Sword Sect Outer Sect

Chapter 4 Homework
Song Yan and Lin Qing walked and talked, and soon arrived at the Pill Academy.

The Dan Academy was quite large, and the lectures were held in the main hall of the Teaching Pavilion. The two of them were familiar with the place and quickly found their seats.

Song Yan was one of the Dan Yuan's miscellaneous workers this month, so he sat on the far right of the second row, with Lin Qing sitting behind him.

"..."

Song Yan closed his eyes to rest, but in reality, he was making the most of every second to cultivate the nameless incantation he had obtained in the black and white space.

Song Yan's original advantage was that his spiritual sense was slightly stronger than that of ordinary people. If he could expand this advantage, alchemy might be easier.

There was still some time before the sermon began, and the number of disciples around gradually increased, mostly outer disciples and a minority of inner disciples.

That makes sense. Inner disciples can freely choose from the four major academies if they want to learn. Usually, lectures and classes cover the basics and are mainly for answering questions for outer disciples who have no one to guide them.

Perhaps because the lecture was given by an elder from the outer sect, the number of inner disciples was slightly higher than in previous years.

At this moment, an elderly man with an air of otherworldly wisdom, accompanied by Elder Hu Zheng of the Dan Academy, Zhou Wen, a disciple of the Dan Academy, and two other young men and women, entered the hall.

The whispers that had been taking place in the hall came to an abrupt halt.

"I am Shen Yu from the Xuan Yuan Sect. I came to the Dong Yuan Sect to discuss matters, but I happened to meet an old friend... It was your Elder Hu who invited me to give you a talk on the art of alchemy."

"I, Shen, have some experience in alchemy, and I will now speak frankly about it. Please take your seats."

Wang Xi and Shen Huai sat in the first row, with Zhou Wen sitting next to them, while Elder Hu sat in the assistant lecturer's seat.

"The art of alchemy is vast and profound. Let's take the simplest Qi-nourishing pill in the cultivation world as an example..."

Song Yan listened with great eagerness.

Elder Shen from another sect spoke very well!
Many Taoist alchemical concepts use the simplest and most basic Qi-nourishing pills as examples, progressing from the shallow to the deep, revealing profound truths through seemingly small things.

Looking back on his alchemy techniques, he realized that there were so many oversights and misunderstandings in many places that he had never even noticed before.

"I see……"

Song Yan absorbed these most basic alchemical knowledge with great concentration.

In his view, Elder Shen was quite capable, except for occasionally revealing an uncomfortable sense of superiority in his words.

The main problem is that there are very few elders nowadays who know how to refine Qi-Nourishing Pills.

“The other elders always talk about things like Huangya Pills and Qi Condensation Pills... Elder Shen is much more down-to-earth.”

Song Yan thought so.

But others don't see it that way.

"A dignified elder of the Xuan Yuan Sect... comes here and immediately talks about Qi Nourishing Pills?"

It wasn't just the inner disciples who were puzzled.

Even some of the outer disciples looked at each other blankly, showing little interest.

Shen Yu saw this, but he didn't care, since he hadn't come here with any intention of giving a proper lecture.

"Hmm... in that case, it might reduce the probability of wasting pills."

Shen Yu spoke casually, while Song Yan diligently took notes.

"Alright, that's all for today's lesson."

Shen Yu coughed lightly: "I will be giving a lecture at Dongyuan Sect for three days. If you are interested, you can come again tomorrow."

"I am not a member of the Dongyuan Sect, so I will not force you to attend today's class. If you are interested in listening to the lecture, go back and refine a Qi-Nourishing Pill, and we will review it tomorrow."

In fact, Shen Yu was just going through the motions as Hu Zheng had instructed.

What does the alchemy skill of his Dongyuan Sect disciples have to do with the elders of my Xuanyuan Sect?

Moreover, they were all unsavory characters from the outer sect, so it was utterly absurd for an elder to comment on them.

The sun was still high in the sky, and with his heart burning with excitement, Song Yan seized the opportunity while his memory was still fresh and went to the alchemy workshop. He rented a second-rate alchemy room and furnace and refined a batch of Qi-Nourishing Pills.

