Though Lin Donglai had already brought two mu of Blood Marrow Rice to harvest, and the two mu of Kidney Essence Grass were nearly ready, the Spirit Plant Hall's examination standards for a Rank-One Low-Grade Spirit Plant Master also required learning a spirit plant spell. Otherwise, one would only count as a spirit farmer, not a spirit plant master.
Thus, after harvesting the Blood Marrow Rice, Lin Donglai devoted most of his energy to cultivation.
His Yang Five Elements cultivation had already cycled through Earth, Water, and Wood.
However, in a short span of time, he had squeezed massive amounts of essence blood from his own body and refined it into fetal breath, and he had already reached his limit.
The Peiyuan Breathing Chicken stew was something he could not afford. During this period of tending the spirit fields, Lin Donglai simply could not get away; his only income was the monthly stipend of two spirit stones, of which he now had only four remaining—and those too were reserved for planting the remaining spirit herbs.
The rice straw from the Blood Marrow Rice was bundled up. Immortal seedlings of the "Husbandry" art among the Hundred Arts had already come to Spirit Field Valley to place orders. All that rice straw together was worth half a spirit stone, and the spirit soybeans Lin Donglai had planted on the field ridges were also worth half a spirit stone—altogether they could sell for one spirit stone.
From the days of setting out full of hope for immortal cultivation, to now toiling in the fields like an old farmer—more than a year had passed, in truth.
Lin Donglai could only sigh: "The spirit stone stipend comes down and falls into our pockets, only to be spent in the blink of an eye. Those with talent don't need it."
"Those without talent bustle about all day on sect missions, thinking about learning an art, thinking about staying in the sect and not being banished to the lower courtyard."
After hulling the Blood Marrow Rice, Lin Donglai invited Ding Zhen over and cooked a pot of spirit rice porridge: "Here, try the first batch of spirit rice I grew."
These days, Ding Zhen had been cultivating two arts side by side: spirit cuisine and artifact-forging blacksmithing. As for spirit cuisine, however, he only attended lectures, without any opportunity to practice.
As for artifact-forging, he couldn't learn anything proper either. The outer-sect senior brothers of the Artifact Refinement Hall simply had them hammering ore endlessly—beating pig iron into refined iron, and refined iron into spirit steel.
Gulping down the spirit porridge, Ding Zhen sighed, "It's been over a year since I came to the immortal sect. When will I ever see the light at the end of the tunnel?"
Since blacksmithing required infusing spiritual power into pig iron, the consumption was enormous. Once his power was spent, he had to sit in meditation to recover—and through this, his cultivation had actually improved. He had reached Qi Refining Second Layer before Lin Donglai and begun cultivating the artifact refinement spell *Spirit Forging Art*, though he had never managed to grasp its fundamentals.
"Keep cultivating, keep learning, use every means to improve your craft. Accumulate it day by day, and you will surely become an artifact refiner."
"The sect plainly doesn't need low-grade artifact refiners—only laborers to hammer iron. Artifact refinement is one of the Four Arts, and even those with good spirit root aptitude will choose to cultivate another art alongside it."
Ding Zhen had already grown somewhat weary of blacksmithing. The Artifact Refinement Hall was not friendly to beginners like them, and he had begun to wallow in self-pity.
"Those outer-sect elders of the Artifact Refinement Hall only teach the talented ones seriously. The untalented are fit for nothing but hammering iron. If you so much as glance at how they refine a magical artifact, you'll get shouted at!"
"It'd be better to farm like you—far more carefree. The Spirit Plant Hall surely doesn't have so much scheming and infighting."
"Maybe the Spirit Plant Hall is much the same. Perhaps I just got lucky and met a senior sister who's easy to get along with."
Lin Donglai felt that what Ding Zhen lacked was a goal, so he said at once, "How about this: find a way to learn the refinement method for the Earth-Shaking Spirit Hoe magical artifact, and forge one for me."
"Even if you can't get access to the materials for refining magical artifacts, you can start by trying to repair broken ones. You can't just sit here waiting for the end."
"There are still eight months. If you can forge such a spirit hoe, you'll surely qualify as a Rank-One Low-Grade Artifact Refiner—that's the exact standard the Artifact Refinement Hall uses to recruit outer-sect disciples."
"If you ask me, if you can't learn from the elders, then be sweeter with your words. I'll give you a bag of spirit rice. Carry it with you and ask the ordinary disciples of the Artifact Refinement Hall to give you some pointers."
"There's always a way. Otherwise, after the two-year immortal seedling period ends, if we haven't mastered a single art, we truly won't have any path forward."
Hearing this, Ding Zhen saw the light at once. He gave Lin Donglai a deep bow and said with exaggerated flair, "Many thanks, Fellow Daoist, for pointing out the way!"
