Tai Zhu Xuan Xiang: Me and My Eight Golden Gourd Sisters

It was a vast and empty space, the place where the inner energy resided. There was no up or down, no left or right, only endless chaos and silence.

But at this moment, that smooth, round bead is suspended in the very center of this chaos.

It was there, motionless, yet it possessed an indescribable weight and profundity, as if it were not a bead, but a star compressed billions of times, slumbering in the endless void.

The moment the black pearl appeared, the internal energy in the dantian trembled violently as if startled by something.

In an instant, the winds and clouds surged!

Streams of internal energy surged towards Wuzhu like waves whipped up by a hurricane.

They spun rapidly around the black pearl, like leaves in the wind. The speed of the spin increased, becoming more and more rapid, forming a visible vortex in the dantian.

The black pearl floated silently in the center of the vortex, motionless, like a greedy bottomless pit, swallowing up all the surging internal energy.

A thread, a strand, a wisp...

In the blink of an eye, all the internal energy in his dantian was devoured.

His dantian was completely empty, as if it had been washed clean. All the internal energy that Cai Xuan had painstakingly accumulated bit by bit over the past few days was now gone.

Cai Xuan was completely unaware of this.

A moment later, Wuzhu moved.

A wisp of internal energy, thinner and fainter than a strand of hair, slowly emerged from Wuzhu. This internal energy was so thin it was almost invisible, seemingly about to dissipate at any moment. Yet, its appearance caused the entire dantian to tremble violently.

The internal energy, as thin as a hair, was completely different from the internal energy that had been absorbed before.

If the previous internal energy was a bucket of murky, chaotic water, then this wisp exhaled now is a drop of clear spring water, refined and purified through countless trials. Its texture is incredibly solid; though it is only a wisp, it gives one a heavy, mountain-like sense of weight. Its purity is also astonishingly high, without any impurities or mixed aura, as pure as the first breath of fresh air at the beginning of creation.

One thread is worth ten, a hundred, or a thousand threads.

It slowly swam within the dantian, dispelling chaos and filling nothingness wherever it passed, making the entire dantian space brighter because of this tiny wisp of internal energy.

Wu Zhu did not stop, but slowly exhaled a wisp of internal energy.

Each exhaled breath was more refined and condensed than the last.

The internal energy in the dantian gradually increased, from a single strand to two strands, from two strands to one wisp, and from one wisp to a small stream. They gathered together and slowly circulated within the dantian.

After exhaling his inner energy, Wu Zhu fell silent.

Beneath its jet-black surface, a faint green glow emanated. The green light was extremely faint, yet it carried a vibrant life force, clearly indicating that Wuzhu had benefited greatly from it.

Although the purity of internal energy has increased, the amount of internal energy in the dantian has decreased by nearly half.

In front of the stove, Cai Xuan slowly stirred the gradually thickening Earth Mother's Tears in the pot, completely unaware that a tremendous change was taking place within his dantian.

After a while, the thickened tears of Mother Earth gradually crystallized, and he quickly picked up a spatula to stir it to prevent it from clumping together. A moment later, the salt made from the tears of Mother Earth was ready.

The crystal-clear salt crystals, like snowflakes piled in the pot, emitted a faint salty aroma.

Cai Xuan pinched off a small amount and put it in his mouth. The saltiness was pure and authentic, without a trace of bitterness, and had a subtle herbal fragrance within. It tasted many times better than the refined salt he had brought. He found an earthenware jar, put it in it, sealed it, and stored it in a corner of the kitchen where it was not easily accessible.

Next, we need to process the aquatic bamboo shoots, aquatic chestnuts, fish, and wild fruits.

Aquatic bamboo shoots are easy to prepare. Simply peel off the outer skin, blanch them in boiling water to remove any wild taste, and then dry them in the sun. They taste best when stewed with meat or fish; stir-frying them on their own doesn't quite do them justice.

Aside from keeping some for consumption, the rest of the aquatic chestnuts are boiled and dried.

This stuff has a high moisture content; if it's not cooked thoroughly, it will mold within two days and won't keep.

We brought back too much fish; we can't finish it all in one day.

However, Cai Xuan had plenty of ways to prepare it. He made soup and fried it, and saved the leftovers for the next day. As for the wild fruits, he blanched half of them and dried them; he mashed the other half, added yeast, and put them in a clay pot to see if they could be fermented into wine.

The Nine Oxen Divine Power Potato Wine was successfully brewed last time, so it should be able to be brewed this time as well.

After a flurry of activity, it was already getting dark.

Dinner was simple: a milky white fish soup, stewed crocodile meat with aquatic chestnuts, and a plate of cold purple sweet potato leaves.

Xi'er buried her head in her food and ate voraciously. In no time, half of the large bowl of stewed chestnuts and crocodile meat was gone. To her left was a large bowl of fish soup. She ate the meat while occasionally picking up the soup to drink, making slurping noises. Her little belly swelled up at a visible speed.

After finishing his meal, the little guy wiped his mouth, his eyes shining, and said, "Brother, let's have fish soup tomorrow too."

"Alright." Cai Xuan had no objection, since there were still plenty of fish left.

After finishing his meal and tidying up, Cai Xuan was about to sit down and rest when suddenly, a surge of surging essence of flesh and blood exploded from his body, like a lit powder keg, violently rushing to his limbs and bones. It was the essence of fish and sword-spined crocodile meat, fierce and scorching, rampaging through his meridians, burning his whole body, making his cheeks flushed, and causing the veins on his forehead to bulge.

"Depend on"

He was fine after eating ginseng stewed with pork yesterday, so he thought he was really okay.

Who would have thought that he was unharmed yesterday because of the ginseng. Today, without the ginseng, the essence of the crocodile meat and fish he had eaten suddenly exploded, and he couldn't handle it.

Without a second thought, Cai Xuan took off running towards the towering tree behind the house.

Xi'er called out from behind, "Brother, where are you going?" He didn't even bother to reply, rushed to the tree, took off his clothes, and rammed into it hard!

"Bang! Bang! Bang!"

The dull thuds echoed through the forest as Cai Xuan slammed into the trees again and again. With each impact, a wisp of violent energy was dissipated, seeping into his flesh and bone marrow, and his physique gradually strengthened.

When Xi'er saw that he didn't respond, she followed him over. Seeing him foolishly bumping into the tree again, she sat down on a rock and watched.

Despite watching it so many times, she still doesn't understand why her brother is so foolish as to run into the tree.

Her brother said it was for practicing martial arts, and she wanted to practice too, but her brother said that girls shouldn't practice this kind of martial arts, and she didn't know why.

As he continued bumping into things, Cai Xuan suddenly noticed something unusual about his body.

Unlike before, within this volatile essence of flesh and blood, there was a trace of cool air, like a mountain spring on a hot summer day, flowing slowly through the body. Wherever it passed, the volatile essence of flesh and blood was as if doused with a bucket of cold water, changing from violent to docile, and from docile to gentle, making it much easier to refine than before.