novelraw Chapter 12: Indescribable Dark History
Chapter 12: Indescribable Dark History
As long as there were things to do, time would pass quickly.
In the blink of an eye, a month had already passed. Li Qiuchen had rebuilt a safe house, expanding its area by a full five times compared to that broken shed from before. Besides this, he'd also cleared twelve medicinal gardens in the surrounding area, planting different varieties of medicinal herbs respectively.
With the help of the Medicine Master's blessing, these medicinal herbs were growing well. Among them, the first planted Calm Heart Grass and Peaceful Spirit Flowers already had plants that could be harvested for refining medicine.
And not just these low-grade medicinal herbs. He'd even found a hundred-year-old black nightshade tree on the cliff face.
Black nightshade, commonly known as black stars or black sky-sky, was a common roadside herbaceous plant that could grow small black berries with a slightly sweet taste. In mountain villages with harsh material conditions, it was almost equivalent to fruit and deeply loved by children.
Black nightshade itself was a medicinal herb. Black nightshade over a hundred years old could grow to the size of a peach tree. The fruits it bore were as large as pigeon eggs and could already be considered spirit plants but this fruit was poisonous.
Eating too much would produce an effect similar to seeing-hand-blue mushrooms. Hallucinations would appear before one's eyes, and one might even vomit or have diarrhea.
As the saying goes, medicine and poison share the same source. According to records in Li Qiuchen's family's inherited "Wisdom Eye Collection," when cultivating the family's method, taking hundred-year black nightshade fruit helped enhance the power of the Yin-Yang Dharma Eyes.
To see things one shouldn't see.
Li Qiuchen didn't know whether his family's ancestor's brain was normal when writing this medicinal formula, or whether his understanding of medicinal properties had problems.Many pill refiners in the past would make this kind of mistake. For example, mixing mercury into pills, then after eating, treating the mercury poisoning effects as a sign of their successful cultivation but having said that, this hundred-year black nightshade fruit was quite delicious, sweet and sour comparable to big blueberries.
Holding an attitude of "it won't poison me to death anyway, so why not try," Li Qiuchen, according to his ancestor's records in the book, took the nightshade fruit during cultivation. As expected, he saw the bizarre scene of colorful little people holding hands and dancing.
The house was shaking. Branches and leaves grew from his own head. The nightshade tree swayed and danced. The beak-broken white crane shed its feather clothes and transformed into a peerless beauty bathing in the river...
Fortunately, the toxicity in this fruit wasn't strong. Before long, everything returned to normal.
After continuously taking nightshade fruit to cultivate for seven days, Li Qiuchen's eyes developed a new ability.
Hallucination.
Not making himself hallucinate, but whoever saw his eyes would experience hallucinations.
To skillfully master this ability, Li Qiuchen conducted many experiments.
Wild rabbits and squirrels would lose vigilance under his gaze and foolishly run to his feet but if it were changed to wild wolves, he could only maintain it for a few breaths of time, making them walk a few steps toward him before they'd immediately regain consciousness.
As for the white crane...
Li Qiuchen stared at it for quite a while, only getting an inexplicably sideways glance from the white crane in return.
The hallucinatory effect varied from individual to individual. The effect was worse on more powerful creatures. Of course, this was also because Li Qiuchen had just gotten started and hadn't continued to cultivate this ability in depth.
The nightshade tree was covered with fruit. Under the Medicine Master's blessing, the fruits it grow were big and round. Even if eaten as meals every day, they could let Li Qiuchen eat for ten days to half a month.
Considering that he couldn't finish eating all these in a short time, and the fruits would fall and rot after ripening, which was truly a pity, Li Qiuchen decided to make fruit jam.
Over these past days, he'd collected some clay and made a simple stove and some pots and jars with unbearable shapes.
Putting the picked nightshade fruits in a pot, adding other wild fruits and clean water, placing it on the stove to slowly simmer over low heat, before long the air was filled with a sweet fruity fragrance.
The white crane sneakily approached and flapped its wings twice.
The meaning was very obvious.
"It's poisonous."
Li Qiuchen kindly reminded, but what he got in return was a disdainful look.
"Ga!"
Meaning, feed me.
This bird's temperament was very strange. It could forcibly resist the craving and not steal Li Qiuchen's peach wood core, then could accept Li Qiuchen's feeding without any psychological burden.
Just like a wealthy family's young lady, treating the feeding as a servant's service. Who knew how these bad habits were cultivated?
Li Qiuchen scooped up a spoonful of jam with soup and water, blew it cool, then fed it into her mouth.
"Ga!"
Meaning, more.
"How about I just name you Gaga."
Li Qiuchen's subconscious sharp tongue earned him the white crane spreading its wings and an invisible kick.
The white crane refused to accept this humiliating name. Only it could cry "ga ga." If Li Qiuchen dared to randomly "ga ga" in front of it, he would suffer its aerial flying kick.
A full pot of jam. The white crane ate half before being satisfied.
Li Qiuchen silently counted to a hundred in his heart, then saw it begin spinning in place like it was drunk.
The white crane flapped its wings and flew into the sky, crying "ga ga" as it rampaged all over the place, leaving trails of auspicious clouds in the air.
Auspicious clouds... hmm?
