Chapter 22

Long Chen couldn't help but be startled, that woman?

"That's the woman who fought with you earlier," Master Yun Qi said with a serious face.

"What? Is there something wrong with her?" Long Chen asked, somewhat puzzled.

Master Yun Qi hesitated for a moment, then said, "Follow me."

Long Chen followed Master Yun Qi to the same room he had been in before, feeling curious. That woman was only at the Ninth Level of Qi Gathering, not enough to make Master Yun Qi specially warn him.

After entering the room and closing the door, Master Yun Qi wiped his hand over his ring, and a scroll appeared in his hand.

"Whoosh"

The scroll opened, and Long Chen couldn't help but be startled. He saw a beautiful woman depicted on the scroll, with clear eyebrows and bright eyes, a simple and ancient medicine cauldron in front of her, and she was refining pills.

What startled Long Chen was that the woman's face was almost identical to the crazy woman he had encountered.

However, the woman in the painting was serene and beautiful, giving a very gentle feeling, while the crazy woman was far from that.

"What is this..." Long Chen asked tentatively. The scroll was extremely old, clearly an ancient item, and he didn't understand why Master Yun Qi had taken it out.

"The person in the painting is my wife," Master Yun Qi said, a rare warmth appearing on his usually serious face as he looked at the painting.

Long Chen couldn't help but open his mouth wide; he had never expected this and didn't know what to say for a moment.

After a while, Master Yun Qi gently put the scroll away and sighed, "My beloved wife has been dead for a long time.

When I first saw that woman, I almost thought my eyes were deceiving me. It took me a while to calm down.

But when that woman said she wanted to be my disciple, it made me immediately cautious."

"What? Does she have some hidden agenda?" Long Chen was taken aback.

Master Yun Qi smiled slightly but didn't answer. After a while, he said, "She is also a pill apprentice, with very good potential, possibly even better than you, so be careful."

Long Chen was still confused, but Master Yun Qi wouldn't say anything more. He took out Long Chen's jade token and engraved his unique mark on it.

That mark contained a bit of his soul power, allowing Long Chen to pre-withdraw some precious medicinal materials from the guild's pharmacy.

After engraving the mark, Long Chen was directly sent out, leaving him with countless questions in his mind.

It seemed that the arrival of that crazy woman was not a coincidence. If it was a deliberate arrangement, what did she want to do?

**Master Yun Qi? But thinking about it, Master Yun Qi is so old, it seems unlikely.**

But even if it was **, he should have found someone more gentle, not such a domineering and arrogant woman, who could stand it.

Could it be that Master Yun Qi has other secrets? Could she be his illegitimate daughter?

But that doesn't make sense either. Master Yun Qi's illegitimate daughter would have no relation to his beloved wife, so how could she look so similar.

Thinking about it made his head hurt, and Long Chen didn't want to think anymore. Anyway, Master Yun Qi wouldn't harm him, but it's better to be cautious.

With the jade token, he went directly to the pharmacy. When Long Chen showed his token, the medicine boy immediately became very respectful.

Long Chen asked about the procedures for pre-withdrawing medicinal materials and learned that with a first-level credit, one could pre-withdraw materials worth up to five million gold coins, limited to first-grade materials.

Long Chen's credit was second-level, allowing him to pre-withdraw first-grade materials worth up to thirty million gold coins and up to five second-grade materials.

This result made Long Chen very satisfied. With this credit limit, he no longer had to worry about not having enough money to buy medicine.

Usually, a pill master can succeed once out of five attempts, which basically means no loss. If they succeed twice, it's a big profit.

For Long Chen, who had the memory of a Pill Emperor, the failure rate for refining first-grade pills was zero. If not for the poor pill fire, his efficiency would continue to improve.

However, for second-grade pills, Long Chen thought it over and decided against it. With his current pill fire, refining second-grade pills would exhaust him.

For now, he should continue to condense the Fengfu Star. The Fengfu Star was just formed and had a lot of room for improvement. He needed to condense it to the perfect realm.

Long Chen wanted to buy all the materials for refining the Fengfu Pill at once, but to his disappointment, the guild didn't have enough stock.

Reluctantly, Long Chen withdrew fifty sets of materials and bought some other first-grade materials. After all, refining pills could be sold to the guild, which was also money.

The Fengming Empire was filled with martial winds, a large population, and countless adventurers. Pills were always in short supply.

However, the Alchemist Guild was a fair organization and never raised prices maliciously. Otherwise, the Alchemist Guild's wealth accumulation speed would be the fastest and most ruthless.

After returning from the guild, Long Chen was walking when he suddenly heard a commotion ahead. He could hear shouts from a distance and quickly went to check.

He saw a dozen workers beating a person. A plump middle-aged man, with fingers like radishes, was pointing at the person on the ground and cursing loudly.

"Brother, what's going on?" Long Chen asked a bystander.

