The Sovereign's Ascension

Lin Yun followed the deacon through the left door and down. When they arrived at the underground chambers, both sides of the corridors were filled with Alchemy Chambers that were shut.

As they walked through the corridor, Lin Yun could see the busy alchemists and apprentices. Even the temperature here was much higher than outside.

Suddenly, an explosion sounded out, followed by a minor tremble. Heads turned from every chamber. They looked at the explosion’s direction with glee on their faces.

“Master Ku Yun failed again!”

“Hehe, how many times has it been this month? Is it the fourth or fifth?”

“Haha. I really feel bad for the disciples under him.”

Lin Yun had shock written on his face as he heard the surrounding conversations. He had no idea what was happening. But the deacon leading him did not have any changes in his expression, he didn’t seem surprised at all.

“Get lost! What a bunch of garbage! You guys can’t even differentiate Silver Powder and Hot Silver Powder? How can you guys be so stupid?! Get lost! Clean up the mess before you guys get lost! Also, don’t let me see you guys in the Pellet Hall in the next three months!” A roar rang out from where the explosion came from.

Three months of not being able to step into the Pellet Hall was equivalent to not having any pellets from Pellet Hall for the next three months. It looks like Master Ku Yun was an unreasonable person. After all, who could accept having their cultivation halted for the next three months?

Not only did Master Ku Yun chase his apprentices away, but he even gave them such a severe punishment.

Lin Yun’s face was dark. He knew that this was the trap given to him by Liu Yue. There was no way he could get any benefits out of the Pellet Hall. He might even get himself into trouble if things were messed up.

But since he hadn’t entered the trap, he immediately turned around and left. He did not want to be barred from the Pellet Hall for three months for no reason.

“Where do you think you’re going?” When Lin Yun turned around, he saw the deacon looking at him coldly with mockery on his face. “Behave yourself. You’ve given your promise to the public. Are you trying to go against it now? Don’t think about it, not even an elder can come and save you.”

“How do I address you?” Lin Yun asked with rage boiling in his heart.

“Hu Xingyang. You may address me as Deacon Hu.” Hu Xingyang looked at Lin Yun without any changes in his expression. He couldn’t stretch his hands to any other place outside the Pellet Hall. But in the Pellet Hall, there was nothing Lin Yun could do despite knowing that it would be a trap. After all, he was at fault for offending Liu Yue!

“Alright.” Lin Yun turned back with a cold face.

The deacon continued to follow behind him, preventing him from running. In just a while, a few disciples with dirt on their faces came out from Master Ku Yun’s chamber, with blood dripping down from their lips.

When Lin Yun saw them, his face turned even uglier. With how they looked, how could they be called apprentices? They looked more like beggars instead.

“Master, I’ve brought someone new for you.”

“Come in.”

The deacon then shoved Lin Yun into the chamber and took his leave, not giving Lin Yun any opportunity to speak.

That bastard! Lin Yun cursed inwardly. When he turned his attention to the chamber, he saw a huge cauldron at the center, with a forge beneath breathing out terrifying flames. They were the earth flames and their temperature was something that not even Lin Yun could bear with the Thunderblitz Battle Physique.

“Look around by yourself first. Don’t touch anything here. I’ll call you when I’m done.” Ku Yun was busy with his own matters, so he didn’t turn around. He had displayed the arrogance of an alchemist to the fullest.

Lin Yun fell into deep thought. Ku Yun was so arrogant as a one star alchemist. But then again, those who could be graded with stars were those who had grasped spiritual runes. There was a great difference between an alchemist who had grasped spiritual runes and one who hadn’t. 

Walking over to the corner, Lin Yun looked at the materials laid out on the table. Some of them were even ground into powder. Lin Yun recognized some of these because he had stayed in the Herbal Hall for a month.

“What the hell are these?” Lin Yun saw crystal jade strips in a brocade box. Taking one of them out, Lin Yun examined briefly before realizing that the jade strips all contained some elementary spiritual runes. Lin Yun was baffled that these elementary spiritual runes were treated so importantly, not to mention that these spiritual runes were inferior to the ones recorded in the Age Sutra.

