Mortal's Purple Sky Cave Heaven

Chapter 3 Refining the Yellow Dragon Pill

Nie Zhaonan sat cross-legged to recover, and when his magic power was replenished, he drew the talisman again.

This went on for four days, and after using up two hundred pieces of talisman paper, he finally drew twenty-seven "Palm Thunder" talismans.

Looking at the talisman in his hand, he finally put down his worries. Nie Zhaonan realized that he was quite talented in making talismans, or maybe it was because he had lived two lives as a human and his soul was strong.

"With this talisman-making technique, I don't have to worry about spirit stones for the time being."

Nie Zhaonan said with a smile on his face.

"The Nie family has a commercial building, so I don't have to risk going to the market outside the family to sell talismans."

Nie Zhaonan narrowed his eyes slightly, thinking about how to trade the talisman in his hand in exchange for spirit stones.

After thinking for a while and finding that there was no danger, Nie Zhaonan immediately put the talisman in his hand into the storage bag, stood up, pushed the door and left.

As far as Nie Zhaonan's current cultivation level is concerned, it is still too weak. He is merely a low-level cultivator at the lowest level of the Qi Refining Stage.

If such a low-level cultivator did not have the support of his family and had not always stayed in the family and never gone out, he would probably have been beheaded long ago.

The dangers in the world of cultivating immortals are not just talk. If you are not careful, you may be robbed of your life and property, and even die.

In the Nie family business building, Nie Zhaonan took out ten talismans and handed them to the middle-aged shopkeeper.

The shopkeeper took the talisman and examined it carefully. He then glanced at Nie Zhaonan, who was in his early teens, and then said with emotion, "You are so young, yet you can draw talismans, and you have full spiritual power. You are truly gifted and have a bright future!"

But he was thinking in his heart that this person must be the famous thunder spirit monk in the family.

His reputation is well-deserved and his future is limitless. He will definitely be a great repairman in the future. It is necessary to make friends with him in advance.

However, in the eyes of this shopkeeper, the great cultivator was just a foundation-building cultivator. After all, he was just a Qi-refining cultivator, and that was all he could think of.

The middle-aged shopkeeper's eyes kept rolling in his sockets. He kept thinking and calculating the gains and losses, and his shrewd eyes kept flashing.

"I just have a little talent in making talismans, thank you for the compliment, shopkeeper." Nie Zhaonan said modestly.

Nie Zhaonan had no idea what the shopkeeper was thinking and answered calmly with no changing expression on his face.

The shopkeeper gave a fair price: "The purchase price of the elementary low-level thunder attribute talisman is slightly higher than the ordinary fireball spell and water bullet talisman. It can be sold for one spirit stone, a total of ten spirit stones."

"What do you think, fellow Daoist?" He finally asked Nie Zhaonan.

Nie Zhaonan touched his chin, felt nothing wrong, nodded, and replied: "That's good, please give me two dozen talisman papers, and use the remaining spirit stones to buy the medicinal seeds for Huanglongdan."

With this amount of spirit stones, he couldn't even buy the herbs for a set of Huanglong Pills, so Nie Zhaonan had to settle for the next best thing and buy some seeds. However, buying seeds and then using spirit stones to ripen them was actually the best option for Nie Zhaonan.

The middle-aged shopkeeper quickly replied: "Okay, please wait a moment."

After saying that, he went towards the wooden stairs to the attic, climbed up the stairs, and quickly went upstairs in a few steps. His figure disappeared. It turned out that he went to get the talisman paper and elixir seeds that Nie Zhaonan needed.

After a while, the shopkeeper handed the talisman paper and spiritual medicine seeds to Nie Zhaonan, and a smile appeared on his wrinkled face. He said in a rather flattering way: "If you need any materials in the future, you can come here. I will definitely satisfy you."

The implication is that giving Nie Zhaonan a special discount is clearly meant to make friends and curry favor.

Nie Zhaonan did not refuse. He took the talisman paper and the spiritual medicine seeds, bowed, and thanked them, "Thank you very much for your care, shopkeeper."

After saying goodbye, he left the Nie family business.

After a while, Nie Zhaonan returned to the room in the courtyard.

He quickly closed the door, entered the Zixiao Cave, and planted the seeds of medicinal herbs needed to refine the Yellow Dragon Pill.

Looking at the medicinal fields full of medicinal herbs, Nie Zhaonan's heart was filled with joy, and a satisfied smile unconsciously appeared on the corners of his mouth.

After a while, Nie Zhaonan calmed down and carefully picked all the seven-star grasses that were three years old, a total of one hundred plants, and cut, crushed, and steamed them according to the requirements of making talisman paper.
After completing the tedious process of making talisman paper, Nie Zhaonan wiped the sweat from his forehead as he looked at the yellow talisman paper spread out on the wooden board.

He sighed and said, "Making talisman paper is really not a simple craft. It is very difficult to successfully make talisman paper. Although there were some small mistakes in the middle, fortunately, it succeeded the first time."

