Chapter Thirty: Steadying the Breath

The sword was two feet long, without a hilt, and razor-sharp.

Chen Jin picked it up and held it before his eyes. On both sides of the blade, two characters were carved: Tiger Fang.

These characters were inscribed in cloudy seal script, imbued with a touch of mysticism. Moreover, this flying sword had been personally forged and refined by Xinyang; it was the vessel of his Tao.

Chen Jin himself was fond of swords... though, something about this felt off. Truth be told, while he liked swords, he wasn’t particularly fond of this flying sword’s design. After all, Chen Jin believed that wielding a sword was all about looking impressive.

More importantly, he couldn’t yet control a sword with his mind—he hadn’t reached the state of concentration; he wasn’t even at the first stage of energy cultivation, so even the simplest sword maneuvers were out of reach.

Still, he would eventually have use for this flying sword. Chen Jin believed he could break through to the stage of focused energy in this world—then he’d be able to wield it. He also wanted to see whether things he recognized as his own here would follow him back to reality.

Well, come to think of it, he’d also picked up Ge Hong’s Hundred Herbs Staff...

He wrapped the flying sword in cloth. Truth be told, he had little need for sharp weapons at the moment; after all, he still possessed Xinyang’s cultivation and could cast spells Xinyang had mastered. Though he couldn’t use this energy for sword control, he could still perform spells.

Moreover, Chen Jin could still use the Soul-Scattering Primordial Sword once—an absolute trump card. Though it hadn’t managed to kill the One-Eyed Lord outright, it had slain him once, so it would certainly be effective against a practitioner at the Soul-Gathering stage.

That said, this move was a weapon of last resort. Its use meant mutual destruction—last time, Xinyang’s shadow soul bore the brunt, and it dissipated afterward. Unless absolutely necessary, he shouldn’t use it lightly.

“Better to break through to the focused energy stage first,” Chen Jin thought, sitting down and silently reciting the Metal Qi Formula of Geng and Xin in his heart.

He also recalled the key points from Xinyang’s “True Self Returning to Source, Illuminating Spirit Heart Sutra” for breaking through to focused energy. Chen Jin had long since mastered how Xinyang made that breakthrough.

In essence, the focused energy stage required the balance and intersection of bodily essence and spirit within the qi reservoir, forming primordial energy.

By rights, Chen Jin should have already reached it, and this body had as well. But there remained a crucial step: the advancement of the spirit and soul. Without progress there, what use was more primordial energy in the qi reservoir? Chen Jin couldn’t wield it directly and had to rely on the spells Xinyang had already mastered. Without a breakthrough in spirit and soul, he couldn’t generate new primordial energy—so this advancement was key.

He began to meditate on all the mysteries of the Metal Qi Formula of Geng and Xin.

Geng and Xin carried the essence of autumn, rich with the fullness of harvest.

Geng and Xin bore the sharpness of metal, piercing and keen, rising to the heavens.

Combined, these two intentions were nothing less than the act of reaping the harvest with a sharp blade...

Chen Jin pondered the inner meaning of the formula, then gathered his essence throughout his body and surged it toward the crown of his head. As this surge happened, he felt as if he stood upon a golden battlefield.

The ground was covered in golden grain, golden corn everywhere.

Upon this fertile land, two armies crashed together—one clad in shining black iron armor, the other in silver and gold.

On the golden soil, they clashed.

In an instant, gold, ink-black, and silver-white swirled before Chen Jin’s eyes, mixing together—gold within black, black within silver, silver within gold.

They did not blend into a new color, as yellow and blue make green; rather, they mingled, like concrete’s stones and cement mixing yet not merging into a new substance.

Yet Chen Jin sensed something new being born. He recalled the feeling of being in his mother’s womb: though he had no eyes to see, that gentle, nourishing warmth was undeniably present.

His heart was as pure as an infant’s, his thoughts free of a single stray notion.

Perhaps this was true tranquility of mind...

Yet this state lasted only three minutes before he slipped out of it.

Though he could not re-enter that state of utter clarity, Chen Jin felt his progress. He could sense ever deeper secrets within Xinyang’s body; his mastery of cultivation had reached a new level.

Most importantly, he could now replenish his cultivation.

Though he still expended more than he could store, at least he wasn’t just a battery that only discharged and never recharged.

Chen Jin was quite satisfied with this.

Inhale... exhale...

He began drawing in essence from heaven and earth, nurturing primordial energy that was truly his own.

...

At the third quarter of the hour of the Tiger—about 3:45 a.m.—Chen Jin, full of satisfaction and confidence, arrived at the site of Xinyang’s old home, the former Lanjia Village.

Truth be told, with all the villagers gone, there was a lingering melancholy in his heart, due to occupying Xinyang’s body. His tear ducts seemed perpetually blocked.

Chen Jin felt wretched; mentally he was fine, but his body felt out of sorts.

He could only blame his cultivation level being lower than Xinyang’s, unable to fully control Xinyang’s body. If he could master all its nerves and glands, such inexplicable emotions would never arise.

He gazed at the overgrown weeds and the burial mounds covering the entire village, the rows of tombstones standing tall. Memories of Xinyang's childhood in Lanjia Village floated through his mind...

“If I were to accept all of Xinyang’s memories, would I then be Xinyang? Or would I still be Chen Jin?” he mused.

He had thought about this before. In the end, he didn’t fully absorb Xinyang’s memories—only the useful information. The mundane recollections he discarded, so he wouldn’t develop a second personality.

Still, those memories couldn’t be forcibly deleted; they simply lay forgotten in the wastebin of his mind, ready to spill out at a certain time and place.

As now, when Xinyang’s childhood memories of Lanjia Village poured out onto the ground.

“How can one accomplish anything with a heart full of sorrow?” Chen Jin muttered.

With this, he cast that memory aside, sweeping it back into the trash, and began pacing around Lanjia Village in the ritual Yu-step, chanting the “Scripture of the Original Vow to Return to the World.”

He circled the village three times, but nothing unusual happened—neither in the village nor to himself.

Truthfully, the disappearance of over three hundred villagers’ spirits was a marvel. Had they truly all gone to the underworld for reincarnation? Wasn’t there a single soul with regrets, lingering as a wandering ghost?

Well... Chen Jin was, after all, one to stir up trouble.

As he wandered in his thoughts, suddenly Ge Hong’s voice sounded in his ear.

“Xinyang, quickly—head for the county seat.”

...