"I see, thank you for letting me know, Daoist Zhu!"

Lin Chang'sheng clasped his fists in gratitude upon hearing this.

"Daoist Wei, you're too polite!"

"We're all loose cultivators here—helping each other out is only right!"

Zhu Zhishan returned the courtesy with a fist salute.

Lin Chang'sheng and Zhu Zhishan chatted in a private booth for over an hour before parting ways, having agreed to head to the Independent Practitioner Marketplace together at the start of next month.

From Zhu Zhishan, Lin Chang'sheng learned that—

Most cultivators are ascetics, usually in closed-door cultivation. Unless the trade market is open, it's rare to see any of them out and about.

The Independent Practitioner Marketplace sells all sorts of low-tier cultivation techniques, various elixirs, and all kinds of bizarre items—you can buy them as long as you have spirit stones.

......

Lin Chang'sheng returned to the inn.

"Still ten days until the trade market opens..."

Lin Chang'sheng's eyes filled with calculation.

Suddenly, a thought popped into his head, and he pulled out the Dragon Blood Pill Formula from his pack, mumbling, "Why don't I use these ten days to reach entry level with the Dragon Blood Pill, simplify it a bit, then push it to perfection? Maybe I can actually refine some Dragon Blood Pills?"

Lin Chang'sheng knew—

The Dragon Blood Pill is effective for martial arts grandmasters. For cultivators at Qi Refining stage level one or two, it should work too. If he could refine some, he could try trading them for spirit stones at the market.

And even if nobody wanted them, eating them himself would give him some experience points too.

The Nourishing Spirit Pill is higher grade than the Dragon Blood Pill and probably harder to gather ingredients for, so he decided to start with the Dragon Blood Pill first.

With his simplify panel, taking the Dragon Blood Pill to perfection shouldn't take more than a few days!

With that thought, Lin Chang'sheng immediately began studying the Dragon Blood Pill Formula, and took a look at the Nourishing Spirit Pill Formula as well.

[Dragon Blood Pill: Main ingredient—Black Line Flood Dragon Blood. Auxiliaries: Snow Ginseng, Purple Peony Vine, Hundred Returns Powder...]

[Nourishing Spirit Pill: Main ingredient—Ice Profound Turtle Blood. Auxiliaries: Divine Sand Grass, Side Cypress Fruit...]

"Never even heard of these herbs before, better get familiar with them before thinking about entry level."

Lin Chang'sheng finished reading the two pill formulas, thinking to himself.

[Dragon Blood Pill (Entry 0/500)]

[Nourishing Spirit Pill (Entry 0/1000)]

[Dragon Blood Pill Formula detected. Consume 1,000 taels of silver to simplify?]

[Nourishing Spirit Pill Formula detected. Consume 2 lower grade spirit stones to simplify?]

After studying the formulas four or five times, Lin Chang'sheng suddenly saw a red prompt pop up in the corner of his panel.

"Hmm? The Nourishing Spirit Pill requires spirit stones?"

"Guess I really have to start with the Dragon Blood Pill!"

Lin Chang'sheng stared at the prompt, thinking to himself.

"Simplify Dragon Blood Pill!"

Without hesitation, Lin Chang'sheng hit confirm.

[Great Dao is Simple: Simplifying Dragon Blood Pill… Simplifying… Dragon Blood Pill simplified successfully == Earthworm!]

Lin Chang'sheng had just confirmed when another red prompt popped up on his panel.

"Earthworm?!"

"What the..."

Lin Chang'sheng stared at the prompt, dumbfounded.

Earthworm—also known as common worm—you can dig those up anywhere damp and shady. Easiest thing in the world to find.

He seriously didn't expect that after simplifying the Dragon Blood Pill, all he'd need would be earthworms.

With that in mind—

Lin Chang'sheng immediately headed downstairs to the front desk, slapped a piece of silver on the counter, and said to the chubby shopkeeper, "Shopkeeper, could you get someone to dig up some earthworms for me? I need them!"

