Nine Star Hegemon Body Art

BANG!

“LONG CHEN!!!”

A furious scream pierced through everyone’s ears. It sounded like an evil ghoul was demanding their lives, causing everyone’s hair to stand on end.

That sound had come from Xia Baichi’s mouth. She was exceptionally malevolent and sinister now; her face twisted as she glared at Long Chen.

That had been the critical moment in the refinement of the Blood Spirit Fruit. She had been trying to find the perfect temperature to purify it.

But with Long Chen’s shocking cries, her flame had burst out of her control. By the time she had managed to put it back under her control, it was too already late, and an extremely precious three-hundred-year-old Blood Spirit Fruit had turned to ash just like that. Her heart dripped blood.

“Haha, my bad. My habit is to warm up my throat before refining pills. I was afraid to scare you, so I shouted several times to tell you that I was about to start refining. Truly unfortunate.” Long Chen acted completely apologetic.

It was intentional, so intentional. Even a blind person could tell. Xia Baichi was practically spitting flames from her eyes.

But she had no way to contradict Long Chen. There was no rule which said that the opponent couldn’t make noise. This time, she had suffered a great loss.

“Focus!” Wei Cang coldly shouted, and only then did Xia Baichi slowly suppress her anger. If she didn’t calm herself, she might really lose.

“I’m very focused. No need to worry about it,” replied Long Chen coldly. “Idiot sister, you should continue refining. Next time, I’ll do my best to keep my voice down for you, alright?”[1]

Xia Baichi no longer bothered with Long Chen. With an ashen expression, she took out her second set of medicinal ingredients from her spatial ring. She then plugged her ears so that she wouldn’t have to worry about Long Chen scaring her again.

What caused him to be speechless was that she actually took out a second extremely aged Blood Spirit Fruit; her many preparations truly caused Long Chen to be depressed.

And since she was already on guard against him, it would be difficult to make her fail again. He could only resign himself to his bad luck.

Long Chen raised his hand and a yellow flame soared into existence. What caused Wei Cang’s pupils to shrink was that Long Chen’s flame was actually not that much weaker than Xia Baichi’s.

Grandmaster Yun Qi was also slightly startled when he saw Long Chen’s Pill Flame. That Pill Flame was several times stronger than from the last time he had seen him refining pills.

“Haha, just like I said, brother Long definitely won’t have any troubles. See, he also has a flame in his hand.”  Fatty Yu was very pleased with himself.

Even for them, it was their first time seeing Long Chen condensing a Pill Flame. They became much more at ease; this meant that Long Chen was a true Pill Apprentice.

His Pill Flame startled many people; although they had been told of his identity as a Pill Apprentice, they had still doubted it. Seeing his Pill Flame in person put out many of those doubts.

Could he really have become a Pill Apprentice in just two months without any previous foundation? They were filled with veneration as they looked at the settled and stable grandmaster Yun Qi.

Yun Qi bitterly laughed inside. Only he himself knew that Long Chen’s pill refining arts weren’t taught by him. It seemed that Long Chen had many secrets surrounding him.

Chu Yao watched as Long Chen condensed his Pill Flame. After stabilizing the flame, he started to warm up the cauldron. His movements were very much at ease and his expression was calm, letting her extremely nervous heart relax quite a bit.

Xia Baichi had once more steadied herself and was steadily purifying her Blood Spirit Fruit. Long Chen had an urge to shout out to her once more, but thinking about how low his chance of success would be this time, plus the shaming ridicule from others, he decided to give that up and start refining his own Blood Spirit Fruit.

His Blood Spirit Fruit was only the size of a longan and much inferior compared to the fist-sized three-hundred-year-old Blood Spirit Fruit of Xia Baichi’s.

Not only was the size different, but the purity of the essence within was much inferior. It could be said that Long Chen was behind before the competition had even started. This was definitely unfair.

He could only do his best to discard the impurities within his Blood Spirit Fruit. In terms of final pill quality, he was already a step behind. He would have to make up for it in other areas.

Suddenly, his flame exploded in strength. His Pill Flame filled the entire pill furnace and the terrifying flame gave everyone a scorching feeling.

“What a powerful Spiritual Strength.”

Even Wei Cang was surprised. Long Chen was using his Spiritual Strength as the fuel for his Pill Flame and had even split a portion of it to protect the Blood Spirit Fruit’s essence so that it wouldn’t be lost. This kind of technique was extremely wild.

But after he recovered from his surprise, he sneered. It was true that his Spiritual Strength was very powerful, but his Blood Spirit Fruit was less than fifty years old, so how could he compare to the one that was over a hundred years old? Moreover, that was a three-hundred-year-old fruit.

Wasting this much Spiritual Strength at the early stage meant that he wouldn’t have enough Spiritual Strength to seal the pill at the critical moment of pill condensation. This was a path of failure in Wei Cang’s eyes. This was clearly not an expert’s way of refining.

Only grandmaster Yun Qi wasn’t surprised by Long Chen’s action. He couldn’t help lamenting at such a luxurious method though. Only Long Chen had the qualifications to use such a technique with his outrageously enormous Spiritual Strength.

Within Long Chen’s cauldron was a pile of red powder which he took out. The powder was very red and didn’t have many spots within it, letting him relax a bit.

Those spots were impurities, but with his current flame strength, it was impossible to completely purify them. This was already the best he could do.

Looking at Xia Baichi’s side, he saw that after she had plugged her ears, she had managed to completely ignore the rest of the world and was very efficient. There was also a pile of red powder beside her.

