Chapter Nineteenth: Feng Tao

  Yuan Futong took a glance and put away the transmission talisman, quickly heading into the store. There was nothing particularly special about it, just that someone wanted to order high-grade medicinal pellets, which Jiang Xiaotie couldn't handle on his own.

  Back in the store, a man with a long sword on his back and dressed as a swordsman was sitting inside drinking tea. Jiang Xiao Tie was waiting beside him, occasionally glancing at the door. Seeing Yuan Fu Tong return, he hurriedly came forward to greet him.

  "Gentleman, this Mr. Feng wants to order a custom-made elixir." Jiang Xiaotie said, pointing at the swordsman-like man.

  Yuan Futong waved his hand and walked forward: "Brother Feng, I presume? I am Yuan Futong. May I ask what kind of Dan medicine you would like to have custom-made?"

  "Is that you, the alchemist of this shop?" Seeing Yuan Futong's cultivation base was almost at the 7th level, and he was actually an alchemist, Feng Tao was slightly surprised.

  "Exactly, what does Brother Feng need?" Yuan Futong slightly furrowed his brow and continued to ask.

  "Haha, Brother Yuan is indeed a hero, not limited by his age. At such a young age, he has already achieved this level of cultivation and is even an alchemist. I'm truly envious!"

  "I don't dare, Brother Feng is overpraising." Yuan Futong's eyebrows furrowed again, and he didn't ask any more questions, wanting to see what this person wanted to say.

  "Haha, look at Brother Yuan's age, not even twenty yet? At such a young age, he has already reached the seventh layer of Qi refinement, which is the progress of the elite children of large families. Moreover, brother has become an alchemist. You know that alchemists in the Qi refinement stage require good fire spirit roots and fire system techniques, and also need guidance from high-level alchemy masters. Brother Yuan, you have achieved this, your master must be very powerful, right?" This Feng Tao, a sword cultivator, seems to be a chatterbox, judging by his non-stop talking style, it's probably due to his personality. Thinking of this, Yuan Futong also tolerated him, after all, the other party was also a Qi refinement seventh layer cultivator, listening to him talk could also gain some understanding of the situation.

  "Hehe, little brother has just learned to refine the elixir and come out to make a name for himself." Yuan Futong did not answer directly, but followed Feng Tao's words and said a sentence.

  "That's right, with Brother's current cultivation, it shouldn't be too dangerous to come out now. Refining pills requires practice, and coming out to gain experience is also a way to hone one's skills. I wonder what other kinds of pills Brother Yuan can refine besides the ones on this shelf?" After speaking for half a day, Feng Tao finally got to the point.

  "The elixirs I need for the Qi Refining stage can basically all be refined by me, it's just that the success rate of refining higher-grade elixirs is a bit lower."

  "Oh, Yuan brother is really a genius."

  "I don't dare, I don't know what kind of medicine Brother Feng needs." Seeing that Feng Tao was about to change the subject again, Yuan Futong quickly asked his question.

  "Oh, I want to buy some Qi-gathering pills, do you have any in stock?"

  Yuan Futong took out a jade bottle from the Qiankun bag, poured out a yellow pill, and handed it to Feng Tao. "The goods are available, Brother Feng, take a look if it meets your requirements."

  Feng Tao took the pill, held it in his hand and examined it carefully for a while, then put it under his nose and sniffed it. He nodded. "The color is not bad, the quality should not be inferior, at least it's mid-grade, did you refine it yourself, little brother?"

  "Oh, yes. However, the technique is not very skilled, and no high-quality elixir has been refined yet. But there are some medium-quality elixirs." Yuan Futong said with some reserve.

  "Haha, mid-grade is already good enough for us scattered cultivators to use such quality elixirs. The grading of elixirs isn't very clear-cut, roughly divided into four levels: low-grade, mid-grade, high-grade, and top-grade. A batch of elixirs usually has some low-grade ones, with mid-grade being the mainstay. To produce high-grade elixirs, one needs to excel in aspects such as medicinal materials, the elixir furnace, or flames. It's hard to achieve solely through technique. As for top-grade elixirs, their appearance rate is even lower; apart from requiring good medicinal materials, an elixir furnace, and flames, one also needs a profound method of collecting medicine when refining the elixir. Using forbidden power to promote the fusion of the elixir's energy during the condensation process is necessary for top-grade elixirs to appear."

