After paying his respects to his father, Lin Shisan sorted through the things in his satchel.
Since it was still early, he sat on the bed and began cultivating diligently.
Lin Shisan was at First Body Tempering.
Even that was only the result of his father sparing no expense, pouring every cultivation resource he had into him.
In fact, he had been stuck at First Body Tempering for five full years.
No matter how hard he cultivated, he could not advance another inch.
Even so, Lin Shisan had never given up.
Whenever he had time each day, he cultivated with utmost diligence.
As Lin Qinghan had put it, cultivation was like building a great house.
Only with a solid foundation could one's cultivation stand firm.
Given time and the right opportunities, one would break through like a blade splitting bamboo and soar straight into the clouds.
After darkness, light was sure to come.
Lin Shisan knew these were words his father had used to comfort him.
Yet for over a decade, he had quietly followed that advice.
Nothing could shake his routine, and he never slacked off.
Even though his cultivation had not advanced an inch, he had never thought of giving up.
His resolve was firm, and his heart in pursuit of the Dao had never wavered.
Four hours later, Lin Shisan had completed two greater celestial circuits, and the sky had turned dark.
After a quick wash, he flopped onto the bed and drifted off to sleep.
He slept until dawn.
By the time he hurried over that morning, breakfast was already over.
He reported to the Servant Hall and collected his tools, then returned to his room to get everything in order before heading straight to the Pill Room.
The Pill Room was not far from Lin Shisan's quarters.
It took only fifteen minutes for him to run there.
Only a few people were there. Quite a while later, Steward Chen Yang finally ambled over.
"Lin Shisan, come here. Be humble and learn from your senior brothers how to clean a pill furnace."
Seeing that Lin Shisan had arrived early, Chen Yang nodded in satisfaction.
At his call, Lin Shisan hurried over.
After bowing deeply and respectfully to Chen Yang, he went straight to a pill furnace to learn.
The pill furnace was enormous, almost twice his height.
Pitch-black all over, it looked like a giant green gourd.
Its surface was engraved with the Earlier Heaven Eight Trigrams, images of divine beasts, and immortals soaring through the heavens.
This was Lin Shisan's first time seeing a pill furnace, and his heart nearly leaped out of his chest with excitement.
He was utterly awestruck.
After watching for a while, Lin Shisan gained some understanding of how to clean a pill furnace.
Then he began trying to clean the Pill Furnace himself.
There were exactly twelve pill furnaces in the Pill Room.
Including Lin Shisan, there were only six servant disciples.
Naturally, being new did not mean Lin Shisan would get one less furnace to clean.
Once the work was assigned, each person was responsible for cleaning exactly two pill furnaces.
Since this was his first time, he fumbled about and had yet to finish cleaning one Pill Furnace, while his senior brothers were almost done with both of theirs.
Still, he took his work seriously, cleaning everything bit by bit.
Even the forgotten corners inside the pill furnace that no one cared about received his attention.
He slowly picked the residue out with his fingers, cleaning them little by little.
Lin Shisan's meticulous attitude soon won Chen Yang's favor.
He nodded in satisfaction.
"Lin Shisan, clean your second pill furnace when you get back."
"For now, follow your senior brothers and dump the furnace ash and pill residue behind the mountain. Remember the way back while you're at it."
By the time everyone else had finished cleaning two pill furnaces, Lin Shisan had only just finished his first.
He was about to start cleaning the second Pill Furnace when Steward Chen Yang, who stood nearby supervising, called him to a halt.
"All right, Boss Chen. I'll go right away."
Lin Shisan immediately set down his work.
Pushing a wheelbarrow loaded with furnace ash and pill residue, he followed the other five servant disciples to the Back Mountain behind the Pill Room to dump it.
The Back Mountain was thick with trees, and its waterside grasses were lush and green.
The scent of damp earth mingled with fragrant flowers and drifted toward them.
It was refreshing and pleasant.
The mountain path twisted and turned, rugged and steep.
