"Look! That's the four carriage from the neighbor four cities!" some higher cultivation strength populations within the Clear Jade City entrance easily spots the four carriage that slowly combined into a straight line, riding along side by side as they getting close to the City entrance. Outside of the Clear Jade City entrance, a large amount of soldier is positioned under the City Lord's order, to ensure no bandits managed to sneak into the city during the Thousand Herbal Garden Opening Competition.

And almost at the same time, the top two disciples from each carriage stands up beside the Coach Driver and greets everyone within their sights. The four carriage continues along their way and entered the Clear Jade City Branch's Bronze Pill Hall. Within the Hall, the carriage proceeds straight towards the area behind Jade Cultivating Land and entered a Marble Stone built Arena with the ability to fit in at least 5000 spectators.

Within the arena, three different section is well arranged in the middle of the Oval grounds. The first section is a table set with a similar Pill Cauldron and some random ingredients on the table. This section taken over a total of 50% of the overall space, with a total of 1000 sets of such setup arranged side by side along the Oval grounds. The second section is where a total of 500 different stage Cultivation Beast is caged and placed side by side to form a circle. Just from a look, any person could easily expect that this second test, will most probably test the capability of each disciple in the term of fighting capability, harvesting skills and also knowledge. The third stage only has 200 tables within, with a scroll on top that was sealed with a special inscription.

"So, this is the test one need to participates, in order to obtain the qualification within top 100 seats and allows them to participate in the Thousand Herbal Garden opening." Long Feng scanned his surrounding and easily seen the prepared stage for each disciple to compete against each other. Just a few minutes later, a streak of 5 Silver flash charge towards the middle of the judging stage, and five strong cultivators appeared from the blinding lights.

"All the participants for this Competition should proceeds to the first stage, the Primary Basic Examination! If there are not enough 1000 Participants, the test will not be started!" a very loud and sharp voice could be heard throughout the whole arena, and in that instant, all participants from the five cities hall quickly went in and obtained a spot. But with the total of 120 Disciples from Thunderburst Jade City, 140 from Jade Ginseng City, 90 from Cloudy Jade City, and lastly, 195 Disciples from the Xuan Wu Jade City, their total is only barely 545 disciples. And due to the lack of so many participants, the Clear Jade City decided to put in as many disciples they could to fit into the total of 1000 participants, so they sent out 455 disciples.

Looking at this situation, Long Feng and Nan Jing Jing further understands the reason why Lang Ren will speak in such way before their departure. With almost half of the participants belonged to the Clear Jade City Branch, even if all of them failed to entered the top seats, they will still claim at least half of the remaining seats. This also means that by the end of the one week period of participants entered the Thousand Herbal Garden, the total benefits for the Clear Jade City Branch will be at least 10 times more than other four branches!

"Seems like all the table is occupied, if that's the case, the Primary Basic Examination will start now!" the previous man speaks once again after he noticed that the total participant finally reached 1000 in total. But after that few words, he steps back to allow another Silver Robe Cultivator to start his speech. "Everyone within the Hall, we are the five Primary Elders from the Capital City's Silver Pill Hall branch. I am Elder Zhan (Grow), the one that speaks before is Elder Hun (Mix), and the three besides me is Elder Lian (Refine), Elder Yang (Concoct), and Elder Fen (Disassemble)."

"This year, we will be the acting judges to select the best 100 disciples within the Inner Division, and this 100 person will be qualified to enter the Thousand Herbal Garden for a total of seven days!" Elder Zhan speaks. Next, Elder Lian walked up and continues. "For this competition, we from the Silver Hall had prepared a total of 50,000 sets of mixed ingredients for those who managed to enter the top 100 seats. For those who managed to obtain seats within the top ten, you will be rewarded with an additional recipe especially from the Silver Hall as further studies."

"Finally, is the Top three rewards. The second runner-up will be rewarded with a [Turmoil Fruit], an essential ingredient to refine the Second Grade Adept Pill, the [Adept Charging Pill] which will increase the success rate of 30% when one is trying to breakthrough from Adept Realm and entering the Practitioner Realm." Elder Lian stopped as he finishes the runner-ups' reward.

"While for the first runner-up, we will be rewarding them with a Beast companion, the [Third Human Grade Cultivation Beast - Bronze Winged Lion]. This Beast Companion is especially obtained by one of the top three Venerable Elder, Honored Elder Bai in the Inter Kingdom Exchanges. The Bronze Winged Lion is a valuable Flying Beast Companion that could travel 1000 Li a day by flying." Elder Yang announced the first runner-up rewards before be step back to allow the last person, Elder Fen to start speaking.

