Chapter 30
Chapter 30
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Translator: Ace
Chapter: 30
Chapter Title: Chapter 30 Relying on the mountain to eat the mountain
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He thought of this and immediately leaped to his feet, jumping toward the world from which the sunlight streamed.
"Thud!"
He passed through the sunlight and the projection of that other world, slamming into the temple ceiling.
Chen Shi landed, rubbing his head, and looked up.
Sunlight came from that other world. It seemed as though following the light would let him enter it.
He leaped up again. His palm passed lightly through the sunlight, but the light and that other world were like illusory bubbles—visible yet untouchable.
"It seems the spacetime in this temple isn't another dimension. Instead, some mysterious power in the temple lets me see another world and allows sunlight and moonlight from there to shine in."
Ever since he began changing his true blood, his appetite had skyrocketed. Whether it was Grandpa's medicinal meals or Granny Sha's cooking, he devoured it all, yet hunger returned before long.
He got hungry too quickly. In just two days, he'd lost five or six jin.
He'd only weighed sixty jin to begin with. Losing five or six made him look even more frail.
Chen Shi knew he was at a critical stage.
The first step in forging the sacred embryo was changing his true blood.
In infancy, humans flowed with true blood—pure and untainted, requiring no cultivation. Infants didn't breathe through mouth or nose but connected via the navel to the mother, called fetal breathing. The qi they needed came through her blood, filtered clean of impurities.
This was innate true qi.
But after birth, breathing through mouth and nose drew in the world's foul qi—acquired qi. The body gradually grew heavy and polluted, innate true qi dwindling. In old age, when it was exhausted, death followed.
Cultivators of evil arts often changed blood in old age, infusing young blood to rejuvenate themselves, replenishing their innate true qi with that from the young.
Some went further, refining purple river carts—extracting placentas from pregnant women to harvest unborn infant blood for their own, staving off decay.
Chen Shi's rapid hunger was a form of supplementation, drawing essence from food to replenish innate true qi and forge true blood.
But ordinary food offered only meager five-grains essence. Grandpa's medicinal meals, packed with potent herbs, were better suited.
Chen Shi cultivated too fast, though. Food essence couldn't keep up, so he began consuming his own muscles and organs to refine blood.
Without enough food, he'd "starve to death"!
The faster he cultivated, the quicker he'd starve!
Chen Shi slowed his pace. Most of his day went to eating and foraging.
Grandma Yuzhu's ducks were nearly eggless from his "tributes." Old Lady Wuzhu's melon patch was barren save a few. Jade Belt River's fish had halved. He even timed meals to raid Gangzi Village—Granny Sha now winced at his approach.
Chen Shi even pondered using himself as bait to hook a massive kun for a taste.
He was that hungry.
That day, Chen Shi reached the Mountain Lord Temple. After brief cultivation, hunger hit hard. He lingered, and it intensified.
Heart pounding with hunger, he rushed out for wild game or fruit. But this newborn mountain had only the temple's great tree—no other plants, no animals daring approach.
Chen Shi descended the path to the forest fat dollies. Dizzy and famished, he pushed on a few steps before the world spun. Thud—he collapsed.
Dazed, he glimpsed blue sky and white clouds, feeling flat on his back. Yet moving leaves and grass said otherwise—he was being carried.
Too starved, he blacked out again.
Some time later, Chen Shi dimly opened his eyes. A mountain stream girl's lovely face appeared, then shifted to Zhuang Granny's wrinkled one.
"He's awake! He's awake!"
Zhuang Granny's voice rang out. Hunger eased slightly; vision cleared. He lay in her tree hollow, mushrooms glowing faintly.
The mountain stream girl sat serenely nearby. Tigerish fat dollies crowded the bed, big black eyes full of concern.
Zhuang Granny gripped one, yanking red fruits from his head—finger-sized. The dolly wailed.
Chen Shi glanced around. The others' heads were sparse; they'd been plucked too.
Zhuang Granny laughed.
"You fainted from hunger. The fruit-fruits carried you here. Stream Girl simmered fish porridge, but you burn through food too fast. Old me used ginseng fruits to pull you back."
Chen Shi sat up, hunger gone. He thanked them profusely.
The mountain stream girl blushed, chuckled softly, and glided away.
The fat dollies approached. Some hopped onto his knees, faces grave, babbling earnestly—likely urging regular meals—then left.
Chen Shi watched them go, thanked Zhuang Granny again, and headed out. His foot buckled; he nearly fell.
Zhuang Granny grinned.
"The ginseng fruit's power just reached your gut, not yet your limbs. No strength yet. Rest, then go."
Chen Shi sat.
Oddly, few fruits filled him with satiety. As they digested, heat waves surged through him, pure comfort.
"What are these ginseng fruits Granny fed me?" Chen Shi asked.
Zhuang Granny, unused to talk, replied only now.
"Just the fruit-fruits' fruits."
Chen Shi grew curious.
"And what are the fruit-fruits?"