Before officially starting to make talisman paper, Nie Zhaonan copied a jade slip for making talisman paper called "One Hundred Instructions for Making Low-Level Talisman Paper" from the Nie family's Sutra Library.

Nie Zhaonan spent nearly half a month carefully studying the annotations and some previous experiences. After fully understanding them, he reviewed all the steps of making talisman paper in his mind more than ten times. Only after he confirmed that there were no mistakes did he start making it.

"We can't slack off even after completing the production of the talisman paper. We still have to hurry up and refine the talismans to earn more spirit stones!"

Nie Zhaonan thought to himself.

Then he began to make talismans in full swing.

From then on, every two months, Nie Zhaonan would sell ten to twenty talismans at the Nie family business. Most of the spiritual stones he earned were used to buy several Yellow Dragon Pill ingredients to cover up his own elixir refining and to ripen the spiritual medicines in the Zixiao Cave.

And so on and on.

One day, when Nie Zhaonan’s cultivation reached the fourth level of Qi Refining, he began to learn alchemy.

Before this, Nie Zhaonan often went to the Nie family commercial building to buy some spiritual medicines for refining the Yellow Dragon Pill. At the same time, he ripened about 300 medicinal materials for refining the Yellow Dragon Pill. Half of the spiritual stones were spent on this, which made Nie Zhaonan feel quite painful.

In the Zixiao Cave, Nie Zhaonan sat cross-legged in front of a bronze alchemy furnace, looking carefully at the recipe for the Yellow Dragon Pill in his hand.

It is said to be a single prescription, but in fact it is just the ratio of medicinal ingredients.

Huanglongdan is not a real elixir yet. It is just a mixture of liquid medicine of high-age spiritual herbs, which gradually solidifies under high temperature and is then rolled into pills.

Even so, the medicinal power of the elixir, the ratio of ingredients, and the control of the cooking temperature are not something that a beginner like Nie Zhaonan can easily master.

Nie Zhaonan had already prepared himself for failure. Even if he wanted to successfully refine the Yellow Dragon Pill and thus step into the realm of alchemy, the difficulty would be extremely great.

Nie Zhaonan carefully prepared the medicine according to the prescription, slowly put the medicine into the bronze furnace, then lit a fire under the furnace and slowly roasted the medicine. As expected, a pungent smell came out of the furnace after a while.

Nie Zhaonan sighed and muttered to himself, "Ah, despite being so careful, the refining still failed. The proportions of the spiritual medicine are wrong, and the temperature of the furnace heating the liquid medicine is too high."

Nie Zhaonan was not disappointed. After thinking carefully for a while, he continued to refine the Yellow Dragon Pill and put another batch of herbs into the alchemy furnace. "The main ingredients are too much."

"The fire is too cold."

"The medicine was not mixed sufficiently."

Problems of all kinds appeared one after another, and accidents continued to occur.

Sunrise, sunset, dusk, night, time passes quickly.

After many failures, Nie Zhaonan's experience in refining elixirs continued to grow and accumulate.

Finally, two hours later.

Looking at the three round and fragrant Huanglong pills in the alchemy furnace, Nie Zhaonan's bloodshot eyes were filled with uncontrollable joy, and he said:

"I have finally succeeded in refining the Yellow Dragon Pill! Although I was able to refine ten medicinal materials and only made three pills, this success means a lot to me!" His tone revealed his undisguised joy.

He stretched out his fingers, pinched a Yellow Dragon Pill, held it in front of his eyes to examine it carefully, put his nose close to it to smell the fragrance of the pill, and Nie Zhaonan nodded with satisfaction.

Then he took out a jade bottle, put the three Huanglong pills in it, put the stopper in it, and put it aside.

After calming down his agitated mood, Nie Zhaonan closed his eyes lightly, and sat cross-legged on the cushion to meditate and refine his Qi, in order to restore his body and spirit which were a little tired from continuously refining the Yellow Dragon Pill for a long time. At the same time, he kept reviewing in his mind the key to his success just now.

An unknown amount of time had passed. When all the fatigue in his body was gone, Nie Zhaonan opened his eyes and continued to devote himself to the task of refining the elixir.

Day and night, after three days of continuous refining, Nie Zhaonan finally refined all the medicinal materials into Huanglong Pills.

There were jade bottles placed all over the ground. Nie Zhaonan counted them carefully and found that there were 165 bottles of pills in total. The success rate was 5%, which made Nie Zhaonan very happy.

"In fact, practice makes perfect. The success rate of the last 50 portions of Huanglong Pills has reached 8%, and 41 bottles of Huanglong Pills have been refined. I can be considered a master alchemist. Of course, I am only a master alchemist who specializes in refining Huanglong Pills." Nie Zhaonan thought quite complacently.

After all, few other alchemists can have a higher success rate in making pills than Nie Zhaonan.

In the human world, due to excessive picking by our ancestors and the invasion of ancient demons, the spiritual energy in the human world has become increasingly thin. The spiritual energy in the mountains and fields is even scarcer, and is not enough to support the growth of spiritual medicines. For various reasons, spiritual medicine resources are extremely precious and scarce.

