Life Is but a Dream
Zhang Xuezhou flew very fast.
But he arrived a little too late.
Like a wisp of smoke, the white light shot into the sky and then dissipated.
The white light appeared in the world for a very short time; if the night hadn't been so dark and the distance so close, Zhang Xuezhou wouldn't have been able to see it.
His arms, which had transformed into wings, remained almost still as he slowly flew over the mountainous region, constantly looking down to search for a target that was emitting white light.
"It's so dark!"
Following the Xuanjia Young Warriors' complaints about the environment, Zhang Xuezhou also had to grumble, finding it difficult to Chu Lands.
"The Golden Crow Great Emperor is my good friend!"
After feeling around on his body for a while, Zhang Xuezhou took out the Golden Crow feather that was tucked inside his clothes.
He chanted a spell, and the Golden Crow feather in his hand began to emit a fiery glow.
Only when his gaze swept downwards again could Zhang Xuezhou clearly see the outlines of the twisted and deformed trees in the darkness.
As if concealing countless evils and fears, these trees present an eerie posture in the light and shadow, as if they want to devour any living creatures that enter the forest.
"It looks somewhat similar to those demonic trees on Fangzhang Island!"
Zhang Xuezhou adjusted his posture, and as his wings slowly retracted, his body fell lightly.
If there are any heavenly materials and earthly treasures, they can only originate from the ground, not from the air.
Zhang Xuezhou remembered that the white light he saw in the distance was in this area. After he clearly saw the location of the landing, he carefully held the Golden Crow Feather and dropped it down to investigate.
The accumulated dead branches and leaves in the forest were so thick that when Zhang Xuezhou stepped on them, it felt like he was walking on a thick carpet.
He reached out and poked the tree trunk, which would take two or three people to encircle, and found that the tree species was quite ordinary, just a common oak, but its enormous size was rather unusual.
"The Qin Dynasty also built the Shanglin Garden, which was later burned down. Did these trees escape the fire, or were they grown within the last hundred years?"
If the tree has been growing for hundreds of years, Zhang Xuezhou thinks it's normal for it to be a bit thick.
If a tree grows to the thickness of two or three people who need to encircle it within a few decades, even a fast-growing tree cannot grow that long.
Moreover, the trees in this forest are not only thick, but also densely packed.
Zhang Xuezhou felt that normal trees couldn't grow this long. Even if the trees wanted to, the land couldn't provide them with enough balanced nutrition.
"In other words, the soil here must be extremely nutrient-rich, so much so that these trees are growing with an excess of nutrients. What makes this soil so special?"
After repeatedly pushing back, Zhang Xuezhou chopped off a tree branch as tall as a person and used it to dig around on the ground.
After sweeping away the waist-high dead branches, fallen leaves, and rotten layer, black soil came into view.
The soil looked fertile, but it didn't meet Zhang Xuezhou's standards.
Although Zhang Xuezhou majored in psychology, he also possessed some knowledge in biological genetics. For people of his generation, even without studying related knowledge, they understood that the needs of soil fertility, fertilizer, and plant growth were interconnected.
The abnormal growth of these trees must have been caused by external intervention.
Zhang Xuezhou used a tree fork to dig several square meters around the oak tree. He couldn't find any external factors, but he unexpectedly discovered a purple Ganoderma lucidum growing near the base of the oak tree.
Like the unusually large trunk of an oak tree, the purple Ganoderma lucidum was not a small plant, but rather the size of Zhang Xuezhou's head.
"Purple Ganoderma lucidum has a sweet and warm flavor, and is effective in treating deafness, benefiting joints, preserving the spirit and replenishing essence, strengthening tendons and bones, improving complexion, and long-term consumption can lighten the body, prevent aging, and prolong life!"
Zhang Xuezhou aloud.
The Yin-Yang School can identify medicinal herbs, and recognizing these identified herbs is even simpler; there is no need to taste or assess their medicinal effects.
This purple Ganoderma is not a woody giant Ganoderma; its texture is soft and elastic, like a slice of meat, and it releases Ganoderma liquid when cut open.
A palm-sized purple Ganoderma lucidum is a good medicine for strengthening the body and bones, while a head-sized purple Ganoderma lucidum is undoubtedly a powerful medicine.
"This purple Ganoderma must be extremely old; it's excellent material for making Qi and Blood Creation Pills, and it would also be great for making Longevity Pills to nourish the body!"
Zhang Xuezhou couldn't find the source of the soaring white light, but he unexpectedly found a powerful medicinal herb, a discovery that greatly pleased him.
"A giant Solomon's Seal? This is huge!"