  The difference in grade within the same kind of Dan medicine is still very large. Like this current Qi Gathering Pill, this Dan medicine is the main cultivation auxiliary medicine after practicing Qi seven layers. If it's a low-grade Dan medicine, not only will the auxiliary effect be lower than that of high-quality Dan medicine, but also if a cultivator eats around 100 pills, eating this Dan medicine again won't have much effect. Moreover, it will also affect the effect of taking other Dan medicines with Huang Jing as the main ingredient. Perhaps 100 Qi Gathering Pills are enough to go from practicing Qi seven layers to practicing Qi nine layers, but after reaching the ninth layer, you can no longer use Qi Gathering Pills for auxiliary purposes. Losing the most common auxiliary Dan medicine is a very troublesome thing for cultivators. If it reaches that point, there's only the choice of using Golden Marrow Pill, which is much more expensive than Qi Gathering Pill, and what needs to be paid out will be even more.

  Generally, when you've consumed over 200 Zhongpin Jiqi Dan, they will lose their effectiveness. However, for cultivators with average innate talent, these pills can be used until the 11th layer of Qi Refining. At this point, it's already possible to afford replacing them with better medicine, and that's roughly the limit of what Zhongpin Jiqi Dan can do. This way, you won't have to worry about using low-quality medicine again. Of course, different medicines develop resistance at different rates, and people with different physiques react differently to medicine. But generally speaking, mid-grade medicine just barely suffices, with only a small margin for error.

  High-grade elixirs are rarely seen among scattered cultivators, only disciples of the four major sects and elites from large immortal families can enjoy them. The effect is much better than that of medium-grade elixirs, and the improvement in cultivation speed is even more pronounced. If low-grade Gathering Spirit Pills can improve cultivation speed by one layer, then mid-grade pills can reach one and a half layers, while high-grade pills can almost reach two layers. This effect is very obvious.

  Top-grade elixirs are rarely seen, and in the Dànmén School, such elixirs are also rare treasures. It seems that only Huichun Valley occasionally produces them, and they are all consumed internally. The preciousness of top-grade elixirs lies in the fact that taking them is said to reduce the difficulty of bottlenecks. This is a very rare advantage, which immediately widens the price gap with ordinary elixirs. In the Qi-refining stage, the effect of elixirs is not obvious, but when it comes to the Foundation Building and Golden Elixir stages, the benefits of using auxiliary elixirs will increase their value several times over.

  However, Yuan Futong's current level is not high, and he can refine a large amount of medium-grade elixirs with few low-grade ones. The main credit goes to Huo Yu's help. Aggregating Elixir was something he only started refining after reaching the seventh layer. During refinement, he consciously controlled the spiritual power provided by Huo Yu to form spiritual fire mixed with his own law-provided flames for alchemy, discovering that both the elixir yield and quality had greatly improved. Knowing that he had discovered another function of Huo Yu, Yuan Futong was confident in his alchemy career. Techniques can be practiced, cauldrons can be replaced with better ones, materials can be bought at a higher quality, cultivation can be improved, and others' achievements can be matched. But having the unique Huo Yu cheating for him, the development of his alchemy career will surely be bright. Currently, he can only refine medium-grade elixirs, but when other conditions improve, refining high-grade elixirs won't be a problem. With this advantageous condition, he took action to open a shop in Fang City.

  The price difference between different grades of the same Dan medicine is very large, especially for those used to break through the bottleneck, the price difference between different qualities is even greater. Ji Qi Dan belongs to general auxiliary Dan medicine, and the difference between each grade is not too big. So there are medium-grade Dan medicines, Feng Tao didn't think about buying cheaper lower-grade ones. After checking the quality of the Dan medicine, Feng Tao returned it to Yuan Fu Tong, who put it back in the jade bottle.

  "How many spirit stones is this dan medicine worth?"

