A draft swept through Emerald Mountain Village in the early morning.
Although Lin He had barely managed to nail the ramshackle wooden hut's window shut with a few rotten boards last night, its drafty walls were still like a sieve.
The damp chill of the morning dew slipped through the gaps between the boards and stabbed straight into the cracks of his bones.
Lin He let out an enormous sneeze and jerked upright in bed. He rubbed his aching lower back. After a night on that hard plank bed, two of his spinal discs were practically ready to pop out.
He turned to look at the other end of the hut.
Su Qiuran had not slept well either and had gotten up early.
She was sitting in her broken wheelchair now, with faint dark circles beneath her eyes. Her gaze was fixed on the emerald-green jade gourd in the center of the battered wooden table.
Last night, after the shock of "Blood-Drip Recognition," the two of them had set the jade gourd on the only patch of floor the moonlight could reach, treating it like an ancestor on an altar, and left it there overnight, brimming with anticipation.
"Well? How much 'essence of the moon' did we collect after leaving it AFK all night?" Lin He rubbed his face as he leaned closer.
Without even lifting her eyelids, Su Qiuran extended a pale, slender finger and pointed at the bottom of the jade gourd. "See for yourself."
Lin He leaned in and squinted, nearly pressing his eyeballs against the gourd's surface, before he could just barely make out a wisp of silver mist along its inner wall at the bottom, finer than a strand of hair by a good third.
The mist was pitifully faint, as though a heavy breath could blow it apart.
"That's it?" Lin He sucked in a sharp breath. "Seriously, isn't this absorption rate way too low? What year of the monkey and month of the horse will it be before we save up one drop of 'essence of the moon' to cleanse our bodies and marrow?"
Su Qiuran gave a cold laugh and folded her arms out of habit. "Young Master Lin, do you think you're playing a game with a cheat engine? Max level in one click?"
"With how thin the Spiritual Qi is in a backwater like Emerald Mountain Village, plus the speed this gourd absorbs moonlight... conservatively speaking, we'll need at least half a year to collect one drop of essence of the moon."
"Half a year..." Lin He plopped down on a long wooden bench, which gave a dangerous creak. "Half a year isn't so bad. Still better than working in the modern world and paying off a mortgage for the rest of our lives. But distant water can't quench an immediate thirst."
The two exchanged a glance. The frenzy of activating their golden finger last night finally faded, and reality dumped a bucket of cold water over their heads.
"Since we need to save up the essence of the moon, let's use the 'essence of the sun' first." Lin He stroked his chin.
"The essence of the sun can ripen plants, so farming is obviously the way to go. And not ordinary crops, either. We need crops from the cultivation world-spirit rice!"
Spirit rice was something Lin He knew all too well from his days as a peripheral member of the Lin family.
It was the most basic of all Spirit Plants in the Cangming Realm. Eating it could slowly increase a cultivator's spiritual power. While mortals would not ascend to immortality in broad daylight after eating it, strengthening their bodies and extending their lives was absolutely no problem.
Most importantly, if Su Qiuran could eat spirit rice regularly, although her congenitally disabled legs would not heal immediately, it would at least keep her muscles from wasting away and lay the groundwork for future treatment with essence of the moon.
"Spirit rice is good and all..." Su Qiuran sighed, a trace of helplessness flashing through her peach-blossom eyes.
"Lin He, have you forgotten the results of last night's inventory of our assets? With everything we have right now, we'd have to think twice even before buying a meat bun. Where are you going to get spirit rice seeds?"
"Where there's a will, there's a way!" Lin He stood and dusted off the seat of his pants.
"Come on, I'll wheel you out for some fresh air. Let's try our luck at the village market. Maybe some blind peddler will have a bargain."
An incense stick's worth of time later.
An exceptionally grating, rhythmic noise rang out along Emerald Mountain Village's potholed dirt road.
"Creak-squeak-creak-squeak-"
Lin He pushed Su Qiuran's scrap-wood wheelchair, which could have passed for an instrument of torture, struggling along the dirt road.
