Medicine Master Disciple’s Cultivation Notes

Chapter 170: The Carp Leaps Through the Dragon Gate, the Peach Blossoms Open

An explosion.

Even with Li Qiuchen's caution in taking only a small bite rather than the entire peach wood core, the life essence concentrated in that single mouthful almost detonated his body on the spot.

An ordinary person would genuinely have come apart.

That was the stored life essence of a Golden Core realm Medicine Master's blessing carrier.

A foolish bird had once eaten a single bite and been brought back from the brink of death, and that was in a state where it lacked the Medicine Master's blessing and couldn't fully absorb it.

Li Qiuchen's Medicine Master's blessing could absorb and convert this life essence at one hundred percent efficiency, without the slightest waste.

At this moment, waste would actually have been preferable.

Li Qiuchen exhaled a labored breath. Scorching air poured from his mouth and hit the bare-limbed old poplar tree in the courtyard.

The poplar tree gave a faint shiver. Every remaining yellow leaf fell away in an instant, and countless fresh green branches and leaves grew back across the canopy. In the midst of the cold autumn wind, the tree had found a second spring.

He had paid too much... no, eaten too much.Li Qiuchen had no choice but to activate the Withered Wood Technique and help his meridians absorb this terrifying life essence together.

His Withered Wood Technique had already reached the fourth level. One more step and the fifth level would mark the Qi Refining great completion, touching the threshold of Foundation Establishment.

The newborn Elixir Viscera, by comparison, was like a kindergartener standing before its senior Withered Wood Technique counterpart, and promptly handed over every lollipop... that is, every drop of energy in its vicinity.

Fifth level!

The life essence held in the peach wood core drove the Withered Wood Technique through another transformation, advancing it to the fifth level.

Every one of Li Qiuchen's forty-eight thousand pores opened simultaneously. Turbid energy poured out. The green shoots that had burst from every acupuncture point across his body fell away on their own, taking with them countless woody fiber-converted body cells.

The Withered Wood Technique resonated faintly, sending perfectly refreshed new cells surging throughout his body, rebuilding the damage from the inside out.

At this same moment, the meridians within Li Qiuchen completed their initial rebirth phase, manifesting within him in a form resembling bands of seven-colored luminous glass.

This was the effect of consuming the seven-colored lotus flower. In the eyes of an ancient cultivator, it would have represented seven distinct spiritual root attributes, corresponding to the five elements, wind, and thunder.

But this seven-colored radiance lasted only a moment before it dissolved, replaced by a crystalline rose-colored luminescence like peach blossoms.

Five elements unified, heaven and earth merged, primal energy undivided. This was what ancient cultivators had passed down in spoken tradition as the heavenly root.

Though it only resembled one. In practical terms the Elixir Viscera was not a cultivation aptitude but a bodily organ.

As Li Qiuchen watched, the Elixir Viscera began to breathe.

In that moment he felt as though the entire world was pressing down on him from every direction.

Like someone from a high-altitude plateau suddenly arriving at sea level, briefly intoxicated by the abundance of oxygen.

So this was what it felt like to run a classic game on cutting-edge hardware.

Yes. The moment the Elixir Viscera began breathing, Li Qiuchen ran a test of his Withered Wood Technique and found that its operating efficiency had risen tenfold without any additional effort.

And this tenfold increase was only the limit of the Withered Wood Technique, not the limit of the Elixir Viscera.

What kind of hardship had he been putting himself through all this time?

No wonder present-day cultivators looked down on the so-called ancient cultivation methods practiced in the common world. The gap was simply too great.

After calming down, Li Qiuchen began to think.

The pool was this shallow, and he had gotten a gold card on the first draw. Somehow there was no sense of achievement in it.

What if he ran two more pulls for good measure?

Besides, the standard starting point was at least nine Grand Heavenly Circuits, and he had finished on the second day. If word got out, would it look too conspicuous?

He could spend a few more days in seclusion. The two young misses had started their new round of illusory realm challenges anyway, and wouldn't need him much.

As for the risk of failure in subsequent attempts...

Li Qiuchen looked at the peach wood core in his hand, barely consumed, and smiled with perfect composure.

No matter. He could afford to keep paying.

He settled his breath and adjusted to optimal condition, then opened his acupuncture points again and entered the embryonic breathing state.

Twelve two-hour periods slipped silently by.

The second day.

The third day...

Until nine days had passed.

With the deep autumn's first light snowfall drifting down without a sound, in a courtyard lush with vegetation that looked as dense as summer, Li Qiuchen, buried within a mass of branches and vines, opened his eyes again.

He looked at the peach wood core still more than half full in his hand, and simply put all of it into his mouth.

A pale green spirit flame rich with the fragrance of living wood erupted from every acupuncture point across his body. Countless roots plunged deep into the ground. A thick tree trunk grew up from the Withered Wood Technique cultivated along his spine, and in a matter of moments had become a flourishing peach tree dense with branches and leaves.

Hundreds and thousands of peach blossoms opened in competition. The cold wind swept through, and an endless drift of soft pink petals covered nearly every inch of ground in the courtyard.

Small green peach fruits emerged from beneath the leaves, gradually swelling larger, turning pale, their skins flushing with a faint blush of red.

Daoist Zhang appeared at the courtyard gate at some point without Li Qiuchen having heard him approach. He raised a hand and caught a petal drifting out from within the courtyard. A look of uncertain astonishment crossed his face.