"For the Champion of this competition, we from Silver Hall, of course, will not be stingy on the treasures. Instead of giving only one reward, we will be giving three rewards to the Champion position, to encourage this disciple to excel himself further." the moment Elder Fen mentioned the word "Three Rewards", everyone immediately put their utmost attention on his next word, afraid of losing even a single word.

"The first reward is a Ranked Category Recipe that once creates a disturbance when it appears within the Brilliant Jade Kingdom. Unfortunately, nobody else managed to decipher and make the research to obtains the replacement for those extinct ingredients."

"The second reward is an Elemental Refining Treasure. The [First Earth Grade Spirit Treasure - Earth Gravity Refining Flask]. This fine Elemental Refining Treasure has three kind of refining ability, and due to the special ancient inscriptions within the flask, three different kind of refined treasure could be produced as long the amount of Earth Elemental is fulfilled. The first refined treasure is known as the Earthen Clay Stone. A non-edible Earth Element stone that beneficial for the cultivator to temper their Earth Element Foundation."

"The second refined treasure is the Pure Earth Dew. This Dew contains the miraculous properties to recover a large amount of Earth Elemental Essence within the body, and at the same time, increase the capacity of the maximum amount of Elemental Essence the user could handle. If this treasure is used often as a body refining treasure, you will have double the capacity of Elemental Essence compared to your peers."

"The third is called the Fake Earth Leaf. Although it is a fake piece of leaf refined from the flask, do not underestimate its special properties. This Fake Earth Leaf allows the cultivator that consume it to be able to convert all Elemental Essence around him into Earth Element Essence, and could increase the speed of tempering the foundation by 10% faster because of the converted Earth Elemental Essence is totally pure without any impurities within."

"And lastly, the third reward. Can we have Elder Hun to announce it?" Elder Fen steps backward, allowing Elder Hun to stand up. "The third rewards is a special treasure only obtainable from their significant contributions toward the Pill Hall. Currently, within the whole Five Branches of Bronze Pill Hall, only two Direct Disciples, one under the Hall Master of Jade Ginseng City and one under the Hall Master of Xuan Wu Jade City, is entitled to holds."

"This is the [Cracked Human Profound Treasure - Longevity Soil Ring!]." the moment this final treasure identity is revealed, all the cultivators with wide knowledge, included the elders and Hall Master from the five branches. This kind of reaction could only indicate one thing about the treasure that just announced by the Elder Hun. "Wife, what is that Longevity Soil Ring anyway? Everyone seems to be restless about it." Long Feng with his usual blank expressions came out immediately as he has no idea what is so good about this treasure.

"Everyone, Quiet." the Elder Hun from Silver Hall sternly speaks, and instantly, the whole Arena within its spectators and participants turned eerily silent, as if there isn't a single life is within this arena. "This treasure is yet to achieve its complete refining stage, thus there is a [Cracked] before its name. But in term of quality, this ring is comparable to a Second Human Grade Cultivating Treasure. Since not everyone knows about this ring, so I shall explain its special properties within."

"The Longevity Soil Ring only could be used to store and cultivates ingredients. From the weakest medicinal plant, such as Black Bitter Mint to any out of the world herbs, all could be cultivated within, until the maturity reach the point desired by the owner. If you store a tree that will bloom fruits within, fruits will be available to harvest as it matures. If you store a plant within, medicinal herbs will be available to harvest once it matured."

"The more Essence Energy you feed into the ring, the faster the growth of the plants that planted within. But one thing you need to know." Elder Hun finished explaining the specialty of this ring before he came into the final piece of information. "Since this is a [Cracked] quality ring, it means that only one tenth of the Essence Energy you feed towards the ring will be accepted, while the remaining ninth will be either wasted or used to slowly repair the inscriptions. So, in conclusion, this is a double edged sword, unless you only use it to plant Black Bitter Mints for life." Elder Hun finished his explanations as he steps backward. The next moment, Elder Zhan step out to prepares the starting of this competition.

"In front of each participant, is a mixture of many kinds of ingredients, an examination Pill Cauldron, a test paper with four different question regarding the basic knowledge a Pill Master should know. Each Lower-Rank Pills refined from the ingredients will represent 1 points, Middle-Rank for 2 points, 3 for Upper-Rank and 4 for Master-Rank. There is no restriction on what grade of refined Pills you wish to create, but bear in mind, this is a competition of Quality and Quantity, not the Grades. The maximum Points one could earn here will be fifty points, no matter how much extra you could refine."

