After giving his instructions, Li Ling strolled along the shaded path beside the waterside pavilion in the East Inner Garden, stretching his limbs.
Before long, the view opened up ahead, revealing a lotus pond over a hundred meters long and wide. The morning breeze ruffled its surface into shimmering ripples.
It was not yet midsummer, so there was no lotus fragrance to smell. Even so, early that morning, carp of every color had surfaced beneath the flower-covered tower to breathe and forage, with servants assigned specifically to feed them.
A bamboo bridge led toward deeper water, an artificial lake connected to the lotus pond. A pavilion stood at its center, and across from it, near the opposite shore, rose a two-story tower whose pillars and walls were covered in climbing roses.
A little later, several servants brought what Li Ling had requested. He walked onto the bamboo bridge and made his way into the pavilion.
Stone stools stood on either side inside, with a round stone table about two feet across between them. Its natural markings resembled layer upon layer of flower petals.
A master craftsman had skillfully carved them into a decorative scene of crabapple blossoms in full bloom, sumptuous yet elegant.
Li Ling sat down and told the servants, "Just leave everything here."
Once the servants withdrew, Li Ling picked up an incense ingot and leisurely scraped it with an incense knife, collecting all the powder in a small earthenware jar before him.
Then he positioned the stamping tool inside a shallow incense burner shaped like a white pottery bowl, took a long-handled silver incense spoon, and spooned the powder evenly over it.
The stamping tool was a Great Evolution Incense Seal Diagram made from an openwork silver plate, delicate and light, with clearly defined lines. After he gently pressed it level with an ash press, a pattern two inches square appeared on the incense ash inside the burner.
It resembled the Great Evolution Heavenly Compass, square within and round without, imbued with the resonance of the Dao. It would ordinarily burn for about two quarter-hours-half an hour.
This was a specially designed standard, perfectly suited to cultivators entering meditative concentration and circulating their energy through a full heavenly circuit.
With these preparations complete, Li Ling took up the Fire-Sprout Branch, a fire-lighting tool made from an exotic overseas wood, and used its sparks to gently ignite the incense powder at one corner of the pattern.
As smoke curled upward, his thoughts settled, and his soul seemed to sink with them into meditation, gradually entering a profound, mysterious realm.
Amid the familiar scent of Spirit-Communing Incense, Li Ling felt his Spiritual Consciousness become clear and luminous, the support it received reaching unprecedented heights. Even his sensing range, which had long remained unchanged, seemed to expand a little, giving him an expansive sense of illuminating every direction.
Everything around him seemed bathed in an invisible radiance, projected into the sea of consciousness within his mind.
These things manifested in forms much like those seen with the naked eye, yet brighter and more finely detailed. He could even freely adjust his viewing angle, examining them from different directions and angles simultaneously.
Li Ling had never experienced observation so exquisitely detailed. He immediately felt that a mortal body truly imposed enormous limitations; what one saw and heard was not necessarily the truth of the world.
After quietly experiencing this for a while, he pushed his innate gift for identifying people by scent to its utmost, making full use of his ability to visualize scents and manifest their substance.
This was another perceptive faculty entirely distinct from Spiritual Consciousness, wondrous in its ability to reach into hidden depths and discern the smallest details.
Sure enough, before long, he sensed new gossamer strands emerging in an endless stream.
If the strands he had seen before were merely a trickle, then now they were practically a genuine little river, spreading as the incense ingot burned and soon numbering in the thousands upon thousands.
"It really does work like that!"
Li Ling was stunned. Then an irrepressible surge of joy flooded his heart.
Heaven has not forsaken me. What I have held in my heart all this time has finally found an answer!
"Heaven truly never seals off every road!"
"I knew it! It couldn't really be as that immortal master said-that my Spirit Root was deficient and I had no foundation for the immortal path. The great Dao of heaven and earth should never have been like that!"
How many years of hardship and resentment had he endured?
Now they were swept away in a single morning, and the feeling of parting the clouds to see the sun rose unbidden within him.
Li Ling began to ponder. Now it's confirmed: these gossamer strands really do come from incense. Normally they remain condensed, and burning releases them.
Others use incense to anchor their thoughts and nourish their souls, but fundamentally, they still rely on the aptitude of a complete Spirit Root to refine qi.
Without an innate ability like mine, though, they can't actively capture these strands. They can only receive them passively. That's the essential difference.
The ancients said that those who eat meat are brave and fierce, those who eat grain are wise and skillful, those who consume qi are divine and long-lived, and those who eat nothing are deathless spirits. What does that make me? An incense eater?
Incense eaters should ordinarily be gods and Buddhas. Apotheosis through incense offerings relies on the faith of living beings. But now I consume incense directly, without praying to gods or worshipping Buddhas, without relying on the masses' Prayer Power. That makes it even purer.