"He cultivated a second-grade Elixir Viscera directly? What is this creature? It's not some old soul reincarnated, or a body that's been taken over, is it?"

It wasn't that he had never seen this kind of prodigy before. It was simply that Yun County was so remote a location. What natural feng shui could this place possibly hold to produce a talent like this?

A mental examination had been conducted previously, and the boy's spiritual consciousness showed no signs of irregularity. But even so...

The corners of Daoist Zhang's mouth twitched, threatening to rise, repeatedly suppressed back down by an act of will.

Calm. Keep level. Don't let it show.

This boy was too sharp. If he saw his master looking like someone who had never witnessed anything like this, that tail of his would shoot straight up to the sky.

Self-confidence was a necessary quality in every exceptional talent, but pride could become the poison that destroyed exceptional talent.

He had to make sure this boy understood that there were always greater heights and greater people beyond what he could see. There was absolutely no room for complacency over one temporary advancement...

Seeing that the unusual phenomena within the courtyard had settled, Daoist Zhang cleared his throat, assumed his appropriate bearing, and gently pushed the gate open.

"Little Qiuchen..."

The old poplar tree that had regained its vitality was gone from the courtyard. In its place stood a vigorous and flourishing peach tree.

The young man in his disheveled clothing stood beneath the tree, his expression thoughtful, contemplating his own hands.

Li Qiuchen was using the Yin-Yang Dharma Eyes to examine the changes in his meridians.

The color of the meridians hadn't changed, but from the sensory experience alone, they had unquestionably surpassed the first-grade Elixir Viscera by an enormous margin.

The outcome was a success. But the process left him puzzled.

It had been too easy.

Well, he would admit he had paid something.

And his ancestor's foundation had done a great deal of work on his behalf.

But something still felt off.

How to describe this feeling. It was like the feedback you got from hitting an enemy with a weapon in a game.

He hadn't felt the impact he should have felt. One swing, and the enemy had been instantly deleted.

Where was the resistance? Where was the sound effect? Where was the controller vibration?

None of it.

Running nine Grand Heavenly Circuits, the hardest part for Li Qiuchen hadn't been the pain of meridian rebirth at all. It had been the loneliness and emptiness of the long and tedious waiting.

If maintaining the sitting position and the embryonic breathing state hadn't been mandatory, he would have been tempted to pick up a stick and play five-in-a-row in the dirt.

The Medicine Master...

The Medicine Master!

A thought flashed through Li Qiuchen's mind and suddenly everything made sense.

When he had discovered that his Hundred-Fruit Immortal Brew was unusually potent, he had discussed it with Senior Brother Yang.

Senior Brother Yang had said at the time that the footsteps of the Medicine Master were drawing closer to this world, so the effects of the Medicine Master's blessing would grow stronger and stronger, and everything related to the Medicine Master would begin to change.

The Elixir Viscera he had just cultivated... in honesty, Li Qiuchen felt it had an unmistakably deep connection to the Medicine Master.

Had the difficulty of cultivating an Elixir Viscera decreased for everyone?

Or was it only for Medicine Master blessing carriers that the difficulty was dramatically lower than for their peers?

This question could only be put to Senior Brother Murong Feng. Asking anyone else would just make them think he was showing off.

A student who scored a perfect one hundred on the end-of-year exam asking the teacher if the questions were too easy?

That was pure provocation.

Hearing the sound from the gate, Li Qiuchen suddenly snapped alert.

Right. He had a master now.

Why was he sitting here puzzling through this on his own?

"Master..."

"Little Qiuchen, I can see that you're a motivated and hardworking student, but you don't need to push yourself this hard. The cultivation path rewards accumulation. If you charge ahead without pause and don't build a proper foundation, problems will emerge down the line."

Daoist Zhang said with an earnest expression, "Your aptitude is genuinely excellent. But it's only here in Yun County that you stand out quite so prominently. In the wider world, outstanding young talents are plentiful as fish in a river. There are countless others at your level, and perhaps beyond it. So whatever you do, don't become complacent."

Li Qiuchen stared.

What was this person talking about?

Which eye of his had detected any complacency?

"Master, I..."

"Be humble. Keep a low profile!"

Daoist Zhang pressed both hands on Li Qiuchen's shoulders, and said in a lowered voice, "Don't tell anyone outside about the second-grade Elixir Viscera. Your master knowing is enough. Not even family members. Human hearts are treacherous. One can never be too careful."

As if I'd go around announcing it to everyone.

Li Qiuchen said helplessly, "Master's guidance is well taken. Your student will certainly follow these instructions, remain humble and low-key, and focus on cultivation."

"Actually, no need."

"Pardon?"

"I mean there's no need to rush your cultivation. Rest a while. Relax properly. The Hongwen Hall isn't going anywhere. What's the hurry? Have you been to Xinghua Pavilion yet? Do you know what kind of place it is?"

Li Qiuchen stared.

Am I supposed to know, or not know?

Daoist Zhang laughed. "You're just far too dedicated to studying. Not much in the way of entertainment in your life, is there? That really won't do. Everything needs balance. Once you've rested up, your master will take you out to see some scenery, visit some elders, and make a few friends."

This attitude of his master's was actually starting to make Li Qiuchen feel a little uncertain about himself.

"Master, if cultivation progresses too quickly, what specifically goes wrong?"

"If your cultivation is too high, those shameless old characters will find excuses not to give you a proper big red envelope."

So it was all about the red envelopes after all.

[NEXT CHAPTER]