The morning sun's rise in the east was a process.
At first, the clouds turned from black to blue-green, then the blue-green clouds were stained crimson, before countless streams of purple Qi surged forth.
At his current stage, Chen Jin's target was the purple Qi of that precise moment.
He gazed eastward and circulated the Eight Scenes Contemplation and Visualization Method.
The eight scenes of the Daoist mysteries were the inner scenes and bodily gods of the human body, collectively called the "Twenty-Four Perfected," corresponding precisely to the twenty-four solar terms.
Through visualization and contemplation, one could gather the moon's essence Qi, and naturally could also gather the sun's essence Qi.
The only question was whether the body could withstand it.
For this, Chen Jin had made all manner of preparations.
When the purple Qi came from the east, he opened his mouth and inhaled, seeking no great quantity, only a single wisp.
At the same time, he expelled a stream of moonlight essence Qi from his mouth, swiftly wrapping it around that wisp of purple Qi.
The two mingled, yin meeting yang, neatly moderating each other's properties, like mixing cold water into boiling water to make warm water.
This way, he could swallow it warm.
That was the principle, but mistakes were inevitable in practice. After all, that wisp of morning sun purple Qi was truly fierce and domineering in its yang nature.
In an instant, Chen Jin felt his throat burn, as though smoke were about to rise from it.
His will was steadfast, and he endured it well, then immediately seized the time to gather a second wisp of purple Qi.
The morning sun rose quickly, too, and the opportunity was fleeting. Once the sun was high overhead, blazing like fire, that little bit of moonlight essence Qi would lose its effectiveness.
As the saying went, "All things are difficult at the beginning." The subsequent Qi gathering went smoothly. In the end, he gathered a full nine wisps of purple Qi before nimbly jumping to the ground and hiding back inside the shrine.
With the Qi gathered, he began refining it.
This process likewise required care and caution, all because this bodily shell was inadequate, with most of its twelve primary meridians still withered and blocked.
Swish!
Within moments, as the morning sun purple Qi took effect, it produced a violent impact, as though withered branches and leaves had been set alight, crackling as they burned.
It felt as though his entire body were burning!
"Hrr! Hrr!"
The pain of that burning made Chen Jin growl involuntarily. At that moment, he felt he had become a piece of copper or iron being forged.
"A precious sword gains its edge through grinding; plum blossoms gain their fragrance from bitter cold."
Suddenly, this line of verse came to him.
Gradually, the tearing pain brought by the burning eased, and then sweetness followed bitterness.
The yin baleful corpse Qi pent up within his body was being refined by yang fire, beginning to turn into True Qi.
Lead was gathered from the moon's radiance; mercury was taken from the sun's essence.
It matched precisely the profound teachings of the Dragon-Tiger Inner Treasury Mysterious Scripture.
Everything was wondrous beyond words.
And so he stopped growling, quieted his thoughts, and entered meditation, slipping into a state of self-forgetfulness.
Time had feet, following the sun along.
Sun and moon turned in succession, and in the blink of an eye, the moon was high overhead.
Tonight, however, the red-haired corpse monster was nowhere to be seen atop the lofty canopy, which seemed very strange.
A sinister wind rose, rustling the old banyan. Even this ancient tree seemed frightened, as though it wanted to draw in its branches and leaves.
There were no lights beneath the old banyan, only a mass of darkness.
Suddenly, something appeared within that darkness, wrapped in the sinister wind, and stopped three zhang before the shrine.
It stared at the corpse monster seated inside the shrine, gnashing its teeth.
After hesitating a moment, it made up its mind and advanced again.
Hum!
The next instant, a sword's cry rang out abruptly, like a dragon's call.
It came from the Slay Evil Sword hanging before the shrine's entrance. Though its blade was sheathed, it would automatically sound a warning whenever it detected something demonic or evil approaching.
Startled, it immediately hesitated, unsure whether to advance or retreat.
"Unsheathe!"
Chen Jin, who had been sitting motionless, suddenly opened his eyes and shouted.
Hiss!
