Chapter 95: I Didn

Feng Xue leaned against a fruitless "coconut" tree, using its shade to shield himself from the harsh sunlight, while on the sea surface, those six-digit lifespans continued drifting slowly—by this pace, it would take another one or two hours to reach shore.

"You've got real patience. Is it really that necessary? You don't actually expect me to walk on water and swim out to drag you up, do you?"

Through the telescope, the figure's silhouette gradually sharpened as it drew nearer—her build was relatively petite, and some white substance, whether hair or seaweed, clung wetly to her head.

Though white hair has a special appeal to Han Chinese, no Han Chinese would find interest in a waterlogged, messy creature resembling a drowned ghost.

"Looks like a girl? Classic light novel opening, huh? No wonder this is isekai toilet paper!"

Feng Xue recalled the aesthetic of his original world and suddenly wondered if this wasn't danger at all, but some kind of isekai cheat ability—but it was merely idle banter in his mind, nothing more. Even if he truly encountered a stupid goddess, unless he could drag her down with him as a companion, he'd never believe he was the male lead of a light novel reincarnation isekai story.

In comparison, he thought it more likely this thing was like the "Great Fisherman" from Death Note—a monster that fashioned a human-shaped lure to fish for people.

He laid out his solar power bank one by one to charge, and considering he might need to fight soon, he decided to conserve both magical energy and physical strength, simply leaning against the tree and pulling out his phone to read various texts.

In the modern, magic-less world, Daoist classics might only serve as metaphysical philosophy, but now that Feng Xue had truly Mastered the Method and could manipulate the Five Phases and harmonize yin and yang, these texts had undoubtedly become treasures.

Whether orthodox Daoist canons, scholarly explorations based on Daoist doctrine, or even relatively plausible creative works—all fell within Feng Xue's research scope. As always, the Five Phases theory was merely a classification system; once you fully understood its categorization patterns, any theory could be fitted into it—

Whether it was practical or not required empirical validation.

At least the several techniques Feng Xue had developed so far were quite usable, and this clearly boosted his confidence!

Reading "The Original Meaning of Journey to the West," Feng Xue quietly savored this Daoist alchemical text that had painstakingly deconstructed and reinterpreted the Journey to the West to reveal the Golden Core path. Before his isekai, he'd known of this work, but had treated it as a joke. Now, having gained some insight into the flow of the Five Phases, he often found new flavors within its lines.

"Clarity, Secret, Completeness, Penetration—this is truly fascinating! The Three Treasures of essence, qi, and spirit are refined internally through the Five Phases; when yin contains yang and yang harbors yin, the tortoise and snake entwine, cultivating both life and fate—only then can you plant a golden lotus in fire…"

Correlating with this alchemical interpretation, Feng Xue began contemplating the Five Phases' circulation within his own body. His current cultivation remained in the stage of 【Circulating Nutritive and Defensive Qi, Organs Generating Five Qi】. According to "The Original Meaning of Journey to the West"'s exposition on the Golden Core path, his next step must be refining the Three Treasures through yin and yang.

"In martial cultivation, Circulating Nutritive and Defensive Qi is the yin-yang cycle of qi; in xuan cultivation, Organs Generating Five Qi (yuan qi) is the emergence of essence and qi—only yang is present. The spirit, which generates magical energy, corresponds to shen, yet contains only yin. Since yin and yang can only transform unidirectionally and fail to form a cycle, lifespan is shortened."

"The legendary post-initiation spiritual feedback should involve the spirit's generated magical energy nourishing the yang of essence."

"From this perspective, in the previous world, Wu Xiu relied on the yin-yang cycle of qi and blood, while xuan cultivators relied on the yin-yang cycle of essence and spirit—both fundamentally achieved lifespan extension through yin-yang balance."

"As for what comes next, perhaps unifying spirit and blood-qi into one grand cycle? A nested system? Like the saying 'the moon hides the jade rabbit, the sun hides the crow'? A state akin to the Taiji diagram, where old yin and old yang, young yin and young yang, harmoniously rotate?"

"Then how do we interpret the entwining tortoise and snake? What is the subsequent 'Gathering and Inverting the Five Phases for Refinement'? The Five Phases refer to the Five Qi, so 'inverting refinement' means reversing them—Five Qi generate yuan qi… Five Qi Converging to the Origin? That matches! Yuan qi is one's primordial essence-qi, so 'Five Qi Converging to the Origin' means transforming the Five Zang-organs' qi into primordial qi? Damn, this is Reverse Birth in Three Stages, isn't it?"

Though he occasionally indulged in wild fantasies, Feng Xue wrote down every absurd connection in his notebook—after all, a poor pen beats a good memory; an unintentional spark today might become the key to tomorrow's breakthrough.

Feng Xue read and took notes, occasionally glancing up at the increasingly close "floating corpse." Well, he'd overestimated her endurance—less than half an hour had passed, and she was nearly ashore.

Feng Xue sat quietly beneath the tree, watching from afar, when a faint hunger pang stirred in his stomach.

Considering he might soon need to extract yuan qi, he pulled a dried biscuit from his Hutian pouch and ate it. Compressed biscuits, chocolate, and candy were emergency rations—better to consume these perishable items first (Note ①).

Yet no sooner had he taken a bite than the "floating corpse," still a hundred meters out, lifted its head as if smelling human flesh like a zombie. From its wet white hair, two pointed ears sprang upright, and with a grotesque, poorly animated 3D-movie motion—like a cockroach sprinting—it paddled with hands and feet, and in an instant, rode its plank onto land.

"What the hell is this?"

Seeing this oddity accelerate further after landing, Feng Xue immediately tossed the biscuit aside and began channeling magical energy—but even with his reflexes, he was half a beat too slow. Before his body was fully enveloped in a green storm of wind, the girl had already snatched the discarded biscuit in her mouth like a dog catching a flying disc, then scampered off on tiny steps to devour it rapidly.

"???" Feng Xue maintained his guard stance, observing the strange girl from over ten meters away, his emotions momentarily disjointed.

Her wet white hair clung to her beast ears, making her otherwise fairly pretty face look disheveled. A once-plump tail dragged wetly behind her soaked outer robe, appearing useless, like mere decoration.

She had blood-red eyes like gemstones, now unfocused, and her slender frame gave no hint of the speed she'd just displayed.

"Beast girl? The tail's too wet to tell, but probably a fox or wolf? But why does this beast girl act like a real animal? Could this be some world where every creature is anthropomorphized like Pokémon?"

Feng Xue mentally grumbled but lowered his magical output, keeping the jade talisman in low-power mode. Facing a physical monster capable of crossing ten meters during the brief moment he channeled energy, he dared not remain unguarded nearby.

Yet the girl seemed utterly indifferent to Feng Xue's vigilance. After finishing the biscuit, she immediately crawled on all fours to the shore and gulped down several large mouthfuls of seawater.

"What the hell? You can drink seawater?"

Feng Xue froze at the sight—due to habitual thinking, he'd never considered whether this world's seawater was salty.

Thinking of this, he slowly walked to the shore, cupped a handful of seawater, and then…

"Pah! This is damn seawater!"

(End of Chapter)