Chapter 55: Procurement

After Ye Qingxuan placed his order through the disciple token, the spiritual herb seeds, the exchanged alchemy furnace, and the materials for the talisman brush required for his tasks were quickly delivered.

Afterward, Ye Qingxuan asked Bai Wenyang for the current price catalog of various materials in the Treasure Pavilion.

With limited funds, Ye Qingxuan only planned to exchange for Tier 2 pills and materials for refining mid-grade and low-grade magical tools for the time being.

After reviewing the prices of the spiritual herb portions required for various Tier 2 pills versus their selling prices, Ye Qingxuan did some mental calculations and quickly selected the spiritual herbs required to refine five types of Tier 2 pills.

These five types of Tier 2 pills included

Tier 2 Spirit Augmentation Pills and Tier 2 Spirit Fusion Pills, which assisted in increasing the cultivation of the Foundation Establishment stage.

Tier 2 Grass Return Pills to heal injuries caused at the Foundation Establishment stage; Tier 2 Spirit Cleansing Pills to remove negative energy within the scope of the Foundation Establishment stage; and Tier 2 Spirit Recovery Pills to rapidly restore the spiritual power of Foundation Establishment cultivators.

The effect of the Tier 2 Spirit Augmentation Pill was the same as the Tier 1 version—increasing the efficiency of the spiritual root's conversion of spiritual qi—but the Tier 2 version was more potent and suitable for Foundation Establishment cultivators.

The Tier 2 Spirit Fusion Pill could accelerate the fusion between different spiritual powers, speeding up the process for Foundation Establishment cultivators to condense spiritual power and accelerate the liquefaction of spiritual energy.

There were many other types of Tier 2 pills with similar effects, but Ye Qingxuan chose the five that had the highest refining difficulty and the highest profit margins.

The current market conditions for these five pills within the Xuantian Sect were as follows

The herb prices for both the Tier 2 Spirit Augmentation Pill and the Tier 2 Spirit Fusion Pill were 100 low-grade spirit stones per portion.

The herbs for the Tier 2 Spirit Recovery Pill were 230 low-grade spirit stones per portion, while the herbs for the Tier 2 Grass Return Pill were 360 low-grade spirit stones per portion.

The herbs for the Tier 2 Spirit Cleansing Pill were 800 low-grade spirit stones per portion.

Within the Xuantian Sect, the normal market price for a single Tier 2 Spirit Augmentation Pill or Tier 2 Spirit Fusion Pill was 100 low-grade spirit stones.

A single Tier 2 Spirit Recovery Pill went for 500 low-grade spirit stones, a Tier 2 Grass Return Pill for 800, and a Tier 2 Spirit Cleansing Pill for 2,000 low-grade spirit stones.

In reality, these were the normal price levels for pills used to assist cultivation, heal injuries, or restore spiritual energy.

The reason why the Tier 1 Spirit Augmentation Pill had the highest price within the Xuantian Sect previously was simply because the number of low-tier spiritual herbs in the sect was countless, and since Qi Refinement stage disciples did not need to go out for training, it created that specific market situation for Tier 1 pills.

However, in the real market outside, the prices of cultivation-assisting pills were generally the lowest, while pills with other functions were typically higher.

Because cultivation-assisting pills only played a supplementary role and contained very little energy, their prices were naturally lower.

In contrast, pills for healing, restoring spiritual power, or removing foreign energies required immense amounts of energy to be effective, so their prices were naturally higher.

This was also why many cultivators in the outside world could continuously consume auxiliary pills to cultivate and increase their power; otherwise, if the price of cultivation-assisting pills rose, the outside world would never be as stable as it was now.

As for those low-tier pills that directly increased cultivation, they had basically been phased out by the Earth-Mystic Realm.

Unless they were high-grade pills containing the world's essence.

Otherwise, for other pills that directly increased cultivation, the massive energy would not be refined through the spiritual root; the spiritual power obtained by directly increasing cultivation could not be fully controlled by the individual, which greatly limited the upper limit of their cultivation.

Therefore, in the current Earth-Mystic Realm, low-level cultivators basically used cultivation-assisting pills.

Only high-level cultivators, upon obtaining spiritual herbs containing the world's essence, could refine pills that directly increased cultivation without side effects.

This was the same principle as the essence feedback Ye Qingxuan received when his Grotto-Heaven upgraded, which allowed him to directly increase his cultivation without side effects.

As for the purchase price of these Tier 2 pills by the Treasure Pavilion, it would be a thirty percent discount off the market price!

