Chapter Twenty-Six: The Seed of Vital Energy

The Blood-Awakening Body-Strengthening Art, a method once long ago deemed of little use, had unexpectedly proved effective again.

After confirming that his liver had regained the ability to absorb spiritual liquid, Chen Yu stopped the transport. He was not exerting his full strength at the moment; after all, the entire sequence of movements made too much commotion. If he combined it with the internal cultivation method from the Organ Rebirth Art, it would likely draw the nearby Daoist priests before long.

Although he had not yet tried it, he was basically certain that the two self-created methods would yield remarkable results when used together.

Drawing his gaze back, Chen Yu pondered the root of the change.

Fetal Breathing.

At that moment, he suddenly realized that some of his earlier guesses might have been wildly wrong, far from the truth.

Fetal Breathing had appeared after he drank the spiritual liquid, and only after Fetal Breathing emerged had spiritual power truly become visible and take shape.

Now, Fetal Breathing had taken on yet another function: it could break through the absorption limit in his mouth—

Or perhaps it had always been so from the beginning.

Chen Yu remembered that the Azure Spirit Root he had grown had never shown its true purpose; after eating it, the only effect was to increase the absorption of spiritual liquid.

Then was the true function of the Azure Spirit Root to act on the dantian? Or to amplify Fetal Breathing?

No wonder he had always felt this thing must have more use than that.

In other words, back then Chen Yu already had Fetal Breathing coiled within his dantian; unfortunately, it may have been too weak, and because his spirit was still being nurtured, it had never taken visible form.

"I did once test the influence between spiritual liquid and Fetal Breathing."

But at that time, he had probably not used it on the liver, the organ where its effect was most pronounced, so the mutual influence had not seemed obvious.

Chen Yu suppressed the many conjectures in his heart and continued reading the Daoist books.

Verification could be done at any time, and it would be more concealed once he returned.

Right now, he needed to make the best use of the short time he had to browse medical texts and Daoist scriptures related to the five viscera—read as many as he could, preferably those that were widely circulated yet he had never seen before.

Unorthodox things were not necessarily good. Compared with them, Chen Yu would rather read books that other Daoists could also accept.

Within him, the spiritual liquid slowly took effect. Even though he did not actively use the Blood-Awakening Body-Strengthening Art, the fetal breath within his liver kept working without pause.

The pace was not quick, but it had endurance.

A mouthful of spiritual liquid took a long time to digest. Only after the sun had sunk behind the western mountains did Chen Yu finally finish absorbing it as he stepped out of the Fengtai Pavilion.

He returned the wooden token and took back his silver.

Though he had not taken any books away, the Zhengyuan Temple still charged him two mace of broken silver, leaving him only nine taels and eight mace.

He noticed that beneath the wooden table, his token had been placed in a separate wooden box. Inside were also two small bamboo slips, one engraved with "the second quarter of the hour of the Snake," the other with the current time.

The little Daoist sat upright behind the table. After taking back the token, he used an abacus, lightly flicked it a few times, and then set it down.

So they really did charge by the hour.

Shaking his head with a smile, Chen Yu felt an inexplicable sense of novelty in his heart.

Then he thought no more of it. He had read too many books today, and his mind was a tangled mess; he would need to sort through it properly once he got back.

"I will come again tomorrow," he said.

The little Daoist smiled and nodded, saying nothing further. Clearly, there were many Daoists like him, who spent half a day reading and even "booked" the next day in advance.

Seeing this, Chen Yu understood that the wooden tokens were not limited in number, and he finally felt at ease. He turned and strode away.

...

Back in the courtyard, he hastily dealt with his meal, stuffing seven or eight steamed buns into his stomach, then shut the doors and windows. He took out the waterskin containing spiritual liquid and tilted his head back to drink several mouthfuls.

The Blood-Awakening Body-Strengthening Art began to circulate! The Organ Rebirth Art began to circulate!

At the same time, he pushed the Invocation of the Divine Art to its limit, driving the much-recovered spiritual power to spread throughout his entire body. With a near-internal-view perspective, he finally noticed the reason he could once again absorb spiritual liquid and strengthen his body.

"So that's how it is."

Under spiritual power, nothing could hide.

Fetal Breathing truly could absorb spiritual liquid to a certain degree, allowing him once again to bypass the limit.

But what mattered even more was the thing wrapped within the fetal breath.

It was a kind of illusory substance, like pale jade.

Whenever the outer layer of fetal breath dispersed and was exhausted, these white-jade-like substances would pour into flesh and blood.

