Chapter 167: A Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing

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At this point, everyone had given up trying to guess what Ethan was doing.

Even the examiners had to admit that, in their long lives, they had never encountered someone so "peculiar."

Practically, what the masked boy did in the first 30 minutes was wait while the ingredients in the cauldron were cooking.

He did nothing: no checking, no stirring, no additions,

nothing.

They all assumed that whatever abominable thing the contestant was preparing was certainly not a pill or anything related to alchemy,

so they stopped paying him any attention and resumed watching the other participants.

"I have to say, no one here has shown an especially impressive performance so far," remarked one of the examiners, a woman in her forties dressed in a pink robe adorned with various gold engravings, her expression one of boredom.

"You can't expect much at this point in the tournament.

After all, we're only in the early rounds;

the most spectacular performances will come in the later stages, as they do every year," replied a middle-aged man next to her, also paying attention to the participants.

"Seriously, this is so boring! Why did they even invite all of us?

Three or four of us could have evaluated this.

Why go through the trouble of inviting ten?" the woman said, her expression irritated.

"Come on, don't be like that.

This is a rare opportunity for us to step out of our usual routine.

And who knows, maybe you'll find your next disciple here," said an old man nearby, who had overheard the woman's complaints.

As they continued their conversation, one of them, who was evaluating the examiners, couldn't help but glance out of the corner of his eye at Ethan's station to see what he was doing, and immediately noticed something.

'Is he about to remove the lid from the cauldron?'

Just like him, the other examiners noticed this change and shifted their attention to Ethan's station.

Their hopes of seeing a good show from him had faded, but seeing him finally do something other than observe his cauldron piqued their curiosity;

after all, they wanted to see what he had produced inside.

After standing still and watching his cauldron for the entire time, Ethan finally moved after forty minutes and lifted the metal lid.

The lid, which had been on the cauldron over the fire for 40 minutes, was now scorching hot, but Ethan didn't seem to feel any pain as he slowly took it off.

As soon as he did, a cloud of steam billowed out of the cauldron, making it difficult to see what was happening for a moment.

Then, as the steam began to dissipate, several small spheres shot out from the cauldron.

At first, no one noticed them, but as the steam completely cleared, people finally saw what they were and widened their eyes in surprise.

"No, it cant be; those are... pills?"

"Wait, how is that possible? We all saw him standing still the entire time; it's impossible he refined them all, right?"

"Exactly! And look at their number; there are at least a dozen there," said another.

As the crowd erupted into yet another discussion about Ethan's actions, the latter waved the pills in front of him, from which he pulled out a couple of glass vials.

One by one, the pills were placed inside and lined up on the small table beside him.

This was the display table where the pills would be placed for evaluation later.

Seeing this scene, the examiners were momentarily at a loss for words, then one of them got up from his seat and went to Ethan's station.

Upon arriving, he didn't even bother to look at Ethan or ask him questions; he immediately began examining the contents of the lineup.

"This color, and this smell, there's no doubt, this is a pill for the cure of the venom of the mountain snake," he said, a confused expression on his face.

"Not only that, but its purity is very high.

This is a level 2 pill of high grade, with a purity of 95%," he said, even more incredulous, almost doubting his own words.

Hearing their colleague saying this, the other alchemists had similar expressions as one by one they rose from their seats and went to check.

They didn't care about their positions, and all ten of them moved toward Ethan's station.

What was once a small, half-empty area was now filled with people examining the various vials set on the display table.

"My God, he's right; this pill really does have a purity of 95%," said the older man, who, like everyone else, was surprised to see Ethan's refined pills were indeed genuine and not just some rounded stuff.

The other colleagues who were already there and had started examining the other pills had similar expressions as they spoke. Sёarch* The NôᴠelFirё.net website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

"This is a pill for immunity against venom, and it too is a level 2 high grade, with a purity of 95%," said the woman in the pink dress as she finished examining the vial in her hand.

"This one is of the same level and purity."

"This one too."

"This one is as well."

One by one, they all gave their conclusions after examining the pill vials, and to everyone's shock, all these pills were of high grade level 2 with a purity of 95%.

They looked at each other, reading the surprise on each other's faces.

'All of these pills are of excellent quality,' they all thought.

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The purity of pills at every level is extremely important, and the higher the level, the more difficult it is to increase its final purity.

All these were level 2 pills, and for them to have a purity of 90% was already extremely good, but what about those at 95%?

These pills could rival all the highest quality pills at this level.

The most astonishing thing about all this was that the refiner not only had refined them all in less than an hour, but also that he had refined them all at once.

'What kind of monster is this?' they all thought while looking at the masked boy.

It wasn't difficult for them to refine a pill by manipulating the materials inside the cauldron with their spiritual Qi.

They could even manage to do it while refining two pills, or even three.

This was something that, once they reached their level and perfected their skills, could be done, although with difficulty.

But what about 12 pills?

They didn't even know if such a thing was possible.

They had observed the whole process from the beginning and even at the end, and could tell that those pills had been refined inside the cauldron and not placed there in a second moment, so they knew these creations were original and made on the spot.

None of them doubted this fact.

But it was precisely for this reason that they found the situation even more incredible.

In the end, while they were still bewildered at how he had achieved such a result, Ethan decided it was time to go.

None of them tried to stop him as each of them remained there, still holding the pills in hand, deep in thought about what they had just seen.

Then, out of nowhere, one of them said, his voice still somewhat uncertain,

"We've let a wolf into this flock of sheep."

Hearing this, everyone nodded while trying not to highlight the strange metaphor used by the alchemist master.