Then they exchanged a smile and turned to critiquing the Blood Marrow Rice porridge: "This rice is tasty, tasty indeed, but it seems to nourish qi and blood. After eating it, your body feels warm, but it doesn't contain much spiritual qi. Even after circulating my cultivation art, it doesn't increase my spiritual power by so much as a single thread in half a day."
Lin Donglai nodded. "You hammer iron, I till the fields—we both do labor that eats at our strength. This rice is cheap and can nourish the spirit."
"Next year, when I become a full spirit plant master, I'll grow better things—varieties with more spiritual qi, and more of them. This time I only planted two mu in total, and harvested less than eighty jin."
"Deal! I'll be waiting for your rice, then!"
The two chatted a while longer, rekindling their fighting spirit for cultivation and their hopes and expectations for the future.
Speaking of which—Lin Donglai had previously borrowed five spirit stones from Xue Hong, but Xue Hong had already broken through to Qi Refining Third Layer some time ago. Before the immortal seedling examination, he was expected to reach the mid stage of Qi Refining, and had already been designated internally as a disciple of an elder of Purple Lightning Peak.
When Ding Zhen went to repay the spirit stones, he didn't even get to see him—he only met the menial servants specially assigned to Xue Hong by Purple Lightning Peak.
After eating his fill, Ding Zhen took ten jin of Blood Marrow Rice to give as a gift, but left behind two spirit stones, meant for Lin Donglai to buy seeds with.
Lin Donglai sighed as he put away the spirit stones, then drank up all the remaining porridge in one go and, for the first time in a long while, began cultivating the Tendon-Changing and Marrow-Cleansing Stake Method.
From Lin Donglai's spirit marrow, which had supposedly been squeezed dry of essence blood, a few more drops were wrung out under the stake practice.
Fortunately, Blood Marrow Rice existed precisely to nourish the spirit marrow and nourish essence blood.
A wave of heat began repairing this deficit—slowly, to be sure, but better than nothing as before.
When noon arrived, Lin Donglai began cultivating the Bingwu Yang-Gathering Art once more.
This time, though there was again the sensation of burning wood, he had already cultivated the Earth and Water elements beforehand, so it was much milder—instead, there was a warm, pleasant feeling.
Earth flourishes wood; wood burns without being consumed—precisely the image of a blazing, radiant torch.
When wood is consumed, it absorbs water and earth; but the earth produced by its burning, in turn, replenishes the earth that was absorbed.
So what was slightly depleted was actually the Water element—like a lamp lit in oil.
Fortunately, the coming fire-attribute fetal breath would require only two portions, and the following metal-attribute fetal breath only one. This Blood Marrow Rice was absolutely sufficient.
In the days that followed, apart from tending the spirit fields—preparing to harvest the Kidney Essence Grass when spring arrived, and to plant two other spirit herbs that could only be planted in spring—Lin Donglai spent the rest of his time condensing essence blood and refining vital essence.
In this manner, in just half a month, Lin Donglai had already planted two strands of fire-element fetal breath within his inner-scene heart.
He began cultivating the last element of the Five Elements Qi-Gathering Method: the Metal Element Qi-Gathering Method.
Completing the link of Metal begetting Water: fire spiritual power consumes wood, wood consumes water and earth, earth is both destroyed and generated in turn, and only kidney water and heart fire stand locked in stalemate—though kidney water holds four portions, it is boiled and evaporated away by the two of heart fire. Completing this one point of lung metal would make the Five Elements whole, the Five Elements mutually begetting.
The inner-scene fertile field could then be opened this very day, and the spirit root dao seed would have a place to take root.
The essence blood had already been prepared in advance.
Slowly, at the hour of Shen on that day, Lin Donglai faced west and cultivated the Gengshen Metal-Gathering Art, surrounded by ordinary iron ore that Ding Zhen had brought out from the Artifact Refinement Hall.
Metal overcoming wood flared up at once, like an axe cleaving into timber. Lin Donglai felt his lungs itch, and in the next moment, he spat out a clot of bloody phlegm.
But immediately after, Earth, Water, Wood, Fire, Metal—the Five Elements Qi-Gathering Method began to circulate.
The Five Elements balanced: fifteen in all, the aspect of flourishing wood.
Wood begets Fire, Fire begets Earth, Earth begets Metal, Metal begets Water, Water begets Wood.
With Wood as the beginning, and Earth as the central mother of the Five Elements.
Vaguely, as Lin Donglai gazed upon his inner scene, he seemed to glimpse a verdant seed growing upon a cliff face imbued with the nature of metal and iron—yet its roots ran deep and firm. Watersed by rain, scorched by the sun, it endured stubbornly, unrelenting, until at last it became a towering giant tree.
As the metal-element essence qi merged with the fetal breath and was planted into his lungs—
The fetal breath of the Five Elements, all complete!
The foundation of the fertile field was established!
The spirit root dao seed, suspended in nameless void, gave rise to a thought of "yearning."
And the transformation of the inner scene began!