"What? What's with that look?" Jiang Jinyue wore a half-smile. "Are you afraid I'll harm you people, or that your childhood sweetheart will get jealous?"
Qi Yan was rather speechless. "Since you've been watching everything that happened to us tonight, miss, you should know she isn't my childhood sweetheart. And this can no longer be considered my home. If a powerful cultivator they never accounted for suddenly appears, one wrong turn could make you my death warrant."
"I can help you." Jiang Jinyue smiled. "If you behave, even the Luo Household could become yours."
"Isn't it you who wants the Luo Household, miss? The clues from the Qi Clan made you think the Luo Household's things might also serve as references?"
"Can't they?"
Qi Yan sighed. "The Luo Household didn't move here together with our ancestors' generation. There may not be any connection. Personally, I suggest investigating in secret, miss. Don't get into a conflict lightly."
"Tsk... Are you worrying about them? A faction that just destroyed your clan, treats you like a puppet, and could screw you over and kill you at any moment?"
"Luo Chaoge has someone behind her. The Resounding Sword Sect isn't easy to provoke... To be precise, I'm afraid of getting dragged into a conflict between powerful people like you. That isn't something I can bear." Qi Yan said calmly, "I can cooperate with you in searching for clues related to the Qi Clan, miss. Anything else is out."
Jiang Jinyue tilted her head and studied him for a long while. "Hey, do you really not need my help interpreting the texts?"
Qi Yan fell silent for a long while before slowly saying, "As long as I've committed them to memory, I have plenty of time to understand them little by little... As long as I stay alive, the possibilities are endless."
"What a cautious little man." Jiang Jinyue smiled. "How about this? Shall we make a bet?"
"Please go ahead, miss."
Jiang Jinyue casually flipped open the book and pointed to a passage. "I'll give you one night. As long as you can interpret one passage, I'll do something for you, such as help you interpret the entire book."
"What if I can't?"
"Then you'll do something for me." Jiang Jinyue finally stopped leaning against the pillar and rose to her full height. "Don't refuse this bet, or you'll die right now."
Her voice drifted away, and she was already gone. Only the fragrant breeze filling the room and the books on the floor proved that what had just happened wasn't a dream.
Somewhat exhausted, Qi Yan slumped into the spot Jiang Jinyue had just occupied, his whole body covered in cold sweat.
He had no idea what was going on. He had muddled through eighteen years without even seeing more than a handful of Foundation Establishment cultivators. The moment he awakened, someone at Foundation Establishment perfection came along, and now even a terrifying demoness whose cultivation he couldn't discern at all had appeared. From the moment he woke up until now, the pressure had weighed on him like a mountain.
Sure enough, his transmigrator predecessors had been right. In a world like this, strength came first. This feeling of not knowing whether he would live to see the next day, of being liable to get crushed to death at any moment, was truly unpleasant.
As for how to increase his strength...
Qi Yan's gaze fell on the book, and he found the original passage Jiang Jinyue had pointed out.
"In cultivation, one's own self is the foundation, while heaven and earth are tools..."
What followed was a lengthy explanation of the principles governing one's physique and Qi and Blood.
Leaving aside the obscure characters in the subsequent text, the reasoning itself needed no explanation at all. It was easy to understand. But just as Jiang Jinyue had said, it somewhat contradicted the common understanding of cultivation today.
It wasn't a matter of the distinction between cultivating one's nature and cultivating one's life.
Modern cultivation first looked at how closely connected and compatible you were with heaven and earth. In plain terms, that was called your Spirit Root. Whether you were suited to learning water or fire arts was, in plain terms, called having a Water Spiritual Root or Fire Spiritual Root. This aptitude, brought with you from your mother's womb, determined your talent for the immortal path.
Uh, it didn't mean you had actually grown some kind of root.
Even those suited to body cultivation would be assigned something like a Sword Spiritual Root, as with Luo Chaoge. Then there were some top-tier geniuses with what was called a Heavenly Spiritual Root, who excelled at everything and learned anything quickly.