"Yes, Elder Shen is absolutely right."

Song Yan nodded happily, showing no signs of the usual fatigue after alchemy.

"There's no need to control everything in the furnace; the medicinal properties will naturally correspond. Retain more of your spiritual energy to control the medicinal properties and the heat..."

Moreover, he didn't know if it was just his imagination, but he felt that his spiritual sense seemed to have improved slightly again.

Could it be that nameless incantation?

Is it really that fast?

He gazed at the batch of Qi-Nourishing Pills, overjoyed. Given the quality and spiritual energy contained within, these pills would certainly be useful for his own cultivation.

The next day, all the disciples handed over the pills they had refined, and Song Yan was no exception.

The pills are not reviewed in class; they are usually compiled, written down, and then distributed by the instructor's disciples or alchemy apprentices.

Over the next two days, aside from some knowledge that wasn't explored in depth the day before, we began to incorporate some basic information about the history of Daoist alchemy and Huangya Dan (a type of medicinal pill).

Although it didn't feel as useful as what he learned on the first day, it was still alchemical knowledge, so Song Yan didn't mind.

Yellow Sprout Pill is one of the most common pills taken by Qi Refining stage cultivators. The refining process and techniques are much more difficult than those of Nourishing Qi Pill. Song Yan has no plans to spend spirit stones to practice refining it for the time being.

Soon, the three-day sermon came to an end.

At 1:15 PM, at Longshou Mountain.

Guiqulai Hall.

"Wang Xi, Shen Huai, you two clean these up, pick out a few good ones, and write some comments on them."

Shen Yu frowned deeply: "What kind of logic is it to have an elder personally teach alchemy to outer disciples... No wonder Dongyuan Sect hasn't produced a second Golden Core cultivator all these years."

"We've wasted so much time on these things..."

He waved his sleeve and left.

Wang Xi and Shen Huai exchanged a glance, said nothing, and began to organize the pile of pills.

Although Shen Yu emphasized that he would not force it, no outer disciple would waste this opportunity, and even if they did, they wouldn't have the guts.

"..."

Wang Xi was just browsing casually out of boredom, while Shen Huai was taking it very seriously.

However, most of these pills were in a terrible state.

"It doesn't even have a pill-like shape; it's a completely useless pill..."

Wang Xi picked up a pill that, by now it could even be considered quite prestigious, with a playful expression.

"The level of the Dongyuan Sect is truly worse than I expected."

Shen Huai continued his work expressionlessly, coldly saying, "Most of these were made by outer disciples of the Dongyuan Sect, so they don't have much opportunity to practice. This situation is quite normal."

"If you let me, an outer disciple of your sect, refine it, I'm afraid it will be almost the same."

"...ho."

Wang Xi chuckled softly, his meaning ambiguous.

Shen Huai didn't pay attention to his contemptuous tone.

But then again.

These pills are absolutely terrible.

Such a simple pill, yet there are very few people who can even form it...

Waste pills.

Waste pills.

Another useless pill.

The furnace has exploded to the point where the pills are no longer recognizable, so please don't hand them in anymore!

Well, I've finally found a pill that can barely be considered effective.

The problem with this pill is that its quality is mediocre, its shape is unstable, and the process of collecting the pill was too hasty.

The problem with this one is that although the shape of the pill is good, the spiritual energy it contains is far too little. It must be that there was a problem with the ratio of the spiritual herbs, but luckily it was successfully made into a pill.

The Qi-Nourishing Pill contains very little spiritual energy, so what's the difference between a cultivator eating it and eating candy?
The problem with this...

Ok?
The person who discovered that strange pill was not Shen Huai, but Wang Xi.

Shen Huai noticed out of the corner of his eye that Wang Xi was in a daze. He thought Wang Xi was slacking off, but when he turned around, he found that Wang Xi was holding a pill and examining it repeatedly, lost in thought.

"how……"

Shen Huai stared intently, his expression changing slightly.

"what?"

(End of this chapter)