Sage Monarch

Yang Qi and Summer Vastcold hurried to the Pill-King's God Palace.

The palace was, of course, a standalone god kingdom.

Inside, it was beautiful, with strange, fragrant plants visible everywhere. It abounded with all sorts of medicinal plants and animals, all of them things that could be used as ingredients for medicinal pills. It was enormous, far larger than any of the medicinal ingredient storehouses in the House of God Ordainment.

Of course, it was also kept under strict guard. Yang Qi saw thousands of deadly spell formations that had been set up to prevent unlawful entry.

With Summer Vastcold to lead the way, there was no danger. Together, they went into the depths of the palace, until they caught sight of a huge pill furnace that resembled a mountain shining with boundless light.

'Sand of radiance and light!'

With his Lord's Eye, Yang Qi could see that the furnace had originally been constructed from sand of radiance and light. Furthermore, its structure was so orderly and strict that it almost resembled genetic material. It was so profound that it made the furnace seem alive.

It was very different from his Heaven and Earth Furnace, which only made sense considering it was created by the High Priestess.

"Master!"

Summer Vastcold's Master was waiting beneath the enormous furnace. Mother Voidwalker sat on a prayer mat, her eyes closed, a mountainous stack of medicinal ingredients next to her.

Other than her, no one else was present.

"I thought you invited two other Paramount Gods to help?" Yang Qi said.

Looking coldly at Yang Qi, Mother Voidwalker said, "They won't come as their true selves. Once I begin concocting the pill, they'll send their will through the void to assist. Normally speaking, men aren't permitted to even look at the Light King God-Furnace. But since you're providing so many holy caliber godstones as fuel, we'll make an exception. In a moment, you'll need to listen to all of my instructions as I tell you how to set the godstones into the spell formation surrounding the furnace. Understand?"

"Yes, ma'am," Yang Qi replied, not daring to say too much.

"This pill concocting session will also be a session of cultivation for you. Considering how much you've helped Vastcold, you can watch the concocting process. I'm sure you'll learn a lot from it, and also improve your psychic power and godhood."

"Many thanks, Senior. My gratitude knows no bounds." Inside, he was chuckling coldly, as he knew that there was no way Mother Voidwalker had any good intentions. She likely intended to use this opportunity to gain deeper control of him, and assess him on a deeper level.

After all, she was the one who had imparted the Chiliocosm Unrestrained Mental Dharma to Summer Vastcold, all for the purpose of transforming his worldview.

She was vicious and merciless, otherwise she wouldn't be an Unbounded expert. Every Unbounded expert was an invincible and domineering figure, and Yang Qi being an Ascendant only meant that she would try taking advantage of him. Every Unbounded expert had fought tooth and nail for years to reach their current position.

When soldiers come, send a general to stop them. When flood waters come, use earth to block them. Yang Qi had spent the last month formulating countermeasures to the Chiliocosm Unrestrained Mental Dharma. And although he wasn't a hundred percent free of it, he was at least seventy to eighty percent confident that his true identity wouldn't be revealed.

"Good," Mother Voidwalker said, apparently satisfied with Yang Qi's attitude. She also gave an approving glance at Summer Vastcold, as if praising her success in getting Yang Qi under control.

"Now, let's fire up the Light King God-Furnace," Mother Voidwalker said. "You two sit in the qian and kun positions. When qian and kun combine, heaven and earth intersect, yin and yang combine, and the taiji is completed."

"Yes ma'am." Summer Vastcold and Yang Qi sat on opposite sides of the formation while Mother Voidwalker unleashed the power of her will, causing a wild tempest to spring up as the medicinal ingredients were pulled into the formation.

'Those are some incredible ingredients,' Yang Qi thought. 'There are even spritefruits in there.'

He nearly gasped in amazement at what he was seeing. There were millions and millions of ingredients of all kinds, which swirled together to form a huge vortex.

This was a much more difficult act than engaging in a fight. It required exquisite control over godpower, and a brain that could calculate matters that even the heavenly workings calculations systems would have trouble with.

Even three medicinal ingredients would have all sorts of interactions and combinations that could produce a variety of effects. That wasn't even mentioning the degree of heat or other matters. That was why concocting pills was almost like an act of creation.