Yet not everyone possessed such talent. Most people had a mixture of all five elements, with none standing out. Ordinary people were all like this. Cultivation wasn't impossible with such aptitude, just more difficult and slower, turning it into A Record of a Mortal's Journey to Immortality. Thus, the strongest in the Luo Household and Qi Clan were only at Qi Refining. Even someone at the Qi Refining first layer like Qi Yan was thought to possess some special method.
In other words, Qi Yan had ordinary aptitude, a Mixed Spiritual Root, and nothing special at all.
But the ancestral methods mentioned nothing whatsoever about "Spirit Roots." Their attitude was essentially, "What you're cultivating is yourself in the first place. What the hell does that have to do with the five elements outside? Those things are just there for you to use." It was difficult to reconcile this with the current fundamental cultivation theory of "drawing Qi into the body according to your particular aptitude."
One might say they should set aside current theories and properly study their ancestors' methods instead. But without the broader environment that had supported them, the obscure characters and special training methods in those ancestral teachings became increasingly incomprehensible with each passing generation. What they practiced ended up neither fish nor fowl.
The book Jiang Jinyue had picked up wasn't even a cultivation method, but a book of incantations. This passage concerned an incantation for disrupting an opponent's Qi and Blood, which Qi Yan had never learned. Even this introductory overview of Qi and Blood theory contained many obscure characters. Reading it made Qi Yan's head feel as big as a bushel basket. He had to guess his way through it, rather like playing Japanese H-games years ago and trying to infer the entire text from the Chinese characters in it.
Random guesses were fine when playing games, but this was cultivation. Guessing wildly would not only get him nowhere, but would very likely get him killed!
Interpret a passage in one night? Give him Doubao and he might stand a chance, but where was he supposed to find it now? His jade pendant couldn't access the internet.
Just as he thought of the jade pendant, it began vibrating gently.
Only then did Qi Yan remember that, buffeted by one incident after another, he had completely forgotten his original intention to thank the girl on the other end. He answered.
Before he could speak, he heard whimpering sobs from the other side. "Senior, you finally answered. You scared me to death. I thought you'd disappeared..."
Qi Yan said, "...Why are you crying again?"
His heavy mood actually lightened considerably, as though he had run into an adorable little crybaby online.
The girl sniffled. "You didn't respond for hours. I was afraid..."
"Afraid of what?"
On the other end, Mu Xunzhen hesitated and didn't answer.
It wasn't really fear over the specific matter she wanted to ask about-"What should I do if I don't want to hand over the Essence-Nurturing Grass?" Rather, she was afraid she would never again find that feeling of having someone to rely on, someone to help her.
But wouldn't saying that sound a little flirtatious? They didn't even know each other's names.
Qi Yan could actually more or less guess what the girl was thinking. He didn't press her, merely asking with a smile, "Did someone bully you again?"
"Mm... A little." Mu Xunzhen said quietly, "It's just, just what you taught me yesterday, Senior. I took three Qi-Replenishing Pills, and Sixth Senior Brother got caught out and had all his meridians burned. I-I'm a little panicked."
"So they came to make trouble for you?"
"They can't exactly say outright that I did it, but they hinted that they knew, so they're asking me to provide Essence-Nurturing Grass to treat Sixth Senior Brother." Mu Xunzhen sniffled. "This herb is really precious. During the trial back then, getting it nearly cost me half my life. It took ages to recover... Sixth Senior Brother was clearly the one who used the Essence-Draining Incantation to harm me first and suffered the backlash himself. Why should I have to give up my Essence-Nurturing Grass... They have loads of medicine themselves..."
Qi Yan asked, "Did you give it to them?"
"No, not yet... I used thinking it over as an excuse and went back to my cave abode. But they'll definitely keep asking first thing tomorrow. How should I answer?"
"Do you think you should give it to them?"
"I don't know..." The girl scratched her head. "I think he deserved it, but it also seems true that he was injured because of me. I-I can't quite sort it out. You've seen and experienced so much, Senior. Could you give me some guidance?"
"Senior?" Listening to her, Qi Yan finally felt something was off.
