On the second day, the sun had just risen. As the warm sunlight landed on Bu Fang's face, he felt an itchy feeling on it.
Opening his eyes, he crawled out of bed slowly before stretching his waist. After washing up, Bu Fang left the room and he went toward the restaurant.
That day, the restaurant seemed extremely quiet and Bu Fang became slightly suspicious. It had been an extremely noisy night… Why was it so quiet now?
Thinking hard about it, Bu Fang looked into the Cloud Mist Restaurant. Before long, he found the Eight Treasures Chicken.
In the distance, Lord Dog was lying under the Path-Understanding Tree as it slept. Sounds of steady breathing could be heard coming from Lord Dog's nose.
One of its paws were pressing on top of the head of the Eight Treasures Chicken.
As its head was pressed on the ground, the Eight Treasures Chicken had a depressed expression on its face. Its wings were drooping and there were feathers all over the ground. Occasionally, its body would twitch.
Its tiny eyes glared at Lord Dog and there was an enraged expression on its face.
It was too scary… It was really frightening. The dog was an extremely fearsome monster!
Bu Fang yawned as he walked toward the Eight Treasures Chicken. Standing in front of the chicken, he sighed as he stretched out his hand to rub its head. However, the Eight Treasures Chicken still had a depressed expression on its face.
"It has been hard on you… You managed to safely make it through the night. Tsk… This chicken meat is really firm!"
Bu Fang praised the Eight Treasures Chicken. He didn't store the Eight Treasures Chicken back into the system's dimensional space, but only walked into the kitchen with a contented expression on his face.
Preparing a portion of Sweet 'n' Sour Ribs and Dragon Blood Rice, he carried two porcelain plates out of the kitchen.
Lord Dog and Nethery were already sitting on the table when Bu Fang came out of the kitchen.
"Blacky's Sweet 'n' Sour Ribs… This is Nethery's Dragon Blood Rice…"
Nethery looked at the porcelain plate in front of her which had only half a portion of Dragon Blood Rice left. A displeased expression instantly formed on her exquisite face and she raised her head to glare at Bu Fang.
Reaching out his hand, Bu Fang patted Nethery's head. "Hey, do you want to turn into a fatty like this fat dog? For the sake of your figure, you should eat less…"
Nethery was extremely angry! She would rather turn into a fatty like that fat dog sitting beside her!
She angrily tilted her head and directed her anger into the plate of Dragon Blood Rice. The way she ate showed how angry she was.
The corner of Lord Dog's mouth curled upwards and it revealed a mocking smile. It seemed as though it was extremely proud of the fats on its body as it laughed at Nethery. The lumps of fat on its body jiggled around.
It made Nethery even angrier…
Bu Fang returned to the kitchen and, after making his preparations, he grabbed the Eight Treasures Chicken and walked out of the restaurant.
He slowly walked toward the central plaza. Today was the day he would compete against Mao Shi. Bu Fang was taking this round pretty seriously as he had already made a promise. If he wasn't able to uphold the promise he made, he would feel extremely embarrassed.
He was someone who kept his word.
The Eight Treasures Chicken seemed to be extremely active as its eyes rolled around continuously.
Bu Fang grabbed the chicken's head and walked towards the small path in the middle of the tall buildings. As it became brighter and brighter, he slowly made his way into the central plaza.
In the instant he entered the plaza, deafening cheers filled the arena. A giant stage was erected in the middle of the plaza and, surrounding the stage, the audience stand was densely packed. It was completely filled and the audience members were incomparably excited. When they saw Bu Fang, all of them started screaming.
There were countless people watching this match.
It was because of a single sentence from Bu Fang.
"If your furnace doesn't explode, count it as my loss."
Wasn't he extremely domineering? Wasn't he extremely arrogant?
Facing a genius alchemist who had the qualifications to fight for the top spot, Bu Fang actually dared to say something like that. This chef was pretty awesome! There were people who admired Bu Fang's domineering attitude. Facing the genius alchemist, Mao Shi, he didn't shrink back at all. Instead, he made a ruthless oath.
Of course, there were others who felt that Bu Fang was only trying to act cool. After all, Mao Shi was not someone whose furnace exploded in the past due to Bu Fang's actions. He was a true genius. He was someone who had the chance to fight for the top spot with Mu Bai… As a genius, he was definitely outstanding in some fields, otherwise, how would he be considered a genius?
If Bu Fang wanted to cause Mao Shi's furnace to explode, it was almost impossible.
Everyone thought that it was something Bu Fang said impulsively.
It could be said that there were countless people who were watching this competition. Almost everyone in the Pill Palace was watching this round.
As of today, there were many people who were rooting for Bu Fang in the Pill Palace. However, the number of people who supported him was much lesser than the number of people who supported Mao Shi. After all, Mao Shi was an extremely popular alchemist in the Pill Palace. He naturally had many supporters. Even though there were more people who were supporters of Mu Bai, the number of supporters he had was naturally far more than Bu Fang, who was someone who had just appeared in the spotlight.
"That chef is crazy! He will know the meaning of despair soon enough!"
"It's finally about to begin. We are going to see how Senior Brother Mao will ruthlessly destroy this chef! I'm so excited!"
"Let Senior Brother Mao protect the dignity of us alchemists!"
"Defeat the public enemy of the alchemists! Senior Brother Mao, it's time for you to unleash your true power!"
...
