Chapter Eight: Fresh—!

When it comes to cooking, one must pursue a harmony of color, aroma, and taste; yet with only basic soy, vinegar, and coarse salt at hand, Chen Yu could only make do. Fortunately, the finished dish turned out presentable enough. Thanks to his mastery of heat and timing, he still managed to produce a respectable meal.

At the end, he ladled out a spoonful to taste, satisfaction gleaming in his eyes. There was nothing more to say—he had achieved his aim. The yellow mushrooms were tender and springy, the chicken-of-the-woods sweet and fresh, and the large, pillow-like “cotton caps” burst with juice at the slightest bite, sending a shiver down the lips and tongue. The fragrance wafted to the nose, as if invisible fingers were scratching at one’s heart, leaving the mouth watering with anticipation.

In the courtyard, pots and dishes were set in order. Just as he was about to sit, Chen Yu slapped his palm—he’d nearly forgotten the great elder still residing in the temple. He hurried to the main hall and offered incense to the esteemed Patriarch, along with two sticks of green wax. According to local custom, offerings to the True Lord and Patriarch were made around midday, for it was said that at this hour, the world’s yang energy was at its peak, and the incense and sacrificial food were most likely to draw the attention of these august beings.

But with Cloud Crane Temple in decline, and Chen Yu himself never much for ceremony—his mind forever on the fields and the kitchen—the daily incense that once persisted through wind and rain had become more haphazard. He forgot as often as he remembered, and when he did recall, he would hurriedly burn two sticks—perfunctory, to say the least.

Still, he was not bound by such conventions, and he considered his manner of offering sufficiently respectful. Surely, he thought, he would not incur the wrath of the True Lords. After all, the world was vast; could they truly be watching Cloud Crane Temple every single day? Besides, the Patriarch himself had never complained.

Once the incense smoke curled and he was certain the Patriarch could enjoy a hot meal, Chen Yu, having straightened his clothes and donned his formal Taoist robe, returned outside. He pulled a plain cloth coat over his robe so that no soup would splash on it. There were, of course, other robes in the temple, but this one, embroidered with clouds, moons, flowers, birds, and a proud white crane soaring in mist across the back, was a symbol of his status as abbot. More importantly, the robe was of fine material, well-fitted and striking, and so he seldom wore it for fear of soiling it unnecessarily.

He remembered his predecessor, the old abbot who passed him the mantle, whose robe was patched and pitted, hardly presentable at all. No doubt, that was the folly of youth, taking little care of one’s things.

Reining in his wandering thoughts, Chen Yu sat at the stone table, picked up a pair of bamboo chopsticks, and popped a tender mushroom into his mouth. Not bad at all. He thought no further, and simply ate with relish.

He was not so unrefined as to gorge himself, but the long-missed flavors did coax him into loosening his belt and indulging more than usual. He finished all the rice steaming in the pot, and in the end even raised the earthen bowl to his lips and drank the broth straight down.

Fresh—!

Hic!

Patting his stomach, Chen Yu, having swept through the meal like a windstorm, began cleaning up as he pondered his next steps. Life on the mountain was leisurely, with little to occupy his energies beyond a few daily chores. But idleness could not be mistaken for laziness. If he grew lazy, he would become restless, his thoughts wandering.

With the spring rains not yet arrived and the fishing rods needing several days to dry, he needed to find something to fill this gap.

“Perhaps... I should try again?”

Bored, Chen Yu’s thoughts turned to the inspiration produced in his sea of consciousness. Together with the red earthworm he’d used not long ago, he had already experimented five times—all failures.

The first attempt, cautious as he was, he chose some wild grass in a corner of the courtyard. The grass grew rampant, thick and tall—shooting from two inches to six feet in less than an hour! But then, abruptly, it died. By the time he realized, nothing was left but a heap of withered husks, which he’d gathered and stored in a sack in the storeroom, where they now collected dust.

Subsequent tests fared no better. Though he used different subjects, the results were strikingly similar: total annihilation. Rooty white tubers with thick tendrils, fist-sized orchard fruit, bean pods with skins so tough a knife could not split them—all underwent violent transformations, only to wither and die swiftly, too sudden to prevent.

Unwilling to give up, Chen Yu turned his attention to animals. This produced the ill-fated king of earthworms, which perished midway through the process.

“Living things are no good?”

Puzzled, he tried using a stone, but when the inspiration touched it, nothing happened. The energy could not be retrieved, so he could only watch as it quietly dissipated.

Now, as he sat, Chen Yu was on the verge of shelving his experiments for the time being—not only because each attempt consumed tremendous mental effort, as if he were mining stone from a mountain for a meager yield, but also because inspiration itself was scarce.

Though his sea of consciousness was vast and boundless, only a tiny area at the very edge could actually capture and condense these points of light into inspiration. Since the first time he’d entered that space by accident, only about twenty or so had accumulated over several months. On average, one every three days.

Yet this time, a new idea had come to him. Before undertaking another round of experiments, though, he needed to make preparations.

...

In the rear courtyard, at the abandoned herb garden, Chen Yu was swinging his hoe, dividing the small plot in two. To call it a “field” was generous—the space was less than a tenth of the vegetable garden, no more than six yards square.

The land, long neglected, was thick with weeds, tangled and lush. Previously, his attention had focused on the mountain fields and vegetable patch that sustained him; this herb garden, abandoned for seven or eight years at least, had drawn little concern.

But now seemed the perfect time. Once tidied, not only would it look clean, but perhaps he could grow medicinal herbs there in the future—just as in the early days of Cloud Crane Temple.

It was said that the second generation Patriarch had even dug up a century-old medicinal plant from the deep mountains for transplantation, though sadly he had not succeeded.

Now, all was changed beyond recognition. Like many powers of the age, Cloud Crane Temple had been founded not as a place of mystic learning, but as a martial order, carved out of chaos. Only later did they turn to the Taoist path.

The first two generations of patriarchs were heroes, forging a reputation in the martial world. But by the third generation, that of the old abbot’s master, talent had dried up—their guardianship sufficient, but their spirit of advancement lacking.

When the old abbot assumed leadership, decline accelerated. Calamity struck; the promising younger disciples all perished, their bones lost to the world. After that, the temple languished, never to recover.

To Chen Yu’s eyes, Cloud Crane Temple, for all its talk of seeking the Way, resembled more the martial sects of the legends in his former life. They shared a common flaw: all depended on a handful of experts to prop them up, with little to no development among their juniors. If luck produced a second-rate or top-tier talent, the sect might string along for a decade or two; if not, with the pillar gone, decline came like a rolling avalanche—shockingly fast.

As for the likes of Zhengyang Temple, which had survived dynasties and upheavals, boasting centuries of heritage and deep foundations—such great powers were truly rare.