Chapter 34: Medicine Master and reward
The message was from lady Soft Feather, she volunteered: “Senior North River, about the matter regarding advance payment of foundation building techniques to Senior Song, leave it to me! Although I’m only at the 3rd Stage, imparting foundation building techniques would definitely not be a problem! It just so happens that I want to make a trip to the Jiang Nan Region as well!”
She truly wanted to witness the process of how Song Shuhang utilizes an induction stove to refine the Body Tempering Liquid. More importantly, she wanted to sneak out to play for a few days while daddy wasn’t yet home. As the saying goes, one only knows the taste of something after eating it, this lady was completely enthralled by the mortal world, she was thinking about leaving home every hour and every minute.
The moment Soft Feather sent that message, Mad Saber Three Waves immediately sent a retort, “Obediently wait for me in Spiritual Butterfly Island, I’ll be on my way in an hour, and will arrive at Spiritual Butterfly Island in the evening.”
The one using such a tone of speech was beyond a shadow of a doubt Spiritual Butterfly’s Respected Sage. It seemed like he was still enjoying tormenting Mad Saber Three Waves, and didn’t go home yet.
Soft Feather stuck out her tongue, then lurked, she didn’t dare send another message.
North River’s Loose Practitioner sent a smiley, he was teasing Mad Saber Three Waves.
Song Shuhang still maintained a smile as he breathed a sigh of relief, and typed into the chat box, “Sorry to trouble Senior North River, I would accept your prepaym……”
Before he was done typing, again came the ding ding! Another message popped up in the chat.
This time it was Medicine Master, he sent a brief two words: “Let me!”
This message was too difficult to make heads or tails of, even North River’s Loose Practitioner wasn’t able to understand what he meant.
A long time later, Medicine Master recovered and sent: “Brother North River, please leave the matter of imparting cultivation techniques to little friend Shuhang to me.”
Another long time later…….
Medicine Master: “Little friend Shuhang, I used magic to simulate your process of refining the Body Tempering Liquid, in the midst of it, I thought of several interesting possibilities that would be of great help to me for perfecting the Simplified Body Tempering Liquid. Some matters can’t be clarified on the internet, so I’m thinking of personally witnessing how you refine the Body Tempering Liquid once, after that, you could strive to help me perfect the Simplified Body Tempering Liquid’s pill recipe. Yep, no matter whether this experiment of mine succeeds or fails, I would give you a rather good reward as a thanks for your trouble. Over here I have a set of body training sword technique and meditation technique.”
After a pause, he then sent another message: “My sword technique and meditation technique are also slightly better than Senior North River’s.”
This was blatant advertising.
“Since Brother Medicine Master intends to guide little friend Shuhang, that would be fantastic!” North River’s Loose Practitioner laughed and said, “Little friend Shuhang, you should quickly agree to Brother Medicine Master, there’s a free teacher to guide you on foundation building, you mustn’t miss this opportunity!”
North River’s Loose Practitioner felt that Song Shuhang’s luck was definitely out of the ordinary.
Normally, for loose practitioners to become a cultivator, the hardest steps are attaining the ‘Body Tempering Liquid’ and ‘Foundation building’.
Foundation building is difficult because for loose practitioners to enter the door, most of them only inherited one or two scrolls of cultivation techniques, then self-studied to greatness. As they often didn’t have teachers to guide them or possessed incomplete techniques, this led them to easily make mistakes in the foundation building process, wasting a lot of time and effort.
For Body Tempering Liquid, it goes without saying that if they want the Body Tempering Liquid, they would have to gather the medicinal ingredients themselves. Then they most likely would have to refine it themselves as well. This process was arduous, and a certain North River’s Loose Practitioner, who lost a family’s fortune, didn’t dare recall those times.
Yet Song Shuhang had the medicinal ingredients as gift from Soft Feather, then had Medicine Master volunteer to guide him in foundation building as a reward. He bypassed a loose cultivator’s two most difficult obstacles easily.
“Thank you both, Seniors.” Song Shuhang gratefully said, the people in Nine Provinces (1) Group were sure enough, great people!
Good person cards were sent to people in the group.
……
……
“Shuhang, address?” Medicine Master asked.
Song Shuhang speedily replied, “Jiang Nan Region’s Jiang Nan University City, I stay at a student dormitory.”
At the same time, Song Shuhang’s gaze couldn’t help but fall on the small bonsai beside his computer. Inside the pot was a plant that grew curved, like a coiling dragon, at its tip was a row of thorns, its stem was purple-black color.
It’s Poison Dragon Grass, Medicine Master previously sent a picture inquiring about this medicinal plant before.
I wonder if Senior Medicine Master still needs this Poison Dragon Grass? Song Shuhang thought to himself.
“Contact details?” Medicine Master asked next.
Song Shuhang immediately sent his cellphone number.