Here, there were many millions of ingredients all interacting. As they entered the enormous formation, all sorts of medicinal effects were unleashed, then transformed based on their interactions. The slightest mistake at any step would lead to ruin.

Yang Qi knew that he couldn't do this. Although his psychic power was formidable, it couldn't compare at all to Mother Voidwalker's.

Her psychic power seemed unending and boundless, as though she could pierce any substructure, create millions upon millions of incarnations, connect to the realm of Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana, and extrude all impurities when she created god pills.

'Incredible,' Yang Qi thought as he watched. 'Nothing short of incredible. Unbounded will convergence definitely lives up to the hype. And now I can tell that I'm still far, far away from the Unbounded level. All I can do is just watch what she's doing. She was right; this experience will benefit me a lot in terms of understanding of how to control psychic power.'

Smiling faintly, Mother Voidwalker exhaled a blast of fire that engulfed the Light King God-Furnace, causing it to shine with radiant light as the medicinal ingredients inside melted.

"Add the godstones now, Void Qi!"

"Sure thing!" Yang Qi waved his sleeve and a stream of walnut-sized godstones flew out like rain, entering the spell formation around the Light King God-Furnace and causing it to flare to life.

Within that light it seemed possible to glimpse countless worlds.

"Elder Sisters, please, let your will come! Help concoct this pill!" Mother Voidwalker said as she tossed the flower of wisdom into the mix. Instantly, two expressions of will pierced through the void and arrived at the furnace.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi could see them in his mind's eyes, and they looked like god dragons from primeval times of chaos. They were so mighty and destructive that they could easily crush the House of God Ordainment out of existence.

Wailing sounds erupted from inside the Light King God-Furnace.

"Send in more godstones, boy!" Mother Voidwalker barked.

Yang Qi increased the volume of holy caliber godstones, until he was certain he had surpassed ten billion. However, Mother Voidwalker still didn't seem satisfied. "Keep going! Don't hold back any godstones. If we fail because you didn't give enough, I'll throw you into the furnace!"

From these words alone, it was obvious that Yang Qi wasn't just helping out. Mother Voidwalker was assigning the primary responsibility for this session of pill concocting to him, and would blame him for any failures.

Yang Qi's heart felt cold, but he knew that now wasn't the time to be defiant, lest he end up dead. However, one thing was already determined in his heart: Mother Voidwalker would pay for this!

'I'm not afraid of you, Mother Voidwalker. I'll suffer in silence for now. But once your apprentice consumes the Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill, I'll use my devil embryo to absorb it!' Even as he was thinking that, he continued throwing out godstones. "Don't worry, Exalted Mother Voidwalker! I won't hold back at all!"

Swissshhhhh!

Godstones continued pouring out like falling rain.

There seemed no end to the godstones that poured out of his sleeve. Ten billion. Thirty billion. Fifty billion.... Over the course of fourteen or fifteen hours, he produced no less than eighty billion godstones to power the formation.

RUMBLE!

Meanwhile, the two visiting expressions of will provided immense psychic power, causing world after world to appear within the pill furnace. Yang Qi could see that, inside the furnace, it was almost as if numerous Big Bangs were occurring one after another, each of them creating new universes. And yet it was all occurring according to some fixed set of rules.

The Light King God-Furnace let loose a piercing howl of a sound.

"More godstones! Hurry! This is the critical moment!" From the glare in Mother Voidwalker's eyes, it seemed if Yang Qi didn't provide more godstones immediately, she would kill him right there and throw him into the furnace.

He waved his sleeve, and more godstones poured out.

'This is incredible,' Mother Voidwalker thought. 'I can't believe this kid has so many godstones. It seems the treasure trove of the Lord of Civilization is nothing to look down on. With him under control, it'll provide access to a huge amount of wealth.' The more Mother Voidwalker realized how rich Yang Qi was, the more it stoked her killing intent.

Of course, Yang Qi knew exactly what she was thinking. However, he also knew she was nervous. She believed that the body he was using had been left behind by the Lord of Civilization himself, whose will would protect his successor.

At this point, the concoction effort had reached a critical moment.

1. I'm sure most of you are aware that qian and kun are synonyms for heaven and earth, yin and yang, etc. They're part of the eight trigrams, and together make "qiankun" which I sometimes translate as "cosmos" or other things depending on the context. I go into more detail .