Chapter 74: Feng Xue Only Needs to Cultivate; Li Maolin Has Much to Consider

But let us not speak of how Feng Xue practiced the Soul-Collecting Art; after leaving the Feng family courtyard, Li Maolin did not simply find some place to rest.

Compared to slacking off, he had plenty of things to do.

The three-候 deadline was not because Feng Xue had seen through him three times—it was simply because today was the sixteenth day of the twelfth month, exactly three 候 before the first day of the New Year.

Once he reached the Yi-Si year, he could shed his half-corpse, half-ghost existence and attain the state of spirit-body unity; though to restore his full strength—or even surpass it—he would still have to wait until the fifteenth day of the seventh month, the human calamity was at least over.

The teaching behind the three-候 period was twofold: first, to suffer loss; second, to hold Feng Xue—a wild card—in place. Since their karmic threads were entangled, they must minimize the risk of his wandering freely, lest more people be drawn into this karmic web.

And what better way to keep a man locked in place than seclusion?

Whether or not this brat was scheming against him, his desire to extract benefits from Li Maolin was undeniably real; so, grant him benefits, bind him to his home, and thus reduce the risk of the human calamity.

And what Li Maolin must do next was even simpler—

Incite a certain disturbance.

Actively teaching techniques brought no clear "loss" to himself; it was hard to say how much it offset the human calamity. Moreover, last night he had greedily absorbed a fair amount of primal energy—even if not much, it might still count toward the karmic ledger.

To ensure his "suffering" plan proceeded smoothly, he still intended to provoke other Profound Cultivators, as originally planned—but now the goal was no longer merely to attract attention, but to inflict actual losses upon himself.

It was like suppressing bandits: make a plan, slowly toss out bait, confine the conflict within your control. Even if you trade blows with the bandits and take losses, you retain the initiative—far better than doing nothing until the bandits launch a full assault on your doorstep.

"But this process must be contained—minimize casualties, avoid replacing one calamity with another. Fine, consider it paying to avert disaster!"

At this moment, Li Maolin was deeply grateful he had prepared contingency plans before entering seclusion; the gold, silver, treasures, and ritual materials in his Pot-Bound Satchel were still sufficient, so he need not agonize over whether purchasing supplies would expose his identity.

The only regret was that he could no longer visit Feng Xue at night to absorb primal energy.

"Endure!"

…

Li Maolin had many things to consider, while Feng Xue only needed to focus on cultivation.

The carpenters worked all afternoon; Feng Xue studied all afternoon. Having previously studied the "Jie Yu" scripture, he was already adept at transforming his Qi into jade and infusing it into stones. After just a few practice runs, he mastered the technique of splitting primal energy. Though more complex than directly extracting a room's worth and soaking in it, it was far more precise: each jade talisman could store different primal energies, allowing him to directly generate different types of Qi by ingesting specific combinations.

After this cultivation breakthrough, two natural offshoots emerged—

First, through exhaustive trial, mix different Qi attributes and test various techniques to confirm the effects of each Qi configuration: single-element spells, mutually-generating element combinations, three-element synergies, etc. Taking one unit of Qi composed of up to five primal energies as an example, there were 231 possible configurations. Feng Xue's first task was to precisely prepare each of these 231 Qi combinations and test them.

Second, divide his Qi within his mind-sea—transform the single chaotic sea of Qi into five distinct Qi pools, so that in the future he could refine Qi directly within his body, guiding the five elements to flow and separate freely.

Compared to the first point, which merely required repeated refinement, the second seemed far more difficult—but in principle, it was even easier than the first.

After all, the foundational cultivation method of the spirit is visualization: simply imagine, during meditation, a grid, a pond, a palette beneath your spirit, and your mind-sea will naturally adapt. Persist long enough, and it will be accomplished.

The visualization rules forbid imagining demons or natural disasters—but imagining myself standing on a Five-Element Disc? Surely that's fine!

Then, then Feng Xue encountered a rather awkward problem—

The capacity of his scrap materials was far too low.

These fragments were fine for inscribing rituals—as conversion devices (like phone chargers)—but if he wanted to store primal energy or even Qi (like power banks), they were woefully inadequate.

After careful selection, Feng Xue found that aside from the blue-and-white seed material he'd bought for fifteen guan—whose capacity was astonishingly large—only a few bracelet cores from Nanshan Manor, nearly given away for free, were usable, but their capacity was only enough for one or two years. At Feng Xue's rate of consumption, a few spells would drain them dry.

"Before I set up the Five-Element Qi pools, I need to get some high-quality materials!" Feng Xue stared at the blue-and-white seed material, which had easily stored sixty years' worth of primal energy with room to spare, and thought of Old Man Wang—how wealthy he was; otherwise, this cultivation method would truly be unaffordable!

"Qi, wealth, companions, land—the ancients never lied!"

…

Without Li Maolin's interference, the night passed peacefully. Feng Xue rose at dawn, ate breakfast, practiced standing桩, then returned to the streets. Though passersby still greeted him, Feng Xue sensed something was off.

It wasn't that their attitude had worsened—quite the opposite. Whether wealthy merchants, their servants and guards, or common folk beyond the affluent district, their gazes toward him had grown even more reverent. This sudden shift left him deeply uneasy.

Fortunately, Lu Cheng County was not large. After walking only a short distance, he arrived at the Bird Market. As usual, he headed to Old Man Wang's shop and found the old man listening to music.

He muttered inwardly at how frugal this man's lifestyle was, yet walked up steadily.

Sensing a flicker of Qi light in his vision, Old Man Wang glanced over, saw it was Feng Xue, and immediately wanted to hide—afraid he'd ask something he couldn't answer and lose his senior's dignity.

But Feng Xue had clearly seen him now; fleeing would be too humiliating. The old man gritted his teeth, maintained his reclusive-sage demeanor, closed his eyes, and listened to the music. When he guessed Feng Xue had reached his side, he still didn't open his eyes, and said:

"Why are you back again? Speak—what do you want to know now?"

"Nothing…" Feng Xue said, finding no fault in the old man's tendency to lecture, and went straight to the point:

"I've come this time to buy good jade—same quality as that Hetian blue-and-white seed material I had before. I need five pieces, preferably corresponding to the Five Elements."

Hearing Feng Xue was here to do business, the old man sat upright immediately, his expression serious:

"Are you preparing for that too?"

"Huh? Which one?"

(End of Chapter)