Ch173 - Apprentice Selection

Edited by Zaki

The next day, the Elders formally selected the disciples. After the Elders arrived, the Eighteen Peak Masters sat on the East side, while the other second-class Elders sat on the West side.

The Officiating Elder, Elder Liu, came out and stood in front of all the disciples. “Disciples, listen, I am the Officiating Elder – Liu Shan. Today is the day for the disciples of the lower and middle continents to choose their Masters. All of you are the elite disciples of the inner door, and you are free to choose the Master you want to follow. Every Elder has a wooden token in his hand, and you can go and get the wooden token from the Elder you want to worship under. Now you can go and get the wooden token.”

Hearing Elder Liu’s words, most of the disciples went to the eighteen Elders seated in the East side. There were also a small number of disciples who had not bought the sect’s information the previous night and knew nothing about the affairs of the sect, so they were completely dumbfounded at the moment.

Seeing Liu Mufeng walking in front of him, the Third Elder raised his eyebrows. “Are you an alchemist?”

Hearing this, Liu Mufeng was stunned. He did not expect this Spiritual Venerable Realm powerhouse, an eighth-level alchemist, would take the initiative to speak to him. Bowing his head, Liu Mufeng bowed respectfully. “Replying to the Third Elder, this disciple Liu Mufeng is a fourth-level alchemist. I admire the Third Elder wholeheartedly, and hope that I can listen to the teachings and learn alchemy under the Third Elder.”

Hearing this, the Third Elder nodded and handed a token to Liu Mufeng. “Alchemy requires concentrated study and hard work. Your mind is too complicated, so I’m afraid it will be difficult for you to become a great talent.”

Liu Mufeng nodded solemnly. “This disciple thanks the Third Elder for his teaching. I will definitely focus on alchemy in the future.”

“En.” Looking at Liu Mufeng again, the Third Elder didn’t say anything anymore, but continued to hand out wooden tokens to other cultivators who came forward to ask for them.

After Liu Mufeng received the wooden token, he went to find his lover. Jiang Xu had already received the wooden token from the First Elder under Liu Mufeng’s guidance. In addition to Jiang Xu, the Zhou family Sisters also received the First Elder’s wooden token, while the Ye family Brothers and Helian Xiaoxiao also received the Third Elder’s wooden token.

After receiving the wooden tokens, all the disciples retreated to the North side, leaving the center of the square empty.

“Okay, the tokens have been given. Now, I request the Elders to test the disciples.” The Officiating Elder said as such.

With a vertical movement, the First Elder flew into the air and hovered above the center of the square. His six disciples lined up behind him.

“Those who have taken the tokens can choose their opponents from the stage. As long as you can exchange 20 moves under any of my six disciples, you can become my disciples.” Looking at the crowd, the First Elder explained the rules.

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“You, you want to fight with me?” Looking at Jiang Xu who was standing in front of him, the sixth disciple looked his opponent up and down.

“Yes, I want to exchange pointers with you. My name is Jiang Xu, this Senior Brother, how do I address you?” Looking at his opponent, Jiang Xu asked.

“I am Sixth disciple of Sword Peak – Feng Hui.” Nodding towards Jiang Xu, Feng Hui responded.

“Brother Feng, how are we going to fight? Martial competition, or sword competition, sparring, or fighting to death?” Looking at Feng Hui, Jiang Xu seriously inquired.

Hearing this, Feng Hui twitched the corners of his mouth. “Sword moves, no other means are allowed. If you can exchange 20 moves with me, you will pass the test.”

“Okay.” Nodding, Jiang Xu drew his sword and took the initiative to fight with Feng Hui.

To be honest, at the beginning, Feng Hui didn’t take Jiang Xu seriously. First, Jiang Xu was a Dual and had a thin body, so he didn’t look very powerful. The second reason was that Jiang Xu was a Spiritual King Ream cultivator. Therefore, Feng Hui, who was a Spiritual Emperor Realm cultivator didn’t think highly about his opponent. But when he started to make a move, Feng Hui realized that this little Dual was not so simple! Each move and sword execution was flawless, and at first glance, it could be said that this person had grown up practicing swords, and his swordsmanship was surprisingly superb.

Feng Hui had discovered Jiang Xu’s extraordinariness, and naturally the First Elder also noticed this. Stroking his gray beard, the First Elder nodded in satisfaction. “Okay, not bad, not bad. You have already passed fifty moves. There is no need to continue.”

At First Elder’s words, Feng Hui and Jiang Xu stopped their exchange.

“Jiang Xu, come over and pay respects to your Master!” Looking at Jiang Xu, the First Elder said with a smile.

“Yes, this disciple pays respects to my Master.” Jiang Xu hurriedly knelt in front of the First Elder, and immediately kowtowed to his Master.

“Okay, you will be my Seventh disciple from now on.”

“Thank you, Master.” In response, Jiang Xu stood up from the ground and happily ran back to Liu Mufeng’s side. “Mufeng, I’ve worshiped my Master!”

“En, congratulations.” Looking at his happy lover, Liu Mufeng smiled and held his wife’s hand.

