Spirit Plant Entry: Immortality Begins with Farming

Chen Yuan was awakened by hunger.

It wasn't my stomach that was hungry, it was my meridians that were hungry, my dantian that was hungry, every pore on my body was screaming "more!"

The feeling was like a riverbed that had been dry for three years suddenly receiving a torrential rain; instead of quenching the thirst, it brought out an even deeper level of hunger.

He opened his eyes and saw a shimmering, purplish-gold halo—the air currents and feathers on the tips of Lieyun's wings, hovering above his face and slowly fluttering, creating gentle breezes.

"Oh, you're awake?" Lieyun's voice came from above. "You've been asleep for a whole day and night. If you hadn't woken up, Baizhi would have pried open your mouth with her sword and forced medicine down your throat."

Chen Yuan struggled to sit up. His head felt like it was stuffed with a wad of waterlogged cotton, heavy and muffled, with a buzzing echo. But his body felt... frighteningly light. It was as if he could leap to the top of the cave with a single bound.

He looked down at his hands. The pale blue veins beneath his skin were clearer than before, and the blood flowed with a faint silvery glow—the mountain spirit energy from the heart of the lake had not yet been fully absorbed and was slowly settling with the blood circulation.

"How are you feeling?" Bai Zhi's voice came from the side.

Chen Yuan turned her head. She was sitting beside the Azure Vine, holding the azure-gold spirit crystal in her hand, scraping off the crystal powder from its surface with her fingertips and sprinkling it at the base of the vine. The crystal powder melted into the moss as soon as it touched the ground, and the vine's leaves immediately trembled, deepening in green.

"It feels..." Chen Yuan moved his neck, and his joints made a crisp "crack" sound. "It feels like someone took it apart and put it back together. Everything feels right, yet nothing feels quite right."

"You've reached the eighth level of Qi Refining." Bai Zhi stopped what she was doing, looked up at him, and said, "Your spiritual energy circulation is three times faster than before, and your meridians are one and a half times wider. Moreover..."

She paused, a silvery-blue light flickering in her pupils:

"There's something new in your aura. It's heavy, it's thick, like... a mountain."

Chen Yuan didn't reply. He had sensed it himself.

In the sea of ​​consciousness, besides the five stars and the cyan vortex, a very faint, silvery-white mist had appeared at some point, quietly floating in the corner.

At the heart of the fog was a tiny, rice-grain-sized point of light, so solid it was blinding.

Mountain Soul.

Although it was only a single strand, it felt as heavy as a small mountain pressing down on one's consciousness.

He tried to manipulate it. The mist trembled slightly, separating a wisp of silvery-white energy that mixed into the spiritual power flowing through his meridians. With just this wisp, the originally gently flowing spiritual power instantly "sinked," its flow rate unchanged, but its impact and heaviness doubled.

"Good stuff," Chen Yuan said in a low voice.

"Nonsense." Lieyun folded its wings, lowered its massive head, and stared at him with its single eye. "What do you plan to do now? Continue 'cultivating the mountain' here?"

Chen Yuan stood up and walked to the lakeside.

The lake water is clearer than it was three days ago; it's so clear that you can see the pebbles on the lakebed seven or eight meters below.

The silvery light in the center of the lake was no longer dazzling, but had become a warm, restrained halo, like a real pearl sinking to the bottom of the water.

The flow of spiritual energy throughout the valley was no longer a chaotic "flow" in his eyes.

Instead, it is a clear, stable, and well-defined network of light. The earth veins are the thick trunk, the blood ginseng is the pulsating heart node, the star frost moss is the fine capillaries, and the green vine is the developing gland—responsible for "secreting" spirit crystals.

This net was something he had painstakingly woven with his divine sense yesterday.

I was exhausted, but it was worth it.

"Yesterday I was just 'clearing' the blockages," Chen Yuan said, his voice low but steady. "I cleared the blockages and patched up the leaks. I made the existing cycle run more smoothly."

He turned around and looked at Bai Zhi and Lie Yun:

"But just being 'smooth' isn't enough. To make it produce more and give back more, we need to... add something."

"Add what?" Bai Zhi asked.

"Array," Chen Yuan uttered the word.

Lieyun's wings unfurled halfway with a "whoosh": "Again? What kind of trouble are you up to now?"

"It's neither a killing formation nor a trapping formation." Chen Yuan walked back to the center of the mossy carpet, squatted down, and traced lines on the ground with his fingers. "It's a combination of a spirit-gathering formation, a guiding formation, and a qi-stabilizing formation. It uses star-frost moss as the formation base, blood ginseng as the formation eye, and green primordial vine as the formation hub. It upgrades this spiritual energy network from a 'natural cycle' to... an 'artificially controlled super cycle'."

Bai Zhi frowned: "The formation needs spiritual energy to maintain it, it needs formation flags and formation plates, it needs..."

