True Origin Scripture

Seeing his uncle approach, Xu Qingtong hurriedly opened the door a crack and called softly, "Uncle, come here, quick."

Chen Jialiang could not help chuckling at his nephew's furtive manner. "You little rascal, acting so mysterious. What is it this time?" As he spoke, he stepped into Xu Qingtong's room.

The moment he entered, Chen Jialiang smelled a strange odor. Looking at Xu Qingtong, he saw a layer of black, greasy filth covering his face and body. The smell was coming from him. He laughed and said, "Qingtong, don't tell me you fell into the privy!"

Looking slightly embarrassed, Xu Qingtong hastily explained, "Uncle, I broke through to the next cultivation realm. This filth is impurities from my body, expelled naturally after my advancement. I want to take a bath and change into clean clothes."

Hearing that his nephew had made a breakthrough, Chen Jialiang was overjoyed. "Good, good! Wait here. I'll fetch you some water right away," he said eagerly.

After bathing and changing, Xu Qingtong sat at the dining table and told his uncle's family about his cultivation.

Then he turned to Chen Ruoling and said, "Cousin, please don't tell outsiders that I'm practicing immortal arts. We don't want to invite trouble." Chen Jialiang thought it over, agreed that his nephew had a point, and gave his daughter a few words of warning as well.

After lunch, Xu Qingtong did not rush to meditate and cultivate. Instead, he sat cross-legged on his bed, closed his eyes, and began pondering.

I have two primordial spirits. If one cultivates while the other sits idle, isn't that a waste of time? Since I can divide my attention, could one primordial spirit oversee cultivation while the other learns spells or studies the jade slips Lu Mo left behind?

Having made up his mind, Xu Qingtong wasted no more time. He took the jade slip containing the Cultivation Basics Guide out of his Storage Bag.

He did not take out any spirit stones. Lu Mo had left him only forty-five. He had given one to his cousin and used seven for cultivation, leaving thirty-seven. Of those remaining, three were metal-attributed stones, which he could not use.

Breaking through to the first level took seven Spirit Stones. If I want to reach the second level, these might not even be enough. I'd better save them for a critical moment.

Xu Qingtong pressed the jade slip to his forehead and sent his divine sense into it, carefully reading through the formulas for the Object Manipulation Technique. Once he had memorized them, he put the slip away. Sitting cross-legged and forming hand seals, he assigned each primordial spirit its task and began cultivating.

Before long, Xu Qingtong discovered that his ideal was plump with promise, but reality was all skin and bones. Trying to meditate and regulate his breathing while practicing spell formulas was almost impossible.

Meditative cultivation drew spiritual qi into the body, refined it into magic power, and stored it in the dantian. Practicing spells, however, guided the body's magic power through fixed meridians before releasing it with special hand gestures. The two processes frequently "collided."

Seeing his plan fall through, Xu Qingtong felt a little disappointed. But he soon steeled his resolve again. If he could not practice spells, he could still study the jade slips. Surely a living man would not let himself die from holding in his urine! He took out the Cultivation Basics Guide again and tried studying it while cultivating.

This time, he finally succeeded. Although he was somewhat awkward at first, Xu Qingtong grew increasingly proficient as time passed. His ability to divide his attention had finally come into its own.

Before he knew it, Xu Qingtong had finished reading the entire jade slip containing the Cultivation Basics Guide, gaining a completely new understanding of cultivation fundamentals.

He had also grasped the methods for practicing several basic spells. All that remained was to find some free time and put them through their paces in earnest. After a full day and night of cultivation, his newly attained First Qi Refining Layer gradually stabilized.

Xu Qingtong was quite pleased with his ability to divide his attention. Doing two things at once could greatly improve his cultivation efficiency. Still, he felt a little regretful that he could not practice spells at the same time.

Xu Qingtong took a jade slip out of his Storage Bag. Unlike the others, this one was black. He had chosen it precisely because it stood out, wanting to see what made it different.

Xu Qingtong extended his divine sense toward the black jade slip, only to discover that he could not enter it. An invisible wall seemed to block his divine sense.

With no other option, Xu Qingtong mobilized his other primordial spirit, sending both charging toward the invisible wall together. The result was the same: his divine sense remained blocked outside the jade slip.

Unwilling to accept defeat, he gathered all his mental focus and stubbornly rammed into that wall once more.

With a boom, Xu Qingtong's divine sense burst into the jade slip. The text he had imagined did not appear. Instead, he felt as though he had entered a space surrounded by gray haze, with nothing else in sight.

"Welcome to this humble Daoist's divine sense jade slip. Your arrival here means that fate has brought us together." A voice sounded beside Xu Qingtong's ear.

Xu Qingtong looked around but saw no one, leaving him puzzled. "Senior, where is this place? Where are you?"

The voice did not answer Xu Qingtong's questions, merely continuing on its own. "I am Dong Xuanzi. Before Spirit Mound Mountain, I observed Jianmu for more than three hundred years and at last attained enlightenment. I obtained a scripture, the True Origin Scripture, and left it to later generations. Only one bound to me by fate may receive it."

Hearing this, Xu Qingtong dared not be careless. He hurriedly gathered his thoughts and listened closely to the Daoist's explanation. "Man possesses a primordial spirit: empty and still, tranquil and serene, abiding in solitude without striving. The spirit governs life. Through qi, the spirit draws sustenance; as qi is drawn in, the spirit endures..."

Nearly an hour passed before the Daoist named Dong Xuanzi finally finished. At the end, he added, "Whoever receives my Dao must practice it diligently. Should you one day achieve great mastery, your spirit may roam the Great Void and range freely throughout the cosmos. Remember: the teachings must not reach six ears! Do not lightly pass my Dao on to others. If fate binds us, we shall meet again someday!" With that, he fell silent.

Xu Qingtong felt the world spin around him, and his divine sense suddenly returned to his body. When he looked down at his hand, the jade slip was nowhere to be found!

He half closed his eyes and began reflecting on what had just happened. He had found the black jade slip in Lu Mo's Storage Bag. After forcing his divine sense inside, he had obtained the True Origin Scripture, and then the slip had vanished.

Clearly, Lu Mo had never read this jade slip. Otherwise, Xu Qingtong would never have had this chance. Moreover, Dong Xuanzi had said that the teachings must not reach six ears! It seemed that he alone knew the True Origin Scripture, and he must never casually reveal it to anyone else.

As Xu Qingtong recalled the contents of the True Origin Scripture, Dong Xuanzi's voice sounded in his mind. Yet the voice recited only the cultivation method for the scripture's first level, then stopped.

Xu Qingtong grew anxious. Could I have forgotten everything that came after? That shouldn't be possible. He was still very confident in his memory.

He tried recalling it again, and Dong Xuanzi's voice sounded once more, still reciting only the first level. Xu Qingtong was astonished, but he could not work out the reason.

Forget it. Since I've obtained this immortal art, I'll cultivate it first and worry about the rest later. With that thought, Xu Qingtong cast aside his distractions and began studying the True Origin Scripture in earnest.

Only as he studied it did Xu Qingtong realize how extraordinary the True Origin Scripture was. Unlike the Five Elixirs Origin Refinement Art, it was a cultivation method for refining the soul.

According to Dong Xuanzi, a person's divine sense was not intangible. Like all things in the world, it possessed form. Yet although it had form, that form was not fixed. In other words, divine sense was like water: it became square in a square vessel and round in a round one. Cold turned it to ice; heat turned it to vapor. With the proper method of control, divine sense could undergo countless transformations. It was truly wondrous beyond compare.