This really is... better to worship myself than the gods!
Several more questions immediately occurred to Li Ling. Incense can produce this substance... I might as well call it incense energy, or incense essence. How much is contained in different aromatic ingredients and incense products? How can I use it most efficiently?
I must get to the bottom of these questions. I don't have the aptitude of a complete Spirit Root. My entire future in cultivation depends on this.
Fortunately, this would not be difficult to verify. He only needed to conduct some comparative experiments.
Although the Spirit-Communing Incense formula Li Ling possessed was secret, craftsmen under his employ had already begun studying it, assisting with production, and even participating in experimental assembly-line manufacturing.
He was a master incense maker, not a drudge. There was no need for him to do everything himself.
To keep the formula secret, he only needed to control the crucial steps. Much of the basic work had to be left to assistants.
Before long, Li Ling took out another sample, an imitation his craftsmen had made as a trial, and examined it.
This incense was yellowish-brown. Even to the naked eye, it fell well short of the finished product he had personally refined, but testing had confirmed that it still helped with Soul Tempering.
The patriarch would collect this sort of product too, using it to reward his disciples or for other purposes.
Li Ling prepared this piece of incense in the same fashion, then closed his eyes and entered meditation in the pavilion again. Sure enough, many more gossamer strands appeared in the void, welling up like a flowing spring.
"Just as I thought. There are fewer than before, but still far more than it releases when unlit!"
Watching the strands drift like mayflies within the smoke and quickly gather into the thousands, Li Ling felt thoroughly reassured.
At this point, his earlier conjectures were fully confirmed.
Next, Li Ling decided to indulge in a little extravagance. He took a fresh incense ingot and lit the whole thing, quietly waiting for it to burn out so he could tally the total incense essence released.
The results showed that his own Spirit-Communing Incense released incense essence in quantities of a million or more, while that made by ordinary craftsmen was considerably inferior, yielding varying amounts in the hundreds of thousands.
Moreover, releasing it all at once created another problem: he could not assimilate it quickly enough.
He could visualize scents, manifest their substance, and actively capture the incense essence with his thoughts to assimilate it, making him extraordinarily efficient.
But if too much appeared at once, it was like swallowing dates whole. He could not attend to everything properly.
Perhaps that would change once his Divine Sense grew stronger. For now, however, he had to take it slowly. Releasing the essence through the normal burning method was the safest approach.
Li Ling continued his comparative experiments with various aromatic ingredients and found that they, too, contained differing quantities of incense essence.
However, the Incense Essence they normally manifested ranged from single digits to a hundred or so, and even lighting them to accelerate its release made no meaningful difference. They could fairly be called inert, utterly unsuitable as cultivation aids.
Various natural aromatics and raw ingredients used in incense making contained slightly more incense essence, but burning them directly only gathered thousands or tens of thousands of strands, far less than the blended Spirit-Communing Incense.
The properties of their incense essence also varied. Li Ling felt they ought to have different effects, but for the moment, nourishing the growth of his soul was a benefit they all shared.
Finally, on a sudden whim, he tried chewing and swallowing them directly. Unfortunately, this proved fruitless; they could not be taken like medicinal pills.
Li Ling clicked his tongue in wonder and made the most of his time refining the several pieces of incense used in his experiments. That day alone, he devoured millions of strands of Incense Essence, increasing the force of his thoughts by three grams or more. After his Soul Projection, the strength and speed of his Spirit Body finally began to show an almost imperceptible increase as well.
After nearly half a month of continued recuperation and exploration, the end of March arrived.
The Ninth Princess asked, "Husband, are you feeling better? Why not lie down a little longer today instead of getting up so early?"
Li Ling replied, "That won't do. I've rested so long my bones are nearly rusting. Besides, the flying sword has been successfully forged today. I have to see it myself."
The Ninth Princess could only get up and summon the maids to dress Li Ling, though she could not help sighing. "You really do perk up whenever these things come up."
Li Ling wore a smile, his face brimming with joy. It was not because he had secretly discovered a cultivation method, but because on this day, a flying sword truly belonging to him had finally been forged.
A flying sword was no ordinary object. It embodied his dream of immortal heroes.
When the scruffy Daoist had rescued Li Ling, he had taken away that unranked pouch artifact but left the flying sword behind.
That was because another person's sword was usually infused with blood essence and refined with Divine Sense. It would never handle as well as one's own weapon; at most, it could be melted down for materials.
The scruffy Daoist had no time for such things, but Li Ling did not mind the trouble. After all, the city had skilled craftsmen capable of forging unranked artifacts, especially the most common low-grade flying swords.
A flying sword cost at least a hundred taels of gold. He had always wanted one to play with, but his work had kept him too busy. Now that this windfall had dropped into his lap, he could finally seize the opportunity to indulge himself.