Li Qiuchen looked at the long strip-shaped trails of auspicious clouds in the sky and fell into contemplation.
Exactly the same as those ancient paintings he'd seen in his previous life. The ancients truly didn't deceive me.
I told it, it was poisonous.
Producing hallucinations was a manifestation of poisoning. Projectile diarrhea was also a manifestation of poisoning.
Considering it was a bird with dignity, Li Qiuchen decided to bury this scene he'd witnessed in his heart, lest it become angry from embarrassment and go all in, completely tearing off all pretense and setting its sights on his peach wood core.
Animals that cultivated into spirits were relatively tough and resilient. Before, it had clearly already been starved to a stick, but after this month of recuperation, the white crane's body had inflated like it was being pumped with air.
This type of large raptor stood over a person tall when upright, and it ate especially much.
This Gaga he was raising was particularly gluttonous. Not only eating fish, but crayfish, mud snails, toads, and crabs were all fair game.
Today it finally got its comeuppance.
It didn't have the Medicine Master's blessing in Li Qiuchen's body that could absorb and digest the toxins in the nightshade fruit. It struggled for a whole day before completely losing strength by evening.
Who knew whether the toxins had been digested, or whether it had run out of strength from diarrhea.
With fruit jam, Li Qiuchen began dreaming of bread at night.
Even without bread, steamed buns would do.
Since escaping from the village until now, he still hadn't eaten any grain-based foods.
Eating roasted fish and boiled wild vegetables all day with no carbohydrates made his stomach very uncomfortable.
The wild was full of foxtail grass everywhere. It was said this thing was millet's ancestor. But just thinking about how this thing would need to be dried, dehulled, and ground into flour after growing... Li Qiuchen lost the idea of trying.
Too troublesome. Might as well go out and steal some.
Considering that he'd now learned a new skill, and it was even a noble control skill, Li Qiuchen's heart was a bit restless.
He prepared to explore a distance downstream along the river to see if he could discover traces of human activity.
Think and do.
The next morning, Li Qiuchen shouldered his pack, picked up his wooden stick, and brought along the white crane that had recovered a bit of strength. Actually, he didn't want to bring it, but if he didn't bring it along, this stupid bird that couldn't feed itself would starve itself to death.
After a month of cultivation, Li Qiuchen's strength had increased considerably.
Children who grew up in the mountains were naturally tough. Back then, he and Hong Yang could run over ten li of mountain paths in one breath. Now Li Qiuchen felt that walking over thirty li along the riverbank in one day would be no problem.
As for the white crane, there was even less need to worry. Only its beak was broken. Its wings weren't broken. However, somewhat beyond Li Qiuchen's expectations, he walked continuously for three days, and both banks were actually uninhabited wilderness.
So just how remote was Songlin Village?
The white crane flew a circle in the sky, descended, and excitedly cried "ga ga" loudly.
Li Qiuchen completely didn't understand what it wanted to express, but felt it should have found something.
Walking forward another distance, his view suddenly opened up.
Here was a lake. Roughly calculating, the area should be about several thousand square meters. The lake surface was quiet and deep, without a single ripple. The surrounding area was covered in green grass like a carpet, like a fairyland.
In the world before transmigrating, this would at least count as a 4A-level scenic spot.
Very suitable for a peerless expert to live in seclusion here.
Li Qiuchen temporarily didn't have this confidence yet.
Everywhere by the lake were wild beast footprints. He could also see rope traps left by hunters. With traces of human handiwork, it meant this place wasn't far from a settlement.
Li Qiuchen looked at the sky and decided to stay here tonight. Tomorrow he'd continue forward.
He wasn't yet psychologically prepared to contact people from outside. Who knew what tricks villages in these mountains had? What if he encountered another old peach tree? That would be a big problem.
Finding a dry place and preparing to start the daily cultivation routine, Li Qiuchen was just about to enter concentration when from the corner of his eye he suddenly saw the white crane standing by the lake, observing something.
Probably seeing something delicious again.
Li Qiuchen didn't pay attention to it and entered cultivation on his own.
With the moon rising above the branches, Li Qiuchen was suddenly kicked awake by a claw. Opening his eyes, he saw the white crane lean close to him, desperately making faces, signaling him to look toward the lake.
Li Qiuchen looked along its line of sight and immediately widened his eyes.
Tonight the moon was bright and stars were sparse. The sky was brilliant with starlight.
The ground was likewise brilliant with starlight.
All along the lakeshore were twinkling little stars.
Li Qiuchen focused his gaze and observed carefully, only then discovering that they were actually river clams as big as palms. In the deep of night, they crawled onto shore, opened their shells, and silently absorbed the moon's essence.
Those twinkling little stars were the reflection of pearls inside the clam shells!
We're rich!
The first reaction in Li Qiuchen's mind was, if he dug out all these pearls and found channels to sell them, wouldn't he achieve financial freedom? Then he could buy two bowls of soy milk, drink one and pour out the other...
Just as he was happily envisioning beautiful future dreams, the white crane picked up a small pebble from the ground and threw it at one of the large river clams.
With just a "pa da" sound, the starlight instantly extinguished.
Li Qiuchen just watched as that river clam turned into a rock completely devoid of life force right before his eyes.
He was silent for two seconds, turned his head, and met the white crane's gaze.
"Is this how your beak got clamped?"