True Understanding

"Chief, how many days has it been? Could something have gone wrong?"

In the early morning, on the clearing at the entrance to Stone Village, many days had passed since Di Yi entered the cauldron. Their initial shock had given way to numbness, and now to worry.

There was no helping it. Although the old chief had said this was Divine Fire Refining the Heavenly Body, there seemed to be considerable discrepancies.

According to the pill formula passed down by their ancestors, this should have been accomplished in one stroke, a result as natural as water flowing into a completed channel. It should not have taken much time.

"Extraordinary people undergo extraordinary things. Divine Fire Refining the Heavenly Body was only ever a conjecture from theory and legend. Who can truly say how it would manifest?" The old chief remained quite composed. He felt that the longer the process lasted, the greater and better the result would be.

After all, the claim that it would happen naturally was only a conjecture. What would truly happen remained unknown.

Besides, in his experience and understanding, the better the outcome, the more time and effort it required. Only after settling and maturation could it become flawless and complete.

"Clang!" "Clang!" ...

Suddenly, the great black cauldron, silent for many days, stirred. It seemed to have been struck by something, actually giving off sounds like a great bell tolling.

The mountains, rivers, sun, and moon on the great black cauldron could be seen glowing. Though each was only the size of a grain of rice, their sheer numbers made up for it.

They gathered in one place, their light dazzling and brilliant, then slipped through the gap beneath the cauldron's lid along with the divine radiance, more than half of which had already been consumed. The accompanying hazy mist was swallowed with them.

At that moment, as the light of the mountains, rivers, sun, and moon entered the cauldron, the divine radiance generated by Di Yi's flesh and blood suddenly grew restless. It frantically met the countless scattered points of light, drawing in the hazy mist that accompanied them.

This process continued for a long time, until the divine radiance generated by his flesh and blood began growing at a speed visible to the naked eye. His entire body shone, as though a deity from ancient legend had descended into the mortal world.

"This is..." Di Yi sensed something very special. It was thought, consciousness, an infinitely vast spiritual world. Originally intangible, it now seemed to be condensing into something real.

After an unknown stretch of time, the area between his brows and his forehead suddenly blazed with light. Vital essence surged, and his blood and qi swelled like a sea. Countless sounds of breaking waves rang out, as though a real ocean had manifested inside the cauldron.

"Rumble..."

As those waves multiplied, Di Yi distinctly heard an earth-shaking roar inside his skull. The commotion was tremendous, as though something was about to take shape, releasing crash after crash.

Then, in a single instant, all manner of radiance flared fiercely. Ten thousand waves of divine radiance rose, towering breakers surged skyward, and the noise was deafening!

"An ocean of mighty potential... is this my Sea of Potential?" As violent vital essence erupted between his brows and his forehead, a fragment of memory opened, and Di Yi instantly understood what it was.

This was a spiritual world that bore "magnitude."

It was the sea of potential, also called the sea of consciousness or the boundless sea. It embodied knowledge and experience, the tangible manifestation of the truth of all perception.

Its size, form, and magnitude determined the quality and quantity of a person's communion with the outside world and nature.

Often, the naked eye could not see nature's truth, and thus could neither learn nor comprehend that truth.

If one cultivated blindly, knowing only the form and not its meaning, the vast heavens and earth would turn upon them. They would be swallowed by things they could not understand, destroyed in an instant like a river bursting its banks.

"The flesh has divinity, and consciousness has divinity too... my strength has grown considerably, and even some of my hidden ailments seem to have faded!" Di Yi was astonished. This truly was an unexpected gain. He had never imagined it would trigger something like this, bringing him such great benefits.

After he adjusted to the changes in himself, a tingling sensation spread throughout his body. Amid the terrifying waves of divine radiance and the roar of a tsunami, all manner of runes flickered above his brows, streaming with color in a brilliant display.

"Moo!"

The figure of Barbarian Bull appeared there and bellowed, following a particular pathway for activating divine radiance.

Waves of sound rolled out. It seemed to be his innate divine skill, a rare precious technique that Di Yi had learned. "Roar!"

Another roar immediately followed. This was Yayu, displaying tremendous divine might. It likewise seemed to be his innate divine skill, a powerful precious technique that Di Yi comprehended and learned.

"Is this... 'stealing and drawing forth'?" Di Yi recalled the old chief of Stone Village's words, but soon rejected the idea.

He could see it clearly. This was not stealing the divinity within the creatures' blood and the essence of their five organs. Instead, it began with manifestations of their living forms, deducing and simulating the "truth" of those precious techniques.

"Analyzing from the point of greatest 'truth'... true understanding?" Di Yi pondered. He had a feeling that this was an ability of his own, an instinct originating from his sea of potential.

As time passed, those waves and that tsunami projected into the great cauldron as clearly as a painting. They were no longer limited to reaching a true understanding of the creatures' blood and the essence of their five organs. They seemed intent on going further, gaining a true understanding of the great black cauldron itself.

"Clang!"

The great cauldron shuddered. Its mountains, rivers, sun, moon, birds, beasts, insects, and fish grew lifelike. Lightning even appeared inside it, and tremendous sounds reverberated within, deafening to the ears.

It was as though ten million beasts were stampeding, or a thousand meteors were striking the earth.

Meanwhile, the scene outside the great cauldron was equally terrifying.

The faint mist, the light of divine radiance drawn down and bound from the heavens, and the burning wisps of mist all converged at that moment, throwing the entire clearing into a seething tumult.

"Crack!"

Just then, a startling thunderclap suddenly exploded across the clear sky. Dark clouds gathered densely, compressed to the extreme, and pressed down over the open space at Stone Village's entrance.

Only moments later, torrential rain poured down amid peal after peal of thunder.

"This... is unheard of!" The sight stunned the people of Stone Village. When had they ever seen rain confined to one particular place? And despite the astonishing downpour, not a single puddle formed on the ground.

"Could we have been wrong from the start? Is this not Divine Fire Refining the Heavenly Body?" The old chief's eyes were bewildered as well. This sudden scene matched nothing he knew; the pill formula contained no record of it.

Regardless, one thing was certain: this rain was abnormal.

Vibrant green could be seen flowing within the rainwater, carrying exuberant vitality. Not only did it fail to extinguish the burning flames, it made them burn with even greater force.

Moreover, when the rainwater fell onto the cauldron's outer walls, the designs there absorbed it. Streaks of brilliant green flowed through them, giving rise to dazzling light that slipped through the gap beneath the lid.

"Oh, Chief, our Sacrificial Spirit, Willow Deity, is stirring!" Just then, someone noticed another change. A hazy halo rose from where Broken Willow stood, actually drawing in the rainwater that had gone unused.

"This rainwater... don't just stand there!" The old chief reacted quickly, calling on the villagers to follow suit and use containers to collect the unused rainwater.

Unfortunately, the rainwater vanished the instant it entered their containers. It seemed that mundane objects could not hold it. They tried for a long time, but all their efforts ultimately came to nothing.

"Chief, this..." The villagers looked helplessly at their empty vessels. That precious rain clearly had an extraordinary origin. What a pity that they could not obtain any.

"Water without bounds, untouched by mortal dust... forget it. We cannot force this." The old chief sighed with regret. He had hoped to bask in Di Yi's good fortune and collect some, just as their Sacrificial Spirit, Willow Deity, had done. It seemed they lacked that blessing.

Still, they had not gained absolutely nothing. At least their new Sacrificial Spirit had stirred. Perhaps before long, Broken Willow, whom their former Sacrificial Spirit had called Willow Deity, would regain the might he had possessed before being struck by lightning.