Chapter 502 End of the second round After everything was said and done, Michael ascended to the air and returned to his seat in the VIP seats, leaving the participants and the spectators stunned. And he was thrilled with the number of badass points he received. Olivia was pping and bouncing up and down in joy from the spectators.
Unlike the battle tournaments, the judges gave no break to the alchemists.
pping his hands again, Hendrix drew everyone''s attention to him.
"Alright, since everyone haspleted the test and witnessed what you can do when you increase your skills, let us start the second round. Please press the red button on the bottom right of the table,"
Hearing Hendrix, Noah moved his finger to the small round red button on the bottom right.
As he pressed the button, the jade table suddenly trembled slightly. Then, the hole in the center disappeared as a pile of neatly stacked ingredients and a golden parchment slowly appeared on the clear, sleek table.
"The second round requires all of you to follow the form on your table and brew the potion. Just like the first round, you have two batches of ingredients so you can only fail once. If you have finished your ingredients in the process of brewing the potion, you will be eliminated,"
"huh?" Hearing this, Noah was at a loss. Creasing his brows, Noah picked up the scroll and slowly pulled it open to read the contents. Unlike the scroll he read in the first round, the scroll in his hand contained neitherplex nor wrong steps.
After memorizing the form, Noah looked around to see everyone reading the scroll without batting an eye. Meanwhile, on the VIP seating, each judge received the same scroll as the participants.
"Revitalization potion," Michael shared the scroll with Eve as she moved closer to him to see the contents written on the scroll,
Throughout a cultivator''s life, they would consume countless pills, potions, and foods on a daily basis. Little by little, they would create impurities to clog their bodies'' energy vines, resulting in slower cultivation. There were many ways to unclog the energy vines and purify the body from within and one of those ways was intaking a Revitalization potion or pills.
In the Majestic, Revitalization pills were one of the fastest-selling products. Michael sold one pill for 9000 gold coins. Currently, the guild has given the form for free like candies. However, Michael did not worry about the form because, unless Hendrix and other six-star alchemists began to sell the Revitalization pills in bulk, his business wouldn''t be affected.
"Twelve ingredients? Seems a bit more, don''t you think?" Eve whispered to Michael,
"The number is not the only problem they have. They need absolute focus and delicate touch to extract the essence. It was challenging. Unless one has total control over their alchemy fire, the ingredient would be burnt to ashes before they could extract the essence" Michael exined to Eve.
On the ground level, Noah raised his head, looking around him only to find that Jennifer, Len, and the others had their eyebrows slightly knit together. Clearly, they were very inexperienced. Else, they wouldn''t be thinking it''s simple to brew the Revitalization potion.
"Good thing I have practiced controlling Heaven''s me," Noah mumbled softly.
"We shall now begin the second round. You have an hour," As Hendrix''s voice echoed through the arena, the ghostly hourss materialized again in the air. After setting down on his seat, Hendrix looked at Noah, who had already raised his me and began to refine the ingredients one by one.
"Speed and control, young man," He muttered under his breath.
Many alchemists were grinning as they thought the form was simple. Moreover, they had one hour to brew one potion. It was a simple enough task in their minds. Hence, they conjured the mes with bright smiles.
Of course, among so many alchemists, there were some cautious ones who were surprised upon looking at the simple test and hesitated. But they just shoved the doubt and hesitation to the corner of their minds and began to refine the ingredients.
With absolute focus, Noah conjured his bright blue me. It took the cauldron a few more minutes to reach sufficient temperature. Afterward, Noah slowly began to throw in the medicinal ingredients one by one. His pupils constricted as he slowly began to refine.
"Are you participating in the Aqua auction Eve?" while everyone was busy refining the ingredients, Michael asked Eve. Since they were friends, they naturally addressed each other by their first names,
"Yes. I reckon you''reing too,"
"I will issue an arrest warrant if you don''te to Voldiguard mansion In Thera," She squinted her eyes as Michael smiled,
"Definitely,"
"Here, take this" With a flick of her delicate wrist, Eve took out a silver medallion in the shape of ''V''
"We can go to the auction together. Voldigards have our own ce in the Aqua pce,"
Michael put the medallion in the system storage with a nod,
Meanwhile, as they were refining the ingredients, the noise from the two seating galleries at the sides also gradually decreased. Numerous gazes swept over the alchemists in the open square, looking at them without batting an eye.
...
As time slowly flew, many red lights flicked in the arena. Michael saw many alchemists had burnt all their ingredients while trying to extract the essence. But, like Michael told Eve, one needed absolute control over their fire and focus. Those whocked either naturally got eliminated from thepetition.
On the other hand, some of thepetitors whose abilities were quite good had already refined the ingredients needed. After hesitating for a moment, they clenched their teeth and tried to merge the essence, beginning the final part of the refinement.
Noah''s gaze focused on the ingredients that were boiling within the cauldron. Because he was worried about the possibility of some problems suddenly arising, he took his time cautiously refining each ingredient.