The broken wheelchair did not even have bearings. It was nothing but dry wood grinding against dry wood. Not only did pushing it take an ox's strength, but the noise could practically lift the top off a person's skull.
"Lin He, I'm begging you, could you use a little finesse when you push?" Su Qiuran was jolted into a daze, both hands gripping the wheelchair's armrests for dear life as she spoke through gritted teeth. "I feel like all my internal organs are bungee jumping!"
"My lady, I'm already being very careful!" Sweating profusely, Lin He retorted between gasps. "This road's like the surface of the moon, and this thing has no suspension. Just pretend you're riding in a Maserati. Hang in there. The old locust tree at the village entrance is just ahead!"
Calling Emerald Mountain Village's market a market was putting it nicely. Less charitably, it was a few shabby cloths spread beneath the century-old locust tree at the village entrance.
By now, it was broad daylight. Four or five stalls were scattered beneath the old locust tree, selling homemade straw sandals, wild fruit gathered in the mountains, and some ordinary crop seeds.
A few sallow, scrawny villagers squatted behind their stalls, chatting intermittently about gossip.
Lin He pushed the wheelchair into the shade of the tree. Once it was securely parked, he first made a round of the seed stalls.
"Uncle, how much are these rice seeds?" Lin He crouched in front of a burlap sack and picked up a handful of dusty grain to examine.
"Three copper coins a catty. Good seeds I saved myself," the old man said with drooping eyelids, taking a puff from his tobacco pipe.
Ordinary rice seeds.
Lin He shook his head and put the grain down.
Even if he used essence of the sun to ripen grain meant for mortals, at most it would grow a little faster and produce slightly larger kernels. Not only would it fetch little money, but it would not do a damn thing to transform their bodies.
Unwilling to give up, he stood and looked around. Suddenly, his gaze landed on the edge of the market.
An itinerant merchant there had just tied up his bundle and was preparing to hang two large bamboo baskets from a carrying pole.
The man wore a reasonably presentable short outfit of coarse cloth, with something bulging at his waist and cloth shoes with thick, layered soles on his feet. One look made it clear he was not a local villager from Emerald Mountain Village, but a peddler who regularly traveled between nearby towns and villages buying and reselling goods.
"Wait here. I'll go sound out the NPC," Lin He murmured to Su Qiuran. Then he put on a friendly smile and hurried over.
"Brother, please wait!" Lin He cupped his hands, copying the way mortals in the cultivation world greeted one another. "I'm new here, and I'd like to ask you something."
The itinerant merchant stopped what he was doing and looked Lin He up and down. Although Lin He wore old clothes, his skin was fair and clean, and his hands had no calluses. He did not look like a rough farm laborer, so the merchant grew a little more polite. "What can I do for you, young brother?"
"I wouldn't presume to trouble you much." Smiling, Lin He lowered his voice. "You travel far and wide, brother, and you have plenty of connections. I was wondering if you had any, or knew where I could get... spirit seeds? Even the lowest-grade spirit rice seeds would do."
At the words "spirit seeds," the itinerant merchant froze for a moment, then scoffed openly as though he had heard some tremendous joke.
"Young brother, you're not running a fever, are you?" The itinerant merchant pointed at the cracked yellow earth beneath their feet, then at the barren mountains in the distance.
"Look at Emerald Mountain Village. Birds won't even shit here, and the Spiritual Qi is so thin that not even a spiritually endowed weed can grow."
"You want to plant spirit rice here? Never mind whether you can keep it alive-even if you did get it planted, it would be a waste. The earth Qi here simply can't sustain spiritual things!"
The itinerant merchant paused, his tone taking on a little more mockery. "Besides, spirit seeds are something only immortal masters can afford to dabble in."
"Even the cheapest low-grade Green Jade Spirit Rice seeds cost five low-grade Spirit Stones per tael at the Hundred Treasures Pavilion in town! Judging by what you're wearing, young brother... heh, don't blame me for speaking bluntly, but can you afford that?"