Chapter 446: Failure or Not?

Taking out all the required ingredients, he immediately began processing them in an orderly manner.

However, this time, unlike before, when a hint of uncertainty had been present behind his actions, his movements seemed more confident as he kept processing one ingredient after another in order to form the concoctions required for pill-making.

The reason for this change was naturally Elder Ru Qi. After closely observing her perform all the processing steps for hours today, her way of working had naturally ended up influencing him, which was somewhat different from the pure textbook way of handling ingredients which he had memorised earlier.

’Since she’s a Tier 3 Pill Master, isn’t it obvious that she’s the one who’s right?’ Yi Chen thought with a smirk and continued on with his actions.

A while later, all the required concoctions were completed, and the final pill-making process was the only thing that was left.

Looking at his cauldron the next moment, he remembered the words he heard from Fan Duan and Huo Yin back at the Enlightenment Hall.

"Controlling the flame’s intensity, right?... Let’s do that then."

With that said, he decreased the diameter of the fire lid, as the intensity of the flames coming out was reduced considerably, thereby lowering the temperature to which the cauldron was subjected.

"I’ve reduced it by almost one-fourth. Let’s see how it ends up burnt in this case then," he snorted the next moment and, in an orderly manner, started adding the concoctions to the heated water present inside the cauldron in a definite sequence as the viscosity of the solution began increasing slowly and steadily.

"It’s working!" Yi Chen exclaimed in delight while stirring the contents of the cauldron. The colour of the solution had started to take on a shade of green slowly and steadily with every stir.

Yi Chen’s excitement reached the roof, but he didn’t let that affect the rate at which he was mixing the concoction, lest he end up spoiling all his hard work.

As a result, time passed at a snail’s pace before the precipitate at the bottom of the cauldron hardened to a required degree, prompting Yi Chen to put out the flames.

However, the excitement on his face wasn’t as vibrant as earlier.

The solution that had taken a light shade of green earlier was now dark green in colour... just a shade away from looking black.

"Another failure, huh?"

With a bitter expression on his face, Yi Chen scooped the precipitate out and soon started shaping it into greenish pills.

’Even though it’s a failure, at least it will still give me a few experience points...’ he thought while letting out a sigh as his hands continued to shape the precipitate into pills one after the other until all ten pills had been formed.

The moment the tenth pill was formed, Yi Chen was waiting for the usual system reward notification, which naturally arrived the very next moment.

However, its contents were much different from earlier.

Ding! Congratulations on creating 10x Sleeping Crane Pills (Partial Success): You earned 30 EXP!

"Wait... a partial success!" Yi Chen’s eyes couldn’t help but widen the moment he saw the system’s message as he instantly pulled open the pill’s status panel.

===== STATUS =====

Name: Sleeping Crane Pills (Partial Success)

Type: Sleep Inducing Pill

Rank: Basic Unranked Pill [Mortal Pill]

Remark: A useless product that might make one fall asleep for five minutes [Regenerate: 10,000 EXP]

==================

’I-It really isn’t a failure...’ Yi Chen thought with a wave of relief on his face when he checked the pill’s status panel.

’I wonder what its efficacy percentage is? From what Fan Duan told me earlier, one needs at least 30% Efficacy to clear the test, right?’

With that thought in his mind, Yi Chen checked the status panel of the pill next to it and one next to the previous one... and the next. He continued it until he had done the same for all ten pills.

"Crap...What shitty luck I have today..." he muttered, failing to get the efficacy percentage from the first remarks of the pills.

’Looks like I have no choice but to spend my experience points... tch’

Clicking his tongue in annoyance, Yi Chen checked his current experience points.

[EXP: 77000 -> 80,030 EXP] (A/N: For those who are confused, there was a miscalculation on Chapter 428’s status panel earlier which, after being resolved, made the total EXP reach 77k)

Letting out a sigh in reluctance, Yi Chen glanced at one of the pills’ status panels the very next moment and regenerated its remark.

[Remark (2/3): 21% Efficacy rate. Barely Passable. (Regenerate: 15,000 EXP)]

"Twenty-one per cent?! To think it would jump by this much after just adjusting the temperature..." Yi Chen’s eyes shone intently the moment he saw the efficacy percentage.

’Just nine more percentage points and I’ll reach the minimum requirement!’ he thought with excitement evident on his face.

With excitement came the desire to test it out again.

The moment that thought took root in his mind, he started cleaning up all the equipment before beginning the pill refining process all over again, this time making sure to lower the temperature even more than earlier.

As for the rest of the steps, he followed them to a tee as earlier and continued stirring the cauldron at a pace necessary to mix everything evenly.

Two and a half hours later, the result was present in front of his eyes.

"Although only slightly...it’s still less dark than earlier," Yi Chen muttered while looking at the darkish green solution and precipitate present at the bottom of the cauldron.

He instantly pulled open its status panel to check his progress.

===== STATUS =====

Name: Sleeping Crane Pills (Partial Success)

Type: Sleep Inducing Pill

Rank: Basic Unranked Pill [Mortal Pill]

Remark: Has an efficacy of 24%. Still a long way from complete success, though. [Regenerate: 10,000 EXP]

==================

"It really increased!" Yi Chen exclaimed the very next moment while thinking to himself, ’Then... if I decrease the flame’s intensity even more greatly, then wouldn’t my next attempt be a success?!’

With that thought in mind, he completely ignored his stomach’s incessant growls and poured himself into refining another batch of pills.

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