Unlike warmth, their integration made no sound at all. Yet Chen Yu sharply noticed that his liver had been strengthened.

Not the slow, gradual improvement under the Blood-Awakening Body-Strengthening Art, but an immediate leap, more than one level higher!

A difference in essence.

And this was only a small portion of it; the effect was nothing short of exceptional.

In his later observation, he discovered that only the fetal breath that had devoured spiritual power would wrap around these white-jade-like things.

Illusory and ethereal, impossible to grasp.

Mysterious, immensely powerful.

Able to transform a person utterly and completely.

In the end, Chen Yu had a thought and gave it a familiar name.

Qi.

Vast and rootless, impossible to fathom.

Just as it was before him.

Of course, the amount of qi he had now was far too little, and with most of it wrapped in fetal breath it was almost invisible. It could only be counted as a seed.

A seed of qi not yet sprouted into growth.

Setting aside for now any likeness or difference between the qi he spoke of and the qi of Daoist teachings, Chen Yu was presently focusing his mind, trying to refine more of it.

Spiritual power surged; the Mud Ball Palace nearly ran dry, and the fetal breath originally flowing endlessly within the dantian grew faint and sparse.

In its place was a bright mass of fetal breath in the liver, having absorbed spiritual power.

Within it, qi was being nurtured, waiting to be fully absorbed.

Before long, he stopped. First, because both spiritual power and fetal breath were running low; overfishing a drained pond might trigger unforeseen consequences.

Especially when he thought of the earlier light sphere—after being hollowed out of spiritual power, it had sunk into chaos, shattered, and ceased to exist.

He feared the same fate for the Mud Ball Palace and the dantian, so he decisively stopped.

On the other hand, Chen Yu also discovered that the liver had reached the limit of how much fetal breath it could store. Adding more would only have the opposite effect, wearing down the liver or even bursting it outright.

Sitting cross-legged on the bed, he closed his eyes to rest. This time when he descended the mountain, he had brought the Orchid Pavilion Divine Fruit with him, but he had already finished it long ago. If he wanted to recover now, he could only rely on the clumsy method.

His awareness converged, his spirit ignited, and wisps of silver radiance settled through the hazy void. Chen Yu gathered them and guided them into the Mud Ball Palace for safekeeping.

There were still too many mysteries in the spiritual domain of humankind. For instance, spiritual power—he had discovered that if he did not guide it, the spiritual power painstakingly gathered would sink all the way down into some deeper place of consciousness, he knew not where, and could never be found again.

In daily life, spirit also accumulated, only not in such an active, deliberate way as now, so the spiritual power that sank away usually was not much.

Half an hour later, having recovered only a little, he continued his experiment: driving spiritual power into the liver, making contact with the fetal breath that lingered in its outer layers, further strengthening the qi within.

The fetal breath was wrapped in layer upon layer. The qi was too little; if he wanted to absorb it into the liver, he had to deal with the fetal breath first.

It was somewhat troublesome, but there was no help for it.

...

Time passed quietly.

In the blink of an eye, two more days went by.

Chen Yu stepped out of the Fengtai Pavilion again, but unlike before, this time he carried more than a dozen books on his person.

At the side, the little Daoist sitting at the table even opened his mouth in surprise, as if he were about to say something.

"Our humble temple is crude, but I am quite fond of these few Daoist books. Since it is getting late, I thought I would take them back and savor them carefully."

After a brief explanation, the little Daoist asked no further questions. Over the past few days, he had seen this Daoist lose himself in the sea of books within the Fengtai Pavilion, forgetting meals and sleep, and knew him to be a lover of reading.

He took the books, copied the titles, then produced a large reference volume and, comparing it with the catalog, found the detailed prices of these books. After a round of calculations, he finally charged Chen Yu twenty-seven taels of stamped silver.

It was neither a great sum nor a trivial one.

Ordinary commoners certainly could not afford so much silver to buy a few Daoist books of little practical use, yet Chen Yu paid without a word of complaint.

He did not have much money on hand, but fortunately, after considering this yesterday, he had sold the Zhongyang Pill that Qian Xuanzhong had gifted him long ago to the pharmacy. Combined with what remained in his possession, it was enough.

After paying and settling the账, Chen Yu carried the Daoist books back to the Chengyu Courtyard. He packed them up, tidied everything, then greeted the Daoist in charge of the place and set off once more toward the Shiya region.

After a long separation, everything worth seeing beneath the mountain had already been seen. He could not help but feel somewhat nostalgic for the scenery above it...