Qin Chuan looked at the young girl and vaguely saw in her the shadow of his younger sister, Qin Kui. He could not bear to let her help with heavy work.
“The things are heavy. I’ll do it myself.”
As he spoke, he briskly unloaded the items from the cart one by one.
Fortunately, though he had spent many years bitterly studying the classics, he had never neglected farm labor. Added to that, he had drawn qi into his body yesterday, and his strength far surpassed that of ordinary people. Even with a one-foot-tall stone lion hidden in the wicker basket on his back, not the slightest trace of fatigue showed in his movements.
“Then I’ll help you carry some of the lighter things,” He Qingxuan said softly, her voice gentle and delicate.
The few of them entered the courtyard together and moved the luggage into Qin Chuan’s room.
“This little courtyard has seven rooms in total. We live in the three main rooms ourselves, one is the kitchen, and the remaining three have all been rented out. The tenants in the other two rooms are not here during the day. You’ll be able to meet them in the evening.”
Teacher He introduced things from the side in a warm voice.
Once Qin Chuan was more or less settled, Qin Li said, “You know where your Third Uncle’s home is. If you run into any difficulties, come find me at any time. Since everything here is in order, I’ll head back first. I have to go on duty tomorrow as well.”
“I’ll see you out.” As Qin Chuan spoke, he escorted his third uncle to the courtyard gate.
Not long after he returned to his room, He Qingxuan’s clear voice came from outside the door:
“Brother Qin Chuan, after dinner tonight, remember to come to my house to watch the Xuanguang Mirror.”
“All right, I definitely will.”
Qin Chuan answered.
He had not expected that even after entering the city, the identity of a Daoist would still be so highly regarded.
After tidying the room simply, he finally had a chance to be alone, with no one around and complete quiet.
He stepped lightly to the door and peered out through the crack. Seeing no one in the courtyard, he took the stone lion out from the wicker basket and gently pressed his palm against it.
The stone beneath his palm was rough and cool to the touch.
In an instant, the Tianyun Furnace in his mind trembled slightly, already imprinting its form and spirit within.
【Item: Stone Lion】
【A stone lion that has guarded a residence for many years. Due to long-term exposure to its master’s inhaling and exhaling of the spiritual qi of heaven and earth, it contains Dharma-nature and holds the cultivation method of the Thirteen Transformations of Startling Spirit. One cultivation technique may be extracted, or it may be returned to the furnace and refined into 1 point of pure Dharma essence.】
Qin Chuan’s thoughts turned rapidly.
His original intention had merely been to try the Tianyun Furnace’s second function, “returning to the furnace.” He had not expected that this stone lion would actually contain a cultivation technique as well.
The Thirteen Transformations of Startling Spirit!
The name alone felt extraordinary and imposing.
After some thought, he immediately decided to choose to extract the cultivation technique.
“Extract.”
【The furnace master has chosen extraction. Estimated time required: one hour.】
The moment his thought stirred, his palm suddenly became scalding hot. Deep within his consciousness, the Tianyun Furnace burst into raging flames with a轰, turning red-hot in the blink of an eye.
Clang!
A muffled sound suddenly rang out as the furnace lid was lifted, and ten thousand streams of light surged forth, transforming into a radiant passage of text.
“This time, it’s actually this fast?”
He was puzzled. They were both items “worth 1 point of Dharma essence,” so why had the last one taken three hours, while this one only required one?
And he did not feel as exhausted as he had last time.
Could it truly be as he had guessed—that the speed of extraction was greatly related to the strength of his own physique?
Although he had only sixty-four spirit particles within his body at present, he had, after all, already drawn qi into his body and stepped onto the Dao path. The gap between him and an ordinary mortal was ultimately as vast as cloud and mud.
Before he could think further, the words formed from the rain of light spread slowly through his mind like an unfurling silk scroll.
【Thirteen Transformations of Startling Spirit】
【A method for cultivating divine sense created by Daoist Sipu, divided into thirteen levels in total. With each level completed, the strength of one’s divine sense doubles. If cultivated to the perfection of the thirteenth level, one’s divine sense can reach thirteen times that of an ordinary person.