Another fifty points will be allocated on identifying the flaws within the Pill Cauldrons. The number of flaws will not be disclosed, so if you managed to get all of them correctly, the fifty points will surely be with you. But remember one thing! Each mistake will deduct your points by five points as well, so if you are unsure on the flaws, do not leave your imprints there!"

"Lastly, is the written test. Within the scrolls is a content of Four examination questions. One on Refining Knowledge, One on Pill Knowledge, One on Medicinal Knowledge, and lastly is a recipe with few empty slots within. You will need to write down the correct ingredients within the slots as your first answer, the suitable Substitute ingredients for other listed ingredients, as well the enhanced version of ingredients to enhance the overall effect. This part of the exam will allow you to obtain a maximum 100 points, with two points deduction for every wrong answer.

"In total, this Primary Basic Examinations could fetch you a total of 200 Points if conducted perfectly. Additionally, the top five best participants that could refine the most Pills from the first part will be able to obtain 10 additional Points for first place, 8 for second place and so on. In the second part, whoever managed to fire up the Pill Cauldron the fastest, will be given 10 additional points, and so on until the fifth person is selected. While for the third part, in all four questions, the one with fewer mistakes in each question will be given 20 additional points, in total, 80 additional points could be earned from this."

"After all the test is completed, the 500 best disciples with satisfying results will proceed to the Secondary Basic Examinations." Elder Zhan finishes his explanations. "If everyone is ready now, you may proceed with the examination. Starts now!"

The moment the word start is heard, a loud Gong sound is released from the strong impact, and the 1000 participants are preparing to complete their first part of the examinations. Long Feng and Nan Jing Jing is located side by side, but each of them is focusing in their own part of ingredients because everyone possesses a different total amount of each ingredient. This way, cheating will be made impossible because, through some rough estimation, each participant's table could refine a certain amount of Pills no matter how much they tried. The only difference could be is how flexible and knowledgeable the Disciple in handling such stress.

Long Feng paid his most attention to the ingredients in his table, and in that instant, he already came out with a total of three different type of Pills to refine. [Metal Morphing Pill], [Calming Spirit Dew Pellet], and [Mystic Suction Pellet]. But from the number of ingredients he has, even in his best condition, Long Feng could only refine about eighteen to twenty Pills altogether. Although the points he could obtain the results could help him to obtain fifty points, but Long Feng's aim is higher.

"I will obtain Full three hundred points in this Primary Basic Examinations!" Long Feng's spirit is fired up to its utmost limit, as he immediately runs through the ingredients again to search for the best recipe he could use to ensure his winning chances. Almost about five minutes later, Long Feng finally obtained the answers he was looking for.

"This ingredient is also suitable to refine the rarely seen [Mix Essence Recovery Pill]. The Bark from Ashes Tree, the Roots from Trident baby Bush and the final ingredient, the overripe Fruit of Dragon Fruit Tree, could be used as replacement ingredient to refine this Mix Essence Recovery Pill." Long Feng immediately have a rough idea on what kind of Pill he should be working at it. Some disciple does have the method to refine as many Pill as possible, but from a random combination of two to three different Pills, the result will be pale in comparison to Long Feng's one kind of Pills because all the ingredients he have in hand could be used to totally refined one same kind of Pills.

Another reason is that of the effectiveness in Double or Triple Concoction. For Long Feng, a Quadruple Concoction attempt could yields him a total of at least 6 to 7 Pills a portion, and most of their quality would be balanced among ranks, compares to those that refined in one batch at a time. But this doesn't mean that Long Feng could easily pass through the second hurdle, identifying the flaws on the Pill Cauldron!

But a hurdle is a dead obstacle and not a living one. Long Feng quickly understands the most important part he should be noticing is not about looking for all the flaws on the Pill Cauldron before refining, but the necessity of searching for the flaws along the way as he Firing the Furnace to its perfection. He remembered a piece of work he used to read in the Tower of Knowledge, regarding the disturbance it could cause if the Cauldron's flaw is not noticed before the refining starts.

In another part of his memories, Long Feng suddenly having a flashback to the moment he saw Elder Shennong is refining some Pills on his personal Cauldron. The fire on below and within is distributed into three strong wisps on the outside, and one weak wisp on the inside. The wisps of fire dance in different tunes, and as the refining process goes, the cauldron could be seen shining brilliantly throughout the time he and Elder Shennong speaks.

Without delaying, Long Feng showcase his prowess in handling the Fire Element within his body. As the Flame is ignited before his eyes, a total of four wisps of fire slowly formed and floats slowly towards the Pill Cauldron. This action managed to pique the five Silver Hall Elder's interest. "That kid seems to be trying something funny in the process of inspecting his cauldron." Elder Zhan is the first to show his interest in Long Feng.

