses many of the principles of cultivation, hence allowing one to easily breakthrough to the next stage. For example, I am at the Full Completion of Transcending Mortality Stage, so as long as I can get my hands on the Life Sucking Beast, I will 100% be able to breakthrough to the Yuan Dan Stage to become an Earth Realm cultivator."
"I wish you the best of luck in catching the Life Sucking Beast, breaking through to the Yuan Dan Stage, and becoming an Earth Realm expert. Oh ya, Senior Apprentice Yan, what's that little pouch on your waist? It can make a long sword appear with just a pat?" As long as Mo Wiji could obtain a skill, he would be satisfied. Something like the Life Sucking Beast was useless to him anyway.
But he had been curious for the longest time about the small pouch on Yan Qianyin's waist. "It's a storage bag, which can store items of much larger sizes. The one that I have was a gift from my master." Yan Qianyin answered, while speeding through the dense foliage, brushing plants and branches to the side.
Storage bag? Mo Wuji was instantly enthralled by it, and wanted to get one badly. Otherwise, it would be very inconvenient for him to travel around. He couldn't just lug tens of kilos of pill refining equipment around.
"We're almost there..." Yan Qianyin's words interrupted Mo Wuji's chain of thought. He looked up to find a cave hidden behind countless green vines.
"The Life Sucking Beast must be asleep. Start refining the pills now. Once you begin, the beast will be alerted of our presence. I'll shield you from the life draining, and the rest is up to you..."
Before she could finish her sentence, a terrifying suction power acted on the both of them. Soon after, Mo Wuji felt his body feeling weaker by the second, as though life and soul were being sucked out of him.