This technique is extremely easy to enter. Even the dullest of people can cultivate the first level within one or two years, with almost no threshold.
However, once one begins cultivation, there is no path of retreat. One must break through to the next level within the prescribed number of years. Otherwise, the continuous doubling of divine sense may charge straight onward, break through the Niwan, and lead to qi deviation.
This stone lion once belonged to Daoist Sipu’s old residence. It is deeply imbued with the Dharma-nature of the Thirteen Transformations of Startling Spirit and contains the complete cultivation of the first level.】
Boom—
Qin Chuan felt a mass of pure Dharma-nature explode in his mind, swiftly nourishing his soul and sea of consciousness.
In an instant, his five senses and six perceptions became twice as sharp, and the strength of his divine sense actually surged to double what it had been before!
“So I’ve already cultivated the first level of the Thirteen Transformations of Startling Spirit?”
He opened his eyes in disbelief, carefully experiencing the transformation of his divine sense.
His thoughts had become exceptionally nimble. The speed at which ideas rose and flowed was more than twice as fast as before.
It was as if his entire sea of consciousness had undergone a complete rebirth, and his ability to deduce and calculate had greatly increased.
Qin Chuan curiously savored the changes in his divine sense.
And the most direct way to test the strength of one’s divine sense was naturally to cultivate through breathing and absorption—the stronger the divine sense, the faster one could sense, capture, and refine the spiritual qi of heaven and earth.
He immediately sat down cross-legged. Relying on the “talisman document” in his robes, his mind sank into that world brimming with spiritual qi, and he began breathing and absorbing.
“The abundance and density of spiritual qi in Jiuchuan County City is indeed just as Third Uncle said—several dozen times greater than in the countryside!”
At this moment, in his “eyes,” within that world that resembled a gray-black photographic negative, the spiritual qi particles drifting in the surrounding air were dense as mist, as clouds.
Compared to the thin spiritual qi environment of the countryside, the difference was nothing less than the gulf between heaven and abyss.
Within Teacher He’s courtyard, the points of spiritual qi shone like countless stars, too numerous to count, while in the rural wilds, there had only been a few scattered specks, sparse and easily distinguished.
If one focused more closely, one could discover that these spiritual qi particles, vast as stars, were mostly seeping up from deep within the earth, as though the earth itself were breathing in slow, profound breaths.
“Beneath the ground here must be the spiritual vein on which Jiuchuan County City depends.”
A thought flashed through Qin Chuan’s mind:
“This is only a civilian residence outside the wards. I wonder what the spiritual qi must be like inside the market ward, and in those high-grade cave residences Third Uncle once mentioned. How magnificent a sight would that be?”
After his thoughts turned, he gathered his mind and focused on testing the strength of his divine sense, beginning to swallow and absorb spiritual qi particles.
Whoosh—
In that infinitesimal realm invisible to mortals, densely packed spiritual qi particles seemed to encounter a vortex upon the sea. They were stirred and torn by an invisible force, helplessly drawn toward the depths of that whirlpool.
That whirlpool was the “great mouth” formed from Qin Chuan’s divine sense, swallowing like a whale drinking the sea, seizing freely and wantonly.
With one “swallow,” Qin Chuan abruptly opened his eyes, unable to conceal his astonishment.
“Eighty-eight particles?”
Yesterday, over an entire night in the countryside, he had only accumulated sixty-four spirit particles. Yet just now, with a single round of breathing and absorption, he had directly taken in eighty-eight particles!
“This…”
He quickly suppressed the shock in his heart and calmed down.
“Such a terrifying cultivation speed is certainly related to the difference in spiritual qi between city and countryside, but the ‘cultivation acceleration’ brought about by the doubling of divine sense is the main reason.”
After all, he could clearly and truly feel the difference in difficulty between moving spiritual qi the two times.
Last night, moving each particle had been like carrying water along a mountain road—rugged and difficult. Halfway through, he had even needed to rest. It had taken roughly the time of one incense stick to absorb a single particle into his body.
Now, it was like driving a water tanker down a broad, open road. Not only was it effortless, the efficiency was astonishing.
“So this is the benefit brought by the doubling of divine sense?”