Even before taking a bite, the spiritual grain rice cooked from the White Jade Rice already felt remarkably different.
The moment she lifted the pot lid, a clean, refreshing aroma rushed to her nose, bringing with it a puff of hot steam. As the steam dissipated, individual grains of warm, lustrous white rice were revealed, perfectly distinct from one another.
The rice truly lived up to its name; if not for the unmistakable fragrance of real rice, it looked as though it had been meticulously carved from white jade.
Shi Yu scooped out a bowl and took a bite with her chopsticks, chewing slowly.
Even without any side dishes, the rice alone brought immense satisfaction.
The delicate, pure grains tasted entirely different from mortal rice, dissolving into strands of sweet aroma as she chewed. The faint spiritual energy contained within the spiritual grain drifted into her limbs and bones along with those sweet scents.
This spiritual energy was subtle, but just as mortals said that five grains nourished the body, spiritual grain was even more potent in doing so.
The spiritual energy contained within it differed slightly from the spiritual energy absorbed through meditation, which gave spiritual grain its unique benefits: consuming it over a long period could strengthen the physique and spiritual power, as well as nourish the internal organs and vital energy.
Long-term consumption of higher-tier, rare spiritual grains could even nourish one's soul. Unfortunately, in this remote corner of Changyuan Prefecture, Tier-3 spiritual grain was already a rarity, and anything higher was practically impossible to find.
Her withered and broken body craved spiritual items of all kinds. After finishing this meal, Shi Yu felt completely refreshed and thoroughly relaxed.
She sank her spiritual sense into the Yin-Yang Fate-Tapping Bell. Now that half a month had passed, the Life and Slaughter Springs had finally produced another drop of spring water.
Shi Yu currently had no use for the Slaughter Spring water, which now accumulated to three drops.
The Life Spring water, on the other hand, was never enough.
“I harvested over thirty jin of White Jade Rice, which will last me a while. I don't need to use this drop of Life Spring water to irrigate crops for now. The pressing priority is to establish my Dao Foundation and enter the first layer of the Qi Refining Realm.”
Yet even if she reserved it solely for her own consumption, a single drop diluted with water would only last ten days at most.
Softly sighing, she felt no dismay. After clearing away the dishes, she returned to the table, took out a spirit stone, talisman ink, and a talisman pen, and began crafting spirit talismans.
With her previous experience, she grew increasingly adept at using her spiritual sense to channel and control the spiritual energy inside the spirit stone, dramatically reducing her failure rate.
The tip of the talisman pen dipped into the ink, swirling with spiritual energy. Under her pen, three source runes emerged one by one, drawn with smooth, even strokes devoid of hesitation.
After the time it took to drink a cup of tea, a spirit talisman took shape. A flash of brilliance faded into the source runes—it was a high-quality Tier-1 offensive spirit talisman, a Blaze Talisman.
Though drawing one left her slightly fatigued, Shi Yu continued.
With her rising proficiency, she rarely made mistakes or failed. Where a single spirit stone previously ran out of energy and turned to dust after making just two talismans, she could now make three.
Her crafting costs had decreased again—a truly gratifying development.
Once she exhausted the fire-attribute talisman ink, Shi Yu mixed a new dish of earth-attribute talisman ink.
Currently lacking self-defense capabilities, she relied entirely on these spirit talismans to forge a balance of offense and defense. Having offensive talismans was not enough; she needed to stock up on defensive ones to feel secure.
Next, she would craft a Tier-1 defensive spirit talisman: the Earth Shield Talisman.
...
Whenever her spiritual sense was depleted, her head throbbed with needle-like prickles of pain.
Shi Yu would then stop, take a sip of diluted Life Spring water, and resume meditating to cultivate. She refined the efficacy of the Dew-Condensing Pill while absorbing the vital energy and spiritual nature of the Life Spring water.
Once her body completely absorbed the pill's energy or the water's vitality, she would swallow another pill or take another sip.
When her state fully recovered, she would resume making spirit talismans or jade talismans.