The audience members were chattering among themselves and they seemed to be extremely excited. It didn't matter if they were located within the projection array or not… They were all equally excited.
Albeit the number of people who supported Mao Shi far outstripped the number of people who supported Bu Fang, the latter was extremely calm. He held onto the Eight Treasures Chicken as he walked into the plaza.
In the distance, Nangong Wuque waved his hands at Bu Fang.
"Old Bu, do your best! Screw that pretentious bastard!" Nangong Wuque yelled at the top of his lungs. The face of the alchemists from Heavenly Shine City instantly turned black.
Bu Fang nodded his head but didn't speak much.
In the audience stand, the Ancient Shura City's Saintess' eyelashes trembled as her gaze landed on Bu Fang.
The hunchbacked elder who was sitting beside her was expressionless.
"Old monster, is everything ready?" The red lips of the Saintess moved as she lazily said. One of her slender legs rose as it crossed over the top of her other leg. Her slippery skirt slipped slightly and her snow-white skin was revealed to the world.
This scene caused many audience member's eyes to widen and they swallowed mouthfuls of saliva.
The Ancient Shura City's Saintess didn't mind at all as she conversed with the old laborer calmly.
"It has already been prepared… This little chef is going to lose for sure," the old servant said.
"Very good. After his first defeat in the competition, he will definitely be extremely disappointed. When that time comes, our chance will appear…"
The Saintess giggled.
"Saintess, since the Netherworld Woman isn't here today, we can directly take action."
"Don't mess around… This is a Pill City after all. Even though our Ancient Shura City isn't afraid of the Pill Palace, it would be troublesome for us to directly kidnap a competitor in the middle of a Pill City. We should find an opportunity to take action," the Saintess lazily said.
The old servant's face which was full of wrinkles scrunched together for a moment. In the next instant, his face returned to normal and he sighed, "Fine."
After that, the gazes of the two of them landed on the stage.
Bu Fang walked up the stage as he held onto the Eight Treasures Chicken. He went to the spot allocated to him. When Mao Shi appeared, the entire audience stand erupted with cheers. All of them roared out crazily.
There were all kinds of encouragement thrown at Mao Shi and there were curses directed at Bu Fang.
"You should hurry up and admit defeat. If you don't, you will regret it…"
Bu Fang glanced at Mao Shi and the corners of his lips curled upwards. "Your furnace is definitely going to explode."
Humph!
Mao Shi sucked in a deep breath and he coldly harrumphed. He looked at Bu Fang with despise and turned around to walk toward his bronze platform.
In the sky, a warship slowly made its way into the central plaza and the five grandmasters gradually made their way out of the warship. Grandmaster Xuan Ming and the others arrived and they appeared as though they were immortals. After seriously discussing with each other, their gazes landed on the stage as they sat in their seats.
The person who was in charge of this round was still the head judge. He had an extremely solemn expression in his face as this round was going to be extraordinary. On one side, there was a genius alchemist. On the other, it was the biggest black horse in this Magical Hand Conference. The competition between the two of them would be extremely intense and the head judge didn't dare to be careless at all.
He didn't think that Bu Fang would lose. After all, he understood Bu Fang and he was sure that the chef was hiding something up his sleeves.
No one knew what this chef was going to cook for this round.
Chicken? Could it be that his dish had something to do with that chicken?
The head judge had noticed that chicken in Bu Fang's hand a long time ago. He narrowed his eyes as he thought about something in his mind. That didn't seem to be an ordinary chicken.
Mao Shi stood on his bronze platform and seemed extremely calm. Even though he was extremely arrogant at times, he was someone who would fully focus when he was refining elixirs. He meticulously took out all the medicinal ingredients which he had prepared in advance and laid them onto the bronze platform.
This time, he had to refine a three-mark spirit pill. It could be said that this was the highest grade of pill refined in this Magical Hand Conference.
The pressure on Mao Shi was extremely huge. After all, he was going to refine a three-mark spirit pill. He wasn't completely confident that he would be able to successfully refine it. Even though he never took this chef seriously, he knew that Bu Fang was not an easy opponent. Otherwise, he wouldn't have a headache as he thought of a way to deal with Bu Fang.
On the other side, Bu Fang took out many ingredients from the system's dimensional space. The dense spiritual energy enveloped Bu Fang's bronze platform and many people let out shrieks of surprise.
That was because they realized that every single one of Bu Fang's ingredient was of an extremely high grade. The spirit energy contained in them was extremely dense.
"Alright, will the two competitors take note, this round will decide whether or not you will advance into the finals. The winner will be promoted into the top three and will have the chance to fight for the first place in the competition against young master Mu Bai. The winner will receive the entry quota to the 'Heaven Secret Territory'. The winner will also receive a one-mark spirit pill prepared by the Pill Palace. Please do your best and fight for your honor!" The head judge stood in the middle of the stage as he solemnly declared to the two participants.
Even though his voice wasn't loud, the noise coming from the audience stand started to die down as he spoke.
After he was done, the audience erupted into cheers and they screamed continuously.
"Now, let the competition officially begin!"
"Wow!"
The cheers from the audience were deafening and seemed as though they were about to flip the sky.
Mao Shi's eyes became sharp and the true energy in his body started to surge. Raising his hand, a ball of black flame emerged from his palm. The terrifying heat immediately caused the temperature in the plaza to rise by a few degrees!
A Heaven and Earth Obsidian Flame, the Universal Dark Fire, had appeared!