As Noah finished extracting the essence of the tenth ingredient, Len and Jennifer finished extracting thest essence. Just when they were about to start merging the essence beads, a soft muffled explosion sounded not far away from the trio. Hearing the sound, Noah raised his eyes to take a look. At that spot, an alchemist was foolishly staring at ck smokeing from the cauldron. Clearly, this was a result of a failed refining attempt.
"What the? I followed the instructions to the word…how…how can it happen…why did I fail," The alchemist stuttered, trembling in shock.
A momentter, he turned the cauldron upside down, dropping a pile of ashes. Taking a long deep breath, the alchemist began refining thest ingredient batch.
As more and more time passed, numerous soft muffled sounds from the medicinal cauldrons urred one after another. The alchemists who failed stared at the ck smokeing from the cauldrons dumbfounded.
Dum!
Dum!
All of a sudden, Noah heard the muffled explosion sounding from his side. He then turned his head to see Len and Jennifer standing behind their tables withpletely stunned faces. One could see dark lines on both their foreheads as they stared at the ck smokeing out of their cauldrons.
Countless sounds of gasps emerged from the spectators'' stand. They did not expect Len and Jennifer to fail. Even the elders in the VIP seatings were not an exception to this.
"Damn. she failed," Even clenched her fist tight looking at her younger sister''s smoking cauldron,
"As I said, she needs more control over her fire,"
Following the shocking turn of events, many red lights began to flicker across the arena, indicating the elimination. Almost one-third of the alchemists destroyed theirst batch of ingredients. By doing so, they left with no ingredients to refine. Hence, they could only walk out of the arena
"Fuck. Why did it fail? My control over the me was clearly very good," An alchemist shouted before leaving the arena. Simr events happened throughout the arena as the judges calmly observed them.
Looking at many getting eliminated, Noah didn''t dare to lose focus. When Noah began to raise his me and perform the merger, some of the alchemists around him including Len and Jennifer threw their gazes over. Under the circumstances where they all failed, they wanted to see if Noah could seed where they failed.
Noah ignored the surrounding gazes as he put all his attention into controlling Heaven''s me. Under the grilling of the blue me, Noah extracted the essence from thest ingredient.
Each essence bead emerged from the cauldron and sparkled in the air. Every twelve beads were floating in a row in the air from blue to pink.
"Try merging them one by one," Noah said in a low-pitched voice, only loud enough for Jennifer and Len to hear. Noah broke sweat on his forehead and merged thest bead in the row with the bead beside.
Hearing Noah''s tip, Jennifer and Len conjured their mes again to refine the ingredients.
Michael, who sat leisurely on the VIP seat got bored of seeing the youngsters failing so miserably. Thus, he focused on the Spycam he ced on Pirate Captain Corey. Currently, he could see her navigating through a treacherous storm, and in the distance, Michael noticed a vague outline of another ship.
"Sabrina," It was clear to Michael that Corey was chasing Sabrina''s ship. Apparently, she had something that the vampires needed. Until they get what they want, Michael knew they wouldn''t let Sabrina go.
The judges and spectators observed the alchemists without batting an eye. But, because of Noah''s focus and experience, he was the first one to merge the beads.
As soon as all the beads merged into an orb, the orb of essence radiated a sweet fragrance along with a bright glow.
"Shit, he''s about to finish" As Len sniffed the faint fragrance emanating from the essence orb, he growled inside.
At this moment, countless people''s hearts were hung in their throats.
"He can finish it,"
Atian''s shriveled palm tightly held the guardrail.
Unlike Michael, the rest were too focused and excited to see the alchemists in action.
The silent atmosphere in the arena continued until Noah kicked the table, sending the vial into the air. With a flick of his wrist, Noah guided the essence into the vial and covered the vial with his Heaven''s me.
Only when all the essence went into the vial, did Noah slowly exhale. He raised his head as a faint smile appeared on his calm face.
Under the thousands of gazes, Noah remained with a dark red vial in his hand. Following Noah''s sess, almost fifteen minutester, the green light of Jennifer and Len was lit up. The two of them ced their potions on the table and exchanged nces, sighing in relief.
After the trio, a few more streaks of green light shot out towards the sky from the arena. Unfortunately, the red streaks of light overwhelmed the green light.
When the sand within the hoursspletely fell, only a little over a hundred people still remained in the arena. The rest of the people had already beenpletely expelled during these two rounds.
As Hendrix pped his hands, Noah slowly raised his head. His gazended on Hendrix who revealed a friendly smile at Noah.
After they concluded the second round, the next event was to once again test for the potions. Just like the first round, when everyone ced their potions into the hold, Noah''s table produced a brighter streak of light, followed by Jennifer and Len.
Once the test waspleted, the sky had already gradually darkened. A crescent moon slowly appeared at the edge of the sky, bathing the city of Oxshore beneath.
Looking at the daylight slowly fading away, Atian stepped forward from his seat,
"Everyone, we will stop thepetition for the day and start the final round at ten tomorrow morning. Everyone, please take a rest and arrive here thirty minutes before,"
With Atian''s announcement, the long day ofpetition finally came to an end. Everyone in the VIP seating nned to take a rest just like the participants except Michael. He had something important to do…Like contacting the Alpha Guardian.