26 A refinement sprint

An Bing Qing didn't touch her meal; her head didn't even have space to sense the flow of time, much less it to think about eating; she still wasn't in the point of starving.

She was pleading to the heavens with closed eyes while entering the black sphere.

Her heart was pounding; after feeling nausea as always, she slowly began to open her eyes with some reluctance.

When her beautiful eyes landed on the pill cauldron's figure, she heaved a sigh of relief and her heart was finally put at easy.

She merrily ran towards the pill cauldron, she took out another set of herbs before engulfing two more Energy Restoration Pills.

"This is the third time, sigh".

The cauldron was warmed up again by her and tens of minutes later, she threw in a green-coloured herb, giving start to her refinement.

Time passed by slowly...

"Yes", the ringing sound of a pill success resounded along the cheerful cry of An Bing Qing.

Her joyful face had sprinkles of sweat drops and there was darkness below her pretty eyes; though it was so, she didn't feel as tired as the first time and the happiness of a success after a failure felt great to her heart, giving her an outburst of energy.

She reached for the pill. It was a little hot but she didn't mind it as she covered it with her hand; she was afraid to see a red pattern.

She swallowed a mouthful of saliva before drawing her lips into a line.

'I never thought I someday will be afraid of seeing a red pattern on my pill. In the past, I longed so much for it to form and I brimmed with joy even when it was only the dark red pattern at the beginning. Tsk, tsk...'

The quality of a pill was also graded. The lowest quality ones had a darker pill pattern; this darkness became lighter as the quality becomes better.

She slowly opened her hand but at the same time she closed her eyes.

'Huh? Bing Qing, you just take it easy. There are another six sets for you to try again; but I wonder, if it has a red pill pattern and I put it on the cavity, will it happen as with the book -nothing or will I have some kind of punishment? Oh my... what if I got banned from this place? Ugh...'

At length, she shook her head.

She heaved a sigh and opened both eyes at once, "It's a white pattern!" she exclaimed.

She jumped all jolly at her success; all her worries were washed away and throw far away in her mind. Then, she excitedly reached to place it on the rectangular prominence.

"Ups!"

'Wouldn't have been better to first have a bunch of white pattern pills?' This thought came too late.

"Click, creak, swish", sounds of movements rang, given her no time to retrieve back her pill.

White light shone brightly as the sliding and switching sounds got louder and louder.

She covered her eyes with her wide sleeves.

When she heard no movement, she lowered her arm and blinked to adjust her dazzled eyes.

She was now surrounded by four walls of lush greenery and a black door was in one of them, just like before.

She looked around first but the pill cauldron wasn't here anymore and her pill was a lost case again. She gave a bleak smile before focusing her eyes on the black door. There were also two lines of words above, 'Labyrinth of Knowledge' and 'Second Door'.

She nodded to herself. She did want to step forward but she didn't do that. She calmed her pounding heart, taking deep breaths.

She waved her hand and her pill cauldron along a batch of herbs appeared; she was going to try refining the Blood Detoxification Pill again.

She wasn't as tired as before and her energy hadn't been as depleted as the first time she refined the Energy Restoration Pill. Her exertion was many times lower with each passing refinement after all.

Still, she took two one-earth Energy Restoration Pills and then she relaxed her body.

After a quarter of an hour, she began.

"Huh?" The warm up of the cauldron went smother. It felt different, though she had already used it before to refine the medicinal liquid. It was as though she only needed a sliver of her energy for the flame to flare.

She threw in one of the herbs. The smooth feeling wasn't that good as a burning smell wafted to the air minutes later.

"Eh?!" Her heart skipped a beat.

"Oh no..." She held her head with both hands while squatting down.

"I knew it. Such a feeling couldn't be that good".

After settling her trembling self, she thought, 'Bing Qing, you stop your nonsense. You were just being overconfident yet again. You can only blame yourself' She shook her head and spoke her thoughts out, "But why it had to be the Blue Spring Spirit Flower, it was the last one. Sigh".

She sprang to her feet and cleaned the dregs in the cauldron; she received the herbs back with a swing of her hand and with another swing another kind of herbs streamed out of her qiankun bag.

She said trying to jolly herself, "There's is nothing I can do now, I can only wait and get the missing herb and some extra ones after we arrive. I really want to read the books inside, but I think it is better to practice my alchemy instead".

She prepared herself to start a refinement sprint; she not only was going to practice but she was going to refine as many pills as possible before arriving.