"What is this place!?"
Having suddenly found herself in a large empty hall before being transported somewhere different the next second, Qing Yi began inspecting her surroundings once again. Hoping that she would not suddenly end up being dragged somewhere different over the next few seconds…
A large mountain stretching far into the sky had appeared in front of her, a narrow path was visible in front of her leading up the tall mountain.
Looking away from the large mountain in front of her, Qing Yi realized that there was nothing else around her other than a thick mist that prevented her from seeing more than a few meters away from where she stood.
"Ah!?"
Touching the mist with her hand, Qing Yi let out a suppressed voice upon realizing that her hand had been forcefully stopped by the thick mist. Preventing her from moving her hand further inside the mist.
"…"
Looking away from the mist and back towards the large mountain, Qing Yi would be dumb if she didn't realize that she was supposed to climb her way up the mountain.𝑓𝘳𝑒𝑒𝓌𝘦𝘣𝘯ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝘤𝑜𝑚
The only thing on her mind, was… How was climbing a mountain related to alchemy…?
Shaking her head as she thought about this, Qing Yi made her way to the base of the mountain where the narrow path started. Not too worried about the fact that the other participants had disappeared, as she had already expected something along that to happen.
They should also be faced with the same situation as me, I wonder if anyone has begun climbing up the mountain yet…
Smiling a bit as she thought about the other participants being faced with the same bewildering situation as herself, Qing Yi soon arrived at the base of the mountain before coming to a stop once again with a confused expression appearing on her face.
"What is that?"
In front of her, at the start of the narrow path of the mountain, was a small ancient looking stone tablet. Even weirder, it had her name engraved into it at the top along with some other information below it.
"Qing Yi… Flying Sword Sect… Expert Alchemist Trial… Specializes in potions… 0 Points…"
Muttering this to herself as she looked over the information on the small stone tablet, Qing Yi quickly understood that it was some basic information about herself, the trial, and the points she had obtained.
There was no real useful information to her about what the trial was about or why she had to climb a mountain for an alchemy trial.
Hah…"
Sighing to herself as she gazed up towards the peak of the mountain that was hidden by a layer of clouds, Qing Yi remember her master's mountain peak…
The road leading up towards her master's pavilion was just as narrow and hard to traverse as the one in front of her! Only when she had reached the Foundation Establishment Realm could she easily travel up and down before that, she had suffered quite a bit going up and down the mountain back then…
Even worse, when she stepped onto the path leading up the mountain, Qing Yi realized that her body became heavier, and it was harder for her to walk.
At this point, she had become even weaker than she was before entering the Flying Sword Sect! How on earth was she supposed to climb such a tall mountain like this?!
Is this really an alchemy trial? Why does it feel more like one of those pressure trials for cultivators!?
Cursing silently inside her head, Qing Yi began making her way up the mountain. No matter how weird the alchemy trial was, Qing Yi was determined to continue onwards and get a high ranking in the alchemy competition!
"W-what is this? Why is the pressure while climbing the mountain so much!?"
"M-my strength!? Is this not supposed to be an alchemy trial…?"
"I thought this trial was about alchemy… Perhaps the Artisan Alchemist made a mistake and sent us to a wrong trial…?
No better than her, the other participants were also filled with disbelief the moment they stepped onto the narrow mountain path.
However, one thing that stood out from this, was the fact that everyone seemed to experience a different degree of pressure. The stronger they were, the bigger the pressure and inversely the weaker they were, the less pressure they experienced while climbing up the mountain.
In the end, all of them had their strength reduced to the same level.
…
At the same time, outside the alchemy trial, the spectators were all watching what was happening inside the alchemy trial on a few large light projections that floated mid-air.
""…""
To say they were speechless upon seeing all the alchemist geniuses struggling to climb up the narrow mountain path was an understatement.
After all, they were all expecting for there to be some kind of alchemy related test inside…. Not climbing a mountain!
"Is this really an alchemy trial…?"
The doubts that the participants had when they first stepped onto the narrow mountain path soon appeared among the spectators as they really had no idea how climbing a mountain under some sort of pressure was related to alchemy…
"Look! There is a cave appearing in front of that young man!"
However, this doubt did not last for long as a loud yell soon woke up the crowd of spectators, as everyone focused their attention onto the handsome looking young man who had been the first to step onto the narrow mountain path.
Not only that, but the spectators clearly saw the several spiritual herbs and cauldron inside the cave in front of the young man!
"Looks like it's still an alchemy trial…"
Several elders among the spectators whose disciple was still in the alchemy competition breathed out a sigh of relief upon spotting the spiritual herbs and the cauldron inside the cave.
After all, the disciples they had chosen to participate in the alchemy competition were mostly skilled young geniuses in alchemy. Not cultivation!
…
"A cauldron? And spiritual herbs?"
A few minutes after the first person had arrived at the cave, Qing Yi also reached the cave tugged away beside the narrow path leading up the mountain.
Not only that, the small stone tablet she had seen at the bottom of the mountain was also there. Of The information on it was also the same with no changes and of course, her points were still a beautiful round zero…
Looking away from her point score on the stone tablet, Qing Yi discovered that the path further up the mountain had been blocked off by the same mist that prevented her from going in any other direction than the narrow mountain path back at the base of the mountain.
"I will have to do something to continue forward?"
Muttering this to herself before looking over towards the cauldron inside the cave, Qing Yi entered the cave before going over the things inside.
Around a dozen or so spiritual herbs with the strongest having reached the Earth Grade, a recipe for an Earth Grade Potion and a cauldron already filled with water infused with a tiny amount of spiritual qi. Barely allowing it to be qualified as the lowest level of spiritual water.
At this point, if she still had no idea what the trial wanted her to do, Qing Yi should probably just quit the alchemy trial before she ended up embarrassing herself…
"Five Windbloom Flowers, five Waterbloom Flowers and five Thunder Thistles…"
Going over the spiritual herbs, Qing Yi soon picked up the recipe.
"This…"
Looking over the recipe, a frown slowly appeared on her face.
The spiritual herbs available to her and the spiritual herbs required for the potion were completely different!
"I have to find out which of these spiritual herbs can be used a substitute for the ones in the recipe…?"
Picking up one of the Windbloom flowers, the frown on Qing Yi's face only deepened further as she realized just how difficult the first test of the alchemy trial was.
The difficulty in finding out what spiritual herb could be used as a replacement for one of the spiritual herbs used in the recipe was extremely difficult. Not to mention that the recipe only used three spiritual herbs and Qing Yi had never heard about any of them before.
Even worse, the names of the spiritual herbs did not give any hint towards what type of spiritual qi they belonged to…
"Hah… Looks like I will have to go figure it out through trial and error…" Sighing to herself with a depressed expression slowly making its way onto her face, as she realized that she would have to ruin some of the spiritual herbs in front of her, Qing Yi felt a small pang of pain in her chest while looking over the spiritual herbs in front of her.
Is there really no other way…?
Even if it was not her own spiritual herbs and they were only around the Mortal and Earth Grade, Qing Yi still felt that figuring out the correct order of the spiritual herbs this way, was way too wasteful…