Eternal Cultivation of Alchemy

Chapter 2372  The Competition Continues

Once the second group of contestants was done, they returned to the hall where they had to watch the others participate. Their timings outside showed their Real Time instead of their Final Time just like the last time, confusing everyone.

No one received any explanations, however, so they all had to wait for what the reason truly was.

The next group were then brought out. After that, the competition was in full swing.

A group went out took place every two hours, which was more than enough time to reset anything that needed to be reset and for the participants to complete their tasks.

Every two hours, 128 participants, or a close number, went up to the maze and took part. One by one, they did the best they could, making pills as quickly as possible. There were very few such cases where the competition took longer than 2 hours, and that was only because the participants failed to make pills good enough to pass through.

Alex made many mental preparations while watching these groups take their tests. All of their mistakes served as warnings, and all their successes became his inspiration. He made sure not to miss anything.

Each successive group broke the previous record, making the 20 pills faster and faster. In three days, the lowest Final Time recorded had been just over 40 minutes. That participant had completed all 20 pills before even entering the first ring and then went through it all in succession.

The people then realized this was, in fact, the fastest method and began copying it. This was certainly an efficient method, and the overall time taken was now getting drastically lower on average.

However, it quickly became apparent that it wasn't easy to make all 20 pills so quickly. Since every single one of those 20 pills was different, these alchemists could only make about three or four of them at once. Any more than that, and they couldn't concentrate enough to achieve at least 85% harmony.

After all, achieving a high harmony was also a difficult requirement for many. Most of them took about 8 to 10 minutes to make their pills. So, for 20 pills, many easily exceeded 40 minutes, often closing in on 50 minutes. When mistakes were made, some even took over an hour.

The technique definitely didn't work for everyone. However, for those for whom it did work, it worked wonderfully.

In the next four days, the Final Time was reduced to 35 minutes. The average hadn't gone down very drastically, but there were a few that managed to complete the 20 pills in such a little amount of time.

Around this time, people began to notice a problem with this method as well. While it was very fast to make all 20 pills and then leave, if everyone used the same strategy, most would end up being late anyway and incur penalties due to their ranking.

So, some participants began making a few pills at a time and moving ahead to avoid the extra penalties. This strategy worked fabulously for those who knew they couldn't make the pills very fast but still didn't want to rank too low.

The competition soon became as much a test of strategy as of ability. The right approach to the entire event could make or break a contestant's performance.

On the seventh day, Alex watched Riveroak and Jai Heiyun leave for the maze together. Thankfully, they hadn't become opponents in the very first round. However, they would meet each other from the fifth ring onward, where the two paths would merge.

Riveroak's strategy was simple and effective. She made many pills in a row before advancing.

Sadly, Jai Heiyun wasn't strong enough to make many pills at once. In fact, she wasn't even strong enough to make four pills at once. The only reason she had survived the last competition was that she avoided making mistakes like others did.

She knew at this point that she didn't have to be the best. She just needed to do better than average. As long as she stayed among the group of contestants who performed well enough, she could move on to the next realm, which would be amazing for her.

Because her cultivation base was still low, just getting the opportunity to advance would allow her to improve quickly for the next competition.

The round began, and everyone sat down to make pills. Alex watched Jai Heiyun pull out three cauldrons at once and start making pills. He rooted for her in this competition, keeping his eyes on her the entire time.

Jai Heiyun seemed determined to do her best, and she began making the three pills. Her speed at making pills was good, and her understanding of ingredients and recipes was impeccable, allowing her to outperform many others.

However, her weaker cultivation base continued to be a hindrance. She made the three pills in about seven minutes. That was quite fast, but not fast enough to surpass the stronger contestants.

Still, with those three pills, she crossed three rings and sat down again to make the rest.

By the end, she managed to make all 20 pills in about 42 minutes, but with an additional 72 seconds added to her time. It wasn't the best performance so far, but it was far from the worst.

At this point, she was easily in the upper half of the rankings.

Compared to her, Riveroak performed even better. Not dramatically better, as her Final Time was 39 minutes, but it was still impressive.

They returned and sat back down beside Alex and the others.

"Definitely make the pills all at once," Riveroak said with a long sigh. "Just the act of sitting down and standing up as you walk through the rings is enough to waste precious seconds. Don't bother with anything else, you three."

"I think I'm with her on this one," Jai Heiyun said. "You three are strong enough that you don't need to make pills in small batches. Making them all at once is definitely the right way."

Alex and the others considered those words and nodded. n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

"We'll keep that in mind when it's our turn."