Throughout this process, the modest amount of innate true Qi in Shi Yu's dantian was depleted and replenished repeatedly. In this continuous cycle, it was tempered and refined, becoming noticeably more condensed.
Her spiritual sense progressed in the same way—slowly, but steadily.
During this time, if she ran out of Dew-Condensing Pills or talisman-crafting materials, Shi Yu took her finished jade talismans to Tongyi Pavilion to sell, using the spirit stones she earned to purchase more pills and materials.
For now, she hoarded the spirit talismans for personal use. Before stepping into the first layer of the Qi Refining Realm, she had no intention of selling them.
After a full month of such single-minded cultivation, Shi Yu finally felt the sensation of an impending breakthrough.
The strand of innate true Qi inside her dantian was now extremely condensed. The cluster gathered into a small vortex, thickest at the center, as if something were about to be birthed from within.
If all went as expected, her yellow sprout Dao Foundation would soon manifest here.
“A Low-grade One-fraction Spiritual Meridian truly makes cultivation arduous.”
Even with a supreme cultivation technique like the Yin-Yang Fate-Tapping Record and an uninterrupted daily supply of pills during her cultivation, it had still taken her this long just to reach the threshold of the first layer of the Qi Refining Realm.
Only by stepping into the first layer of the Qi Refining Realm would she cross the threshold of cultivation and officially join the ranks of cultivators.
On the path to immortality, this was merely the very beginning.
Shi Yu knew from her memories that back when she still possessed her Supreme-grade Fire-attribute Spiritual Meridian, under the guidance of Xuanqing Immortal Venerable, it had taken her a mere half a day to nurture the yellow sprout, establish her Dao Foundation, and step into the first layer of the Qi Refining Realm.
Compared to then, her current pace was countless times slower.
“Still...”
Shi Yu examined her interior. After more than a month of nourishment from the Life Spring water, the spiritual meridian inside her body—once dim and faint as a firefly—was now slightly brighter than when it had first emerged.
Without a spirit-measuring ruler at hand for a detailed test, she could only sense it vaguely, but her spiritual meridian had likely upgraded slightly from Low-grade One-fraction to perhaps two or three fractions.
The spiritual meridian that had been stripped from her in the past was bright as the blazing sun, fierce and dazzling.
Although her current one was far inferior to the original, it revealed encouraging news: under the nourishing care of the Life Spring water, this newly born spiritual meridian would continue to grow.
Spiritual meridians were innate, fixed from birth, with virtually no possibility of further growth.
Yet the Life Spring water could stimulate the birth and growth of spiritual meridians, fundamentally elevating a person's aptitude for cultivation.
The more she experienced the Life Spring water, the better she understood how precious and wondrous it was; such a treasure could never be allowed to fall into others' knowledge or greed. Raising the grade of a spiritual meridian—if word of such a thing got out, cultivators across the entire Origin Realm would be stirred into a frenzy.
In the world of cultivation, plundering opportunities had always been one of the central themes.
Finishing her cultivation, Shi Yu stretched lazily, her raven hair cascading over her shoulders like a waterfall.
She pinned her hair up into a man's topknot, changed into male robes, and only then left for Tongyi Pavilion.
When alone in her small yard, Shi Yu dressed however she felt comfortable, but whenever she stepped outside, she invariably disguised herself as a man.
The Origin Realm had no concept of male superiority over female; strength alone commanded respect.
However, traveling openly as a female cultivator while lacking strength would inevitably attract ill intentions. Even though she had given herself an unremarkable face, caution was still paramount.
“With a breakthrough imminent, it's time to buy that bottle of Qingming Dew.”
Spiritual dew was a natural treasure capable of enlightening spiritual sense and aiding state-of-mind cultivation, thereby benefiting realm advancement.
The item Shi Yu wanted to buy was Qingming Dew, the lowest grade among spiritual dews. Given her current cultivation level, using anything superior would be wasteful; Qingming Dew was just right for her.
The last time she saw it at Tongyi Pavilion, a tiny jade bottle no larger than a thumb cost ten low-grade spirit stones.
Fortunately, she had saved up several dozen spirit stones during this time, precisely for a moment like this.
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