Lin Yun merely took a few glances at them before he lost his interest. They were all a pile of garbage to him.

“Haha, you can’t understand them?” Ku Yun was standing behind Lin Yun and saw how Lin Yun placed the jade strip down. With an arc rising on his lips, he continued, “You’re really ambitious to look at spiritual runes when you’re here. But that doesn’t matter. You can look at them as you wish here. Ponder over them if you don’t understand. Perhaps you’ll get them after three to five years.”

Ku Yun’s words made Lin Yun feel awkward. He had no idea how he should reply. But after a brief pondering, he asked, “Master, does your cauldron explode often? I heard from the apprentices in the other chambers that you’ve exploded your cauldron four to five times this month.”

“What do they know?! I’m refining the Firecloud Pellet. The Firecloud Spiritual Rune is one of the hardest to grasp among one star spiritual runes. If I succeed, then I’ll be promoted to a two star spiritualist. At that time, I’ll get all of them to shut their mouths!” Ku Yun replied with a blackened face. His mood turned foul the moment Lin Yun mentioned the exploding cauldron. “Cut the crap. This is your opportunity. All my underlings are gone and you’re just in time to learn more stuff.”

What do you mean by ‘just in time to learn more,’ you’ve clearly chased them away. And now, I’m going to handle five people’s tasks all by myself.

“I’ll only tell you the proportion once, so remember well. 11 grams of Sunfloat Herb, three portions of Hot Silver Powder, one Firecloud Fruit… Place the materials into the cauldron according to the sequence I told you. Oh, and remember to add spiritual jades to the forge. The forge can’t afford to be extinguished any time during the refinement or the pellets will be ruined.” Master Ku Yun babbled over a hundred materials before turning back to Lin Yun, “Got that?” 

“Got it.” Lin Yun pondered briefly before nodding his head. He had a photographic memory, so something like this was nothing to him.

“You remembered it already?” Ku Yun looked at Lin Yun with doubts before asking, “Then recite it to me. If you fail to do it, then I’ll get the Pellet Hall to withhold providing you pellets for a month.”

“11 grams of Sunfloat Herb, three portions of Hot Silver Powder, one Firecloud Fruit… That should be it for now.” Lin Yun recited the entire recipe without any stops.

When Ku Yun heard that, he narrowed his eyes into slits. He knew that he had picked up a treasure this time. None of those who came to be an apprentice were garbage, but they were just barely acceptable.

“Not bad. Wear this set of clothes. You’ll be under me for the next three months. If you pass my test after three months, I’ll let you officially take me as your master.” Ku Yun threw a set of clothes over to Lin Yun before taking out a pile of herbs. He first shared the recipe with Lin Yun, which the latter remembered.

“What are we doing now? We’re not refining the Firecloud Pellet anymore?” Lin Yun asked.

Waving his hand, Ku Yun replied, “Not for now. I’ve already exploded four cauldrons, so I need to refine some Greater Profound Pellets to recoup my losses.”

Why are you getting me to remember the recipe if we’re not going to refine it? Lin Yun was speechless.

In the blink of an eye, it had already been three days since Lin Yun came under Ku Yun. Lin Yun could tell that Ku Yun had some skills because his refinery of the Greater Profound Pellets went smoothly. Every single cauldron had successfully produced over a dozen pellets, with some elementary spiritual runes imprinted on them.

The Greater Profound Pellets were indispensable to the Profound Martial Realm, just like how Xiantian Pellets were indispensable to those in the Xiantian Realm. The Greater Profound Pellet could greatly aid in forming the profound veins.

But it was a pity that Lin Yun could only stare at those hundreds of pellets. The past three days had been torture for Lin Yun. He had to manage five people’s worth of work all by himself, not to mention that he still had to put up with Ku Yun boasting about his ‘treasures.’

“Alright, we’ll start with the Firecloud Pellet today.” Ku Yun impatiently wanted to start refining the Firecloud Pellet after refining over a hundred Greater Profound Pellets.

Honestly speaking, it was also because of Lin Yun. He initially wanted to let Lin Yun get used to the assisting process, but he never expected Lin Yun to be entirely different compared to those pieces of garbage. He felt that Lin Yun alone was more useful than five people, which greatly boosted his refining efficiency.

