Chapter 39: Comprehension

The films are excellent.

Tang Lingwu must have put in considerable effort, selecting only high-quality documentaries.

The clarity is maxed out, the production team is top-tier, and every frame burns money with its beauty.

Several of them have extremely high ratings online and are called the sacred texts of bird enthusiasts.

What satisfied Zheng Fa even more was that the cameramen hid lenses in trees, beside bird nests, and even on sheer cliff faces; some even hung them on the birds themselves.

They got as close as possible to the natural lives of these observed creatures.

Even setting aside the thought of trying to comprehend the Spirit Crane Body from them, these meticulously produced documentaries were enough to attract Zheng Fa, a country bumpkin.

One, two...

Every night, Zheng Fa watched these documentaries.

Watching the flying birds in the lens, watching their daily lives.

Watching them take to the air, soar, and land.

Hunting, feeding, playing.

He felt as though he saw some very familiar scenes, which seemed vaguely similar to the patterns in the third volume of the Spirit Crane Body, the Spirit Crane Heart Sutra.

But exactly what it was remained vaguely obscured by a layer of window paper, leaving Zheng Fa still unable to figure it out.

Even after he had nearly finished watching all the documentaries, he still failed to connect the two.

That evening, he unconsciously clicked on the set he had never seen before, The Vanished Sky Dominators—Pterosaurs. The opening narration made him pause.

"Among the many hypotheses on the origin of birds, the conjecture that birds descended from dinosaurs is the most recognized by mainstream scholars."

"So some say birds are close relatives of dinosaurs."

Zheng Fa paused, came to his senses, and felt a bit surprised in his heart.

It really is birds!

"Pterosaurs have long been extinct in our world; we cannot know exactly how they lived. But through fossil evidence and observation of bird habits, we can use modeling to simulate the appearance and movements of pterosaurs."

Zheng Fa stared at the pterosaur model created with special effects on the screen, and strange images flashed through his mind!

That's it!

The author of the Spirit Crane Body seems to have followed the same approach as this documentary: observing the movement patterns and living habits of many birds, modeling—no, creating a type of bird-man that never existed!

The images in the book gradually aligned with the pterosaur image on the screen.

Zheng Fa almost wanted to grab this person's collar and ask:

You drew an animation, and you didn't write a note?

Zheng Fa spent several days watching documentaries day and night. Especially after truly comprehending the mysteries of the Spirit Crane Heart Sutra, he watched the documentaries he had seen before again, breaking down and recombining every picture in the Spirit Crane Heart Sutra to compare them with the birds' movements in the documentaries, deepening his understanding of these images.

After staying up late for several days like this, even with his physical condition at the entry level of the Pine-Crane Stance, he inevitably looked haggard at school, with faint dark circles under his eyes.

"Zheng Fa, what have you been doing lately?" Wang Chen asked with some concern, looking at his face.

"Doing what?"

"I mean, didn't you sleep well last night? Why do you have no energy at all? Are you sick?"

"Oh, I've been watching videos these past few nights." Zheng Fa touched his face and explained.

"Watching videos, what videos... You, hmm?"

Wang Chen's expression suddenly became strange, as if he had thought of something.

"Tang Lingwu gave them."

"Tang Lingwu gave them?" Wang Chen seemed plunged into immense incomprehension.

"That day, the day Old Chen confiscated your phone."

Wang Chen twitched his mouth corner; that day was too unforgettable, and he did remember that Tang Lingwu had indeed sent Zheng Fa a message that day.

But at this moment, he had no mind to talk about that; instead, his face was full of gossip: "Don't say anything, let me guess!"

"?"

"The kind where... they don't wear clothes?"

"Why would they wear clothes?"

Zheng Fa was surprised, not understanding why this person would ask such a question.

"The kind with very few people?"

"Hmm... you could say that."

A strange, excited light flashed in Wang Chen's eyes.

"Indoors?"

"No, mostly outdoors."

"Tang Lingwu actually likes this kind of thing?"

Wang Chen muttered, as if he had discovered some incredible big secret. He patted Zheng Fa's shoulder and said leisurely, "The adult world may be wonderful, but you still need to take care of your health!"

Zheng Fa said nothing, just looking at Wang Chen with a gaze that said, "You are seriously ill."

Then he heard Wang Chen sigh: "Tang Lingwu, this person in our class, has good grades, is beautiful, and Old Chen watches her closely. The boys in the class dare not speak to her, but according to my observation, at least half the boys in our class have some affection for her."

"So many?" Zheng Fa indeed had never paid attention to this; who liked whom in the class was never within his scope of concern.

"You are focused on studying. I dare say, it is far more than you think. I didn't expect her private hobbies to be so stimulating..." Wang Chen stroked his chin, with an expression of having gained new knowledge: "If the whole class of boys found out, tsk tsk..."

"Tsk what?"

"It would mesmerize the other half of the boys!"

Zheng Fa looked at Wang Chen, who wore an expression of absolute certainty.

For some reason, his words sounded contradictory: very vulgar, yet they seemed to make a lot of sense.

……

The Seventh Young Master saw Zheng Fa in his study, looking even more haggard.

"What happened to you?"

To watch those documentaries, Zheng Fa had stayed up almost the entire night for the last two days in the modern world.

"I was contemplating the 'Spiritual Crane Body'," Zheng Fa explained.

The Seventh Young Master exchanged a glance with Gao Yuan beside him, shook his heads, clearly unconvinced.

After all, Zheng Fa had already returned the book; what was there to contemplate?

The Seventh Young Master looked at Zheng Fa, shook his head, then picked up a book from the shelf behind him and handed it to Zheng Fa.

"What is this?"

"Forget about the 'Spiritual Crane Body'; let me tell you, martial arts have no future. Learn Talisman Arts with me instead!" the Seventh Young Master said with a sigh.

Zheng Fa looked at the book in front of him; on the cover was written: "Complete Explanation of Talisman Diagrams, Volume One."

"What is this?"

"Didn't I tell you before? Talisman diagrams."

Zheng Fa flipped through it; indeed, it was full of those complex and abstract patterns.

Having just suffered the torment of the bird-man, Zheng Fa felt a slight headache, put down the book, and asked, "If I finish studying this book, will I understand the Dao of Talismans?"

"Heh, finish? Do you know how many volumes are in this set?"

"No."

The Seventh Young Master held up one finger.

"Ten volumes?"

The Seventh Young Master shook his head.

"One hundred volumes?"

"A whole room!" The Seventh Young Master pointed to a room on the side of the study, saying with some grief and indignation, "In there, they are all!"

Zheng Fa turned his head, looking at the rows of bookshelves inside that room reaching up to the ceiling, and swallowed hard.

"Moreover, new volumes are added to this set every year! I've been studying since I was a child until now, yet the number of books I haven't seen keeps growing!"

The Seventh Young Master's tone was so aggrieved it made one's heart ache.

Zheng Fa truly understood; this was truly an endless sea of learning.

"Young Master, what exactly are talisman diagrams?"

"I don't understand either." The Seventh Young Master shook his head. "According to this book, all talisman diagrams originate from the immortal sect cultivators' comprehension of heaven and earth, containing the Great Dao. In fact, many of the earliest talisman papers were drawn with nothing but talisman diagrams."

"But later, some discovered that although certain talisman diagrams looked different, they produced the same effects, so some cultivators proposed the concept of Yang Yuanfu, attempting to find their similarities."

"As for these, it is because immortal sect cultivators still comprehend new talisman diagrams every day..."

Zheng Fa suddenly realized, finally understanding those rooms full of books.

"The method of exhaustive enumeration..."