The four wisps take their positions as Long Feng started to Ignite them, Three Strong Fire on the bottom and one Weak fire within! As the cauldron slowly heat up, a few sign of flaw started to appears, and with each appearance, Long Feng slapped an imprint on the part before he proceeds with firing up his cauldron. The process goes smoothly until Long Feng finally felt there are no more flaws to be spotted within the cauldron before he decided to push his Flame to its limit.

"Come out now, Red Fire Stage!" Unknown to everyone including Nan Jing Jing, Long Feng actually managed to ignite his Fire Elemental into the Red Fire Stage, totally overpowering all but one disciple within the stage! "That kid actually able to train his Foundation of Fire Element into the second stage at such a young age, what a good talent!" Elder Fen praise Long Feng's capability in obtaining the Elemental Foundation of a Second Fire Stage.

Being the fastest among everyone, Long Feng actually spends only twenty-two minutes to firing his cauldron into perfection! A loud and clear howl is released from the Pill Cauldron belonged to Long Feng's table, and without any delays, Long Feng proceed with his Pill Refining process! After he distributes all the ingredient accordingly, Long Feng noticed that his amount of ingredients is exactly enough for three Quadruple Concoction, One with Bark of the Ash Trees, One with Trident Baby Bush's Roots, and another with the Ripe fruit from Dragon Fruit Tree.

The moment Long Feng throws all the ingredients into the cauldron, Elder Hun is the next one to be shocked with this performance. "Are he extremely confident? There are Flaws within the cauldron that will cause the process of refining affected slightly, added with the difficulties of Quadruple Concoction requirements, one needs to have more than hundred to thousand times of trial before he could perfectly manage the Fire, Temperature, procedures, and formations." Elder Hun, who was the best in Ingredient Concoction, also do not dare to confidently say that he could success ten over ten attempts in Quadruple Concoction.

With his speed of refining becoming quicker, Nan Jing Jing by his side already started to be distant from her beloved current position. Long Feng's refining process quickly ends as he entered the second attempt of Pill Refining, and soon, the third attempt, where all of them is done within 90 minutes. With all the refining attempts are completed, Long Feng reached his palm towards the part where the last Primary Basic Examination questions are written.

As he looked at the first three questions, Long Feng could easily complete the answer sheet and pinpoint all the important parts that shouldn't be missing within his answers. Due to the fact that Long Feng already completed the refurbishing task of Comprehension on Pill Refining and the Temperament Sutra, the first two question could be easily answered. Meanwhile, for the Medicinal Knowledge, a hit of poison knowledge is required, but the question still doesn't manage to give any difficulties to Long Feng in his attempt to perfectly answering the question.

But the moment he looked at the final question, Long Feng's starts to felt the stress.

"What an amazing Recipe, this must be one of the closed to Ranked Category Pill Recipe." Long Feng looked on the remaining ingredients and the effect it could bring, as he slowly strains all the brain juice within his head to look for the answers. From the question sheet he is holding, Long Feng decided to enter into his own world, and imagining the possibility of this Pill could bring if he really managed to perfect it.

Soon, after using a total of one full hour in his imaginary realistic world, Long Feng could come out with a few ingredients and its Substitute ingredients. But because of his lack of confidence in making sure the accuracy of his answers, Long Feng repeat the imaginary refining procedures with all the available ingredients within his mind, before he finally completed it by spending a total of three hours within this part.

As he looked at his surrounding, most of the student had already in the same part as he does, but except for a few totally capable and talented disciples, most of them are still stuck on the first questions, never forget to mention that if even Long Feng need three hours to complete this final question, how long would the other participants need?

Long Feng writes down the answer on the question sheet, and run another final inspection on his answers before he raises his hand to indicates that he completed all the task within this Primary Basic Examination.

==========

[YinYang Stabilizing] Concoction

Usage: Cultivation-1 / Healing-5 / Enhancement-1

Ingredients:

[Yin Essence Soul Seed]

[Softening Yin Grass] - Sub / [Yin Essence Soul Grass] - Enhanced

Lighting Cultivated Pine Sap

[Thunder Essence Dew] - Sub / [Raging Thunder Rhinoceros Refined Horn] - Enhanced

Yang Rich Essence Fruit

[Yang Spirit Flower] - Sub / [Yang Essence Devourer Beetle's Soul Pearl] - Enhanced

[Balanced YinYang Grass]

[Blue Yin Grass & Red Yang Roots] - Sub / [Hundred Years Black & White YinYang Grass] - Enhanced

Clear Toad Fruit's Wax

[Clear Maple Giant Ant Egg] - Sub / [King Toad Fruit's released Golden Sap] - Enhanced

Recipe by: House of Hundred Pills

Refined and studied by 4th Generation Headmaster - Yao Yan

==========

With the recipe's missing ingredient and the name is filled in, Long Feng raise his hand to indicates that he already completed all the task within this examination. Elder Fen waves his hand towards seats prepared to the participants, and not even a minute after Long Feng's completion, two disciples stand up to hand over their answers as well.

