Chapter 662: The Times Have Changed

Not long after Little Wei Yuan returned to Qingming, an immortal boat from the Taichu Palace main mountain arrived.

The immortal boat was fully loaded with tens of thousands of catties of medicinal ingredients, as well as seedlings of dozens of types of medicinal herbs. Although none were precious varieties, many auxiliary materials were needed in basic body-forging pills. Coupled with hundreds of catties of main medicine, it was just enough to refine 30,000 Peiyuan Pills.

The Master Zhi Dan Loose Practitioner naturally saw Little Wei Yuan's intentions, so he gave extra seedlings and seeds for all medicinal ingredients, and the quantity was huge.

Once the medicinal ingredients arrived, Little Wei Yuan was overjoyed and immediately called for the old Daoist Master Chuhe and Xu Xu Henshui, receiving the medicinal ingredients while discussing Qingming's future alchemy grand cause.

The medicinal ingredients were fine; the main business of the Jianmu Hall was actually planting medicine.

Most of the Taichu Palace's medicine gardens were in the hands of the Jianmu Hall. Taichu Palace cultivators could only eat the Creation Sect's medicine, and if the Creation Sect wanted to sell medicine, they could only buy medicinal ingredients from the Jianmu Hall.

Thus, in the repeated tug-of-war over the past thousand years, the price difference between pills and medicinal ingredients had reached a balance: the Creation Sect ate the big bones, and the Jianmu Hall ate the smaller ones.

These ordinary medicinal ingredients used for body forging naturally didn't have high environmental requirements; basically, any piece of spiritual field could grow them. The old Daoist Master Chuhe took stock and found that Qingming could open 5,000 mu of new spiritual fields.

Under the power of Jianmu Jianmu Sheng Lu Xuan in Qingming, ordinary spiritual fields could also have eight times the growth speed of the outside world, and these medicinal ingredients would only take one year to mature.

Now Human World Renjian Yanhuo had completed the optimization of the Peiyuan Pill formula, as well as the redesign of the refining process and the planning of the medicine workshop.

Preliminary estimates showed that after all 5,000 mu of medicine fields were planted, the new medicinal ingredients added each year could refine 600,000 Qingming-version Peiyuan Pills, enough for 50,000 Tendon-Muscle Realm body-forging cultivators to use for a year.

And the medicinal ingredients sent by the Taichu Palace this time were enough to refine 300,000 Qingming-version Peiyuan Pills.

The medicinal effect of the Qingming-version Peiyuan Pill was only one-tenth of the original version, so even Little Wei Yuan was embarrassed to call it a Peiyuan Pill. Xu Xu Henshui suggested calling it a "Small Peiyuan Pill," but Little Wei Yuan still felt a bit guilty in his conscience, and finally, imitating the style of Dao Foundation flying swords, changed it to "Peiyuan Small Pill."

This was the internal name in Qingming, but it was still collectively referred to as Peiyuan Pill to the outside world.

Little Wei Yuan also prepared to build a medicine firm, specifically for the sale of Qingming pills in the future.

Regarding the name of this medicine firm, everyone discussed it for a long time, and finally, the old Daoist Master Chuhe said, "In my opinion, why not call it the One-Pattern Medicine Firm."

"What does this mean? Are we only going to sell one-pattern spirit pills in the future?" Xu Xu Henshui was somewhat surprised; even the Creation Sect didn't dare to have such a big tone.

"Of course not, we sell all kinds of pills. Hehe, you don't know, outside they are used to calling medicine firm names and pill names together, like Jishi Firm An Gong Pill. When others mention our pills, what they will say is One-Pattern Peiyuan Pill!"

Xu Xu Henshui was greatly shocked: "This, isn't this cheating people?"

"How is it cheating? We are indeed called the One-Pattern Medicine Firm! The name is just a gimmick; let's get people here first." The old Daoist Master Chuhe explained with a smile.

Little Wei Yuan also felt it made sense. As long as people came, they wouldn't be able to run, so he immediately said, "This name is good! It's settled."

Little Wei Yuan acted vigorously and swiftly, and everyone started to implement it as soon as they dispersed. The first medicine workshop of the One-Pattern Medicine Firm was built not far from Xu Xu Henshui's alchemy hall. This place had abundant spiritual energy, and Xu Xu Henshui could also come over to provide guidance from time to time in the future.

The medicine workshop was planned to be quite large, occupying dozens of mu. After marking the boundaries, Yu Yu Zhizhuo led a thousand Dao Foundation cultivators to arrive, working vigorously, building four alchemy halls fifty feet long and five feet high in one go.

Subsequently, hundreds of cultivators brought thousands of body-forging porters, transporting countless strange and bizarre equipment, and Yu Yu Zhizhuo personally supervised the placement of this equipment in designated positions.

At first, only Xu Xu Henshui was watching, but soon the alchemists in his alchemy hall discovered that the alchemy equipment being transported in was not only something they had never seen, but they hadn't even heard of it. And these pieces of equipment were more complex than the last, and they couldn't understand them at all. Where did alchemy need these things?

The alchemists were all curious, and every day after finishing their routine alchemy work, they would gather at the construction site to watch the excitement.

Xu Xu Henshui just watched quietly, often standing for several hours, and the smile on his face gradually disappeared.

A thousand Dao Foundation cultivators worked together, and the construction of the medicine workshop naturally progressed rapidly. In just half a month, a brand-new medicine workshop had risen from the ground.

After the framework of the medicine workshop was built, seeing those four long, huge alchemy halls, as well as the square medicine processing hall in front, Xu Xu Henshui felt that his alchemy hall looked like a farmhouse courtyard.

