Mid-January.

More than four months had passed since Fang Yun returned to the sect from the Zeng Family’s ancestral land.

This January, the Inner Sect Competition was set to take place.

Naturally, Fang Yun had signed up for it.

He might not care for the prizes anymore, but placing in the Inner Sect Competition awarded Talent Points upon completion.

He still remembered the competition three years ago. Just for making it into the top eight, he had received 1,150 Talent Points before any bonuses.

This year, there was no doubt he would take first place.

His matches always ended quickly, after which he would disappear from Battle Peak.

During the competition, no disciple bothered to discuss who would win first place. The most heated debates were over who was most likely to contend for second.

In the last competition, the first-place prize was a Middle-grade Foundation Establishment Pill, and second place received a Lower-grade Foundation Establishment Pill. Those rewards had gone to Bai Qinying and Wu Junxin, respectively. This time, the only prize was a single Lower-grade Foundation Establishment Pill.

This time, Yuan Yunfan took second place.

The first-place prize, the Lower-grade Foundation Establishment Pill, was now in Fang Yun’s hands.

Since he already possessed a Top-grade Foundation Establishment Pill, he had no use for this lower-grade one. He would deal with it later.

Breaking through a major Realm was different from advancing through minor realms. Multiple Foundation Establishment Pills were useless to him, but different Foundation Establishment Spirit Medicines could be used together for a cumulative effect.

In these four months, Fang Yun had drawn for Life Talents a total of 1,185 times.

The Talent Points he gained each month hovered around 30,000.

Dan Cloud Peak.

Inside Superior Alchemy Room Number One.

Fang Yun was refining Qi Enhancement Pills.

He now used good-quality Spirit Medicine to refine Qi Enhancement Pills. Since he always produced six Upper-grade Qi Enhancement Pills anyway, giving him superior-quality Spirit Medicine would be a waste, now that he could refine them perfectly.

As for inferior-quality Spirit Medicine, he had yet to encounter any since he started taking on alchemy assignments.

’This is the last batch.’

After collecting the six pills, Fang Yun didn’t even need to look to know they were all Upper-grade Qi Enhancement Pills.

Refining Qi Enhancement Pills was so easy for him now that he felt he could produce six upper-grade ones with his eyes closed.

Leaving the Superior Alchemy Room, Fang Yun went to Dan Cloud Pavilion to turn in his assignment.

Wang Yourong rarely appeared at Dan Cloud Pavilion to perform her Steward duties anymore. Fang Yun knew that his Junior Sister Wang was now spending more time on her own cultivation.

In Elder Bai Heyan’s cave residence.

After leaving Dan Cloud Pavilion, Fang Yun appeared here.

"Fang Yun, what can I do for you?" Bai Heyan asked as Fang Yun entered. 𝒻𝑟𝘦𝘦𝘸ℯ𝒷𝑛𝘰𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝘤𝘰𝘮

"Elder, it’s about the Qi Enhancement Pill refining assignments. You can go back to assigning them to me normally, like any other disciple."

This was the very reason Fang Yun had come to see Bai Heyan.

He now had enough Upper-grade Qi Enhancement Pills to cultivate to the peak of the Qi Refining Tenth Layer. Under these circumstances, there was no need to keep taking advantage of the special arrangement.

With his Qi Enhancement Pill refining assignments returning to normal, it was also time for him to contribute more to the sect.

"It seems you have enough Upper-grade Qi Enhancement Pills. Very good." Fang Yun’s actions made Bai Heyan think even more highly of him. "I’ll make some adjustments to your future Tier One pill refining assignments."

"By the way, Fang Yun, when do you think you’ll reach the peak of the Qi Refining Tenth Layer?"

"Probably by the end of this year," Fang Yun replied.

Reach the peak of the Qi Refining Tenth Layer by the end of the year, and then he could prepare for Foundation Establishment.

That was Fang Yun’s current plan.

Once he successfully reached Foundation Establishment and became a Sect Elder, his monthly Talent Point bonus would increase significantly.

His current sect influence hadn’t changed in the last four months. The next change would likely come when he became a Sect Elder.

