Deep-Mountain Herbalist

The Hundred Thousand Mountains stretched on without end. Venomous insects, fierce beasts, miasma, and foul waters made the environment harsh, and people rarely ventured there in ordinary times. Yet this unique land had nurtured countless creatures and rare spiritual herbs.

Places where spiritual energy gathered could give birth to certain special medicinal herbs, imbued with the spiritual energy of heaven and earth and the essence of sun and moon. They often drew wild beasts to devour them as well.

One day, White Snake slithered through the mountain forest in search of prey, unaware that a change to her life as a snake was about to arrive...

Beasts and birds possessed an ability: without learning or experience, they could distinguish good from bad through instinct alone, as though some unseen force guided and propelled them. This was called instinct.

White Snake raised her head and flicked out her tongue, searching for the scent of prey.

Suddenly, a scent that lured snakes deeply stimulated her olfactory system. It was an aroma she had never smelled before, a faint fragrance that made her feel comfortable. It was as though a voice in her mind told White Snake to hurry and eat that thing. Drawing on the inherited memories buried deep within her soul, White Snake determined that it was not a trap. After a brief hesitation, she twisted her body and followed the scent.

She crossed a small stream, her tongue constantly catching the scent as she slithered swiftly onward. Judging by the smell, it was not far away. After climbing a slope, she found a hollow in a mountain ravine halfway up the hillside. Within it was a small pool about a meter across. Beside the pool stood a tender green blade of grass, jade-green from stem to tip like colored glass. Digestive fluid trickled unconsciously from the corners of her mouth. With almost no hesitation, she opened her jaws, uprooted the grass along with its soil, and swallowed it whole. Then White Snake felt a blaze of heat in her belly, and her vision went black as she passed out...

In truth, that grass was neither wild grass nor some rare, heaven-and-earth-born marvel. It was merely a tonic herb that had grown for many years and was rich in medicinal potency. By chance, it had grown where spiritual energy converged, making it exceptional in quality. White Snake knew none of that. She only knew that eating it would benefit her. Besides, if she did not eat it, other fierce beasts might follow the scent and come to fight over it.

Passing out in the mountain forest was dangerous. Fortunately, the little pool lay hidden in a ravine halfway up the mountain.

The sun set and the moon rose. After being unconscious for an entire day, White Snake's tail twitched as she slowly woke.

Upon waking, she secretly cursed herself for being careless. Luckily, she had not been poisoned. Then she felt as though her whole body was bound tight and unbearably tense. Having shed her skin several times before, White Snake knew she was about to grow larger and longer again. She twisted her serpentine body down the mountain.

Returning to her old nest among the rocks, she slipped into the pile of stones and scraped herself hard against their sharp edges.

Snake Scales were the tough outermost keratin layer of a snake's skin. They prevented moisture within the body from escaping, but they did not grow along with the body. A snake had to shed its old skin before it could grow larger. White Snake was somewhat puzzled. It had been less than a month since her last shedding, so why was she growing again?

The skin around her head came off first. Using the rough edges, she continued scraping herself, slowly peeling away the old skin from her head down to her torso. Finally, the skin at the tip of her tail came off, and the entire shedding process was complete.

Possessing human intelligence, White Snake used her tail to coil up the old skin and hide it in a crack between the rocks. She did this to avoid drawing the attention of hawks and falcons.

Shedding was dangerous. Leaving aside predators watching like tigers eyeing their prey, failing to shed the old skin could easily lead to death. It also consumed a great deal of nutrition. Many snake catchers took advantage of snakes becoming stiff-bodied and docile during shedding to capture them. Otherwise, White Snake would not have crawled into a pile of rocks.

Exhausted all over, she fell asleep once more...

The next day.

White Snake discovered that her Snake Scales had become whiter and more beautiful, and she had grown longer again. From head to tail, she measured a full five meters. She was already considered a colossal creature in this forest. A larger body meant greater fighting strength. White Snake did not know what her limit was, but bigger was always better.

The weather was good. She slithered out of her den and continued hunting.

The Hundred Thousand Mountains were difficult to cultivate and unsuitable for human habitation. The harsh environment meant people rarely came here, but precisely because of this, it had become a place of longing for impoverished herbalists. Carrying all manner of tools and insect repellents, herbalists pressed onward one after another into the depths of the mountains, earning a meager bit of silver to feed their families. Many never made it back out.

