Planting Spiritual Herbs, A Fussy Lotus

After loading the Frost Wheat he had bought into his Storage Pouch, he was in an excellent mood and continued strolling through the market. He had originally hoped to find a suitable spirit bird that could bind with that Frost Ice Snow Lotus.

But perhaps buying those Wheat Pellets at a bargain had used up all his luck. After searching for ages, he found nothing. Instead, he bought an interesting, low-grade Magic Tool.

"Mo Family Automaton Workshop again."

"Too bad it wasn't open. I could only buy this outside. Otherwise, I'd have gone in to broaden my horizons."

On his way home, he stroked the mirror in his hand. As long as one mirror was placed somewhere, the other could show whatever was reflected within it—a Cultivation World version of a surveillance camera.

And it didn't even need wires! It was wireless!

Its range was limited to only a few hundred meters, though. On top of that, it was easily detected by Divine Sense and could display images but not sound, so it was merely an amusing little object.

After all, this was the Cultivation World. If someone casually set up surveillance and got caught, the other party could truly follow the Magic Tool's Spiritual Energy fluctuations right to their door.

But it was still quite useful to Li Ye. With it, he could observe the spirit plants growing in the courtyard at all times while indoors. If anything happened, he could deal with it promptly.

After returning home, he first went inside to warm himself up, taking out both the Glass Snow Lotus and the Frost Wheat while he was at it.

In fact, he had been thinking about it earlier. The Frost Wheat's description said, "Can bind with any spirit plant capable of producing seeds."

Then, would this Glass Snow Lotus work?

Lotus seeds were standard seeds, weren't they?

The question was whether it could bind with only one side willing—and whether, after finding a suitable spirit bird in the future, he could bind it with the Glass Snow Lotus again.

"Let's give it a try."

"But do I have enough Vital Essence?"

He focused his mind on the two different spirit plants. He could vaguely sense that the Frost Wheat was willing to bind, while the Glass Snow Lotus sent out an intent of resistance.

Thirty points of Vital Essence required.

"So that's how it is." Li Ye's eyes lit up. This binding attempt had failed; it wasn't that binding was impossible. In other words, if he could persuade the Glass Snow Lotus, they could bind.

That was strange. Did the Glass Snow Lotus count as a spirit beast? Weren't only spirit plants and spirit beasts able to bind?

Could these spirit wheats be special?

This failure did not disappoint him. Instead, it proved that his idea was indeed viable. How could a Golden Finger be such an inconvenient thing? He simply needed to dig deeper into its uses.

The only problem was that this thing would die in a month. He had no idea whether binding could solve that issue.

He let out a breath, picked up the Frost Wheat, and went into the courtyard.

According to the explanation in the book that young cultivator had given him, Frost Wheat needed to take root in pure snow. This pure snow could be snow falling from the sky, but that placed very high demands on the environment.

Because snow would inevitably pick up all sorts of things as it drifted down.

Clearly, the snow here was still not good enough.

So Li Ye could only figure out a way to make snow himself. That was not difficult—he could compress water droplets with Spiritual Energy, then spray them into the air, and they would directly turn into snow.

What concerned him, however, was what kind of water to use for the snow.

After mulling it over, he simply tried communicating with the Frost Wheat. He set out the water he had drawn from the well, filtered water, and water mixed with some Spirit Stone dust.

Then he asked, "Which kind do you like?"

"..."

A long silence followed.

Just as he began to wonder whether these spirit plants had such poor spirituality that they could not communicate, he finally vaguely sensed the Frost Wheat's consciousness fluctuate.

It pointed toward the well water.

Come to think of it, that well was the courtyard's only source of Spiritual Energy. It was because of that well that the rent cost a full twenty Spirit Stones per month. Luckily, when he arrived, the original owner had paid the rent not long before.

That made things easy. Li Ye immediately took the well water outside to make snow, then marked out an area for the forty stalks of spirit wheat around the outer edge of the Silver Moon Grass and patiently began planting them.

He admitted that he was still a novice at planting. Even after reading those books, it was difficult to perfectly control things like depth and spacing—

But he could vaguely sense the wheat's consciousness. As long as they felt comfortable, that was the most suitable arrangement. At worst, he could make more adjustments.

Practice made perfect. He did not believe that just because he could not do it now, he would never be able to do it later.

Just like that, he soon finished planting the forty stalks of Frost Wheat.

The planting was not particularly neat. The spacing between the wheat was uneven, some close and some far apart, with the stalks crooked and their depths varying.

But this was indeed what they found most comfortable. Two of the wheat stalks even conveyed a desire to "snuggle up."

After finishing the planting, Li Ye examined them.

Their so-called "Wheat Pellets" still had not finished forming. It seemed they would need some more time.

Once they were done forming, he truly wanted to taste what the "pills" produced by wheat were like.

"Little ones, grow well!"

As usual, he offered the Frost Wheat a few words of encouragement.

After planting them, he found a place to set up the mirror, making sure he could clearly see this area. Then he returned to the house and took out the Glass Snow Lotus.

Having spent a while inside a Storage Pouch capable of storing spirit plants and spirit beasts, the Glass Snow Lotus looked rather listless.

But once it came into contact with the frigid wind outside, carrying snowflakes along with it, it seemed to come alive. The tightly closed bud showed signs of blooming.

Yet the moment Li Ye stopped walking, it immediately wilted again.

"..."

Was this flower messing with me?

He looked around. The cold wind was still blowing, and even standing still was freezing. How could taking a few casual steps possibly result in any difference in icy snow qi?

From what he had learned from the Spirit Vine earlier, this spirit plant seemed to hate being rooted in one place for too long. Supposedly, what it liked most was the shifting snowfields of snowy mountains.

It could "move around" everywhere without needing to move.

He truly could not understand it, but since he had already bought it—and its lotus seeds really were important—he could only keep moving. Throughout the process, he continuously sensed the consciousness fluctuations of the Glass Snow Lotus.

The result was still nothing.

It seemed to simply want to absorb the so-called icy snow qi everywhere.

After walking for a while, Li Ye found the cold outside truly unbearable. He placed it, bottle and all, beside the well, then hurriedly hid inside the house.

He brushed the snow from himself and lay back down on the bed, silently considering what to do next. The things he already had were taking up what little energy he possessed; if he became too greedy, the losses would clearly outweigh the gains.

So for the time being, he would obediently stay home and first get the lotus and spirit wheat sorted out. Once he recovered some Vital Essence, he would bind all the Silver Moon Grass and Flint Crystal Worms.

Once this batch of Silver Moon Grass produced enough Moon Nectar Pearls, he would find the Spirit Vine to turn in the task. While he was at it, he could buy some spell manuals as well—the spells the original owner knew were still far too few.

With those thoughts in mind, he fell into a deep sleep.

He slept straight through until nightfall. After waking, he glanced at the mirror hanging nearby and suddenly saw something rather bizarre.

It startled him wide awake.