"Chu Yi, the Lucky Pill Refiner. From Jade Ginseng City!"

"Huang Ying, First Class Shield. From Xuan Wu Jade City!"

The two of them heads toward the seats beside Long Feng, and in a polite way, Huang Ying gave Long Feng a bow and initiates a handshake. "So, you are the one they called, Pill Master in the Sheep Clothing?" Huang Ying says. The moment Long Feng heard the nickname, he tilts his head and gave her a blank face. "Hahaha, I guess you are not going to answer me, I hope we will have a good match in this competition, and I will fight with all my might to obtains the first place!" Huang Ying continued as she sat down on the seats.

"Zhang Pu, the Hundred Variants. From Cloudy Jade City!"

"Yue Ying, First Class Spear. From Xuan Wu Jade City!"

The next two come over towards the 500 seats, and from the looks, the first 10 seats are well made compared to the other seats behind them. The completing Disciples keep coming in, and the next two person is extremely familiar to Long Feng.

"Gou Yu, the Formation Master. From Clear Jade City!"

"Nan Jing Jing, Mesmerizing Circle. From Thunderburst Jade City!"

Nan Jing Jing wished to seat beside Long Feng, but she understands that her current situation only allows her to be seated at the seventh position. And the next three finally appears along and join the first seven of them to be seated in the top ten position.

Chen Nan, the Poison Hand. From Cloudy Jade City!"

Tie Peng, the Metal Plate. From Jade Ginseng City!"

Liu Tsung, the Shadow Concoctions. From Clear Jade City!"

With the top 10 disciples is gathered, the remaining 490 disciples quickly came into the seats as quick as possible. As the examiner began to inspect the successful participants, the failure among them is being sent away from the Oval Ground as the examiner busy inspecting the answers within each table. After a total of thirty minutes, a large group of the 500 participants only managed to obtain an average total point of between 90 to 120, while a small portion among them managed to obtain a good 130 to 145 Points.

When it came to the top ten participants, Elder Fen walks slightly closer to the ten and starts to announce the results. "The Ninth and Tenth positions go to Liu Tsung and Chen Nan, with 160 Points!" Elder Fen announced the seat position, as Chen Nan moved to Liu Tsung seats, while Tie Peng move up one seat above on the eighth, and Liu Tsung takes over Tie Peng's previous seat.

"Eighth Seat, 164 Points, Tie Peng. Seventh Seat, 168 Points, Yue Ying. Sixth Seat, 172 Points, Nan Jing Jing, Fifth Seat, 174 Points, Gou Yu, Fourth and Third Seat, 178 Points, Zhang Pu and Huang Ying." Elder Fen announces the few remaining results in one shot, only leaving Long Feng and Chu Yi's position on hold.

"Long Feng, answer me, How do you come out with the YinYang Stabilizing Concoction as the answer?" Elder Fen asked. As the question is asked, the others stare blankly towards him as they too wondering about how Long Feng came out with that name. "Dear Elder, Xiao Feng only roughly guess the name because of the ingredient used in the recipe is mainly to stabilized the disturbance of Yin and Yang Energy within the body."

"Xiao Feng dared to write down this name because of the [Yin Essence Soul Seed], the [Yang Rich Essence Fruit], and the [Balanced YinYang Grass]. If Xiao Feng did offend Elder in any way, please give this junior a chances for fake bravado." Long Feng politely answer the Elder's question.

"Good. Very Good. Really as how Brother Zhan expected, a pretty good seedling." Ender Fen praises Long Feng for being quite talented before he turned around and announce the remaining results. "Second Seat, 184 Points, Chu Yi. First Seat, Full 200 Points, Long Feng." the moment everyone within the Arena heard the results, a loud scream could be heard, especially Lang Ya who has also seated along in the spectator seats, altogether with the other five more brothers.

"Good Job, Seventh Brother!" the six of them is howling like a group of wolves with banners and flags with Long Feng's name on top, and what is worst written within the Flags, is the word [Refiner of the Tiger Stripes Soul Pill].