The day of the final test arrived, and Momo felt the nervousness creep back in. The stress was at an all-ti high, not just for herself but for everybody.
For many, this test was likely going to be the deciding factor on whether their master was going to move on or not. For her, it was likely going to decide whether her master was going to get another pin or not.
She could see it happening if she managed to rank first today. But if she landed anywhere else, the chances were very low. As such, the stress she felt today was higher than any other day before.
She had to do her best, but her best also had to be better than everyone else's.
It did not help anyone that they were going to be allowed a single chance to make this pill. Unlike the Speed test, when they were allowed to make 3 pills and use one of the attempts, they were forced to make one pill and just that. If they made the tiniest mistake, it was going to be costly.
Momo sat in the hall with her fellow peers, waiting for the Alchemy God to finish announcing the rules of the competition to the audience. He began explaining the matter of how the ranks were being determined since the pills being made were going to be of different tiers.
From the Alchemy God's explanation, each tier was going to add a certain value to the overall pill at the end. It was to be 0 value between Common and True pills, 5 additional value between True and Saint pills, and 10 additional value between Saint and Immortal pills.
If two participants managed to get 50% on both of their pills, but one made a Saint pill and the other made an Immortal pill, the one who made the Immortal pill would be considered as equivalent to having made a 60% Saint pill.
The Alchemy God had explained to everyone how in real life, the difference would be much vaster. However, since they were there to test an Alchemist's prowess and not the quality of the pill, such a decision was made.
People who could make higher-grade pills were still to be given so bonus without letting them entirely run away with the competition. Momo thought that much was fair to the ones who could make better pills, without being unfair to the ones who couldn't.
"You have been divided into groups of 20," a Divinity in the room suddenly spoke up, cutting through the Alchemy God's announcent on the outside. "This is the group in which you will be heading out."
A list ca up in the air, detailing how the disciples were spread out in groups of 20. Not all groups had 20 in total due to the odd number of participants there, but looking through it, the list was alright.
Momo went through the nas, trying to find her own. She had to check through all of the groups before finally finding her na on the last one. When she did, her eyes naturally moved to the rest of the nas on that list, and the nas she read shocked her.
Shenxian, Yuren, the two Immortals, and many of the other disciples that had done well in the previous competitions were all cramd into this one group.
Momo looked back, going through the other groups, and realized that the groups were most likely their present status in the competition. It wasn't necessarily their ranks, but the group in which they had landed.
Momo was in the top 20, she understood, so she didn't have any imdiate fear. However, the ones that were being called out first were now going to be even more stressed.
It was as much a guarantee as they could get to tell them that they were doing badly and needed to step up their ga. It was both a ploy to get them to stress harder, while at the sa ti motivating them to do better.
In addition to that, it was also good entertainnt tactics. Get the bad ones out of the way at the start and keep the good ones for the end. One didn't need to have been involved in these matters to know it was smart.
Momo felt her stress lower a little, her nervousness dying down, as she realized that it would take her so ti before she was called out. The ones who were called out beforehand were the ones who needed to stress for now.
The Alchemy God was done with his work outside, so the first group was called out to a crowd full of cheer and applause. Over two-thirds of the stadium was filled up at this point, so people were most certainly interested in watching this competition.
The disciples got their cauldrons out and prepared as their ingredients were brought over to them. They took a few minutes to check and get ready. Once they were all ready, the competition began.
The whole world seed to go silent for this competition as everyone quietly watched 20 different Alchemists make the single pill that would make or break their master's future.
Unlike the ones that would co later on, these Alchemists knew that they had done badly the entire competition so far, so if they did not do well this ti around, their masters were most likely not going to receive all the points they needed to make it into the next competition.
There were 500 of them and only 100 spots. So, these disciples did their best to do what they could for their masters.
One by one, they began submitting their pills. From the screens, Momo could see so many different emotions. So seed happy. Others seed sad, angry, dejected. All sorts of emotions passed through them. One by one, their ranks began showing up on a list in the sky.
The highest rank from the first 20 participants was a young woman who had managed to create a Saint rank pill with 89% Harmony. Others had done well too. Three of them were above 80%, 12 above 70%, three above 60%, one above 50%. The last one was simply titled 'failed'.
From what Momo could tell, the young man had simply failed to create a pill, likely due to so mistake he made under stress, which ended up destroying the entire pill.
The participants were taken away from the stage, but they did not return to the hall. They were taken sowhere else.
After a brief recess, the next group of participants was brought out to the stage, and the sa thing repeated.
They made their pills, and 15 minutes later, all 19 of the participants were done. Their nas appeared on the list above.
While no one had managed to defeat the young woman in the first rank, they had done way better on average. The second group had most certainly outdone the first one, especially because no one actually failed this ti around.
The third group was even better, with five people making pills above 80%. No one ranked first yet, but they were getting there. One after another, the groups were doing better, so sooner or later, soone else would co to take away that spot.
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