Medicine Master: “I’ll arrive tomorrow morning and will look for you!”
Subsequently, before Song Shuhang was able to say anything else, Medicine Master had already gone offline.
I initially wanted to mention the Poison Dragon Grass to Medicine Master, never mind, I’ll wait till he comes before bringing it up to him.
“He’s coming tomorrow morning?” Song Shuhang pondered, he should have class tomorrow morning, right?
Whatever. If there isn’t any other choice I’ll just have to ask for another morning of leave. In any case, he had been asking for leave often these days, adding one more morning to the mix is no big deal.
Nine Provinces (1) Group.
Soft Feather who was intimidated away by her father stealthily popped in again: “Senior Song, have you truly decided to take the path of being a loose cultivator? Even if there are people from Nine Provinces (1) Group helping you, being a loose cultivator is very hard.”
“This is a way that suits me more for now.” Song Shuhang smiled as he replied, “By the way, Soft Feather, now that I think about it, the matter of the two professors getting hospitalized wasn’t a coincidence, right?”
“Wahahaha, what are you saying, Senior Song? That was definitely a coincidence, a coincidence! From youth to adulthood, I’ve never spoken a lie!” Soft Feather replied at lightning speed, “Oh, my eldest senior disciple is calling me, there must be something that I’m needed for. Seniors, y’all have a great chat, I’m going off for now ha~.”
As she said that, she didn’t give Shuhang any chance to reply, and hastily got offline.
Song Shuhang pinched his chin, “As expected, it wasn’t a coincidence, like I said, how can there be such a coincidence in the world? Both professors were hospitalized due to a leg injury at the same time.”
I feel sorry for Teacher Renshui and Professor Smith, perhaps when I have time in a few days I should pay them a visit.
After all, it was their injuries that allowed him to accompany Soft Feather to Luo Xin Street, that allowed him to receive Soft Feather’s two boxes of medicinal ingredients as a reward, that allowed him to have a chance to have access to the world of cultivation.
With that said, chatting in the group earlier was simply like a dream.
Originally, he imagined that to become a cultivator he would definitely have to go through many tests set by the seniors in the group, then he would have to experience some difficulties of the same level as Tang Seng collecting the scriptures, then he would attain the way to a long life.
[TL: Author is referring to a monk who played the lead role in the novel Journey To The West, where Tang Seng’s goal was to collect some scriptures. The journey was fraught with hardship.]
He didn’t expect that not only would the Seniors not have any difficult test for him, they instead lent their assistance in various ways.
If this was truly a dream, then he sincerely hoped that he wouldn’t wake up.
In the Nine Provinces (1) Group, North River’s Loose Practitioner sent another message, informing Shuhang, “Little friend Shuhang, if you have anything you don’t understand regarding the path of cultivation in the future, do not hesitate to come to the group to ask us.”
“You chose to be a loose cultivator, which represents that you don’t have a teacher to guide you in your cultivation. So once you encounter a problem you should ask immediately, especially when it comes to cultivation, you must not be shy. Otherwise, if you take one step in the wrong direction, you will end up making more and more mistakes. If it’s a small mistake it would just waste cultivation time, if it’s a great mistake you may deviate in cultivation and be possessed by the devil, drawing a great calamity to your body.”
“Thank you for reminding me, Senior.” When talking about problems, Song Shuhang immediately thought of an issue, “By the way, Senior North River, I wanted to ask if it’s alright if I gave the Body Tempering Liquid to others for consumption? For example my family? Is this prohibited by the group?”
Song Shuhang wasn’t a selfish person.
Body Tempering Liquid’s effects were so good, the process of body tempering would also get rid of many problems with the body, so he immediately thought of Daddy and Mommy Song, filial piety is the most important virtue, after all.
“We do not have any such prohibitions, if you have excess pill medicine, you may choose to give it to your relatives. After all, pill medicine and cultivation techniques are different, cultivation techniques must not be rashly divulged, but there are no such restrictions on pill medicine.
North River’s Loose Practitioner followed this statement up with, “However, I have to remind you of something. In this world, medicinal ingredients aren’t as abundant as you might think. In addition, there aren’t many people who are as generous as Soft Feather, it’s very likely for you to be unable to receive more medicinal ingredients in a short period of time. Also, you have thirty-two sets of pill refining medicinal ingredients, even if you succeed every single time, it’s just thirty-two servings of Body Tempering Liquid. This amount is far from enough for what you require to complete the hundred day foundation building.”
He did not dislike Shuhang’s notion of giving the medicinal liquid to his relatives to consume, he even admired that thought.
For him to think of his family and friends the moment he experienced the effects of the body tempering process, a person like that was greatly suited to be North River’s friend. Possessing benevolence, righteousness, generosity and filial piety, these are required for one to be at ease becoming daoist friends with.
When all’s said and done, nobody would like to become life and death friends with someone who repeatedly does evil deeds.