Core Condensation
The cavity remained constricted within the Origin Return Pearl for three days.
Every evening after the Qi gathering ended, Long Tian could feel the bead wall compressing inward by a barely perceptible amount. As the Power of Origin of the Yu Jin passed through the Origin Return Pearl in the circulation loop, it could remove the excess matter that had become oversaturated on the surface of the bead, making room for a new core deeper inside. On the morning of the fourth day, when Long Tian woke up, he felt that the rotation speed of the Origin Return Pearl had slowed down to an extremely slow level overnight, like the brief silence of a furnace before casting. He sat up and placed his palm below his chest. Through his clothes, he could feel a solid object, harder than before, slowly taking shape deep inside his chest cavity—no longer an empty cavity, but something with weight, smooth edges, gradually solidifying like a cast iron core.
He didn't activate his Soul Ring, but simply closed his eyes and focused his energy into his dantian, watching as the new core lit up with its first ray of light in the very center of the Origin Return Pearl. The light initially appeared as a thin line, piercing through the entire pearl from the very center of the core, as thin as a thread pierced by light. The two ends of the line extended to the sides, evenly creating a gap in the inner wall of the Origin Return Pearl. The temperature at the edge of the gap slowly increased, and Long Tian could feel a continuous warmth spreading from the inside out deep within his chest, spreading along the sternum to his ribs, then turning back and converging into his spine. The patterns on the scales on his back bulged slightly under the continuous warmth, like the tender surface of a new leaf peeking through an old shell in spring rain.
Yu Jin waited for him outside to come out for breakfast. When he opened the door, his steps were slower than usual, and his gaze lingered for a moment on Long Tian's chest. Long Tian stopped in front of him and pulled open his shirt a crack—a very faint gray-gold halo shone through the skin in the center of his chest, like a wick sealed with thin wax, the light seeping out evenly and gently illuminating a small patch of skin around it.
"Is it done?" Yu Jin asked.
"It's taking shape. It's still solidifying; it'll probably need another two days to fully set." Long Tian straightened his clothes, and as he lowered his hand, his fingertips brushed against his chest, feeling a subtle warmth seep in through his fingertips, like touching a stone wall that had been baked by the sun all day. "Don't let anything hit the center of my chest these next few days. It's like a piece of glass that's just been softened by heat; if it deforms, all this effort will be wasted."
Yu Jin nodded and stepped aside to let them pass through the doorway. As the two sat on the threshold eating breakfast, Long Tieshan came out of the house, glanced at his son, and his gaze lingered on his chest for a moment. He finished his half-eaten biscuit, dusted off the crumbs, and said, "Don't fully activate the Sixth Ring on your back until your new core is completely solidified. Let the new core grow strong on its own before adding any load."
Long Tian responded and finished the last mouthful of porridge in his bowl. When Yu Jin took the bowl from him, his fingertip accidentally brushed against Long Tian's finger. Long Tian felt the edge of the new core in his chest tremble slightly for a moment, like a seed that had just been planted being bumped against the side by another seed that fell beside it. Yu Jin also felt it, and when he withdrew his hand, he glanced at his fingertip but said nothing.
For the next two days, Long Tian did not engage in any high-intensity training. He only maintained the most basic Soul Power circulation each day, allowing the new core to slowly converge its texture within the inner wall of the Origin Return Pearl. Yu Jin's Qi fusion also paused. During those two days, the two maintained their own separate trajectories, only occasionally sensing each other's state through their shared origin texture when they sat side by side.
By evening on the sixth day, the new nucleus had completely solidified.
Long Tian sat at the entrance of the stone house, closed his eyes, and focused his mind on his dantian. He saw that the shape of the new core inside the Origin Return Pearl had completely stabilized—a dark gray sphere about the size of a finger joint, with a smooth and dense surface, separated from the inner wall of the Origin Return Pearl by an extremely thin air gap. The two were not in direct contact, but when the pulsation of the new core was transmitted to the wall of the Origin Return Pearl through the air gap, it would cause the pearl wall to vibrate synchronously. The entire Origin Return Pearl was operating in a new resonance mode, with a rotation speed 20% slower than before, but with a heavier force. Each rotation carried the profound aftertaste of the core's underlying structure.
He stood up and walked to the center of the open space in front of the house. The moment the six Soul Ring lit up, the newly grown scales on his back emerged from under his skin without any additional activation, lining his spine completely. When the two-headed Dragon Shadow rose from behind him, it carried a layer of dark gray luster unique to new cores. The outlines of the two heads were clearer than a few days ago. Each of the golden and dark heads had a fine ridge extending from the top of its head to the base of its neck, like the patterns on a newly sculpted stone statue. Long Tian tried to keep the Dragon Shadow emanating outwards. It lingered in the twilight for nearly a quarter of an hour before slowly fading, longer than ever before.
Yu Jin stood by the door, watching the Dragon Shadow continue to hover in the twilight, the luster of the dark gray bead on its chest rising and falling slightly with the resonance. Long Tieshan stood at the workbench on the side of the house, putting down the hammer in his hand, watching from afar as the two-headed Dragon Shadow slowly circled once in the deepening twilight before returning to its original position, like a fledgling eagle that had just learned to fly steadily returning to the branch from which it took off after its test flight.
That evening, after dinner, Shen Mo laid out the newly received message on the table. "Meng Changyuan didn't return to the camp. The team he led had set up a temporary outpost on the southern slope of the mountain and hadn't left. He stayed behind."
The room fell silent for a moment. Long Tian placed his chopsticks on the rim of his bowl, without looking up, and continued chewing the last mouthful of rice. Yu Jin sat beside him, finished his soup, and placed his bowl on top of Long Tian's to put it away. Long Tieshan sat by the stove without moving, his hand holding the fire tongs, drawing a short mark on the ground, as if gesturing a distance to the edge of a certain location on a map.
Long Tian stood up and walked to the door. Night had fallen completely, the moon hadn't yet risen, and half of the open space was illuminated by the orange-yellow light of the firelight from the stone house, while the other half remained dark. He stood on the threshold, gazing at the direction the southern mountain ridge stretched out. The Origin Return Pearl rotated rhythmically at the lower edge of his chest, its new core continuously providing the point of each pulse deep within. The patterns on the scales covering his back gleamed with a warm, dark light in the firelight leaking from the doorway, like an old armor that had been repeatedly polished, finally revealing its previously hidden color after the final step.