That was the Blood Spirit Fruit’s medicinal essence. What caused Long Chen’s eyes to shrink was that the three-hundred-year-old Blood Spirit Fruit was truly different from his. That powder was much brighter than his and had even fewer impurities.

He couldn’t help but frown. No matter how great the refining techniques he had, he didn’t dare display any of them. If that scoundrel Wei Cang noticed, he would find it very fishy.

Right now, he had to take things one step at a time. If he really couldn’t win normally, then he would throw caution to the wind and take some drastic measures. In any case, he definitely wouldn’t lose.

Refining herb after herb, he realized that over half the time had passed. As for Xia Baichi, she had already sealed her furnace and begun refining the pill.

After sealing the furnace, it meant it was already finalized. Other than the final moment of condensing the pill, there were no other steps that were likely to fail.

“Long Chen, time’s almost up. I really am looking forward to the time when you kneel in front of me.” Xia Baichi had already taken out her earplugs and was coldly sneering at Long Chen.

Her sealed furnace only had to maintain a stable Pill Flame. In order to repay her grievance against him, she started to attempt disturbing him.

“I’m begging you, shut your mouth. The crap you spout will affect the quality of the air,” said Long Chen.

“You-!”

Xia Baichi’s anger caused her Pill Flame to jump ever so slightly, scaring her and forcing her to calm herself down. She didn’t dare speak again and even once more put in her earplugs.

She realized that in a battle of words, even ten thousand of her weren’t equal to Long Chen. Right now, she focused all her energy on the pill. She looked forward to the moment when Long Chen would be humiliated in front of her.

Long Chen also sealed his furnace a short time later. The two of them were both urging their Pill Flames to increase the speed of forming the medicinal pill.

BANG! A quarter hour later, Xia Baichi’s pill furnace started to boom. The originally silent plaza immediately became excited.

Even though they hadn’t seen pills being refined before, they had all heard that when the pill was formed, strange events would occur with the pill furnace. This was clearly an omen of the pill forming.

The sound became louder and louder, and the furnace started to shake violently. With a cold shout, Xia Baichi slapped her hands onto her pill furnace, her Spiritual Strength pouring in.

BOOM!

A huge explosion rang out and then the pill furnace became completely silent. Xia Baichi was unable to suppress her own excitement.

With her rich pill refining experience, she was ninety percent sure that she had successfully refined it despite being a bit nervous inside.

Slowly reaching her hand into the furnace, a dense pill fragrance swept out and quickly spread throughout the plaza.

“What a dense fragrance!”

Many people were surprised, and Wei Cang was very pleased. Even without looking, he could tell that she had succeeded just from this fragrance.

“HAHAHAHA!!!”

Xia Baichi took out a round medicinal pill; her face was filled with feverish excitement. But due to her being too excited, her laugh sounded coarse and hard to listen to.

“Who stepped on your neck?” Long Chen glanced at Xia Baichi and asked with great concern.

Although she knew he was ridiculing her, she didn’t care. She coldly glared at him. “Kid, I’m waiting for you to kowtow to me, haha…”

Long Chen shook his head a couple of times and no longer said anything. But he really was alarmed inside. This crazy woman’s luck truly was too good. She had actually refined a middle grade Blood Condensing Pill. It was no wonder she had laughed so wildly.

There was an extremely faint pill line on her pill, and although it was extremely faint, there was no doubt that it was a pill line.

With Xia Baichi’s ability, the probability of her refining such a middle grade medicinal pill was definitely not over one percent.

Did the heavens favor idiots? Long Chen couldn’t help but curse inside. If it continued like this, then he really might lose. No, he had to think of a method.

At this time, Long Chen’s pill furnace was also starting to shake, meaning that his pill was also on the verge of forming. He had reached the most critical moment.

“Crap, I must win!”

Long Chen took a deep breath. In front of everyone’s shocked eyes, he slapped his hand atop the pill furnace and opened the lid slightly.

“What?!”

Yun Qi was completely shocked; at this critical moment when the pill was forming, you absolutely could not open the furnace’s lid! Otherwise, the medicinal nature inside would be lost!

Even Wei Cang was shocked. Long Chen’s actions were completely out of the ordinary for refining pills, but he appeared completely serious and it didn’t seem as if he was giving up.

At the same time as he opened the lid, Long Chen’s Spiritual Strength started to wildly circulate and tightly locked in the medicinal nature within the pill furnace.

BOOM BOOM BOOM!!!

The pill furnace was continuously emitting explosive sounds and sweat poured down Long Chen’s face. The medicinal pill within the furnace was acting like a struggling wild bull.

Long Chen used his Spiritual Strength to seal it, but the amount of Spiritual Strength being used was completely shocking.

Crap, I’m almost out of Spiritual Strength!

Long Chen suddenly felt a burst of fatigue. He shouted out, madly sending his Spiritual Strength out.

BOOM!

The entire martial arena shook along with the pill furnace. Long Chen closed and tightly pressed down on the furnace’s lid.

Only when the pill furnace became still did Long Chen finally relax. His whole body was drenched in sweat. The amount of energy he had used just now had been too great.

Slowly opening the lid, the pill fragrance floated out. Looking at the medicinal pill within the furnace, Long Chen’s expression suddenly changed.

[1] As he did in a previous chapter, here he turns her name Baichi into ‘idiot’. The pronunciation of the ‘chi’ is first tone when he says idiot and second tone in her real name.