These alchemy halls were stiff and lacked spiritual interest and vitality, but they were big and long enough, not comparable to Xu Xu Henshui's two-story buildings.

Another ten days passed, and all the equipment was installed. After testing for three days, everything was running correctly, so Little Wei Yuan arrived to open the furnace and refine pills.

For such a big event, Little Wei Yuan usually had to say a few words before opening the furnace. Thus, thousands of cultivators sat in a black row below, listening quietly to the Realm Master's speech.

Facing so many high-level listeners, Little Wei Yuan was also in high spirits, throwing the speech draft written by Human World Renjian Yanhuo aside, and improvising, starting from the ordinary farmhouse courtyard where he was born, all the way to how he suffered from hunger and cold when he was young, how he was bullied, and how he finally seized a line of opportunity to enter the Taichu Palace.

And now in Qingming, as long as you work hard, regardless of your background or status, everyone can have the opportunity to stand out!

Little Wei Yuan spoke with emotion, almost shouting "Dare to call the sun and moon to change the sky," but fortunately, he reined in his horse at the edge of the cliff.

After he finished speaking, someone in the audience shouted: "Time to eat!"

Thus, with a "whoosh," thousands of cultivators disappeared on the spot.

Little Wei Yuan on the stage was a bit messy; he originally had "two last sentences" that he hadn't spoken.

Yu Yu Zhizhuo said apologetically, "Junior Nephew, I'm sorry! The project progress exceeded expectations, and the quality was good, so I added a meal for everyone; the food today is a bit good."

Little Wei Yuan smiled and said, "It doesn't matter, Junior Uncle, go ahead and get busy."

At this moment, the medicinal ingredient hall had already started work early, and it was bustling with activity. Hundreds of body-forging cultivators were scattered in over a hundred work areas, processing medicinal ingredients. Beside each work area stood a sign, stating which medicinal ingredient was to be processed in this area and what the process steps were.

In the vast majority of work areas, there were no more than three steps, and most had only one step: shredding, slicing, or soaking in wine and drying. Each body-forging cultivator worked mechanically like a puppet; they didn't need to do anything else here, nor did they need to think.

Xu Xu Henshui was standing in an alchemy hall, watching quietly.

The hall didn't look like an alchemy room at all, and the alchemy furnace was even more bizarre. It was no longer an elegant and ancient circle or square, but a long strip, and it was divided into many grids, looking like... a feeding trough for cattle and horses.

Xu Xu Henshui didn't know why this thought floated up.

At this moment, many Dao Foundation cultivators walked into the medicine workshop, one by one with expressionless faces, ignoring Xu Xu Henshui. Xu Xu Henshui knew that these were Little Wei Yuan's Dao Foundation warriors, so he didn't speak, just watching quietly.

Then a bell rang, and the pill refining began.

Several cultivators walked in holding the pre-processed medicinal ingredients. These medicinal ingredients had already been allocated and packed in small boxes. Each box could just be poured into one grid of the alchemy furnace.

In the blink of an eye, dozens of grids were filled with medicinal ingredients, and the dozens of Dao Foundation warriors beside the alchemy furnace began to light the fire, melting the medicinal ingredients with Dao fire, with each Dao Foundation warrior responsible for one grid. There were also ten Dao Foundation warriors, each possessing Five Elements Dao power, who walked back and forth, adding fire to whichever grid was unbalanced.

Five Dao Foundation warriors patrolled back and forth, checking the furnace temperature and pill fire of the entire furnace every half-stick of incense. Once there was an imbalance, they would compensate on the spot.

Little Wei Yuan rushed over, scanned the inside of the hall with his spiritual sense, checked the situation of the pill liquid in the furnace, was very satisfied, greeted Xu Xu Henshui, and left again.

The refining of Peiyuan Pills was not complicated to begin with, roughly half a day would suffice. Little Wei Yuan's alchemy method took longer, but it was only a day.

Xu Xu Henshui watched quietly for a whole day.

Finally, the pill fire of a furnace was perfect. Just as Xu Xu Henshui was about to speak to remind them to collect the pills, he saw ten cultivators walk in hurriedly, and then the alchemy furnace opened, countless pills floated in the air, and were collected by the cultivators. The whole process was very smooth.

Xu Xu Henshui reached out and took a few Peiyuan Small Pills, observing them carefully. The three pills were full of particles, the pill quality was uniform, the medicinal properties were gentle, and the most rare thing was that the three pills were almost identical, and even Xu Xu Henshui found it difficult to distinguish the differences.

Each grid produced dozens of pills, and this hall refined a total of over 800 Peiyuan Small Pills in one furnace. The other three halls should be about the same. Xu Xu Henshui even suspected that the number of pills produced in each hall would be exactly the same.

Calculated this way, just this medicine workshop alone produced over 3,000 Peiyuan Small Pills daily, and 100,000 monthly, enough for 100,000 people to take for cultivation. The medicinal ingredients sent by the Taichu Palace this time were not enough for this medicine workshop to use for four months.

But Xu Xu Henshui knew that Peiyuan Pills didn't need so many in normal times. These medicinal ingredients had basically swept the Taichu Palace's medicine treasury clean.

At this moment, the cultivators began to clean the alchemy furnace and transport out the waste, then load in a new furnace of medicinal ingredients. Their movements were mechanical, yet incomparably skilled; they didn't need rest, didn't need immortal silver rewards, and never made mistakes.

Looking at the hall where everything was in order, Xu Xu Henshui suddenly had a feeling that this hall was coming toward him, and then smashed him to pieces.

Thus, he knew that the times had really changed.

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 663 =====