Nowadays, in the world of immortal cultivation, there are very few spiritual medicines needed by low-level cultivators, not to mention sufficient spiritual medicines for alchemists to practice, increase their proficiency, and improve their alchemy skills.

Nie Zhaonan is obviously not among them. With the Zixiao Cave in his hand, Nie Zhaonan can continue to ripen elixirs. With countless elixirs to practice with, he can constantly improve his alchemy skills and accumulate alchemy experience. It is only a matter of time before he becomes a true high-level alchemy master.

Nie Zhaonan came to the Nie family commercial building again and just walked into the hall.

The middle-aged shopkeeper came forward and greeted him in a familiar manner: "Daoyou, let's go to the second floor to trade."

After saying this, he made a gesture of invitation and led the way.

After many transactions, the middle-aged shopkeeper has had a preliminary understanding of Nie Zhaonan's character. Nie Zhaonan is not very fond of showing off, is cautious, and has a steadiness that is rare among young people.

As a result, for many subsequent transactions, the shopkeeper would invite Nie Zhaonan to go upstairs to increase the privacy of the transaction and prevent it from being snooped by anyone with ulterior motives.

Nie Zhaonan nodded and replied, "Thank you, boss."

He calmly followed the shopkeeper and went up to the second floor.

The waiter in the commercial building was used to this. After taking a look, he continued to explain the functions and uses of the magic tools to other customers and strongly recommended them to buy them.

But some customers were curious about this. A middle-aged man in a gray robe with a stubble on his face asked the waiter in surprise: "Waiter, the Taoist friend just now and I are both mid-stage Qi Refining cultivators. In fact, my cultivation level is the sixth level of Qi Refining, which is two levels higher than his. Why did he get this treatment?"

These words attracted the attention of everyone in the hall.

The waiter thought for two seconds and replied tactfully, "I don't know much about this young Taoist friend. I just know that he comes to the business building to trade some talismans every once in a while. I think he is a talisman maker."

There was no other color in his tone, he just spoke calmly.

"Haha. Do you think other people are just as ordinary as you? You haven't accomplished anything at your age, old man Luo?" A middle-aged man joked, seeming to be quite familiar with the middle-aged man in gray robe.

The middle-aged man in gray robe snorted indignantly: "Humph, you are still the same. The eldest brother doesn't talk about the second brother."

He made a casual retort and walked towards a counter in the distance, seemingly not wanting to communicate too much with this person.

After that, the topic was not continued, and the quiet hall resumed the sound of questions and explanations.
Upstairs, the two sat opposite each other in a private room.

The middle-aged shopkeeper poured a cup of tea for Nie Zhaonan and said casually: "Daoyou, this is a rare spiritual tea. Although it cannot increase your cultivation, it can calm your mind and spirit. The taste is also quite pleasant, with a sweet aftertaste and a lingering fragrance. Daoyou can try it."

Nie Zhaonan was not worried about the shopkeeper tampering with the tea. Not to mention that the two of them knew each other quite well, their identities as both were members of the Nie family, so there was no conflict of interest.

On the other hand, he is highly valued by the master of the house, and the shopkeeper will only try to curry favor with him.

He thanked her and said, "Thank you very much, boss."

Nie Zhaonan picked up the tea, took a sip, and savored it carefully. It was indeed as the shopkeeper said, it was memorable.

After tasting the tea, the shopkeeper was the first to ask, breaking the silence: "What kind of transaction do you want to make this time?" The shopkeeper was a little confused about Nie Zhaonan's arrival. After all, it was only a month since the last transaction. According to Nie Zhaonan's habit of trading every two months, this arrival was quite unexpected.

Nie Zhaonan flicked his hand over the storage bag, and then a jade porcelain bottle appeared in his hand. He handed it to the shopkeeper and said casually: "I have recently learned the art of alchemy and was lucky enough to make some Huanglong Pills. Shopkeeper, can you take a closer look and see how much they are worth?"

"Yellow Dragon Pill?" Upon hearing the word Yellow Dragon Pill, the shopkeeper exclaimed in surprise.

He opened the bottle stopper, poured out a round Huanglong Pill, and examined it carefully. Then he said, "It is indeed Huanglong Pill, of high quality. I can give you 10 spirit stones for one bottle."

After all, Huanglong Pill is only a pill used in the early and middle stages of Qi Refining. Its effect on the late stages of Qi Refining is not very obvious. Therefore, no matter how good its quality is, it cannot be priced too high.

Nie Zhaonan hesitated for a moment and nodded: "Okay, let's do this price."

Then he took out ten bottles of Yellow Dragon Pill from his storage bag and handed them to the shopkeeper, saying, "Shopkeeper, just give me fifty spirit stones. The remaining spirit stones can be used to buy 10 dozen talisman papers, and the rest can be used to buy Yellow Dragon Pill, Golden Marrow Pill, spiritual medicines, and seeds."

Thank you all fellow Taoists for your support!

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(End of this chapter)