[ Ding! Congratulations, Host! Madam Yun Ling has successfully given birth to a child with an Ordinary Bone Root! ] [ Congratulations, Host! You have gained ten years of life. Your remaining lifespan is sixty-three years. ] [ Congratulations, Host! Your strength has increased by one hundred, reaching the level of a Five-star Azure Obsidian martial artist. ] [ Congratulations, Host! Your bone root has risen to Ordinary, increasing your strength cultivation speed tenfold! ] [ Congratulations, Host! You have obtained a Second-grade Enlightenment Pill! ] [ Congratulations, Host! You have obtained a Second-grade martial art—the Thirteen Grand Protectors Horizontal Training Technique! ]
Happiness had come so suddenly that Xian He was a little dazed.
"Crack! Pop!"
Suddenly, the bones and muscles throughout Xian He's body crackled in unison, and his muscles began to tremble involuntarily.
A rush of heat inexplicably welled up in his dantian and coursed through his extraordinary meridians, accompanied by the crackling of his bones and muscles.
The strange phenomenon appeared quickly and vanished just as fast, lasting no more than a few breaths.
"Did I level up?" Xian He beamed.
He clenched his right fist and squeezed his biceps with his left hand.
His muscles had once been soft and flabby, but now they felt as hard and smooth as pebbles.
He was now a Five-star Azure Obsidian martial artist, with three hundred pounds of strength in one arm. He could also store far more things in the Mountain River Society Diagram at once.
"Not only did my strength increase by a hundred, but my lifespan also increased by ten years... Wait, was I originally only going to live to seventy?" Xian He felt a little glum.
Living to seventy was already pretty good. In modern society, few low-level workers even made it to retirement at sixty-five.
Living conditions on the Tianyun Plateau were even worse than in the Real World. Grandma Chen was only in her fifties, yet she looked as old as someone in their seventies or eighties.
He had lived in the Inner World for almost a year, using up a year of his lifespan. Now that he had been rewarded with ten years, that meant nine extra years on top of his original fifty-four.
Because of the Symbiotic Mark, Yun Ling's lifespan had also been extended by nine years.
Just as Xian He was about to look into his other rewards, Ziyan came outside with the baby in her arms and exclaimed excitedly, "The baby's here! Madam has given birth! It's a big, healthy boy!"
"I'm a father? I'm a father!" It was Xian He's first time becoming a father, and tears of joy welled in his eyes.
Before his parents passed away, they had always urged him to get married, saying they wanted to hold a grandchild.
Now they had a grandson, but they were no longer here.
Although they never got to see him, they had already picked out their grandson's name.
"From now on, your name is Xian Dabao!" Xian He said, gazing intently at the baby in his arms.
Day after day passed. Nurtured by the spiritual energy of heaven and earth and carefully cared for by everyone, Yun Ling recovered quickly and was already able to get out of bed and walk.
Xian He stayed in the kitchen, preparing nutritious meals for mother and child.
Pomegranate wood powder porridge, wood powder and pomegranate pie, pomegranate juice, pomegranate jam...
Once a chef reached Grandmaster Level 1, he could do more than just copy recipes by rote; he could also build on what he knew and experiment with new dishes.
However, experiments didn't always succeed. Most of the time, they failed.
Even when they did, it didn't matter. Muyang and Ziyan didn't mind tasting the dishes he had failed to perfect.
Only when a chef reached Grandmaster Level 3 could he guarantee a one-hundred-percent success rate when inventing new dishes. But that wasn't something he could achieve in a short time.
Two months later.
Yun Ling had fully recovered.
However, Xian He was worried about possible complications, so he put the farming plans on hold and postponed them until next year.
Now that Yun Ling had recovered, Xian He stopped preparing her nutritious meals.
First, the Crystal Pomegranates had been disappearing at an astonishing rate. Five hundred had been used up in two months, leaving only half in the cold storage.
Second, all that nourishing food, combined with a lack of exercise, had made Yun Ling put on weight. If she got any heavier, she'd turn into a Tiger tank. Xian He didn't like driving tanks.
At last, he could leave the kitchen, take a break, and catch his breath.
Sitting by Fairy River, Xian He summoned his system inventory and continued to study his remaining rewards.
The Second-grade Enlightenment Pill could grant sudden insight into one level of a Second-grade martial art.
However, he didn't plan to use it to gain immediate insight into the Thirteen Grand Protectors Horizontal Training Technique.
"My bone root has already improved to Ordinary, so I can cultivate it on my own first. I'll use the pill when I hit a bottleneck."
Someone with a Poor bone root who practiced a mid-grade martial art without sleeping or resting for a year could reach, at most, the fourth level: Proficient.
Someone with an Ordinary bone root who practiced a mid-grade martial art without sleeping or resting for a year could reach the fifth level: Mastery.
Xian He had no intention of pushing himself that hard. He planned to spend two years cultivating the Thirteen Grand Protectors Horizontal Training Technique.
"Besides, in two years, Yun Ling will be able to give me another child, and I'll get another reward then." Xian He's lips curved slightly upward.
He would stop helping Old Man Yun for the time being. Selling porridge was no more important than cultivation.
Besides, Xiao Yang and Li Zhen, those dogs, kept looking for trouble with him. He'd rather lay low and cultivate inside the Mountain River Society Diagram than go out and get beaten up.
In the Real World, inside Xian He's home.
Greedy Wolf's Five-star Azure Obsidian assassin, Du Feng, sat by the bed in the bedroom, looking deeply frustrated.
He had turned the entire house upside down but found neither Xian He nor his newlywed, beautiful wife.
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