Ye Qin was almost stunned.
He had never dreamed that he would find several little Dew Grass plants in the gray, lifeless Purple Mansion, growing between the gray rocks of the Floating Island.
He drifted over and caught the rich fragrance. A flicker of delight stirred in his heart. The scent was even stronger than the one he had smelled a year ago. Just breathing it in invigorated him immensely.
He had been searching for little Dew Grass for ages. He never expected to find several plants here.
He racked his brains, trying to remember. Back when he had eaten a Gray Egg and his stomach had hurt so badly he had nearly passed out, he had searched through his large herb basket for an antidote and grabbed a medicinal plant. But he couldn't remember whether he had eaten it. The next day, when he searched through the basket again, the little Dew Grass had vanished. That missing plant had become a thorn in his side ever since. Now, unexpectedly, he had found five of them here.
Ye Qin drifted above the five little Dew Grass plants for a long while. He even landed on a leaf, confirming that they weren't illusions but were real.
He couldn't help staring blankly.
The Purple Mansion Floating Island was in the sea of consciousness within his Mud Pill acupoint. There was no way several little Dew Grass plants could have appeared here for no reason. They had to be connected to the little Dew Grass he had picked from the cliff back then.
He had several questions.
First, how had the little Dew Grass gotten onto the Floating Island?
Second, how had one little Dew Grass plant become five?
Third, what was the little Dew Grass used for?
If he could figure out these three things, all his questions should answer themselves.
The mountain peak.
Two days later, Ye Qin's divine sense stirred, and five little Dew Grass plants appeared out of thin air in his hand. His divine sense stirred again, and they vanished. He couldn't help bursting into laughter. It had taken him a full two days of pondering and repeated experiments to figure out what was going on.
It turned out that the Purple Mansion Floating Island in his sea of consciousness was connected to the world he lived in. As long as he moved something with his divine sense, the little Dew Grass on the island could easily appear in his hand. To move them back to the island, he simply did the same thing, using his divine sense.
The mystery of how the little Dew Grass had appeared on his Floating Island was solved. After he had eaten the eagle egg and suffered stomach cramps, he must have unconsciously drawn the little Dew Grass into the island, where it had landed in a crack between the gray rocks.
Suddenly thinking of something, Ye Qin hurriedly grabbed his large herb basket and tried moving some of the ordinary herbs inside onto the Floating Island. If it worked, he wouldn't have to carry the heavy basket anymore. He could just use the island to store his herbs and save a great deal of strength.
But after trying every ordinary herb in the basket, he found that none of them could be moved into the Floating Island.
Ye Qin couldn't help feeling a little disappointed. His plan to save his strength wouldn't work. It seemed only little Dew Grass had the special ability to be moved onto the island.
As for the second question—why one little Dew Grass plant had become five—he still had no clue.
Ye Qin began to consider the third question: what exactly was this little Dew Grass? What was it used for? How could it have such a unique effect?
At the Herb Gathering Hall, Ye Qin had learned the simplest and most common way to test the medicinal properties of an unknown herb.
If he wanted to know what the little Dew Grass was and what it could be used for, the simplest way was to eat a little and taste it. That was how people had identified the medicinal properties of every herb in the world.
Many herbs could be eaten directly, though their effects weren't very strong. When made into medicine or pills, their effects were usually much more noticeable.
Ye Qin took out one of the little Dew Grass plants. Smelling its faint herbal fragrance, he decided to use the Herb Gathering Hall's "Medicine Testing Method" to sample its medicinal properties. To be safe, he prepared dozens of different antidotes and detoxifying herbs, along with a foul-smelling herb that could cause violent vomiting, in case he was poisoned.
Once everything was ready, Ye Qin first touched his tongue to the little Dew Grass.
A quarter of an hour later, there were no adverse effects.
He put one of its leaves in his mouth and held it there without moving.
A quarter of an hour later, there were still no adverse effects.
Usually, if an herb was poisonous, this gradual "Medicine Testing Method" would make the tip of the tongue go numb, bitter, or painful. But since the body absorbed only a tiny amount of poison, it would cause suffering without killing the person immediately. (This method will definitely poison you. Readers, do not try it!)
Ye Qin saw that after two attempts his tongue still felt fine. Instead, a fresh herbal fragrance lingered in his mouth. He was fairly certain the little plant wasn't very poisonous. It was probably a mild medicinal herb, or perhaps an ordinary one.
Ye Qin bit into the leaf again, chewed it up, and swallowed it bit by bit. To his surprise, after the little Dew Grass went down, cool streams of energy arose in his belly and coursed through his meridians, crashing along them. When they passed through his Mud Pill, they quickly vanished.
He knew this feeling all too well.
It was what happened every day when he practiced cultivation.
Eating this herb had much the same effect as cultivating.
Before long, Ye Qin had eaten the entire plant. The streams of energy grew fierce, crashing through his meridians until they ached faintly, and surged through his body at full force. Then he began meditating, sending his divine sense into his Purple Mansion Floating Island.
What he saw on the island startled him.
Although Ye Qin had been mentally prepared, he still couldn't contain his delight.
Dozens of inch-long strands of White Glow had appeared in the air above the entire island, drifting to and fro. He widened his eyes and quickly counted them. There were more than seventy. In other words, that inconspicuous little Dew Grass had transformed into seventy strands of White Glow. Every strand was a supplement for him.
The medicinal effect of eating one little Dew Grass raw was roughly equivalent to ten days of cultivating the Sitting and Forgetting Selflessness technique from the Sitting-in-Forgetfulness Sutra.
Ye Qin could hardly contain his delight. He had finally discovered a way to rapidly increase his cultivation speed.
Under normal circumstances, he would have to cultivate painstakingly for at least ten years to complete the first level of the Sitting and Forgetting Selflessness technique. The second would take twenty years, and the third forty. Even if he cultivated until he died, he would only make it to the late third level.
But things were different now.
If he could get his hands on plenty of little Dew Grass and eat one a day, he could increase his cultivation speed more than tenfold. He would finish the first level in a year, moving so fast he'd practically be flying!
"No wonder people in the martial world like eating inner-strength pills made with herbs that have accumulated decades, or even centuries, of medicinal power, to strengthen their internal energy. They really do work wonders."
Now that Ye Qin understood the effects of the little Dew Grass, he didn't rush to eat the remaining four plants or absorb the White Glow.
Instead, he drifted around the four little Dew Grass plants on the island, circling them as he tried to figure out how to cultivate more. The four plants would only last him four days at most. He had to find a way to get more.
Ye Qin drifted there, thinking and thinking until he nearly racked his brains raw. He didn't believe that many of these rare little plants would be growing on the mountain's cliff face, waiting for him to pick them. Finding another two or three would already be a blessing from the heavens.
With so few of them, he couldn't solve the problem of running out. And if he didn't have enough little Dew Grass, in a few days his cultivation would be painfully slow again. It wouldn't help him nearly as much as he had imagined.
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