"Huh? Aren't you?"
Qi Yan didn't know whether to laugh or cry. "Well... I'm not old."
Mu Xunzhen was very surprised. "I'm sixteen. What about you?"
"...Eighteen."
Mu Xunzhen brightened. "So you're a big brother."
She paused slightly at that point. She had wanted to ask his name, but swallowed the question, feeling it would be presumptuous and rude. Besides, ever since she was little, her parents and sect had taught her that people's hearts were unfathomable and that she shouldn't casually disclose too much identifying information to strangers. Presumably, the same went for him.
After some thought, she asked, "My name is Little Seven. What about you, Big Brother?"
She had assumed he might be somewhat displeased by such concealment, but Qi Yan, accustomed to online conversations, found it perfectly natural instead. He smiled easily. "Then just call me Brother Yan."
The address "Brother Yan" was a little modern, and the girl wasn't used to it. After a moment's hesitation, she still said, "Then may I call you Brother A-Yan?"
"Whatever you like." Feeling as though he had returned to his online-chatting days, Qi Yan was in a very good mood. "Back to the original question. You went through a thousand hardships to obtain that Essence-Nurturing Grass. Why should you give it to someone who harmed you? You weren't the one who told him to use the Essence-Draining Incantation. He reaped what he sowed. What does that have to do with you? There's no need to agonize over it."
Mu Xunzhen let out a breath and said happily, "You think so too, Brother A-Yan? I was wondering if I was being too wicked."
"If you really must pay compensation, that's called compensation for losing a war, something done out of helplessness. Have you fought a war, or is there someone who can truly force you?"
Mu Xunzhen's voice gained a measure of confidence. "My Essence-Draining Incantation has been broken, and the cultivation I ought to have is rapidly returning. I'm confident I can break straight through to Golden Core within a few days. Unless an elder steps in to pressure me, even Eldest Senior Brother isn't much stronger than me. He can't force me."
Wait, what's your cultivation?
Qi Yan nearly choked on his own spit.
You said you were sixteen, and now you're saying you're confident you can reach Golden Core in a few days?
Luo Chaoge had begun preparing for Golden Core before turning nineteen, and if her luck was bad, who knew how long she might remain stuck there. That already made her a very rare genius. Then he turned around, and a little crybaby said she could reach Golden Core at sixteen!
No wonder she could modify incantations herself... Although the practical usefulness of that modified Tribulation-Transferring Incantation really was rather limited. In a normal battle, when would you get the chance to touch your opponent and chant for ten seconds? Still, regardless, it did work. It had added some applications for special circumstances to the incantation, and he himself had benefited.
This little crybaby was absolutely a peerless prodigy!
"Brother A-Yan, what's wrong?"
"Cough, cough... N-nothing."
"You're so clever, Brother A-Yan. Are you at middle or late Golden Core?"
Qi Yan just wanted to dig a hole and bury himself in it. He swiftly changed the subject. "Then are any elders pressuring you?"
"No elders have intervened yet..." Mu Xunzhen's voice grew quieter again. "But when Master comes out of seclusion..."
"He'll favor your Sixth Senior Brother more?"
"I don't know... Maybe." Mu Xunzhen's voice grew quieter and quieter. "Sixth Senior Brother has an uncle who serves as a steward on another peak..."
Qi Yan was silent for a moment.
Their experiences really were very similar.
With his parents gone, just look at how the main sect had bullied him. They had even fed him poison. The little crybaby had also said before that she "had no home anymore"...
If one compared the sect to a school, when two students had a dispute, the teachers would favor the student whose parents stood up for them and wrong the poor little one without parents. That, too, was human nature, something found everywhere.
Things might have been a little better with her master around. After all, this girl was outstanding. With her master in seclusion, things were even worse. The pressure from that so-called steward relative, the other fellow disciples' wariness and suppression of this genius junior sister, and this little girl's honesty and kindness on top of it all... The chemical reaction from mixing them together could turn this little crybaby into a little bitter melon.
So, sharing the same affliction, they huddled together for warmth through their jade pendants.