“We have them all.” Chen Yuan interrupted her, pointing to the glowing moss carpet beneath his feet. “Star Frost Moss is naturally affinity-rich with spiritual energy, making it the best natural array base material. Blood Ginseng is connected to the earth's veins, providing an almost limitless source of spiritual energy. Azure Vine…” He looked at the emerald-like vine, “its roots are now intertwined with the main root of the Blood Ginseng, serving as a natural ‘valve’ for the diversion and regulation of spiritual energy.”

He paused, then added:

"What we lack is simply the 'line' that connects these three things according to specific orientations and rules."

Bai Zhi remained silent for a few moments.

Then she stood up, walked to Chen Yuan's side, squatted down, and drew a line in the sand with her finger:

"The book 'An Introduction to Ancient Formations' mentions a 'Plant Vein Formation,' which uses spiritual plants as its veins and the earth's energy as its power source, requiring no external materials. However, that formation requires all spiritual plants to be of the same origin and species, and to possess at least three hundred years of spiritual energy..."

"We are different," Chen Yuan said. "Blood Ginseng, Star Frost Moss, and Azure Vine, although different species, are all my symbiotic spiritual plants. They all carry my aura in their origin, so they can be considered 'pseudo-same origins.' Moreover..."

He pointed to the intricate silver-white and purple-gold patterns on the surface of the blood ginseng:

"This thing has been encased in the earth's vein spirit bubble for seven days, and its internal structure has long since changed. It is now not only a converter, but also a natural... spiritual energy imprint template. As long as it is guided and made to pulsate in a specific way, the spiritual energy fluctuations emitted by these patterns on its surface can form a stable 'field' around it."

Bai Zhi stared at the blood ginseng for a long time.

"...You want to use the pulsation of the blood ginseng to replace the array master's spiritual power imprint?"

"Hmm." Chen Yuan nodded. "Using it as the center, let the spiritual energy field generated by the pulsation spread outward like water ripples. Then use the Star Frost Moss as a 'receiving point' to fix the 'wave' and form the array base node. Finally, use the roots of the Azure Vine as 'conductors' to connect the nodes and form a complete circuit."

He looked at Bai Zhi:

"Your 'eye for detail' can see the subtle traces of spiritual energy flow. I need you to help me 'see' the spiritual energy field generated by each pulsation of the blood ginseng, the path of its diffusion, where it resonates with the spiritual energy of the star frost moss, and how the roots of the green vine should connect the resonance points into the optimal route."

Bai Zhi took a deep breath and closed her eyes. When she opened them again, the silvery-blue light in her pupils was almost blinding.

"Give me half an incense stick," she said. "I need to familiarize myself with the current Reiki network structure first."

Chen Yuan didn't urge her. He walked to the blood ginseng, sat down cross-legged, and placed his hand on its warm, pulsating body.

Consciousness sinks in.

The power of the silvery-white stars seeped downwards, connecting with the complex and dizzying energy channels inside the blood ginseng.

He "saw" the entire process of spiritual energy being drawn from the earth's veins, transformed, and pumped out with each pulsation of the blood ginseng. He also "saw" how the patterns on its surface flickered like breathing with each pulsation, radiating specific spiritual energy fluctuations outwards.

What he needs to do is fine-tune the rhythm and intensity of this "breathing".

Make the pulse more regular, make the order of the lines more precise, and transform the emitted spiritual energy fluctuations from chaotic natural rhythms into purposeful and interpretable "signals".

This is ten times more difficult than simply analyzing the flow of spiritual energy yesterday.

Yesterday was about unclogging the sewers. Today is about performing delicate surgery on a living heart.

Chen Yuan's forehead began to sweat again.

After an incense stick has burned.

Bai Zhi opened her eyes, her voice a little dry: "I saw it clearly. Each time the Blood Ginseng pulsates, it generates 371 major spiritual energy fluctuations. Among them, 94 will resonate stably with the Star Frost Moss. The location of the resonance point... I've memorized them all."

She crouched down, her fingertips darting across the sand. Glowing silver-blue lines emerged beneath her fingertips, intertwining and quickly forming an extremely complex dotted line diagram covering half the moss-covered ground.

"This is the optimal connection path," Bai Zhi pointed to the diagram. "Using the root system of the Qingyuan Vine, following these lines, we can connect over 90% of the resonance points, forming three nested loop circuits. But..."

She paused:

"The root system of the Qingyuan Vine has a limited growth rate. It will take at least ten days for it to fully grow along this path."

"It won't take ten days." Chen Yuan opened his eyes, his face even paler, but his eyes were frighteningly bright. "We'll help it grow."

He placed both hands on the blood ginseng and took a deep breath:

"Bai Zhi, I'll count to three. I'll triple the pulsation frequency of the Blood Ginseng and increase the intensity of its spiritual energy field fivefold. Keep a close eye on the changes in the resonance point and tell me to adjust the direction as needed. Lie Yun—"

He turned to look at the giant eagle:

"A large amount of spiritual energy will be drawn up from the earth's veins soon, and some of it will dissipate into the air. Use your wings to fan the air and press the dissipated spiritual energy back to the roots of the Azure Vine. Don't waste it."