"Are you confident?" Bai Heyan asked with a smile.

"Of course."

Fang Yun answered confidently. He had a Top-grade Foundation Establishment Pill, supplemented by the Foundation Establishment Spiritual Object, the Celestial Wood Spirit Leaf.

If he still said he wasn’t confident with all that, he would be selling himself far too short.

Of course, if he could obtain another good Foundation Establishment Spiritual Object to stack the effects, that would be for the best.

Bai Heyan only touched on the matter of Foundation Establishment briefly before returning to the topic of alchemy assignments.

"Once your Qi Enhancement Pill assignments are the same as the other disciples’, I’ll figure out a way for you to refine a few more batches of Spirit Ascension Pills."

Hearing this, Fang Yun immediately thanked him, "Thank you, Elder!"

Currently, when refining Spirit Ascension Pills, he could still only produce one Upper-grade pill per batch. However, alongside that one upper-grade pill, he could now consistently produce four or more Middle-grade ones.

The more he refined Spirit Ascension Pills, the slower his progress became.

This wasn’t due to his Alchemy Talent, but the limitations of his Realm.

Second Tier pills were normally refined by Foundation Establishment Cultivators. Lacking the aid of a Divine Sense put Fang Yun at a great disadvantage when refining Second Tier pills.

But even so, with the boost from his five-star Alchemy Talent, no Elder of Alchemy besides Bai Heyan himself could consistently achieve better results than him when refining Spirit Ascension Pills.

This visit to Elder Bai Heyan had yielded an unexpected reward.

As far as Fang Yun was concerned, he could never have too many Second Tier pills like the Spirit Ascension Pill. Even when he reached the mid-Foundation Establishment Stage in the future, Spirit Ascension Pills would still be quite effective in aiding his cultivation.

Spring passed and autumn came.

「Six months went by in the blink of an eye.」

During March and May,

in each of those two months, Fang Yun took on three Spirit Ascension Pill refining assignments. Previously, the most he had ever gotten in one month was two, and in more than half the months, he only got one.

The increase in Spirit Ascension Pill assignments, and thus the number of times he refined them, also advanced his current skill level.

Due to the limitations of his Realm, his personal assessment was that his overall progress wasn’t significant.

His best batch of Spirit Ascension Pills yet had yielded two Upper-grade, one Middle-grade, and four Lower-grade pills.

That was his own evaluation. In the eyes of the Elders of Alchemy, however—especially Song Qiaoqiao and Bai Heyan—it was a completely different story.

He hadn’t even reached the Foundation Establishment Stage, yet he could refine two upper-grade pills from a single batch of Spirit Ascension Pills without producing a single Wasted Pill.

This achievement made him the second person in the history of the Celestial Cloud Sect to do so.

The first had been born a thousand years ago and had later succeeded in Core Formation, becoming a Supreme Elder of the sect. At that time, the Celestial Cloud Sect had considerable growth potential, but it also faced great external pressure.

June was not a good month for Fang Yun.

He had accepted a Guardian mission that month, and it passed peacefully, resulting in a particularly low Talent Point settlement.

Compared to the average number of Talent Points he usually earned each month, the amount he got this month was negligible.

For Fang Yun, the lack of any Demon attacks was a stroke of bad luck.

The reason he had taken the Guardian mission last month was that the conflict between the Stone Demon Sect and the Shen Family had intensified. With support from the Celestial Demon Sect, the flames of war were threatening to spread beyond the Shen Family’s territory.

Currently, Fang Yun’s primary source of firsthand information about the outside world was Bai Qinying; the Elders on Battle Peak received such news the fastest.

His secondary source was Yang Yingjie. It was worth mentioning that Yang Yingjie had already reached the Qi Refining Tenth Layer late last year.

With the conflict escalating, Fang Yun had wanted to test his luck and see if he could earn more Talent Points from combat.

Because of his bad luck this time, Fang Yun had no desire to go out on another mission after returning.

In just over five more months, he would reach the peak of the Qi Refining Tenth Layer.

All that was left to do was cultivate diligently, accumulate Talent Points normally each month, and strive to break through to the Foundation Establishment Stage early next year.