The Continent of Yan.

Lies across the northeastern section across the vast sea that span across 100,000 miles in diameter, the continent boost a major resource that suitable for its resident to cultivate and achieve a higher standard of cultivation throughout their lives.

In the middle of the continent, exist a river that almost split the continent into two, which known as the Continent Cleaving River. Only a total of three spots is still maintaining their position, holding this two piece together to continue to be known as the Continent of Yan.

The first spot is a Mountain area, where the river failed to cleave through and forced to flows around the nine peak, known as the Nine Dragon Mountain Peak. The second is a jungle that contained seventh of a tenth part of the total population within the continent, which largely consists of what known as the "Cultivation Beast". The jungle is known to the other residents as the Dark Yan Forest.

Lastly, is believed to be man-made, and yet mysteriously debatable. Carved with murals and ancient languages that none of the residents in the continent could understand, the two pillars that connected together, allowing the resident to travel across the north to south and back through the bridge built in between is known as the Immortal Ancients Path.

Due to this Continent Cleaving River, the majority power between this continent is split into two forces. The north is much more prosperous, and contain more of the heritage left by their ancestors, so it had been known as the upper domain, while the south is known as the lower domain, barely receive any major attention and tutelage from the north, and remain outdated, in all terms.

In the south, there exist a total of four different major forces that dominate the whole lower domain, and warring against each other to obtain the total control of the domain, to step across into the upper domain. In the west of the lower domain, twelve power exist.

The Twelves country consist of one dynasty, three empires, and a total of eight kingdoms.

The eight kingdoms warring among each other, to obtain the next position to becoming the fourth empire within the west lower domain. While on the same time, the three empires are battling against each other, to consume each other to obtain the right to fight against the dynasty while keeping the eight kingdoms from manage to combine into another competing power.

The only one that manages to remain strong, unmovable by the threats is the dynasty, which believed to be established around 3,000 years ago.

One of the reason is due to the dynasty applied the tax of half of all the production from the other three empires and eight kingdom to be presented as the tributes each year, to prevent the dynasty from destroying the balance of power on the west lower domain.

Among the eight kingdoms, one of them is known as the Brilliance Jade Kingdom.

Ten years ago, a mysterious child is born.

It was also one that date itself, is believed to be the most auspicious date where the element of wood and fire is the strongest and most compatible with each other.

But unfortunately, the child has grown up under a very disappointing situation.

His father is a wood element cultivator but pass away five years ago because of an accident. Although the mistake does not come from his negligence, the employer decided to pay a small sum of compensation to the family instead of openly admitted that he tried to use some shorter path to force grow the precious cultivation plants to earn a quick profit from the sales.

Losing his father at the age of five, the child grows up with his mother, who struggles to meet each day because of her weak cultivation. In this continent of Yan, cultivation is extremely important, along with the high elemental compatibility. The better one is compatible with the element he or she is focusing on, the faster they are able to obtain a breakthrough in their cultivation.

Due to the mother is focusing on metal element since young, the lack of the metal element in the city outskirt cause her cultivation to remain stagnant on the same stage for more than five years. Added with the death of her husband, she no longer has the privilege to cultivate as she required to take care of her only child.

But Long Feng doesn’t blame his parents for failing to provide a better life for him.

The couple gave him the name of Long (Dragon) Feng (Phoenix), due to the fact he was born under the auspicious date and also because he possessed an excellent compatibility towards wood and fire element, which the wood believed to be the symbol of a dragon and the fire to be the symbol of a phoenix. The surname Li is placed in front, as his family name.

"Mother, I will make sure I am accepted into the Bronze Pill Hall and start learning the art of refining ingredient and pill formation so I could make our lives better."

Long Feng held his mother's rough hand before he falls asleep on the bed.

Since five, Long Feng had been promising himself that he would try his best to improve his cultivation and give a better life to his mother when he reaches his age to participate into one of the academies. In this Clear Jade City, they are staying, a total of three academies is available for the child that reaches the age of 10 to enroll and cultivate.

The Pill Hall, which is focusing on the cultivation of refining and pill formation.

The Martial Hall, which is focusing on the cultivation of martial arts and art of warfare.

And the Culture Hall, which is focusing on the gathering of resources and developments.

Each Hall is differentiated by a rank, starting from Bronze, the lowest ranked, and up to Silver, Gold, Crystal and finally Jade.

No matter what Hall the youngster starts their cultivation within, the power starts off equally, with slight differences depending on their nature element compatibility, as well on the hall's practice.

A pill hall student may be weaker in term of martial art compared to a martial hall student, and the martial hall student may be weaker in term of skill and battle capability compared to a culture hall student, while a pill hall student may be more durable and challenging against a culture hall students.

The cultivation stage is divided into nine tier, starting from Refinement Tier, to Adept, Practitioner, Master, Elder, King, Emperor, Saint and lastly the Sovereign. It is heard as rumors that after one advance through the sovereign tier, each advancement stage next is as difficult as advancing a whole tier.

While on each tier, starting from Refinement tier, is split into four categories.

Human, which consist of the first three stage. It is split into early, middle, and late.

Earth, consisting of the second three stage.

Heaven, with the final three stage.

And peak category, only reserved to those who are on the bottleneck of breaking through the next tier.

The next day, the enrollment of the new selection of students finally starts.