"Dig for earthworms?"

The chubby shopkeeper looked at Lin Chang'sheng, a bit confused, but seeing the silver, he nodded right away. "No problem, I'll have someone go dig up some earthworms and deliver them to your room!"

"Great!"

Lin Chang'sheng nodded and went back upstairs.

The shopkeeper went off to make arrangements.

Tap tap tap!

Tap tap tap!

........

Purple Lightning Flying Needle experience +1!

Thunderous Slash experience +1!

......

In his room, Lin Chang'sheng was embroidering with cloth in his left hand and a needle in his right, while gripping a rattle between his feet, twirling it with both to make the ropes pummel the drum like raindrops—thump, thump, thump.

At the same time, red prompts kept popping up on his panel.

.......

"Dear guest, here are your earthworms—is this enough? If not, I'll have someone dig more for you!"

An hour later, there was a knock at Lin Chang'sheng's door—the chubby shopkeeper's voice came through too.

"Yeah, bring them in."

Lin Chang'sheng opened the door to see the chubby shopkeeper and a teenage errand boy, each carrying a large wooden bucket—two buckets of earthworms in total.

"Here you go!"

The shopkeeper set the earthworms in the room. Lin Chang'sheng picked up a stick he'd prepared, walked over, and poked around in the bucket, pulling out an earthworm to coil it on the ground.

Dragon Blood Pill experience +1!

Dragon Blood Pill experience +1!

"Nice! Coiling earthworms works!"

Seeing his experience points shoot up, Lin Chang'sheng immediately turned to the shopkeeper and said, "This will do for now. If I need more, I'll let you know."

"Noted."

The chubby shopkeeper nodded and took the errand boy with him as they left.

Dragon Blood Pill experience +1.

Dragon Blood Pill experience +1.

Lin Chang'sheng closed the door, grabbed the stick and kept coiling earthworms with one hand, embroidering with the other, while his feet worked the rattle. Red prompts kept flashing across his panel.

He realized that a single earthworm could be coiled about a hundred times. If he coiled one too much, it'd die—and a dead earthworm didn't give experience points anymore.

Six days later—

[Dragon Blood Pill Perfection]

"Finally reached perfection."

Seeing the red prompt on the panel, Lin Chang'sheng let out a long breath. At the same time, a massive flow of new information rushed into his mind—it was the technique and insights for refining Dragon Blood Pills, including a burst of enlightenment about alchemy itself.

This flood of information instantly fused with his consciousness.

In the next moment—

Lin Chang'sheng felt as if he'd been refining Dragon Blood Pills for a hundred years.

"Awesome! Now that I've mastered refining Dragon Blood Pills, I just need to buy some of the ingredients and an alchemy furnace, plus rent a little courtyard."

With that, Lin Chang'sheng stood up and headed out the door.

His Thunderous Slash skill had reached perfection yesterday, but he was still a bit short on the Tang Sect Flying Needle.

........

Jishi Medicine Hall.

This was Jinyong City's biggest medicine hall, with hundreds of branches and all sorts of medicinal ingredients and elixirs for sale.

"Hello, distinguished guest. What would you like to buy today?"

Lin Chang'sheng walked into Jishi Medicine Hall, and a pharmacist in his forties came up, greeting him warmly.

"I'd like to buy some Black Line Flood Dragon Blood—do you have any?"

Lin Chang'sheng asked.

It was the main ingredient for Dragon Blood Pills; as long as he got this, the rest would be easy.

"Black Line Flood Dragon Blood… We don't have any in stock, but we do have half the carcass of a Black Line Flood Dragon. Would you want that?"

The middle-aged pharmacist hesitated before answering.

"Just half the carcass..."

Hearing this, Lin Chang'sheng frowned.

But then he remembered—thanks to his alchemy insights, he now knew how to refine Black Line Flood Dragon Blood from its body. With the carcass, maybe he could extract enough blood for his needs after all.

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