In the dark room, time seemed to lose all meaning.
Li Yuan maintained his Internal Vision, sinking his entire mind into his body as he guided that faint yet tenacious thread of Crimson Sun Qi and Blood through his parched meridians. It was a slow, delicate process, like channeling water through a cracked riverbed. It demanded immense patience and control.
He could clearly "see" the stubborn Yin Sha Curse power entrenched in his meridians let out silent wails as the Crimson Sun Qi and Blood passed through, like snow beneath the blazing sun. It quickly Melted Away and receded. The energy, warm and brimming with life, washed through and nourished his meridians, once clogged like a silt-choked stream. They became clear again, even a touch tougher and broader than before.
And the tiny Crimson Sun at the center of his qi sea, after Smelting part of the Anomaly's devoured essence, seemed to have grown ever so slightly more solid, its light and heat more stable.
After an unknown amount of time, when the last substantial mass of Yin Sha Curse power in his body had been dispelled and Smelted, Li Yuan slowly withdrew from his Internal Vision.
His eyes remained closed, but the world already felt different to him.
First, the Bone-Chilling Cold that had tormented him for ten years, like an ever-present background hum, had vanished! It hadn't weakened; it had all but disappeared! A sense of ease and clarity unlike anything he'd felt before filled his body, as if he'd been relieved of a thousand-jin burden.
Second, his senses. He could hear the howling wind outside, the faint clack of the night watchman's wooden clapper in the distance, even the soft scurrying of a mouse in the corner. Everything was startlingly clear. The dust and mildew in the air, too, stood out sharply.
Last, his control over his body. He gently moved his fingers and felt a strength and fullness that had been missing before, not that old, sluggish weakness.
Hunger surged through him again, a ravenous beast awakening. But this time, it wasn't the hollow, enervating hunger that drained everything from him. It was... a hunger full of longing, his body crying out for energy!
His gaze drifted of its own accord to the corner of the room, to the slop bucket left behind by the servant, reeking of sour rot.
Before, he would have felt only humiliation and despair. But now, as he looked at the murky liquid and floating scraps, his eyes held scrutiny and... anticipation.
"'Smelting'... can devour and Smelt foreign energies and the essence of flesh and blood..."
That sacrificial cold meat had contained a trace of Sacrificial Food Fiend Qi, a low-grade energy, so the Crimson Sun had been able to convert it effectively. What about the scraps in this slop bucket? They might be filthy, but at their core, they were made from all kinds of ingredients. Surely, to one degree or another, they contained a trace of the most basic Food Essence?
Once the thought arose, he couldn't suppress it.
He needed energy, a great deal of it, to strengthen this nascent Crimson Sun and replenish the years of depletion wrought by the Yin Sha Curse! He had no choice. He had to make use of every resource at hand!
Li Yuan struggled up from the straw pile and sat up. His movements were still a little stiff, but far more nimble than before. He went to the slop bucket. Its pungent odor hit him, churning his stomach, but he only frowned slightly before reaching into the cold, sticky grease without hesitation.
Holding his breath, he quickly felt around and picked out the larger scraps that seemed to be meat or bones, laying them on a relatively clean rag nearby. Most of them were cartilage, bits of meat, and bones with shreds of meat still clinging to them, mixed with rotten leaves and grains of rice. They looked sickening.
After gathering about a small handful, he returned to the straw pile and sat down, staring at the heap of "food."
Without hesitation, he picked up a filthy scrap of meat and shoved it straight into his mouth without even wiping it off.
Cold, slick, and intensely sour and rotten, it burst across his tongue. His body's revulsion was so strong that he nearly vomited at once. But he clenched his teeth, forced his throat to work, and swallowed it down!
The moment the food fell into his stomach—
The Crimson Sun deep in his qi sea seemed to Sense the addition of "fuel." It quivered faintly, and an invisible, searing force swept across his stomach!
Something miraculous happened.
The foul, nauseating stench seemed to be Purified and stripped away in an instant. In its place, a faint yet genuine "warm current" spread from his stomach and flowed into his limbs. This current was far purer and more potent than the energy his body had produced on its own while digesting the cold meat.
His body absorbed it quickly. His intense hunger eased a little, and his weakness seemed to lessen by a fraction.
It worked! It really worked!
Li Yuan's eyes blazed with astonishing light! It was the light of hope, a glimpse of a path reaching to the heavens in the depths of despair!
He didn't hesitate. Like a starving beggar—or a shrewdest of diners—he began to "eat" quickly and silently. He stuffed the cold, foul-smelling scraps into his mouth one piece after another and forced them down.
With every swallow, the Crimson Sun turned faintly, refining the most basic, meager Food Essence from the filthy scraps and converting it into the most rudimentary Crimson Sun Qi and Blood to nourish his battered body.
There was nothing to it but the most naked desire to survive and grow stronger—not the slightest concern for taste.
He could clearly feel his strength returning bit by bit as one faint warm current after another flowed through him. His hands and feet were no longer cold. A weak but genuine heat gathered and swirled in his chest.
When he swallowed the last piece of cartilage, Li Yuan licked his lips, reluctant to stop. There was even a bit of grease on them, but he didn't notice.
He lowered his head to look at his still-thin hand. It seemed a little tougher beneath the skin. He clenched it gently.
"Crack..."
His knuckles snapped crisply, and a strength far greater than before lay within them.
He stood and tried taking a few steps around the room. His legs were still a little unsteady, but he no longer drifted like before, as though he could topple at any moment. A solid, grounded feeling rose from the soles of his feet.
He walked to the wall and looked at a blue-gray brick in the corner, used to prop up a table leg. Before, even with all his strength, he might not have been able to budge it.
He took a deep breath, gathered the faint but newly born Crimson Sun Qi and Blood in his body into his right fist, then punched hard!
"Bang!"
A dull thud. His fist struck the rough, cold brick, bringing a stab of pain, but it was bearable. Several fine cracks had appeared on the brick's surface! It was nowhere near shattered, but to him, this was a transformation as vast as heaven and earth!
Li Yuan stared at the cracks, then at his reddening fist, his chest heaving violently.
Not from pain, but from excitement.
He'd done it!
He'd survived! He'd found a path of his own! The Crimson Sun and Smelting were the ladder he would climb out of this hellish abyss!
The scraps in that slop bucket were the first stepping-stone on his ascent... insignificant, yet vital.
His gaze returned to the filthy slop bucket. There was no disgust in his eyes now; he looked at it as if it were an undeveloped treasure trove.
"Not enough..." he muttered. His voice was hoarse, but it held a resolve he'd never known before. "Nowhere near enough."
He knew this was only the beginning. This meager Food Essence was a drop in the bucket for his long-depleted body and the Crimson Sun that still needed to grow.
He needed more! Better! Fuel packed with more energy!
Night deepened, and the cold wind continued to howl. But in this dilapidated side room, a seed called "hope" and "strength," bathed in the light of that nascent Crimson Sun, had broken through the cold, hard earth and quietly begun to sprout.
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