"Hehe, you'll die laughing. See that chimney over eighty feet tall? That's what that guy built.

Today, the boss came to inspect it, and he almost died of shock. The big guy read the blueprint upside down. They actually wanted to dig a well, hahaha..."

Long Chen almost burst out laughing. What a bizarre situation. Looking at the person on the ground, he felt a slight shock.

The person didn't look old, probably not older than Long Chen, but he was very tall and abnormally strong. He lay on the ground, letting the people beat him without retaliating.

What shocked Long Chen was that when the people's fists and feet hit the person, a mysterious force repelled them.

If not for Long Chen's remarkable soul power, he wouldn't have noticed the subtle vibrations. But the young man had no spiritual energy fluctuations, clearly not a cultivator.

The young man was beaten for a long time without any reaction, while the people beating him were exhausted, with sore hands and feet.

"Damn, this idiot is costing me a fortune. Beat him to death."

The fat boss, seeing the big chimney, was furious and kicked a few times himself.

"Stop it," a voice suddenly said.

"You think I'll stop just because you say so? Who the hell are you?"

The boss, still angry, cursed without thinking and then looked at the person.

But when he saw who it was, he immediately broke out in a sweat and stammered, "Y-Your Highness..."

"Stop it. Here are a hundred gold coins, enough to tear down the chimney and dig a well," Long Chen, not wanting to argue with such a person, threw him a bag of gold coins. If money could solve the problem, he wouldn't bother to act.

The others quickly stopped, and the fat boss hurriedly said, "Your Highness, this..."

"Take it and get lost," Long Chen said coldly, frowning.

Seeing the fat man's face, Long Chen knew he wanted to connect with him. He coldly snorted, not giving such a person a good face.

"Yes, yes, I'll go," the fat man quickly led the group away, looking embarrassed.

"Little brother, get up," Long Chen said to the still lying young man.

The young man seemed to be sleeping. Hearing Long Chen's voice, he raised his head in a daze, finding that the people who had beaten him were gone.

"Did you save me?" the young man asked, somewhat confused.

"Get up and talk," Long Chen smiled. The young man looked very honest and likable.

"Oh"

When the young man stood up, the onlookers gasped. Lying down, he seemed big, but standing up, he was nearly ten feet tall, like a giant, making everyone feel pressured.

"So tall"

Long Chen was also surprised. In front of him, everyone else looked like children.

"Why didn't you fight back when they beat you?" Long Chen asked, seeing how strong he was. The people beating him weren't martial artists, and he could easily take them down.

"They said I did something wrong. They beat me, so I couldn't fight back," the young man said honestly.

Long Chen shook his head. The big guy was strong, but his intelligence seemed like a child's. It was rare to find someone so honest and simple, but to build a chimney instead of a well showed a worrying level of intelligence.

"Where is your home?"

"I don't have a home. Big brother, do you need a laborer? I don't need wages, just give me food. I'm so hungry," the young man pleaded.

Just as Long Chen was about to speak, someone reminded him, "Your Highness, don't be fooled. This guy can eat a whole cow in one meal. Hiring him is not worth it."

"No, I can eat without meat. Just give me food," the young man said anxiously.

"Alright, come with me. What's your name?" Long Chen asked.

"My name is Man Niu. Thank you, big brother," Man Niu said excitedly.

"Okay, I'll call you A Man from now on. Just call me Brother Long," Long Chen nodded.

"Okay, Brother Long," A Man nodded honestly.

When Long Chen and A Man left, the onlookers couldn't help but envy the big guy, thinking he was lucky to be appreciated by a prince.

On the way, Long Chen asked A Man about his past. A Man said he was picked up by a kind person, but when he was five, a plague killed everyone in the village, leaving only him alive.

So he wandered to the capital, working as a laborer for food, but because of his large appetite, he was quickly driven away, living a hard life.

"A Man, from now on, follow me. I won't let you go hungry," Long Chen felt a sense of sympathy.

Indeed, great people have similar greatness, and miserable people have their own misery. Although their identities were different, their misery was not much different. Long Chen had just turned his luck around.

As they were walking, they entered a wide road, and suddenly a loud cry came. A huge figure rushed past.

It was a luxurious carriage pulled by a red-blooded yak, a first-grade magical beast, racing without regard for the people around.

A five or six-year-old girl was playing by the roadside. Suddenly, she saw the huge red-blooded yak and was frightened, forgetting to dodge. She was about to be run over by the carriage.

Long Chen snorted coldly, and with a loud crack, he stepped on the ground, shattering several tiles. He moved like lightning, grabbing the little girl and quickly moving to the side.

Just as Long Chen steadied himself, the carriage rushed past them. Just as he thought everything was over, a voice filled with anger came:

"Bold commoner, daring to obstruct the carriage, you're asking for death."

With a cold snort, a long whip whistled through the air, heading straight for Long Chen.