Zhuang Granny said,
"Ginseng in these mountains, thousands of years old. Ginseng fruits are what they bear. One saves a life. You were so starved, I gave several."
Chen Shi jolted. The fat dollies were thousands of years old?
Impossible to tell.
"Granny Zhuang, know the Mountain Lord Temple?" Chen Shi asked after a thought.
"Yes. Where you've been. It and the mountain erupted from underground recently. Grew tall overnight—faster than me."
Envy tinged her words.
She grew slow.
Chen Shi perked up, laughing.
"If it burst from below, it was here before, just sunk. Did you see it back then, Granny?"
Zhuang Granny pondered, shook her head.
"No. When I remember, it was flat land. Mountain's new."
Chen Shi startled.
Zhuang Granny was the oldest tree he'd seen—millennia, likely.
Yet she was a new shoot from her stump after the original died!
The original was ancient!
So the temple sank before her birth?
How ancient?
"My original body fell six thousand years ago."
Zhuang Granny mused.
"I grew a body then."
Chen Shi pressed,
"Memories from before your original fell?"
First such question. She strained, face changing—terror. Body quaking, voice hoarse:
"Fire! Endless thunder-fire! It severed my body! It's burning!"
She shrank to the corner, helpless as a child.
Chen Shi rushed to soothe her.
"Even Zhuang Granny fears it. That upheaval six millennia ago was no trifle. Tied to the temple's sinking?"
Chen Shi pondered, then dismissed it.
"I'm just a kid of ten-odd years. Adults' business?"
The ginseng fruits were potent—life-from-death stuff. Yet half a day later, hunger returned.
"Stronger than Grandpa's brews, but limited," Chen Shi thought.
Two days on, Old Chen house was eaten bare. Huangpo Village too.
Even Granny Sha in Gangzi Village scraped empty pots.
Her gaze at Chen Shi shifted—from doting son to debt-collecting pest.
"Keep freeloading, and we'll all starve."
Chen Shi reflected. Can't drain the well dry—let crops regrow for next harvest. He decided to hunt.
Black Snake Xuan Mountain coiled on a Qianyang Mountain peak, gazing afar. Rain had just cleared; clouds parted, mist散—fine weather.
It breathed clouds, wind scattering them.
Suddenly, the valley quaked. A mountain-sized beast burst from the woods.
A sealed hog.
Wild boars past fifty years hit eight hundred jin—hogs, spirit beasts.
Hogs had huge heads, tiny bodies, monstrous strength—even蛮 bulls flew.
Sealed hogs lived a century: heads two-thirds body, steel-spike bristles, ivory tusks cracking mountains, endless brute force.
This one wasn't huge—nine-chi shoulder height, overtopping men by two chi. Tusks two-chi long, arm-thick. It flipped thousand-jin boulders, toppled trees with ease.
Yet ahead darted a tiny figure, gripping both tusks—wrestling the beast!
Chen Shi, skin-and-bones skinny, but freakishly strong. Size mismatch, though.
Man and hog locked. The hog shoved him from the woods—not outpowered, but two legs couldn't grip; ground plowed as he slid.
"In strength, you lose!"
Chen Shi roared. Arms bulged, twisting tusks. Waist twisted—boom! The colossus slammed down!
As it rolled up, Chen Shi surged, pinned the head, smashed the skull with fists!
The sealed hog twitched, stilled.
Chen Shi shouldered the meat-mountain, bolted to a nearby stream—lest he starve en route.
Great Snake Xuan Mountain watched from afar as Chen Shi bustled by the water.
It didn't interfere.
Survival of fittest. It too had hunted blood-meals once, preyed on spirit beasts.
It watched Chen Shi.
By the stream, Chen Shi cleaned and butchered the spirit beast: ribs, loins, kidneys, offal, crisp bones, ears, head meat, elbows, trotters—fine cuts.
He felled trees. Grill-suited parts roasted; stew-suited boiled in his big pot.
—He'd hauled Old Chen's medicine pot over.
Hog fat dripped golden over pine, brushed with coarse salt on searing ribs.
"He eats better than I did," Great Snake Xuan Mountain thought.
It watched. Chen Shi oiled ribs; first table-sized rack was done.
Sealed hog was spirit beast, but gamey, tough.
Chen Shi's body-tempering honed his jaws—no issue.
Crisp-charred bits lacked gaminess. Crunch—outer crisp, inner tender fat exploded, bathing eight thousand taste buds in saliva flood. Pure bliss.
Spirit power in the flesh erupted in his gut, nourishing organs. Hunger plunged.
Great Snake Xuan Mountain, three millennia on wind-dew diet, felt hunger stir.
Moments later, it saw Chen Shi approach, hefting a hind leg.
Grilled crisp-tender. Too big to cook through, so deep gashes rubbed salt, stuffed herb leaves—pickled full.
Great Snake Xuan Mountain sniffed the aroma. Three millennia wind-dew, yet mouthwatering.