Chapter Twenty-Nine: New Harvest

Under the cover of night, Chen Jin set out for the same village as before. Practitioners possessed boundless energy, so traveling overnight meant little to them; journeying in the dead of night was of no consequence, and Chen Jin was no exception.

He obeyed Ge Hong’s instructions without question. After all, this elder brother was formidable—not only older than him, but also more advanced in cultivation and blessed with a sharper mind. What else could he do but follow orders dutifully? There was no need to think of himself as fate’s chosen one or heaven’s favored child. People like Ge Hong were the true movers and shakers of their era. It was a pity he chose the path of cultivation; had he been inclined toward government, perhaps the Ge family would have become as illustrious as the celebrated Wang clan.

In fact, it seemed that all practitioners of this era were possessed of keen intellects, or perhaps only those with sharp minds could become practitioners at all. Achieving the state of Tranquil Thought already meant one’s wisdom and memory far surpassed the common man; such a person, among ordinary folk, could well be a strategist on the level of Zhuge Liang.

No, Chen Jin was not boasting about himself. Though he had his share of cunning, it was only average by worldly standards. He felt he did not even match up to his parents, which explained how they had managed to build such a large corporation. Everyone in his family was clever—except, perhaps, his younger sister, whose mind seemed a bit lacking; the others were all quite bright…

“What nonsense am I thinking?” Chen Jin chided himself.

As he walked, he began to move with the Yu Step, silently reciting the Metal Essence Formula in his heart.

When he combined the Yu Step with the Metal Essence Formula, he felt a coolness spread across his skin as the vital energies of heaven and earth surged into his body through every pore, swiftly enhancing his constitution.

Yet when he simply sat in meditation, practicing the Metal Essence Formula, he could only draw in the world’s energies through nose and mouth; much of what he inhaled was exhaled again, leaving but a scant residue within him—far less, at least ten times less, than what he gained by walking with the Yu Step and chanting the formula.

Though Chen Jin now occupied Xinyang’s body, the energies he absorbed entered Xinyang’s flesh, but ultimately, when he returned to reality, the energies would become his own. Thus, he needed this vital essence all the more.

“I should walk with the Yu Step more often,” Chen Jin thought.

Then again, the Yu Step looked remarkably like a shaman’s dance—no, it was a shaman’s dance, truly. But to gain more of the world’s essence, a little shamanic dancing was a small price to pay. He would not remain long in this world; soon he would return, and if anyone witnessed and laughed at him, so be it—it was not as if they could laugh forever.

Still, he wondered whether, upon returning to reality, the Yu Step and Metal Essence Formula would yield the same results.

In the real world, the air was so foul that once, after trying a breathing exercise (without the Yu Step), he felt as though his lungs had been injured—deeply uncomfortable. After that, he took to eating more dishes from the Wang Family Restaurant.

Most modern practitioners had only begun their cultivation journeys three years ago, when the vital energies of heaven and earth were much as they are now. They started by strengthening their own blood and energy, not relying on the abundance of worldly essence. Some speculated that the ability to cultivate was unrelated to the density of these energies—at least at the start. But after crossing that threshold, progress did depend on the world’s essence. Yet in modern times, the essence was scarce, so practitioners used the energy contained in food to aid their cultivation, as well as collecting herbs and refining elixirs.

Chen Jin pictured himself in the modern world, treading the Yu Step, reciting the Metal Essence Formula, and taking great bites of the Wang Family Restaurant’s roast suckling pig…

But the world’s essence was slowly reviving. Chen Jin recalled a file he’d seen in an online group: an official survey by the Practitioners’ Association charted the spatial distribution of the world’s vital energies across the country. Over the past three years, levels had grown from nothing to abundance, with the most dramatic increases in the East Sea and South Sea regions. Abroad, the sharpest rises were recorded at the North and South Poles.

In Fujian Province, where Chen Jin lived, the city of Minxi had seen the most rapid rise in vital energies, yet it was the least populated with practitioners. Some group members constantly joked about “occupying” Minxi and taking up residence there.

Lost in thought, Chen Jin arrived at the ruined Daoist temple. He did not head straight for the Lan family village, because, within Xinyang’s vast memories, he had discovered something relevant to the temple.

He stepped inside, forming a seal with his hands and widening his eyes.

Standing before the wall where the portraits of the Three Pure Ones had once hung, he pressed the seal against the plaster.

Immediately, hundreds of tiny glimmers lit up the dim temple, gathering around his hand and merging into the wall.

Then, a faint blue-green sword mark appeared—like a child had scrawled on the wall with a glow pen, but Chen Jin knew better. This was no childish doodle; it was Xinyang’s spirit power, transforming his flying sword from solid to immaterial and embedding it within the wall by supernatural means.

The secret behind this, Chen Jin had recorded, but could not yet comprehend. Only after reaching the next level of cultivation would he grasp its mysteries; for now, he memorized the process as if learning formulas by rote, to understand later.

Still, this allowed him to glimpse the path ahead.

Gazing at the sword’s imprint, Chen Jin could not help but curse Xinyang for being so roundabout—would it not have been simpler to keep the sword close at hand? Yet, he would not refuse such an inheritance.

It was like grumbling about the cook while still reaching for the bowl.

He began to recite the incantation to summon the sword.

At the same time, he cut his right index and middle fingers, pressing them together to let the blood flow freely.

He pressed his right hand against the wall, chanting the spell while tracing intricate sigils.

These were not random scrawls, but the ancient Cloud Script—a system devised by early practitioners who studied the movement of clouds and the heavens, capable of channeling the world’s energies.

The sigil Chen Jin traced was specifically meant to summon Xinyang’s flying sword, in concert with the incantation.

It was fortunate indeed that Chen Jin now possessed Xinyang’s body, for the summoning required Xinyang’s own blood.

As the wall became covered in sigils drawn with his blood, a crisp sound rang out—a hiltless, razor-sharp sword dropped from thin air to the ground.

His luck, it seemed, had not run out yet.

…