The Bronze Pill Hall is positioned in the northern section of the Clear Jade City.

This location, is also believed to be the most prosperous based on the evaluation from a few high tier cultivators, based on the density of its element deep within the land itself, and also because the land is fertile enough to be used to cultivate and grow a few type of plants to be refined into refining resources benefitting the cultivators.

"The auspicious time had arrived! Let us starts the evaluation and examination for new students enrollment!"

An elder, dressed in a robe specialized for the Inner division of the Bronze Pill Hall shouted across the square.

"Queue in a total of three lines, and each of you listens well."

"You will be tested in three different subjects upon enrollment to determine your acceptance into the pill hall."

"The first subject is the compatibility with your elements. As you all may have known, each element contributes differently towards the refining and pill formation. The control of your elemental mastery could affect the results of the refining process, thus the pill hall only select the best student that has a very good compatibility with the element they are born innately."

"Your second test is to check your skill in identifying the cultivating resources and cultivate them accordingly. I believe I don’t need to further explain how important is this test because this is the most basic requirement to become an apprentice of any pill hall across the Brilliant Jade Kingdom."

"Last but not least, is your test on pill formation. To pass as an apprentice of the pill hall, one needs to possess the most basic capability of controlling their cultivation Qi, and mold them into any kind of shape to finely form the cultivating pill suitable for consumption."

"You will need to pass all three exams to be accepted into the pill hall but that is not over!" the inner division elder raised his tone out of sudden.

"the pill hall is divided into a total of four parts, and only by passing all this exam would you be accepted into the Outer Division of the pill hall."

"Get ready now, and let the test began!" the elder finished his speech, and with a swing of his hand, he retreated to the seats provided to the chief examiner to pay attention to the participants.

"Number 239, Lan Feng, Failed!"

"Number 240, Wang Qiong, Failed!"

"Number 241, Yu Hao, Failed!"

The difficulties of the test quickly dampen the will of the group of 10 years old child, as the is only 8 children successfully pass the first test among the 241 children that went up to the stage.

"Number 290, Mang Qi, excellent in fire elemental, and good in water elemental, Pass!"

"Number 291, Mang Hu, excellent in fire elemental, and average in earth elemental Pass!"

Out of sudden, the successful candidates for the first test increased into 10. meanwhile for Long Feng, holding the number 444 in his hand, started to sweat a little, because the number is literally inauspicious for anything.

"How could I be that unlucky to hold this worst number one could get ?" Long Feng blame his unlucky life a little, but still, place some hope to pass his first exam.

"Number 442, Tan Jing, excellent in earth elemental, excellent in water elemental, Pass!"

"Number 443, Gou Yu, excellent in water elemental, weak in earth elemental, Pass!"

(Mistake noticed by Simple Bob. corrected.)

"Number 444, Long Feng, come up to the stage please!"

Long Feng step quickly onto the stage, and place both hands on the side of a huge brass pot. Within the pot contained a very special type of soil and seed specialized to examine a cultivator's ability in earlier stage to determine their path.

The soil is called the black soil of five elements, where the nutrient is converted from receiving the external elemental qi injected by a cultivator.

While for the seed, it is called as a five colored daffodil. Each color of the daffodil represents an element, red for fire, yellow for metal, brown for wood, blue for water, and grey for earth.

The more compatible a cultivator with the element, the more brilliant the daffodil petals grow. Some cultivator with only one element prowess can only grow one colored five petal daffodil, while those with two usually manage to grow two colored daffodils, with the difference of 4:1 or 3:2 depending on which elemental is stronger between the two.

Only the best cultivator that was nurtured well since young have the capability of growing five colored daffodils, but sometimes luck and the growth of the young seedlings is also one of the main reason the daffodil is different from each other.

Their color range from Weak (Dark colored), Average (light colored), Good (clear colored) and Excellent (brilliant colored).

Long Feng inject as much Qi as he could, afraid of not even able germinate the daffodil seed. A total of two minutes pass, where the examiner almost going to announce that Long Feng failed in his test.

The seedling in the pot slowly germinate, and the stalk of stem quickly outgrown all previous participant's daffodil in term of size.

If the other participant's daffodil stem is as thick as a pinkie finger, Long Feng's daffodil stem is as rough as the thumb of his feet!

As the peak point of the daffodil stem finally split open, a three colored daffodil blooms in front of all other participants within the square to see. A total of 2 Brilliantly colored brown petals, 2 brilliantly colored red petals, and one clear azure colored petal is produced in front of everyone.

"Why one of his petal from the daffodil is azure colored ?"

"Did he got a defective daffodil seed ?"

"But he got excellent in both wood and fire element compatibility."

The chattering started to hear from almost all part within the square, as the examiner returned to the side of the elder of the inner division to consult his opinion.

"Young one, what is your name again ?"

The elder asked.

"Lo... Long Feng!"

He quickly answered.

"Follow me, I will personally escort you to the second test ground for your identifying examination."

The elder finished his sentence, and turn around preparing to leave the square.

With haste, Long Feng run towards the elder, afraid of any changes of mind in the elder if he dares to dally.

"Number 444, Long Feng, excellent in wood elemental, excellent in fire elemental, excellent in sky elemental, Pass!"

The examiner announced Long Feng's result, and create a huge commotion to all those within the square.