Night time, second floor bedroom.
Xia Zhi sat at the desk, quietly waiting as he looked at the [Burning Incense Burner] before him.
After about 5 minutes, a faint fragrance wafted from the burner.
The incense was ready.
Xia Zhi lifted the burner's lid and took out a regularly shaped, crystal-clear piece of incense.
[Perfect Calming Incense].
Its creation had exhausted the last small portion of that [Calming Pill].
Xia Zhi calculated that one [Calming Pill], combined with other incense materials, could produce ten portions of [Calming Incense].
A bottle of [Calming Pills] cost 50 points and contained five pills total. If he were to convert all of them into [Calming Incense] for recycling, he would just break even.
But merely breaking even wasn't enough. Xia Zhi needed a method to steadily earn points so he could freely open treasure chests.
He needed to find a way to craft supernatural items that could be mass-produced at a low enough cost.
This was because the system's recycling price was always calculated at the lowest price for the current quality, regardless of the item's selling price.
For example, both iron-grade items selling for 1 point and 9 points in the [Shop] would be recycled for 1 point.
So the supernatural item he needed to find didn't need to have powerful effects - it just needed to meet the system's recycling standards.
Xia Zhi lowered his head in thought. He had now mastered basic alchemy knowledge and could craft many low-level supernatural items.
But incense was still most suitable for his current situation.
First, he had expertise in incense materials.
Second, he had the [Burning Incense Burner], which had the hidden effect of "50% increased success rate for incense creation, 20% increased perfect success rate." At least so far, he hadn't failed once when using it to make incense.
To earn points steadily, a high success rate was most important.
Xia Zhi opened the system panel and filtered for "incense" in the [Shop].
A list of items appeared before his eyes:
Joy Incense, price 2 points
Intoxicating Incense, price 3 points
Calming Incense, price 3 points
Dream-Inducing Incense, price 4 points
Soul-Settling Incense, price 5 points
Evil-Dispelling Incense, price 6 points
Lightning-Warding Incense, price 8 points
Rain-Praying Incense, price 10 points
...
Xia Zhi actually found the type of Calming Incense he made in the list, and its price was quite high at 3 points.
This was just for regular Calming Incense - if it were Perfect Calming Incense, the price would likely be even higher.
Xia Zhi curiously scanned the other incense types, then locked his gaze on the cheapest one, clicking to see its detailed information.
[Joy Incense]
Quality: Iron-grade
Type: Consumable
Properties: None
Effect: Can make people feel joyful
Hidden Effect: None
Price: 2 points
The lower the product price, the lower the cost. Since iron-grade items all recycled for 1 point anyway, he decided on this one.
After making his decision, Xia Zhi searched specifically for its formula in the [Shop].
[Joy Incense Formula]
Quality: Iron-grade
Type: Book
Properties: None
Effect: This is a book recording the formula for Joy Incense
Hidden Effect: None
Price: 1 point
Xia Zhi bought it and began reading carefully.
"...The fragrance type can be adjusted freely...but the joy effect requires three supernatural materials: Snake Blood Wood, Star-Pattern Shell, and Succubus Hair..."
Xia Zhi's expression became somewhat strange when he read this part.
Succubus hair?
Is it the kind of succubus I'm thinking of?
Wait, is this "joy" in [Joy Incense] the kind of "joy" I'm thinking of?
Never mind.
It doesn't matter since it's just for recycling.
Let's make it first and see.
Xia Zhi found these three supernatural materials in the [Shop], each priced at 1 point.
He had no extra points now, so he had to take out another [Calming Pill], cut it open, and craft several more [Calming Incense] to recycle before he could buy these three raw materials.
A crimson piece of wood, as if freshly soaked in blood.
A white shell covered in countless star-like patterns.
A bundle of purple hair emanating a strange, alluring fragrance.
Using his iron-grade dagger, Xia Zhi cut appropriate portions from each, and selected the same incense proportions as [Calming Incense].
