Chapter 4862 — Where the Problem Lies
The Blossom Guardian · Page 1 of 2
After its last upgrade, the Shennong Cauldron was more than equal to refining seventh-grade pills. The Nurturing Essence Pill in particular was not counted among the harder seventh-grade recipes, so it posed no difficulty at all.
Two hours later, a fresh batch of Nurturing Essence Pills emerged. Wei Zhao had expected five at best—after all, the Nurturing Essence Magic Gold Grass he had estimated was only enough for five portions, and this was his first attempt at the pill besides. Bringing the batch to completion at all would already have been perfect.
But the final result nearly dropped Wei Zhao's jaw to the floor. Ten Nurturing Essence Pills sat gleaming inside the Shennong Cauldron—ten whole pills, every one of them top-grade!
That was not merely a hundred percent success rate; it was damn well two hundred percent!
Fortunately Wei Zhao was alone. Had Qing Xuanzi, his disciple, been there to observe on the spot, the man's eyeballs would surely have littered the ground, and his entire worldview and philosophy of life would have been overthrown beyond repair.
Yet Wei Zhao was long since accustomed to such surprises. After a brief moment of shock he quickly regained his calm, for with a wondrous artifact like the Shennong Cauldron, aided by the finest quality Nurturing Essence Magic Gold Grass and auxiliary ingredients, plus a decent measure of luck, overproduction in refining—though unexpected—was in truth only reasonable.
Putting away the ten Nurturing Essence Pills, Wei Zhao's attention soon returned to the tablet computer. A little surprise like this was not enough to make him forget the matter of Qing Xuanzi.
With the monitoring analysis results from his own Nurturing Essence Pill refinement in hand, he set them against Qing Xuanzi's for comparison, and could not help frowning once more. Though both came from the same software, the two curves and their parameters were poles apart—not a single point of similarity could be found between them.
"Could it be because the pills are different? One is the Great Return Pill, the other the Nurturing Essence Pill—the refining processes are fundamentally different to begin with. Trying to pin down the root of the problem through such a comparison is a bit of a stretch." Wei Zhao mused for a moment, then decided not to agonize over it. If he wanted a more direct and reliable comparison, he need only refine a Great Return Pill himself.
When the analysis results of Wei Zhao's own Great Return Pill refinement came out and were compared with Qing Xuanzi's, the picture was indeed clear at a glance!
Both were seventh-grade Great Return Pill refinements, and the broad shape of the two curves was nearly identical—as expected. Yet the differences were still numerous, the most obvious being the refining curves themselves: one smooth and flawless, well-nigh perfect; the other rising and falling in ceaseless fluctuation.
In itself, however, this proved nothing. Wei Zhao possessed a wondrous artifact like the Shennong Cauldron—apart from the channeling of true qi, everything was computer-controlled, so his refining curve was naturally flawless. Qing Xuanzi, by contrast, relied entirely on his own control. However rich his experience, he could never match the perfection of a computer; such a thing could not be forced.
"Qing Xuanzi's refinements fail at the drop of a hat—is this the reason?" Wei Zhao said, stroking his chin. But he promptly overturned his own idea: "That can't be it. Plenty of seventh-grade alchemists share Qing Xuanzi's problem, but not all of them do. If this were the cause, it would be a limit no alchemist could ever overcome."
And so it was: the human brain was not a computer after all. A computer could control the refining curve with near perfection, but alchemists who relied purely on experience could never manage it—not even the legendary Mystic-rank alchemists.