The reason for such a large price difference was that the Xuantian Sect would take a twenty percent tax on the transaction volume for opening shops in the market.

After deciding on the pills he wanted to refine, Ye Qingxuan calculated his spirit stones and found he had a total of 43,575 low-grade spirit stones remaining.

Due to his tight budget, Ye Qingxuan only planned to purchase

20 portions of Tier 2 Spirit Augmentation herb, 20 portions of Tier 2 Spirit Fusion herb, 20 portions of Tier 2 Spirit Recovery herb, 20 portions of Tier 2 Grass Return herb, and 30 portions of Tier 2 Spirit Cleansing herb.

The profit margin for the Tier 2 Spirit Augmentation and Spirit Fusion pills was the highest, but for the same amount of refining work per batch, the Tier 2 Spirit Cleansing Pill earned more spirit stones.

Furthermore, the greatest current use of the Tier 2 Spirit Cleansing Pill was to remove demonic qi from Foundation Establishment cultivators in the Outer Realm battlefield, so the demand was huge. It was Ye Qingxuan's primary pill for accumulating capital in the early stages.

Tier 2 pills had no auxiliary effect on Ye Qingxuan; he chose to purchase the herbs for the Spirit Augmentation and Spirit Fusion pills merely to practice and master the refining process for these two types.

Once he had accumulated enough capital, it would be time for Ye Qingxuan to enter the Tier 3 market.

With the remaining three thousand-plus spirit stones, Ye Qingxuan planned to purchase Tier 1 spiritual ores and materials used for refining mid-grade and low-grade magical tools to prepare for studying tool refining.

Once the procurement list was finalized, Ye Qingxuan sent the order to Bai Wenyang via his disciple token.

Subsequently, he instructed the brothers Ye Zhaoheng and Ye Zhaoyu to take his entire fortune of 43,575 low-grade spirit stones to the Treasure Pavilion to transact with Bai Wenyang.

Inside the Treasure Pavilion, Bai Wenyang looked at the list sent by Ye Qingxuan. Seeing the spiritual ores and materials for refining mid- and low-grade magical tools at the end of the list, he muttered to himself

"Is my Junior Brother Ye planning to study tool refining as well?"

He did not believe that his Junior Brother Ye, who possessed such startling talent in alchemy, could also smoothly enter the field of tool refining.

Shaking his head slightly, Bai Wenyang stopped thinking about it and headed to the warehouse to prepare the goods for Ye Qingxuan.

Although it took some time, the process was very smooth. That same evening, Ye Zhaoheng and Ye Zhaoyu returned with the purchased materials.

The next day, Ye Qingxuan began refining the Tier 2 Spirit Augmentation Pills.

Since Ye Qingxuan was already at the Purple Mansion stage, and combined with the fact that he now completely controlled his Immortal Soul—with his consciousness merging into the essence of his spirit, vitality, and soul—his comprehension had once again reached a new level.

Thus, he succeeded on his very first attempt at refining Tier 2 Spirit Augmentation Pills.

The first batch yielded 3 pills, the second batch yielded 5, the third batch yielded 7...

Ye Qingxuan was currently using an alchemy furnace of the top-grade magical tool level, which was more than sufficient for refining Tier 2 pills.

However, the higher the grade of the pill and the more energy it contained, not only did the refining difficulty increase, but the number of pills produced per batch would also gradually decrease.

Even with Ye Qingxuan's heaven-defying comprehension and his control over spiritual power and divine sense, he could only eventually stabilize the yield of the Tier 2 Spirit Augmentation Pill at 9 pills per batch.

This yield was essentially the limit for one portion of herbs.

Afterward, Ye Qingxuan spent less than a month refining all the herbs for the five types of pills into finished products.

From the 20 portions of Tier 2 Spirit Augmentation herbs, Ye Qingxuan refined a total of 168 pills.

From the 20 portions of Tier 2 Spirit Fusion herbs, he refined a total of 172 pills.

From the 20 portions of Tier 2 Spirit Recovery herbs, he refined a total of 135 pills.

From the 20 portions of Tier 2 Grass Return herbs, he refined a total of 132 pills.

From the 30 portions of Tier 2 Spirit Cleansing herbs, he refined a total of 175 pills.

The reason the total yields for the Spirit Recovery, Grass Return, and Spirit Cleansing pills were so low was primarily because these three types contained too much energy.

For one portion of Tier 2 Spirit Fusion or Grass Return herbs, Ye Qingxuan could only stabilize the yield at 7 pills per batch.

For the Tier 2 Spirit Cleansing Pill, he could only stabilize the yield at 6 pills per batch.