Looking at Liu Mufeng standing hand in hand with his apprentice, the First Elder raised his eyebrows. He thought to himself:Little Dual looked too young for marriage, but looks like the two have been married for a long time. I thought I could partner him with my other disciples and now that is out of question.

After Jiang Xu, other swordsmen who had taken the token also took the stage to challenge. There were thirty newcomers who had taken tokens from the First Elder, but in the end, only three were selected, namely Jiang Xu, Zhou Xiangyun, and Zhou Xianglan.

It was the Second Elder’s turn to choose next. The Second Elder was a martial cultivator who had ten disciples. Therefore, he chose to select the apprentices in the same way as the First Elder. Those who took the tokens had to exchange 20 moves with any of his disciples to be chosen. In the end, the Second Elder selected six disciples.

The Third Elder was an alchemist, and his topic was also very straightforward: fourth-level Rejuvenation Pill. All the people who got the tokens were asked to refine the pill at the same time.

The thirty-two people who got the token walked out of the crowd and found their own positions to stand. Afterwards, the Elder in charge of the spiritual plants in the sect gave each disciple the spiritual plants needed to refine the pill.

“My topic is very simple, the fourth-level Rejuvenation Pill. The spiritual plants you will use for this test have been issued by the sect. Half of the medicinal pills you refine need to be handed over to the sect, and the remaining half can be kept for yourself.” Seeing everyone, the Third Elder explained.

“Third Elder, is there something wrong with this spiritual plant? This is not theTianyangplant, this is theTianyinplant, right?” Looking at the Third Elder who was hovering in mid-air, a disciple asked.

“Yes, it is theTianyinplant. This is the problem I am testing you on, how to use theTianyinplant to refine the fourth-level Rejuvenation Pill.”

“This this……”

“Hey, how do you refine this? TheTianyangplant nourishes theYangand theTianyinplant nourishes theYin. These two cannot be used interchangeably at all!

“Yes, the medicinal effects of these two spiritual plants are different.”

Holding the spiritual plants in their hands, the disciples who were participating in the assessment were discussing the issue. No one knew what to do next.

Staring at the six spiritual plants in his hand, Liu Mufeng first checked them carefully and determined that, except for the Tianyin plant, the other five spiritual plants were relatively normal and had no problems. Only then did Liu Mu Feng nod his head in satisfaction. Then, he took out his own pill furnace and began to refine the pills.

Seeing that Liu Mufeng was the first to take out the pill furnace, the Third Elder’s gaze immediately fell on him, and the others also turned to look at him in astonishment. But they soon discovered that there was a transparent barrier around Liu Mufeng, and they could no longer see how Liu Mufeng refined the medicine pills.

Seeing the barrier around Liu Mufeng, Ye Qian frowned. He knew that this barrier was not set up by Liu Mufeng himself, but by the Third Elder. Obviously, the Third Elder did not want others to see the refining process. As per Ye Qian’s calculation, soon everyone would also be surrounded by a barrier, and could only see themselves, not others, and could not communicate with others.

Hovering in mid-air, the Third Elder kept staring at Liu Mufeng. He saw that Liu Mufeng was processing the spiritual plant. Liu Mufeng first tempered all the spiritual plants five times, purifying them into spiritual liquid and putting them in a bottle. Then, he took out two spiritual plants from his storage ring and threw them into the pill furnace.

Seeing the spiritual plants taken out by Liu Mufeng, the Third Elder couldn’t help but widen his eyes. Because Liu Mufeng was not using spiritual plants, instead he had added two poisonous plants.

After refining the poisonous plants into spiritual liquid, Liu Mufeng poured the other six spiritual liquid into the pill furnace and started to condense the pill.

Looking at Liu Mufeng, who was skillfully refining the pills and starting to condense the pills, the Third Elder was thoughtful. In fact, if you want to use theTianyinplant instead of theTianyangplant for the Rejuvenation Pill, you only need to use the combined medicinal power of the other three spiritual plants. However, Liu Mufeng’s method was something the Third Elder had never thought of.

Not long after, Liu Mufeng’s six medicinal pills were refined. And the barrier around him also fell off.

Liu Mufeng put the six medicinal pills he had refined onto the jade plate, and respectfully handed them over to the Senior Brother who had come to collect the medicinal pills.

“Master.” Holding the medicine pills, the disciple came to the Third Elder.

Reaching out, the Third Elder took the jade plate. He picked up the medicinal pill and smelled it carefully, and found that it was no different from ordinary Rejuvenation Pills. The Third Elder left three medicinal pills, and asked the disciple to send the other three back to Liu Mufeng.

Looking at this disciple whom he had not been optimistic about from the beginning, the Third Elder couldn’t help but raise his brows. He thought to himself:Did I think wrong? Could this disciple really be a prodigy in alchemy?

Not long after, Ye Qian, Ye Fan, and Helian Xiaoxiao also refined the medicinal pills, but the method they used was the same as what the Third Elder had thought, and it did not attract the attention of the Third Elder. In the end, among the thirty-two, only Liu Mufeng and the other three had successfully refined the Rejuvenation Pill. Many of the others had either blown up their pill furnaces or refined poisonous pills, and some even simply could not condense the materials into pills.

Ela ~ The first elder and officiating elders are different people. So I corrected that