Chapter 29: Essentials of Celestial Phenomena

As soon as Jiang Yuanzhan left, Bai Guagua jumped out right behind him, insisting on dragging Zhang Wei to the bank to check the password.

The two arrived at the ATM at the street corner and took a look; the balance inside had a full four zeros!

"Fifty... fifty thousand!" Bai Guagua's eyes went wide, she swallowed her saliva repeatedly, and her little head was instantly filled with all kinds of delicious food.

Although Zhang Wei was also happy, he had been prepared in his heart for a long time, so he wasn't too surprised.

After all, it could be said that he had traded his life for this money; he wasn't the only one who had narrowly escaped death that night because of him.

Just taking the Yi Zhong group of seven as an example, each person's background was at the level of Han Mei's; strictly speaking, this fifty thousand wasn't even worthy of their status.

However, Zhang Wei wasn't greedy for more; this fifty thousand was at least enough for Bai Guagua's high school expenses.

"I want to eat apples! I want to eat hot pot! I want to eat seafood!" Stars were practically popping out of Bai Guagua's eyes.

Zhang Wei stroked the girl's hair and said earnestly, "Guagua, I have to save this money for you, for your dowry when you grow up."

Absorbed Bai Guagua's Resentment, +555.

Bai Guagua was so anxious she stomped her feet: "Who wants you to prepare a dowry? I'm not getting married! I'll go to Emei Mountain and become a nun, okay? Hurry up and buy me good food... don't run!"

Zhang Wei had no choice but to run; Bai Guagua's words had already drawn a wave of resentment from the people around them, and some even began to suspect he was a human trafficker planning to sell the little girl to some remote mountain corner in western Sichuan...

In the end, the two bought a large pile of snacks at the supermarket, all things the little girl loved to eat, and carried them home in big and small bags. The benefits of being an Awakened were then revealed: the two large bags weighing over thirty pounds were carried by Bai Guagua alone, her small frame almost completely hidden, yet she could still free up one hand to eat while walking.

The consequence was that by the time they got home, the little girl's belly was round, and she didn't even eat dinner that day.

That night, Bai Guagua leaned happily on the sofa, wiggling her little feet while eating snacks and watching TV, while Zhang Wei returned to his room and opened the book *Essentials of Celestial Phenomena* left behind by Jiang Yuanzhan.

This seemed to be a textbook-style book, though it was in a semi-finished state, and even this made Zhang Wei marvel for a good while.

How much time had passed... once the people above mobilized, the efficiency was truly high.

Although the book contained obscure and profound classical Chinese that was extremely difficult to understand, fortunately, there was a translation under every paragraph, so it was readable; furthermore, there was an insert in the book, which was a large, folded map.

Spreading out this chart, which was several times larger than the book, it was covered in countless dense stars connected by simple lines—some with seven or eight stars in a line, others with only two or three, and a few individual stars not connected by any lines.

Some stars had text annotations next to them indicating their names, such as Yaoguang and Kaiyang; the stars connected by lines also had collective names, such as the Big Dipper and the Six Jia; each large star field also had a name, such as Ziwei and Taiwei.

All the star fields on this image were collectively called the *Three Enclosures, Four Symbols, and Twenty-Eight Mansions*.

The Three Enclosures were Ziwei, Taiwei, and Tian Shi.

The Four Symbols were Canglong, Xuanwu, Baihu, and Zhuque, which were further subdivided into the Twenty-Eight Mansions.

According to the preface of this book, this star chart was drawn by the ancients; the era and author were both unreliable, and it had been added to and revised by successive generations. When paired with the breathing techniques inside, it could achieve the effect of prolonging life.

It was just that after the Song Dynasty, this *Essentials of Celestial Phenomena* was proven to be useless, providing no benefit to the human body, and was subsequently shelved and ignored, though it had been passed down all the same.

So, how did this forgotten classic see the light of day again and get unearthed?

Besides the *Essentials of Celestial Phenomena*, some ancient families in the country also had similar inheritances passed down, which many elders treated as casual exercises for their leisure time. However, after the Giant Demon Devouring the Moon that night, these people inadvertently discovered that these long-sealed methods had actually produced miraculous effects!

Once some people awakened, they used these dusty classics to practice breathing and could faintly resonate with the stars in the sky, drawing a magical power into their bodies and achieving indescribable, miraculous effects.

Thus, this *Essentials of Celestial Phenomena* successfully entered the sight of those above, and within a very short time, it was translated, edited, and adapted into a popular textbook at the fastest speed possible.

Although this was a classic that would have entered the public eye sooner or later, obtaining it early was a leading advantage. From this, it could be seen that the goodwill from Jiang Yuanzhan was already very obvious, though it was unknown if it represented him personally or a group...

Zhang Wei recalled the only star lit up in the "Star Palace" and, combining it with the positions, began to search for the same one on the chart.

But searching through this vast sea of stars was no easy task, and since the stars in the "Star Palace" had no text labels or straight lines connecting them, his eyes grew blurry without him being able to determine the location.

Zhang Wei pondered that the meaning of the book was for Awakened individuals to use breathing to draw in the Star Power of the entire sky, and only after reaching a certain level would they randomly establish resonance with one of the stars, then follow the lines connected on the star chart to specifically establish a "Star Bridge" with the next one.

For example, with the widely known Big Dipper, if an Awakened established resonance with one of the stars, the next goal would be to connect with another adjacent star in the Big Dipper.

Except for the first star resonated with, which was uncontrollable and seemed completely random—some being in the Canglong star field, others in the Baihu star field—the choice of the second star had to follow the methods in the *Essentials of Celestial Phenomena* to select the next one connected by the lines.

Thus, Zhang Wei was frustrated: he could use Resentment Value to light up any star in the "Star Palace" at will, so should he follow what the *Essentials of Celestial Phenomena* said, or should he feel his way across the river himself?

If he could, he really wanted to dig out the dream-based methods in Bai Guagua's brain to compare which was superior and which was inferior.

One was from an extraterrestrial visitor whose civilization was unknown how many years more advanced, and the other was written by ancients from at least a thousand years ago; Zhang Wei really couldn't put the two on the same level.

Under the dim desk lamp, he chewed and absorbed the content of the classic, and one passage, suspected to be an annotation by a contemporary scholar, caught his eye.

"Editor's Note: Whether it is Starlight or Star Power, through research on several Awakened, we roughly estimate that it is a unique force field emitted between celestial bodies. Unlike the 'four fundamental forces of the universe,' this force field does not act on any object, but has a peculiar effect solely on living beings..."

Then, Zhang Wei saw a sentence that prompted him to make up his mind:

Once one vein is fully connected, a Supernatural Ability will manifest!

Annotation: This "vein" does not refer to the meridians in traditional medicine, but to the unique fluctuations that appear under the collision and influence of force fields between adjacent celestial bodies.

We speculate that the ancients had long discovered the miraculous interaction between stars, connected certain stars with lines, and collectively referred to them as "Star Veins."

As for "once one vein is fully connected, a Supernatural Ability will manifest," since there are currently no examples, we can only roughly speculate that this is a magical catalysis born from the resonance of star force fields after an Awakened connects a vein of stars!

"Once one vein is fully connected, a Supernatural Ability will manifest... Supernatural Ability will manifest..." Zhang Wei muttered to himself, his brows furrowed tightly.