The Slay Evil Sword left its sheath, its cold edge slashing straight into that mass of dense darkness.
"Ah!"
A shrill scream rose. "What a vicious sword..."
The female voice swiftly fled, vanishing into the distance.
This time, it dared not leave any more threats.
Chen Jin rose at his leisure and walked out of the shrine.
After striking that patch of darkness, the Slay Evil Sword had cut into a root, sinking several inches into the wood. He had to go pull it out and return it to its sheath.
He would have liked to say "Return to your sheath" and have the magic sword fly back on its own.
The problem was that he could not do it.
That single slash had already taken all his strength.
But it had all been worth it.
As the saying went, "It is not the thief stealing that you fear, but the thief keeping you in mind." The creature appeared and disappeared like a ghost, coming and going without a trace, making it difficult to hunt down and kill.
Since that was the case, he might as well wait for it to come to his door and give it a vicious blow. Even if he could not kill it, a grievous wound would keep it from daring to return.
That was precisely the effect he wanted.
As for the True Qi he had consumed, as long as he could gather morning sun purple Qi, the rate at which his True Qi recovered would multiply, like a spring opening in a dried-up well, bringing fresh flowing water from its source.
With yin and yang working together, a new path had opened in his cultivation. Most directly, he could now begin linking and opening all three yin meridians of the hand.
Chen Jin pulled the sword free and returned it to its sheath. Standing in the darkness to inspect the scene, he discovered a splatter of blood on the ground. It seemed green, giving off a dim glow, and was quite eerie.
Ghostly creatures have blood too?
He thought this with some surprise. It seemed this fiend had already attained some cultivation and condensed a physical form.
Without a magic sword in hand, it would have been hard to say whether Chen Jin would win or lose. With the Slay Evil Sword, linked to him by blood and specifically countering evil entities, there was little suspense about the outcome.
Holding the sword, he leaped into the tree.
Though it was already late at night and only a waning moon remained in the sky, a waning moon was still a moon, and even a mosquito's leg was meat. Every mouthful he could absorb counted.
Besides, once the moon set, would morning not come soon enough?
When the sun rose, he could begin gathering morning sun purple Qi again.
Having tasted the marrow, Chen Jin now knew its savor and was unwilling to let any opportunity to gather Qi slip by.
He even wondered whether he could gather Qi at dusk, when the sun was setting...
"Great-uncle, I've investigated it thoroughly. A White Zombie with less than three years of maturation escaped. As for Yan Ji and the others, they may have gone out to search for the corpse because they feared punishment. But the terrain in the mountains and wilds is complicated, and there's no knowing where they've gone."
Inside the room, the man knelt before the black coffin and reported respectfully.
Great-uncle's surprised voice came from within the coffin. "Yan Laojiu, you're saying a White Zombie could lift its coffin lid and rise?"
Yan Laojiu said in puzzlement, "I found it strange too, but out of all those hanging coffins on the cliff, this really is the only wooden coffin that's empty."
"Did you see it with your own eyes, or did you hear it from the people under you?"
"I heard about it first and felt it couldn't be true, so I went up to look myself. It's absolutely certain."
Great-uncle seemed to think of something and asked again, "Which White Zombie was it?"
Yan Laojiu hesitated. "The one numbered three-zero-three."
"Hmm?"
At that sound, the temperature throughout the room seemed to fall, turning chillingly cold.
Great-uncle suddenly sighed. "An oversight like this is going to bring disaster."
Yan Laojiu hurriedly said, "Great-uncle, whatever it was in life, it's already been made into a zombie after death. It's a dead thing now. What trouble could it possibly stir up? I reckon there must be something fishy about this. Unfortunately, we can't find Yan Li and the others to question them."
Great-uncle snorted. "When they return, they must answer for this under the family rules."
Yan Laojiu hastily assented, then asked, "Should we inform the Holy Maiden about this?"
"Not for now. Yan Hui is going to lead people into the mountains to slay demons and vanquish evil. We mustn't disturb her state of mind. Leave it at that."
"Yes."
Yan Laojiu withdrew, only to discover that his entire body was soaked in cold sweat.