Chapter 8: Meeting Leng Yanran, the Alchemy Genius!
Chu Feng could sense that the other alchemists around her were all looking at her with faint rejection and jealousy.
He organized his thoughts and slowly walked forward.
“Excuse me, are you Senior Sister Leng Yanran?”
Chu Feng’s voice was gentle and polite.
Leng Yanran acted as though she hadn’t heard him, continuing to control the furnace fire on her own, without even lifting her eyelids.
Chu Feng wasn’t embarrassed. He calmly continued, “I am Chu Feng, President of the Heavenly Dao Mutual Aid Association. I came today uninvited, hoping to discuss a collaboration with Senior Sister.”
When she heard the word “collaboration,” Leng Yanran finally showed a trace of reaction.
Her movements halted, and she slowly raised her head. Those cool, autumn-water-like eyes fell upon Chu Feng for the first time.
There was no emotion in her gaze, only indifference, as though she were looking at a piece of stone.
“I don’t need collaboration.”
Her voice was as cold as her gaze—distant and rejecting.
“I don’t have pills, nor do I sell them. Please leave.”
After speaking, she lowered her head, ready to continue her work, clearly unwilling to waste another word with Chu Feng.
A hard wall indeed.
Chu Feng thought to himself that she truly had a perfectionist temperament.
People like her couldn’t be swayed with profit—they had to be approached through technique and philosophy. To win her over, he had to strike where she prided herself most—her craft.
“Senior Sister has misunderstood.” Chu Feng smiled slightly. Not only did he not leave, he even moved a little closer.
He glanced at the poor-quality herbs inside her furnace and shook his head, speaking with a hint of pity:
“I didn’t come to buy pills from you.”
“I came to tell you that your alchemy method is fundamentally wrong.”
“Your technique might be perfect, but your process is far too inefficient. Your output, far too limited.”
“In short…”
Chu Feng paused, looking at Leng Yanran’s icy expression that had slightly changed from surprise, and stated clearly:
“You’re using the mindset of an artist to do something that should be industrialized. That—” he said each word slowly, “—is a waste of talent!”
“Waste of talent?”
Leng Yanran’s hand tightened around the fan in her grip.
For the first time, the calm surface of her cold eyes rippled with fury.
Alchemy was her one and only pride, her faith in life.
She could endure exclusion from her peers and suppression from her superiors—but she would never tolerate anyone questioning, let alone insulting, her “Path of Alchemy”!
“What do you know?”
She spat out the four words coldly, her tone so sharp that the surrounding air seemed to drop several degrees.
“I don’t know alchemy,” Chu Feng admitted calmly, before turning the conversation around.
“But I know efficiency—and how to maximize value.”
He didn’t back down from her imposing presence. Instead, he met her gaze directly and launched his “dimensional strike.”
“Senior Sister Leng, let me ask you a question. To refine one furnace of Qi Nourishing Pills, from preparing herbs to completion, how long do you need?”
Leng Yanran frowned, clearly reluctant, but still answered coldly,
“One hour.”
“How many pills are formed? How many of top grade? How many of mid-grade?”
Chu Feng pressed on.
“Ten pills in total. Three top-grade, seven mid-grade.”
There was a faint hint of pride in her tone.
Using a low-quality furnace and inferior herbs, maintaining a thirty percent top-grade rate was enough to make ninety-nine percent of the alchemists in the Pill Pavilion feel ashamed.
The nearby alchemists, who had been secretly eavesdropping, all revealed looks of astonishment upon hearing this.
Yet Chu Feng merely shook his head.
“Too slow, and far too unstable.”
“What?”
Leng Yanran thought she had misheard.
“I said, your efficiency is too low, and your quality control is poor.”
Chu Feng pointed out the problem bluntly.
“The reason you can achieve a thirty percent top-grade rate isn’t because of your process—it’s because of your personal talent and ‘intuition.’ Such a model can’t be replicated, and it can’t be scaled. You alone, even if you work tirelessly for a day and night, how many furnaces can you refine? A hundred pills? Two hundred?”
“You…”
Leng Yanran was at a loss for words. What Chu Feng said was undeniably true.
“And I,” Chu Feng continued, his voice filled with confidence, “have a method.”
“One that can increase your output by ten times on the current foundation—and ensure that every single pill has nearly identical quality!”
Ten times the output? Uniform quality?
Not only Leng Yanran, but even the alchemists eavesdropping nearby found this unbelievable.
“Nonsense.”
Leng Yanran sneered, her expression full of disdain.
“The path of alchemy is precise to the finest margin—an error of a hair can lead to disaster. It relies on harmony of mind and adaptability. How could it be as simple as you claim?”
“No. On the contrary—it’s exactly that simple.”
Chu Feng cut her off.
“The only reason you think it’s complicated is because you’ve made something simple overly complicated.”
He raised a finger and began explaining his “revolutionary theory” born from modern industrial factories.
“First—standardization!”
“We don’t need to chase after the illusory ‘top-grade.’ What we need is a stable, reliable ‘standard-grade.’ What we must do is quantify every single step of alchemy, and compile them into a strictly executable ‘operation manual’!”
“For example—herb grinding: specify exactly how many rotations, with how much force. For flame control: define exactly when to use low fire and when to use high fire, and to what height the flames should reach. Eliminate all vague operations that rely on ‘feeling’!”
“Second—assembly line production!”
“You doing every step yourself is the greatest waste! We can divide the entire refining process into ten—or even twenty—steps. Then assign each person a specific task!”
“For example—one person focuses solely on grinding herbs. Doing it day in and day out, he’ll master it and reach unmatched efficiency and precision!”
“One person handles measurements, one manages ingredient addition, one controls the flame… We’ll turn everyone into a perfectly operating cog in a high-efficiency production line!”
“Third—KPI assessment!”
“We’ll no longer evaluate based on the vague concept of ‘top-grade rate,’ but on three core indicators: one—total output per unit time; two—product yield rate; and three—cost per pill. Everything will be measured by data!”
Chu Feng’s pace quickened, his eyes gleaming with brilliance.
Every word, every concept he spoke was like a heavy hammer smashing against Leng Yanran’s deeply ingrained beliefs.
Leng Yanran was completely stunned.
She felt her entire worldview shaking under the impact of this wild yet powerful new idea.