Following the formula's requirements, he added the materials to the [Burning Incense Burner] in sequence.
After waiting quietly for almost 8 minutes, a faint fragrance wafted from the burner.
Since Xia Zhi used the same incense materials, the fragrance type hadn't changed - it smelled exactly like [Calming Incense].
But the effect was completely different.
Just smelling this trace of fragrance released when it was ready made Xia Zhi feel involuntarily cheerful.
Opening the lid, he poured out the incense inside.
It was a blood-red crystal with floating star-like patterns, looking even more beautiful than [Calming Incense].
Xia Zhi admired it in his hand for a while before storing it in his inventory.
A item description appeared on the system panel.
[Perfect Joy Incense]
Quality: Iron-grade
Type: Consumable
Properties: None
Effect: Special incense made with the Burning Incense Burner, can please humans and entice spirits.
Hidden Effect: Burning duration increased by 30%, joy and enticement effect increased by 30%
Recycling price: 1 point
Another perfect creation - it gained the "Perfect" prefix in its name and an additional hidden effect.
As he had guessed, regardless of quality, all "perfect" supernatural items could gain hidden effects.
Moreover, due to the [Burning Incense Burner]'s bonus, its effect became different from the regular [Joy Incense] sold in the [Shop], gaining a strange "entice spirits" description.
Xia Zhi looked at the item description on the system panel, pondered for a moment, then put it away and continued crafting new [Joy Incense] with the remaining supernatural materials.
After more than an hour, he used up all the supernatural materials and crafted 11 pieces of [Joy Incense] total, without a single failure.
A simple calculation showed that buying materials cost 3 points, and recycling all the final products would yield 11 points, for a net profit of 8 points.
Xia Zhi rubbed his face, suddenly feeling extremely tired.
He opened the system panel to check his character information.
His spirit power value had become extremely low.
What happened?
Xia Zhi was puzzled and checked the log.
"Used [Burning Incense Burner] once, successfully crafted [Joy Incense], consumed 5 spirit power."
This message filled the screen.
So it was because of his continuous use of the [Burning Incense Burner].
He had originally thought the [Burning Incense Burner] crafted automatically, but it actually consumed his spirit power.
But Xia Zhi remembered that when he first used the [Burning Incense Burner], he also crafted more than ten pieces of incense, yet he hadn't felt as tired as today - was it because those were just regular incense?
Xia Zhi pondered for a moment, casually mixed some regular incense materials, used the [Burning Incense Burner] to craft it, then checked the system panel again.
This time his spirit power didn't decrease.
Indeed, it only consumed his spirit power when crafting supernatural items.
It seemed that in the future, he couldn't just increase his mana limit - he would need to increase his spirit power limit too, otherwise his point-earning speed couldn't improve.
Xia Zhi recycled all the crafted [Joy Incense], gaining 11 points, then lit a piece of [Calming Incense] and went to bed.
The completed manuscript of the first volume lay on the desk.
Today he really had no energy left to observe that female reader's reaction. He hoped she would like that major cliffhanger.
Thinking this, Xia Zhi fell into deep sleep amid this incredibly calming fragrance.
---
Yue Hai Pavilion.
Even in the deep night, a light still burned in one room.
The desk was piled with various documents, and three intellectual young women were buried in them, working hard to handle affairs.
Under the lamplight, their faces looked very haggard, and occasional sounds of moaning and sighing could be heard from one of them.
"How can there be so many things to handle?"
"We really can't keep up!"
"How did Senior Ganyu manage this before? Her efficiency alone was higher than the three of us combined. Even if she has a half-adeptus constitution, isn't this too terrifying?"
"When will Senior Ganyu come back?"
"I feel like I'm about to die... wuu, I want to rest..."
"Will I miss seeing the moon during the Fleeting Colors in Flight festival?"
"Wuu..."
----
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