The Boss Behind The Game

Mansion of the Dead, Beiqi.

After an arduous three-day studying extravaganza, the day of the trial finally arrived.

All the players shared a common understanding of how tormenting and painstaking their three-day journey was. In order to be ahead of tens of millions of players and qualify as Potion Masters, they had all abandoned sleep and food, while burning the midnight oil to study under the dim light in the Mansion of the Dead.

The entire place was shrouded in a solemnly studious air. Under such a conducive environment, the players labored through the pages to learn the basic fundamental skills regarding becoming a Potion Master.

Finally, the day to reap the results of their assiduous efforts was here.

While waiting, the players couldn't help but feel extremely nervous, just as though they were taking their college entrance examinations in high school.

Lu Wu personally requested the Rock Ghost King to be the judge and members of the Wood Spirit Clan to assist him for each trial, so that he could select the most gifted player from the 10,000 applicants.

Initially, the Wood Spirit Clan refused the offer as they had an irreparable feud with the Rock Ghost King.

However, the Rock Ghost King went to the Wood Spirit Clan's territory and personally apologized to them. He even released the souls of the deceased Wood Spirit Clan people as an act of apology. All in all, it was done so that the trial could be held smoothly.

Lu Wu had always been greatly troubled by the feud between the Wood Spirit Clan and the Rock Ghost King. After all, they were from the same faction. However, after he found out that the Rock Ghost King actually set the souls of the dead Wood Spirit Clan members free, all of his worries were resolved instantly.

With assistance from Bei Li, all the souls received a mark from the artifact, allowing it to create new living bodies for them to enter.

Thus, all of them were revived successfully!

The joy of the reunion dampened the intense hatred they held for the Rock Ghost King. Ultimately, all misunderstandings and conflicts were rectified, as their relationship began with renewed civility and peace.

Thus, the Wood Spirit Clan cordially accepted the offer to assist the Rock Ghost King in the trial this time.

After all preparations were in place, the Potion Master Trial officially started, while the players trembled with anxiety.

[Server Announcement: The Potion Master Trial officially begins now. All applicants please stand by, as you will be transported to the Trial Arena in five minutes!]

The players did not have any unusual movements, even after hearing the game notification.

Their eyes were still firmly fixated on the books in their hands, hoping to squeeze in the information of a few more pages, hoping that it might prove to be useful in the exam later.

The entire group of players behaved similarly, hastily trying to read and memorize more in the last few moments, five minutes before the start of the trial.

Ten… nine… eight…

When the transport process was activated, the players' bodies immediately transformed into streaks of light, before disappearing from the spot and transferring to the Trial Arena.

Suddenly, a roar of bitter screams reverberated through the air.

"Ah! Please let me study a while more, just one more page is enough!"

"I want to study, please let me read for a while more!"

"I'm done for, I'm doomed! I'm too nervous so I've forgotten the information on the page of Spiritual Material Compendium Three. I'm done for!"

...

Lu Wu was greatly amused when he saw the players' expressions.

However, since he had announced that the trial would be held three days later, he would not go back on his words. Lu Wu wanted to select the creme de la creme of the players that had exceptional potion crafting abilities.

After all, the shorter the time frame was, the easier it was to identify the talented ones among the less gifted players.

After officially entering the Trial Arena, the players realized that their surroundings were shrouded in complete white, except a table that was placed in front of each of them. The table was laden with a huge assortment of spiritual materials of different levels as well as a purple potion-crafting furnace.

[Rule Notification: The trial duration is six hours. Players will be ranked according to their score, the players in the top 10,000 rankings within six hours will become Potion Masters!]

Score Corresponding to the Potion's (Elixir) Grade:

First-level Elixir (First-stage Potion): 10 points.

Second-level Elixir (Second-stage Potion): 30 points.

Third-level Elixir (Third-stage Potion): 120 points.

Fourth-level Elixir (Fourth-stage Potion): 600 points.

...

(Note: Elixir and potion are both divided into 10 levels and 15 stages. Stage one to two are at the beginner's level, three to four are at the intermediate level, five to seven are at the advanced level, eight to nine are at the master's level, while stage 10 is at the divine level. The Rock Ghost King's standard is placed at the fifth to sixth stage.)

After the players had learned about the trial, another game notification instantly popped up again.

[The trial officially begins now, all players are advised to wisely use their time to craft elixirs!]

When they heard that the trial had commenced, the players hastily rushed toward their respective crafting tables with all the spiritual materials on them. Without any hesitation, they started to identify the quality of the spiritual materials and try their best to remember the recipes from the books as well as the instructions on refining the spiritual materials.

During the trial, the players would not be able to open their personal channel or peruse their books. Everything on the line depended purely on the memories in their minds.

Moreover, much to their disappointment, the players couldn't utilize their analyzing ability in the Trial Arena.

Thus, some of the players were completely flummoxed.

The spiritual materials came in all kinds of colors - purple, red, yellow, and many others. The players couldn't simply identify any of the spiritual materials that were on their table.

What is this shit? Some of them broke down in despair, overcome with the urge to smash the table before them.

Without the ability to use their analyzing abilities, the players could only rely on the images that they recalled in their memories to identify the mysterious and baffling materials. A portion of the more talented players had even learned to identify the spiritual materials according to their unique herbal scents.

In mere moments, the vast gap in skill level among the players started to materialize.

The second step required them to ascertain which spiritual materials could be crafted into powerful elixirs after refining them, which was a crucial step in the crafting process.

Since all of the players were considered amateurs at this point and couldn't measure the ingredients properly, Lu Wu had specially prepared an electronic scale for them. It would be extremely useful for measuring the weights of the materials needed. (It would be akin to bringing a calculator to the college entrance examination.)

If there were mistakes in measurements, the spiritual materials might clash and become incompatible with one another during the crafting process, thus failing to create an elixir.

Half an hour passed swiftly, as some of the more skilled players had already measured the correct amount of necessary spiritual materials to craft the elixir that they wanted, using the electronic scale.

The next and most essential step was none other than the potion-crafting.

This process had the most extreme difficulty, as it was further subdivided into three different steps. In the beginning, control of fire was of crucial importance. The player had to constantly observe the condition of the melted potion mixture and adjust the flame accordingly. They also had to be wary of the sequence of adding the materials, as each of them needed to be brewed for a different amount of time.

The final step was the condensation or the potion coagulation step. Luckily, the last step had the lowest difficulty. If the previous steps were done perfectly, there should not be any problems at this stage.

After an hour had gone by, only about a hundred players from the tens of millions of participants had successfully crafted First-level Elixirs with poor quality. Meanwhile, a majority of them failed completely on their first try.

What they would be tested on at this stage would be their mental acuity.

It was crucial for a Potion Master to maintain a calm attitude and mindset when crafting potions. After all, they would need to use many spiritual materials for each crafting process. Needless to say, spiritual money cost soul coins, which cost real money!

Thus, without a steady heart and unyielding perseverance, it would be impossible to progress as far as a Potion Master.

A surge of contempt broiled in many players' hearts at this moment.

Not only did they have to relive the harrowing moments from their school exams, they also felt completely absurd, as though they had become a sort of researcher who was despondently trying to invent new weapons.

This stringent and taxing difficulty brought many players with weaker mentality onto the verge of tears.

In the second hour, the more agile and nimble players had already crafted eight to nine times already, while the slower players had only managed to do it once or twice. Meanwhile, the players who lagged behind were still permanently stuck at the spiritual material identification step, slowly slipping into a state of despair and exasperation.