Lieyun glared with his one eye: "Have I become a blower?"

"Otherwise what?" Chen Yuan smirked. "Your bones are just healed, so move around more."

"Damn it..." Lieyun cursed, but his wings had already spread out, and the air currents and feathers began to swirl faster.

"Ready." Chen Yuan closed his eyes. "Three."

Within his sea of ​​consciousness, the five stars shone at their brightest simultaneously. The silver mist surrounding the Mountain Soul trembled violently, diverting half of its power into the silver-white stars.

"two."

The blood ginseng suddenly swelled! The patterns on its surface flickered wildly at an unprecedented speed! A visible purple-gold wave of energy exploded outwards from its center!

"one!"

Chen Yuan pressed down hard with both hands!

Boom! ...

The entire moss carpet trembled violently! A deafening roar, like muffled thunder, echoed from the ground! Waves three feet high erupted from the lake's surface!

The blood ginseng's pulsation frequency increased more than threefold in an instant! It was like an overloaded heart, frantically drawing in the earth's spiritual energy, transforming it, and pumping it out!

The purplish-gold spiritual energy burst forth like a flood, rushing towards the marked resonance points along the path guided by Chen Yuan!

The Starfrost Moss clumps collectively lit up! Each clump of moss transformed into a small, luminous array, receiving, fixing, and transforming spiritual energy!

Bai Zhi's pupils constricted, and she spoke rapidly, like popping beans:

"Point 7 is shifted three inches to the left! Point 9 is overloaded, divert the flow! Point 15... Point 15 is not lit, insufficient spiritual pressure, increase the pressure!"

Chen Yuan's forehead veins bulged, and he gritted his teeth, frantically fine-tuning the spiritual pressure distribution of the hundred output paths of the blood parameters according to Bai Zhi's instructions.

It feels like controlling hundreds of faucets at the same time, and having to ensure that the water pressure and flow rate of each one are accurate to the millimeter.

With such a massive influx of high-purity spiritual energy, the roots of the Qingyuan Vine began to grow wildly!

It doesn't extend slowly; it "snails" out like a living snake! The main root splits into dozens of lateral roots, each precisely piercing the path nodes marked by the angelica! Wherever the root tips pass, the sandy ground bulges up, and purplish-gold light trails spread across the surface, like blood vessels growing!

The wings of the Cloud-Splitting Vine created afterimages. It forcefully pressed the dissipated and exploding spiritual energy in the air towards the roots of the Azure Vine with a gale. The spiritual energy was forcibly "pressed" into the soil and then absorbed by the greedy root system.

The entire Starfall Lake Valley has now transformed into a massive, roaring furnace of spiritual energy.

One incense stick. Two incense sticks. Three incense sticks.

When the last lateral root of the vine reaches the last point of resonance and successfully connects with the aura of the star-frost moss—

hum-

A deep, resonant sound, as if from the depths of the earth, echoed through the valley.

All the restless spiritual energy subsided into tranquility at this moment.

No, it's not calm.

It is orderly.

The blood ginseng resumed its steady and powerful pulsation, but with each pulsation, the entire spiritual energy network covering the valley flickered in sync.

The star-frost moss no longer shone individually; their halos merged into one, rising and falling like breathing in rhythm with the blood ginseng.

The roots of the Chinese vine (Cynanchum aureum) penetrate deeply into every node of the network, like a neural network, tightly connecting the entire system.

Meanwhile, the main body of the Qingyuan Vine grew three feet taller within the time it takes for three incense sticks to burn.

At the top of the vine, the two spirit crystal buds had grown to the size of walnuts, their surface covered in a solidified cyan-gold jade-like material, and the light emanating from their internal crystal cores was so dazzling that it was impossible to look directly at them.

Most surprisingly, five new buds, each the size of a grain of rice, sprouted in the middle of the vine.

Chen Yuan released his grip, leaned back, and fell onto the mossy carpet, his chest heaving violently, too weak to even lift a finger.

"It's done..." he squeezed out the two words through gritted teeth.

Bai Zhi also collapsed to the ground, her face deathly pale, but her eyes shone with an eerie light. She gazed at the massive array before her, which seemed to breathe spontaneously and shimmer with light, and murmured:

"The Vein Array...it's really done..."

Lieyun folded its wings, panting heavily, its single eye scanning the valley before finally settling on Chen Yuan:

"Kid, what exactly have you gotten yourself into?"

Chen Yuan lay on the ground, looking at the slowly flowing array light reflected in the crystal ceiling, and forced a weak smile:

"have no idea."

He paused, then added:

"But from now on... we'll cultivate here for a day..."

"It's been about ten years since I was stationed outside."