He couldn't refuse the purple lingzhi that was offered to him. Zhang Xuezhou tore off a strip of cloth from his clothes and hung the lingzhi on his back. He then used a tree branch to dig at it several times until he saw the orange-yellow root.
By digging along the rootstock, Zhang Xuezhou Zhang Xuezhou the bare stem and found two small leaves swaying on the ground.
The stems and leaves of this Solomon's seal plant seem to grow like it's just playing around, but the Solomon's seal that it produces is longer than Zhang Xuezhou's thigh and looks like it's three to five hundred years old.
"That doesn't make sense, it's practically reverse aging!"
It's understandable that purple lingzhi grows by relying on trees; if the trees grow well, it's not surprising that the parasitic purple lingzhi also grows well.
However, Polygonatum is not a parasitic medicinal herb; it even needs to compete with oak trees for its growing environment.
There are only small trees next to a towering tree, and there are rarely two wild medicinal herbs next to one.
"Could there be a great spirit jade down there?"
Zhang Xuezhou kept digging up large medicinal herbs, and when he looked doubtful, he couldn't help but quickly make a hand seal.
The treasure-hunting technique yielded no results for him.
"Without the support of the spirit jade, how could this great herb grow so well? This isn't some kind of Grotto-Heaven Secret Land!"
Unable to find the spirit jade using treasure hunting techniques, and with the stars and moon above him synchronized, Zhang Xuezhou was quite certain that the place he was standing on was not a secret place, which made him question his life.
He peeled off the Solomon's seal rhizome, leaving only a section of the stem to prevent the roots from breaking.
Once everything was sorted out, Zhang Xuezhou continued his haphazard digging to seek verification.
"We can't dig anymore!"
When the second purple Ganoderma lucidum came into view, Zhang Xuezhou felt he could no longer turn the soil here.
Everyone loves heavenly materials and earthly treasures, but here there were so heavenly materials and earthly treasures that Zhang Xuezhou began to question the meaning of life.
The large amount of medicine in the snake pit could at least be explained, but Zhang Xuezhou couldn't explain the situation under this grove of trees.
Having acquired the three medicinal herbs, Zhang Xuezhou picked up the burning Golden Crow Feather and looked around. He saw two tender leaves on the ground not far away, which looked no different from the Polygonatum he had dug up earlier.
"Even the Venerable One's herb garden isn't this outrageous! The top-grade herbs cultivated by the Alchemist of Five Trees Mountain are simply not worth mentioning here!"
Finding a single large medicinal plant is a matter of luck, finding two is an accident, but finding a whole patch of large medicinal plants of the same size makes Zhang Xuezhou feel that he may have uncovered someone else's treasure trove.
This is not a large medicinal herb that grows normally in nature; there must be human intervention involved.
Zhang Xuezhou was a little worried that he might happily steal the medicine, only to be slapped hard from behind, or that the traces he left behind would lead to an investigation.
This is no small matter, and Zhang Xuezhou is not comparing himself to ordinary people.
If the underlying cause cannot be thoroughly investigated, he will not be at ease no matter how much medicine he takes.
This prevented him from becoming dizzy from the strong drugs; instead, he became somewhat suspicious, constantly scanning the dark areas around him.
As he leaped out of the hole he had dug with the tree branches, he carefully filled it back in with withered branches, fallen leaves, and rotten soil.
"I'm not sure about the purple Ganoderma, but at least forty-eight more of this Polygonatum species can still be found!"
After a thorough inspection, Zhang Xuezhou specifically looked for seedlings with two leaves on the ground.
After verification, he felt that at least forty-eight more Solomon's seal plants were buried in this area of several hundred meters in radius.
Even the patriarch himself would drool if he came here!
Aside from the limited variety of major drug products, Zhang Xuezhou could not find any other flaws.
If he hadn't lacked a storage bag and hadn't found it difficult to dispose of these large quantities of medicine in a short time, Zhang Xuezhou felt he would have definitely gotten rid of them all.
As he continued searching with the Golden Crow feather in hand, he saw a white streak flash across the distant sky, and the distorted shadows of the trees around him faded away.
As Zhang Xuezhou scanned his surroundings, he noticed that the trees had changed imperceptibly. They were no longer the large trees that required three or four people to encircle, but were only as thick as his waist.
Beneath his feet lay a layer of loose soil covered with withered branches and leaves, but it seemed that with just a little effort, he could step onto the ground.
The small leaves of the Solomon's Seal that had previously emerged from the ground have quietly disappeared.
Everything changed imperceptibly as the sky began to lighten, a change that occurred in the instant Zhang Xuezhou looked up.
If it weren't for the two purple Ganoderma lucidum mushrooms the size of human heads on his back, and a Solomon's seal as thick as a thigh, Zhang Xuezhou would almost have doubted whether he was hallucinating.