In a valley lay a pool roughly a hundred meters across. Though small, it was deep. Along the water's edge stood a moss-covered cliff, where a man in his thirties with a medicine basket on his back was clinging to the rock face and gathering herbs.

His left hand gripped a vine tightly, while his right carefully dug an intact herb from a crack in the stone and placed it into the basket on his back.

Holding the vine, he slowly moved sideways to another spot. Upon seeing the plant in a rocky hollow, the herbalist rejoiced. Dendrobium officinale! This risky journey into the mountains had paid off handsomely! Once he sold it, he would even have enough money to buy his wife a bolt of cloth to make clothes. Delighted, the herbalist began picking the Dendrobium officinale, failing to notice that the vine in his hand had been badly worn away by the rock...

The herbalist suddenly felt his left hand go empty and toppled backward! My life ends here.

Splash! Water sprayed in every direction.

Poor people who lived in the mountains year-round generally knew a little about swimming. The man had intended to swim to shore, but his arm had been injured when he fell down the cliff, leaving him unable to exert any strength. He could barely stay afloat and could not swim, which terrified him.

"Help... help..."

His cries for help echoed through the valley. Though he knew there could not possibly be anyone nearby, he still instinctively shouted with all his strength, fighting to survive.

In the distance, White Snake raised her head.

She had just seemed to hear some strange sound. Finding nothing unusual, she lowered her head and continued slithering in search of prey.

In fact, the cries for help were loud, but snakes relied more on their bellies to sense vibrations, so she had not heard anyone calling clearly. It was not until White Snake reached the pool's edge that she saw, through infrared sensing, a human figure bobbing up and down in the water.

The infrared image told her it was a human.

A human?

In twenty years, White Snake had never seen even a single human. She had once thought there were no humans in this world. The appearance of the drowning man stirred memories of her past deep within her soul.

In that brief moment, the herbalist's struggling grew weaker and weaker, and he slowly sank beneath the water.

Just as the herbalist hazily believed he was doomed to die, he saw an enormous white snake swimming toward him underwater. A herbalist drowning deep in the mountains, only for calamities never to come alone when he encountered a giant snake.

My poor old and young family...

Underwater, White Snake twisted her body and quickly swam to the herbalist. Her tail wrapped around his shoulder, and she swam forcefully toward the shore.

A moment later.

"Cough, cough..."

The drenched man lay on the shore, coughing water out without stop. At last, he abruptly sat up and gulped down mouthfuls of air. Before passing out, he remembered a giant snake dragging him away, yet he had awakened on the shore. Where was that giant snake?

He looked up to find a snake head as thick as a bowl directly before him.

"Ah..."

With a scream, the herbalist flailed in panic and scrambled backward. But behind him was a cliff wall, leaving him no room to retreat. The white snake did not move. Instead, she looked at him with an expression of disdain. Yes, disdain. The herbalist was certain that snake was looking down on him for screaming and shouting like that.

From the man's clothing and hairstyle, White Snake could tell he was an ancient person: yellow skin, black hair, an Eastern face. The weaving techniques were very primitive, and his clothes and hair resembled the styles of the Qin-Han era. In other words, this was an ancient world.

After watching for a long time, White Snake turned and left.

For some reason, the herbalist seemed to feel that the snake had sighed. It was deeply bizarre.

White Snake had merely been reflecting. A snake was still a snake. No matter what her previous life had been, it was all in the past. Seeing a human had not stirred much emotion in her heart. Perhaps twenty years of passing seasons had made her bid farewell to the past. She had saved him only because that tiny remnant of humanity within her had acted up. After all, he was the first person she had ever encountered, carrying a slight commemorative significance.

The herbalist let out a breath of relief, examined his arm injury, and found herbs to treat it. Only after bandaging the wound did he notice that the sun was sinking ever lower. It seemed he would not be able to leave today.

His medicine basket was lost, along with his provisions. Just as hunger became unbearable, that white snake returned.

She set down a mountain pheasant strangled to death, then turned and left.

The herbalist stared dumbfoundedly at the food on the ground, then at White Snake receding into the distance. He hurriedly knelt and repeatedly kowtowed, muttering to himself, though no one knew what he was saying...