Sometimes, the difference between decay and immortality came down to two simple words: patience.
With that thought, Zhang Tie's expression grew resolute. Slowly, very slowly, he drew back his hand. Once he had pulled it all the way back, a victorious smile appeared on his face. He took a deep breath, glanced at the Little Tree, then fixed his mind on the Mysterious Archway and left Castle of Black Iron...
Zhang Tie had no idea that the small choice he had made that day about patience had taken his state of mind one step closer to maturity.
After returning to his shabby little room, Zhang Tie stood there for a moment before sitting on the bed and beginning to cultivate Abacus Mental Calculation through visualization. When he finished, he took the crystal he had left charging in the Crystal Sand on the windowsill and began polishing his Divine Palace Bright Point. Just before his mental strength ran out, he practiced the visualization exercises from Abacus Mental Calculation once more. Then he checked the clock. There was still more than an hour to go. Resisting the urge to return to Castle of Black Iron, he lay down and fell asleep.
He slept until the middle of the night, when the need to urinate woke him from his dreamless slumber.
By the faint moonlight coming through the window, Zhang Tie checked the alarm clock beside his bed and saw that it was nearly four in the morning. More than two hours had passed since the first Flawless Fruit had fully ripened.
Barefoot and wearing nothing but his underwear, Zhang Tie sprang out of bed. He swiftly fixed his mind on the Mysterious Archway and vanished from the room...
Several hours later, Zhang Tie was back in Castle of Black Iron. His first move wasn't to rush over and pick the fruit. Instead, he unzipped his shorts, pulled out his equipment, and, less than ten meters from the Little Tree, turned his back to it and relieved himself. After a few shuddering, blissful chills, the pressure in his bladder finally eased, and Zhang Tie felt wonderful. He pulled up his shorts and headed for the tree. He was still four or five meters away when he caught a whiff of a fragrance that instantly made him feel invigorated. It was quite unusual, with a hint of ripe fruit, a touch of sandalwood, and a mysterious note he couldn't quite describe. It smelled wonderful. Zhang Tie breathed it in deeply several times, intoxicated, then fixed his gaze on the ripe Flawless Fruit that was giving off the scent.
Compared to a few hours earlier, the Flawless Fruit had changed again. It was still about the size of an egg, and its color was still a ripe, dark red, but the whole fruit now seemed to gleam. Its smooth surface had turned faintly translucent, and inside it, like the shifting colors in pietersite, a dusky golden sheen seemed to flow.
"Gulp..." Zhang Tie couldn't help swallowing. Then his feet carried him forward of their own accord, and he reached out to touch the ripe Flawless Fruit.
--The Flawless Fruit has ripened. To use it, pick and eat it directly. Note: The fruit cannot be taken out of Castle of Black Iron. Twelve hours after being picked, its energy and vital essence will gradually dissipate.
A translucent dialogue box appeared automatically, reminding Zhang Tie what he needed to know.
As the dialogue box slowly vanished, Zhang Tie's chest rose and fell. He took two deep breaths, his gaze growing firm, then plucked the Flawless Fruit from the tree without hesitation, as if picking a peach. He held it to his nose and smelled it again, brought it close for a better look, then tipped back his head, opened wide, and swallowed it in one bite.
The moment Zhang Tie's teeth broke through the unusual fruit, his mouth filled with rich, sweet juice. It was so delicious that every pore on his body seemed to open in pleasure.
With a slurp, Zhang Tie gulped down the first mouthful of juice, and the fruit was already less than half its original size. He took another bite and finished it in no time. In texture, the Flawless Fruit was much like a ripe tomato, but Zhang Tie swore he had never tasted a fruit so delicious in his entire life.
As soon as he had finished, Zhang Tie ran his tongue over his lips to lick up the juice and savored the taste, wondering how much the fruit might change him. But before he could finish, the Flawless Fruit's power had already spread through his chest and abdomen.
A comforting, warming heat rose inside Zhang Tie's chest and abdomen, so pleasant it made him want to moan. It turned into a gentle, rolling wave of heat that began to circle through him. It hadn't made two full turns before, like a python that had suddenly spotted its prey, it wheeled around and lunged straight for Zhang Tie's Divine Palace Bright Point. Realizing that the heat was targeting his Divine Palace Bright Point, Zhang Tie's face changed. He sat cross-legged on the ground and, guided by his qi sense, entered a state of cultivation in an instant...
