Slow Cultivation

Herbalist Wang had talked himself hoarse, threatening and tempting Ye Qin in turn, all to drive him to gather herbs even more desperately. Naturally, there was a reason for this. As his master, Herbalist Wang was entitled to a share of the herbs his apprentice gathered. Ye Qin kept five percent of the money from the herbs he collected, Herbalist Wang took ten percent, and the rest went to the Herb Gathering Hall. So of course Herbalist Wang wanted his apprentice to gather as many herbs as possible.

Ye Qin knew all this perfectly well. He simply lowered his head and remained silent.

After a year, he had earned sixty Silver Leaves—not even close to the money needed to buy a low-grade manual for one Gold Leaf. Without enough strength to defend himself, why would he risk his life so easily? The herbs belonged to someone else, but his life was his own. He could turn it over any way he liked and still couldn't see how risking his life to gather herbs was worth it. As for Yang Yicheng and Feng Xiao, if they wanted to risk their necks, that was their business.

What troubled Ye Qin was not merely being lectured by Herbalist Wang every month.

What worried him more was the pace of his cultivation.

After a full year of diligent cultivation, he had increased the brightness of his white orb by less than a tenth. At this rate, it would take him at least ten years to double its brightness.

The lowest, first level of the Sitting-in-Forgetfulness Sutra's Sitting and Forgetting Selflessness required him to double the orb's brightness before he could achieve mastery. The second level required twice as much energy.

By a rough estimate, completing the first level would take ten years, the second twenty, and the third thirty.

By the time Ye Qin completed the first, second, and third levels of the lowest stage of Sitting and Forgetting Selflessness, he would already be a frail old man of seventy or eighty, and then he would pass away.

And his lifespan was only eighty-one years.

That age was clearly carved into his Life Primordial Spirit Stele, and every passing day took one day away. Ye Qin didn't know why his lifespan was written on the stone stele, but after a year, he had come to believe in it completely.

The thought of dying at eighty-one filled Ye Qin with a helpless fear. Fear of death was instinctive, and knowing the day one would die only made that fear worse. It had nothing to do with how brave he was.

Now that he knew when he would die, Ye Qin had lost interest in the things Herbalist Wang spoke of: advancing to Herbal Gathering Artisan, making a name for himself in the Herb Gathering Hall, marrying, and having children. He couldn't summon the slightest enthusiasm for any of it.

Besides all that, Ye Qin's body had begun to change as well.

The first three levels of Sitting and Forgetting Selflessness required him to restrain every outward "breath" during cultivation, preventing any loss of vital energy.

The first level restrained outward "expressions," minimizing changes in his face.

The second level restrained inward "emotions," minimizing emotional fluctuations.

The third level restrained "mental strength," keeping him from doing anything that would exhaust his mind or tax his mental energy.

In this way, he could restrain all his vital energy and speed up his cultivation. If he couldn't, the extra losses would slow his progress to some extent.

Ye Qin had only just begun cultivating the first level, so he had to restrain his expressions.

Throughout the year, whether it was wind and rain, thunder and lightning, scorching sun or bitter winter, or other people's mockery, he had maintained almost the same expression: indifference. It was an expression he could keep year after year without much effort.

He had also gradually begun to speak less, since talking too much made it easy for his expression to change.

Now, even though his emotions still surged violently within him, and his mind was sharper and clearer than ever as he thought, his expression did not shift in the slightest.

Others didn't know the reason. To those who knew Ye Qin, he had undoubtedly grown cold and distant, difficult to approach.

During his three years as a Herb Gathering Apprentice, Ye Qin had always handled things calmly and never tried to bully anyone. He had a proud, youthful air about him. He was neither like Yang Yicheng, who was competitive and fond of throwing punches, like some street tough, nor like Feng Xiao, who quibbled over trivial matters and was far too calculating. Of the five fellow apprentices, Ye Qin was by far the easiest to get along with.

His two junior sisters, Qian Ruoxiu and Sun Ying, both liked to seek him out in private to chat and share interesting stories. They even brought him pastries they had made themselves to taste. Girls matured earlier than boys and were more thoughtful; they were already making plans for their futures.

But ever since he became an apprentice at the Herb Gathering Hall, they had only seen him now and then, when he returned to the county town each month. They had plenty they wanted to tell Ye Qin, but with each passing visit, he grew more indifferent. He showed no reaction to the things that delighted them, as if a stranger were telling him a stranger's story. His "heartlessness" broke theirs, and they came to resent him and stopped speaking to him.

What could Ye Qin do, besides feel a little bitter?

Even when bitterness filled his heart, it stayed there. His face could no longer show anything besides indifference.

He was like this even with his two junior sisters, so naturally his relationships with his senior brother, Yang Yicheng, and his junior brother, Feng Xiao, had deteriorated even further.

Once, Yang Yicheng had invited Ye Qin to join him and a group of Herb Gathering Hall apprentices for drinks in the street. Ye Qin didn't want to go somewhere so lively, so he declined. Yang Yicheng felt that Ye Qin had slighted him and wasn't acting like a friend, and he took it badly.

Feng Xiao thought Ye Qin was too aloof. Ye Qin never smiled when greeting him, so Feng Xiao took it to heart. The already shaky relationship between the fellow apprentices had grown even more distant over the year. When they happened to meet, they merely exchanged greetings and rarely had a chance to chat.

Herbalist Wang, on the other hand, didn't care about Ye Qin's changes in the slightest. He wore a cold, sour expression himself all day long, and Ye Qin's indifference suited him just fine. It was the attitude a Herb Gathering Apprentice ought to have. What good was all that enthusiasm? It couldn't fill your stomach. Doing the job properly was what mattered.

The one thing that comforted Ye Qin was Cheng Daniu.

Whenever Ye Qin returned to Zhuqi County, he went to see Da Niu at the Yang Family Smithy. Da Niu had become a blacksmith's apprentice, a sturdy, dark-skinned fourteen-year-old. He could now forge simple farm tools skillfully under Uncle Yang, and he had no trouble supporting himself. Da Niu was still the same as before; Ye Qin's indifferent expression hadn't driven a wedge between them. But their relationship was no longer like that of sworn brothers who had shared every hardship. Da Niu felt more awe than anything else toward him.

Ye Qin felt downcast. He had seen that same look of awe in the eyes of many county townsfolk: it was the reverence ordinary people felt toward those from the martial world. Still, as long as Da Niu was doing well at the Yang Family Smithy, Ye Qin could rest easy. He couldn't ask for much more now.

He knew that if things went on like this, no one could bear his growing indifference. From the moment he began cultivating the Sitting-in-Forgetfulness Sutra's Sitting and Forgetting Selflessness, he feared he was destined to walk this path alone.