Li Ling told the Ninth Princess, "Your husband yearns for the immortals, yet cannot seek them out and pursue the Dao. Surely I can at least have an unranked flying sword forged to play with?"
"It only costs a few hundred taels of gold, after all. It's not even as expensive as a beautiful concubine or a fine horse."
The Ninth Princess said, "A beautiful concubine can entertain you, and a fine horse can be ridden. What use do you have for a flying sword?"
At this, Li Ling immediately grew interested and asked, "Speaking of which, does your ability to wield flying swords mostly involve the soul's thoughts or magical power? Is refining them meant to maintain a connection, so an enemy can't seize them in actual combat?"
The Ninth Princess replied, "Exactly. Infusing them with blood essence or refining them with Divine Sense surrounds them with your own vital aura, so ordinary people cannot move them with Divine Sense. Otherwise, when a low-level cultivator encountered a high-level one, their weapon would be snatched away on sight, leaving them helpless. Even high-level cultivators would have to stay constantly vigilant. Wouldn't that become a fatal weakness?"
Li Ling said, "I see. Even though I lack the aptitude of a complete Spirit Root, that shouldn't stop me from refining an artifact and binding it to myself, should it?"
The Ninth Princess said, "Refining artifacts mostly involves your vital aura. The communication talisman the patriarch gave you earlier, so you could contact him in an emergency, works on the same principle. It won't be a problem."
Li Ling said, "Then I can rest easy."
As they chatted, the two washed and ate, then went out with a retinue of servants and maids, proceeding in a bustling escort toward the sword forge at the home of Master Hong, a renowned craftsman in the eastern part of the city.
Upon reaching their destination, Li Ling jumped down from the carriage. Before him stood a platform several zhang high, like a mountain of flame.
It had actually been made by hollowing out a single enormous boulder. Shaped like a furnace cauldron, it had channels on either side where molten iron poured down in ceaseless, surging waterfalls.
It already had the makings of a small steelworks and could be considered advanced among workshops dependent on manual labor. Presumably, its furnace design, fuel, and alloy formulas were genuine closely guarded secrets, while the manpower and resources it consumed were beyond anything an ordinary craftsman could imagine.
Clang, clang, clang, clang!
The endless sound of hammering rang out all around them. The forge's smiths were working at their respective stations, already displaying the beginnings of assembly-line production.
As Shopkeeper Huo had said, every craft and trade in this world ultimately served immortal masters once it reached its highest level. With help from certain supernatural powers, they possessed techniques and ideas that surpassed those of ancient societies.
Li Ling noticed them repeatedly hammering blade blanks, all made of hundred-forged steel. This was a precious substance whose quality rivaled specialty steels, its value falling between mundane goods and spiritual materials. It was also commonly used for unranked artifact weapons.
Before an anvil at the very back sat a hale old man with white hair and beard, smoking a pipe as he watched two craftsmen who looked like his disciples hammer a sword blank. Their rhythmic blows rose and fell in alternation, the ringing clangs seemingly drowning out every other sound.
This old man was Master Hong, the foremost swordsmith of the Hong family workshop.
A disciple stepped forward to alert him. Only then did Master Hong notice them. He rose with his pipe in hand and came forward to pay his respects. "Greetings, Prince Consort Li, Ninth Princess. I did not know you were coming and failed to welcome you from afar. Please forgive me."
Li Ling extended a hand as if to help him up. "There's no need for such ceremony, Master Hong. We came unannounced. Sorry for the trouble."
Master Hong chuckled. "Has Prince Consort Li come to collect his flying sword?"
Li Ling replied, "Yes. I heard that the flying sword I commissioned from you has been completed."
Master Hong said, "To tell you the truth, my workshop already had a sword blank nearing completion, refined over and over through a thousand layers. When the Prince Consort placed the order a while ago, it was just right for forging this sword. Were refined gold not a mundane material, lacking the wondrous properties of spiritual materials, it would have been good enough to qualify as a ranked artifact. Your arrival is perfectly timed. Once a drop of your blood essence is fused into the blade, it can come out of the furnace."
Forging a flying sword was not merely time-consuming and laborious; it also required a sufficiently skilled craftsman to be available. Once the forging was complete, the owner's blood essence had to be fused into it as it left the furnace, filling the blade with their vital aura and laying the foundation for later refinement.
Li Ling had come in person to witness the flying sword leave the furnace precisely so he could place his own mark upon it.
As for the flying sword he had previously picked up, it had naturally been melted down completely, its refined gold extracted to cover the forging fee.
But that alone was nowhere near enough. Li Ling had spent another hundred and fifty taels of gold on materials and called in several favors before he could persuade Master Hong, the finest craftsman in the city, to do the work himself.