At that moment, an astonishing transformation was taking place at the Divine Palace Bright Point in Zhang Tie's navel, one he could never have imagined. In his perception, the enormous, relentless wave of heat was like a legendary fire dragon burrowing into its own lair, circling around his Divine Palace Bright Point. His Divine Palace Bright Point seemed like a copper-mouthed opening, endlessly devouring the wisps of warm energy given off by the fire dragon. Those wisps slowly widened the "entrance," continually reshaping it so that the dragon's massive body could squeeze inside. As the opening grew larger, it could devour more energy, and the light within it grew brighter. The fire dragon circling the opening spun faster and faster.
More than ten minutes later, with a "boom," the opening, which had glowed green, expanded all at once. Its green light turned blue, but even then, the opening was still tiny compared to the fire dragon. The relentless dragon continued circling it, spitting warm energy into the lair. After another ten minutes or so, the blue light at the opening grew brighter and stronger. Then, with another "boom," the opening widened again, and the blue light turned purple. The fire dragon spun even faster. The endless heat rising from Zhang Tie's chest and abdomen kept transforming into waves that fueled its ferocity, and those waves poured one after another into the now larger, brighter opening. Half an hour later, the purple-lit opening had grown so large that it seemed able to hold the fire dragon's body. The dragon immediately plunged its entire length inside without hesitation...
"Boom!" With another mighty crash, the long fire dragon vanished completely into the opening. After blazing brightly, the purple light shattered into fragments and scattered in every direction. Where the dragon's lair and the opening had disappeared, a red spark appeared. It began to burn, eventually becoming a blazing fire that stubbornly burned in the darkness, sending its light and heat into the cold gloom around it.
When Zhang Tie clearly "saw" the flame burning at his Divine Palace Bright Point, he began to cry. Tears streamed down his face, and then he threw his head back and laughed like a madman. Even he hadn't expected the Thought Fire at his Divine Palace Bright Point to ignite today, in this way. The effect of a single Flawless Fruit was astonishing—it had easily broken through the green, blue, and purple barriers to igniting a Divine Palace Bright Point, turning him in one fell swoop from an ordinary Battle Worker into a first-level Battle Soldier.
Could the purpose of the Flawless Fruit be to ignite Bright Points? The question flashed through Zhang Tie's mind and disappeared. He stood up and took in the feeling of having his first Bright Point ignited.
The feeling was strange and powerful. His body seemed hollow inside, as if his organs, bones, and muscles had all disappeared, leaving him an empty sack of skin. Then it was as if wind rose from his Divine Palace Bright Point and blew in every direction through his body. It was a spring breeze, warm and gentle, bringing life wherever it touched. Zhang Tie had heard his older brother explain that every time a Bright Point was ignited, the body went through a process of change and improvement. It could feel very different: sometimes pleasant, sometimes painful, sometimes strange in all sorts of ways. The pleasure some people felt after igniting a Bright Point could be more intense and overwhelming than the climax of sex, while the pain from others could rival childbirth. It truly made you understand what it meant to break out of a cocoon and become a butterfly.
The warm breeze from his Divine Palace blew for seven or eight minutes before stopping. Then Zhang Tie's whole body crackled and popped for more than a minute before falling silent. This was the process known as "bone adjustment," something everyone experienced when their first Divine Palace Bright Point was ignited. Zhang Tie thoroughly enjoyed it. The whole process felt as if an unseen hand of creation were at work. With a few casual adjustments, Zhang Tie felt his bones becoming like a brand-new machine, tuned and fine-tuned by an expert. Once it was over, his bones seemed to have settled into a state of harmony he had never felt before. He was filled with strength and an unprecedented sense of coordination, so elated that he wanted to shout something out loud.
Only then, in this era, could someone truly be said to have begun the path of cultivation.
"Teacher Daina, I'm here! I ignited my Divine Palace Bright Point! Ah..."
Zhang Tie threw his head back and shouted!