The doors to the alchemy room remained closed for a full three years.
When Han Li finally emerged calmly one day, the demon cores had all been transformed into various rare pills.
For the first two years, Han Li focused on refining pills primarily using five-level demon cores as the main ingredient.
Although these pills no longer had significant effects on him, any one of them would be a prized possession for a Foundation Establishment cultivator, something they would be ecstatic and desperate to acquire.
Through the process of refining these pills, Han Li's mastery of alchemy improved significantly.
After all, even a genuine alchemy master wouldn't have the opportunity to practice with so many demon cores at their disposal.
For an ordinary alchemist, using thirty or forty demon cores in their lifetime would be considered an extraordinary achievement.
Even though the methods for refining each type of pill vary considerably, there are always some common principles that Han Li could learn from.
As a result, the extensive practice with these rare pills pushed Han Li's alchemy skills to a level slightly above that of a reputed alchemy master.
Consequently, when Han Li later used six- and seven-level demon cores, his success rate in refining pills naturally increased significantly.
This brought Han Li great satisfaction!
Otherwise, given the rarity of six- and seven-level pills, even Han Li would be reluctant to waste them carelessly.
After finishing the alchemy, Han Li rested for about a month.
During this period, he frequently visited the insect chambers to check on the tricolored Golden Devouring Beetles and the original, non-evolved beetles.
While he was in the alchemy room, he had ordered the puppets to take turns feeding the beetles with Chimeric Grass.
Unfortunately, a terrible discovery awaited Han Li.
Although the tricolored beetles continued to eat the Chimeric Grass, the grass seemed to have lost its special ability to stimulate them into a frenzied state, showing no unusual changes after consumption.
At first, Han Li thought the effect might be negligible due to the short duration and the large number of beetles.
So, out of curiosity, he isolated several hundred tricolored beetles and fed them exclusively with the grass to observe any behavioral changes.
But after several feedings, these beetles remained unchanged, just as before.
This left Han Li feeling quite frustrated.
He could now conclude that the Chimeric Grass had indeed lost its miraculous effect on the evolved beetles.
Although he didn't understand the reason, it was clear that he had lost the method to rapidly breed and advance the tricolored beetles.
These beetles would be used up one by one!
Now he had no choice but to revert to the old method, having the puppets concentrate on feeding the grass to the unevolved golden and silver beetles.
These beetles were becoming increasingly aggressive, indicating that another breeding cycle was imminent.
After dealing with these matters, Han Li composed himself and entered the secluded cultivation chamber.
He planned to use various pills to assist in mastering the eighth level of the Azure Origin Sword Art, aiming to break through to the mid-stage of the Foundation Establishment realm.