  "Fifty-one pieces, and if Brother Feng uses high-grade spiritual medicine to trade, there's a discount." Yuan Futong didn't forget to advertise, high-grade spiritual medicine is collected by many households in the market, if you go to those shops to buy it's really expensive, it's better to collect yourself. His own shop had just opened, there was no business, others had good things and couldn't think of selling them here, they all sold them to familiar shops. So advertising is still necessary, discounts are still needed. This is common sense that people who have been in the economic society know.

  "Oh, you're still collecting spiritual medicine. Can we exchange it for dan medicine?" Feng Tao didn't notice the notice posted by Yuan Futong on the door, or maybe he saw it but didn't pay attention.

  "Haha, I can do this. You provide the medicinal materials and I'll take care of the refining business. Of course, under the condition that you know about Danfang, I also accept rare Danfang that I've never seen before at a very reasonable price. Brother Feng, if your friends need Dan medicine or want to sell them, please help me spread the word."

  "Oh, okay, I will. As it happens, I have some medicinal materials to sell, you can estimate the price." Feng Tao said as he took out a pile of jade boxes from his Qiankun bag and placed them on the table. The medicinal materials were all packed in special jade boxes for collecting herbs, it seemed that Feng Tao was also a very professional herb collector. Yuan Futong opened each box one by one, occasionally pointing to Jiang Xiaotie beside him, giving him a brief explanation of the value of the medicinal materials. In fact, Yuan Futong had not come into contact with many medicinal materials, just some low-grade ones left behind by Lin Qianshan, and some top-grade spiritual medicines left behind by Yuan Xing and Gu Dao Ren.

  But the book in his hand did not disappoint her 2,000 spirit stones' high price, with very detailed introductions to various medicinal materials. Yuan Futong had studied this "Spirit Medicine Compendium" seriously over the past three years and had also conducted medicine identification training with the spirit medicines in his hand. Now he was not at all intimidated by the numerous types of medicinal materials that Feng Tao took out, one by one examining and estimating their prices. Feng Tao listened silently beside him, nodding repeatedly without raising any objections.

  After the medicinal materials were counted, Yuan Futong said to Feng Tao: "Brother Feng, I'll take all these medicinal materials. Although there aren't many high-grade medicinal materials, the variety is very rich. How about we settle for 900 Ling Stones?"

  "Alright, Brother Yuan not only has a good eye for things, but the price he offers is also fair. Then can you help me take a look at this spiritual medicine and see how much it's worth?" Feng Tao himself had an idea in mind, seeing that Yuan Fu Tong didn't lowball him, and the price he offered was slightly higher than other places, so he took out the real thing and handed the jade box to Yuan Fu Tong.

  Yuan Futong opened the jade box and smiled slightly: "Brother Feng is really lucky. Is this thing for sale?"

  "Hehe, give an estimate." Feng Tao didn't respond immediately, apparently afraid of selling at a loss.

  "This is a Silver Thorn Grass, the fire candidate should be over a thousand years old. It's one of the main medicines for refining the Soul Gathering Pill." Jiang Xiao Tie, who was standing beside him, listened with his heart racing. He didn't know about the Silver Thorn Grass, but he knew about the Soul Gathering Pill, which was an auxiliary medicine to help break through the 9th layer of Qi training, and it was extremely expensive. This Silver Thorn Grass is probably not cheap either.

  "Haha, Brother Yuan is quite knowledgeable, I wonder how much Brother Yuan estimates it can sell for?" Feng Tao was also a bit nervous.

  "If Brother Feng wants to sell, I'll give 1,500 spirit stones for it." Yuan Futong estimated the value and quoted a price.

  "Haha, brother is pleased. Just 1,500 yuan for all of these, and I'll throw in some Qi-gathering pellets." Feng Tao was thrilled with the price, which was much higher than he had expected, and quickly finalized the deal. Yuan Futong's expression revealed that he had given a slightly high price, but considering his own interests, it wasn't a loss either, so he didn't mind. After all, giving a good price would also help him attract some customers for himself.

  "Alright, there are 48 of them in total. There are 50 Spirit Gathering Pills here, I'll give them to Brother Feng."

  "Then thank you. I'll definitely help you promote more." Having obtained two more Lingdan, Feng Tao was also very happy and left with a smile.