He even had the thought of taking Lin Yun as his disciple. But if Lin Yun knew what was going through Ku Yun’s mind, he would probably cry out aloud. Lin Yun didn’t want to stay in this place for another second, even at the expense of offending the Pellet Hall.

“Do you still remember the recipe I told you the other time? I won’t repeat it if you do.” Ku Yun took out a pile of materials for the Firecloud Pellet and called Lin Yun over.

Lin Yun already knew that this fellow wasn’t reliable. If someone else were in his shoes, how could they remember the Firecloud Pellet’s recipe from three days ago?

“Start the fire!” Ku Yun said. 

Reaching into the spiritual jade box, Lin Yun grabbed a pile of spiritual jades and tossed them into the forge. His heart ached when he did this. These spiritual jades would be in good hands if they were given to him. Lin Yun could even use them to increase his Sword Firmament Token’s grade.

Using them to refine the Firecloud Pellet would only go down the drain. When the spiritual jades were thrown into the forge, the fire began to burn with starlight energy emitting out.

“Start putting in the materials according to this sequence, ten sets of Sunfloat Herb and Whiteorchid Root! Remember the portion I told you previously. Don’t mess it up,” said Ku Yun.

Lin Yun immediately prepared ten sets of materials and tossed them into the cauldron. Meanwhile, Ku Yun would control the fire and focus on refinement.

“Quick, the Pale Remnant Flower’s liquid!”

“Well done. Increase the fire!”

“Go to the side hall and get some Hot Silver Powder. Remember, the Hot Silver Powder, not Silver Powder.”

Lin Yun followed Ku Yun’s orders and ran around the chamber covered in sweat. When he was almost done, Ku Yun took out a jade strip emitting a faint light and started inscribing spiritual runes.

Looking at Ku Yun, Lin Yun wiped his sweat and felt relieved. He knew that he could relax now. He watched as Ku Yun spread out a piece of paper flickering with spiritual lights. Then, Ku Yun took out the demonic beast ink and dripped his blood into it before taking out his artifact brush from his interspatial pouch.

Judging from the solemn expression on Ku Yun’s face, Lin Yun knew that the former was going to inscribe a one star spiritual rune now. As for adding his blood into the ink, it was to gain better control over them when inscribing.

However, Lin Yun knew that Ku Yun was only half-baked. In Lin Yun’s eyes, Ku Yun hadn’t even stepped into the threshold of alchemy. Compared to that senior recorded in the Age Sutra, Ku Yun wasn’t even qualified to hold his shoes.

Lin Yun watched on as Ku Yun inscribed the Firecloud Spiritual Runes with his forehead covered in sweat. Looking at Ku Yun, Lin Yun laughed inwardly. Ku Yun looked like a child trying to draw. Not only was he slow, but his inscribing was also ugly. Lin Yun couldn’t even bear to watch it.

Back then, before Lin Yun even cultivated the age energy, he wasn’t as troubled when inscribing spiritual runes.

When Ku Yun saw that Lin Yun was focused on how he inscribed the spiritual runes, Ku Yun felt gratified and sighed, “Good. Watch and learn. If you can learn even just a tiny bit of this one star spiritual rune, you will be able to walk with your head held high in the Pellet Hall.”

Lin Yun laughed inwardly when he heard that. He couldn’t be bothered with what Ku Yun was doing and turned his attention away.

“Done!” Ku Yun cried out in excitement, raising the white paper and throwing it into the cauldron.

But when Lin Yun turned to see what Ku Yun was doing, his face changed drastically. The white paper was permeated with violent energy and barely came together to form a Firecloud Spiritual Rune.

The Firecloud Spiritual Rune was made up of hundreds of elementary spiritual runes. It was extremely hard to inscribe and extremely violent. If they were thrown into the cauldron with such temperature, the consequences would simply be terrifying.

“No, wait!” Lin Yun called out, but it was already too late. Ku Yun didn’t even listen to him and tossed the Firecloud Spiritual Rune into the cauldron.