Fortunately, stone steps had been laid along the entire route to even out the footing.
Even so, sweat was already beading on Lin Shisan's forehead.
When had a mountain boy like him ever done such heavy work?
Including the wheelbarrow, the load weighed three or four hundred jin.
Panting hard, Lin Shisan finally reached an open hollow half an hour later.
The area was spacious, over a hundred meters across.
A great deal of furnace ash and pill residue had already been dumped into a huge pit.
Mixed in with it were piles of broken fragments.
They varied in size, and some were still relatively intact.
He could tell that some were fragments of discarded Furnace Cauldrons.
After dumping their furnace ash and pill residue, the other senior brothers went to fetch water by the river, knowing the routine well.
Lin Shisan alone retraced his steps to the Pill Room to continue cleaning his second pill furnace.
By the time he finished cleaning the second pill furnace, it was completely dark.
The other servant disciples had finished long ago and had already spent quite some time back at their quarters, chatting and shooting the breeze.
Lin Shisan, meanwhile, struggled back to the Back Mountain with four large sacks of furnace ash and pill residue on his wheelbarrow.
After dumping the furnace ash and pill residue, he did not leave immediately. Instead, he crouched down and rummaged through the ash heap.
"This one's too broken..."
"This one's pretty enough, but it's missing a leg..."
"This one's all right, but it has a little hole..."
Lin Shisan shook his head helplessly.
He had spent ages rummaging through the junk, hoping to find a decent vessel to hold food offerings before his father's memorial tablet.
"Why is this Furnace Cauldron so black?"
"It's so black it shines?"
After searching for another good while, only the black cauldron in his hands seemed passable.
It was smooth to the touch, with a faint coolness.
At least it was not missing any limbs; it was a whole, undamaged vessel.
"Black it is, then. Having one is better than having none."
"Once I get my monthly allowance, I'll go down the mountain and buy a new one."
He cleaned up the little black cauldron, wiped it down again, and tucked it into his pocket.
Following his senior brothers' example, he stopped by the lake to fetch water on the way.
Only after filling the water vat and sweeping the Pill Room did he leave, his back and waist aching.
It was already late at night when he returned to his quarters.
The other disciples had long since drifted off to meet the Duke of Zhou in their dreams.
He thoroughly wiped the little black cauldron he had found with a damp cloth once more, then carefully set it
in front of his father's memorial tablet.
He placed the two bruised, damaged peaches in it as well.
Though the offerings were a little shabby, nothing that ought to be there could be left out.
He lit incense and candles, then kowtowed three times.
Utterly exhausted, he collapsed onto the bed and fell asleep in no time.
What he did not know was that after he fell asleep, a seven-colored radiance suddenly welled out of the little black cauldron.
It came quickly and left just as quickly. In the blink of an eye, the seven-colored radiance vanished again.
The next day.
"Huh? What's happened to these peaches?"
"They still had rotten patches yesterday. How did they get so plump and juicy today? They're fresh and sweet, as if they've just been picked."
He woke early that morning.
After a night's sleep, Lin Shisan had recovered his strength and felt full of energy.
Once he got out of bed, he followed his usual routine.
He first cultivated through one greater celestial circuit, then was about to pay his respects to his father.
But he noticed that the two peaches he had placed in the little black cauldron yesterday seemed fresher than before.
More importantly, not only had the mottled dents on their surfaces disappeared, but even the scrapes and rotten patches had vanished.
He found this rather eerie.
A chill ran through him, and he sprang to his feet.
Had the peaches repaired their scrapes and rotten patches on their own?
Or had someone slipped into his room last night while he was sound asleep to steal something?
But if they had come to steal, why would they have swapped two fresh peaches for his Bad Peach?
What on earth was going on?
He picked up a peach and was about to examine it closely when a commotion came from outside the door.
"Someone, come quickly!"
"Someone jumped into the river!"
"There's a dead body in the Clearwater River! It's floating on the surface!"
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