This heat slowly started spreading from his stomach to the rest of his body. It wasn't a violent and howling inferno; it was a sensation more akin to spending time in a hot spring, with a comfortable warmth flowing through every part of his body.

Lao had his eyes closed at the moment, not just enjoying the sensation but also inspecting the changes in his body.

Lao's body was riddled with internal injuries, both old and new, from all those years of punishment he endured after running away from his old sect. These internal issues were a serious problem and something he had to deal with if he wanted to continue his cultivation journey.

He was pleasantly surprised to find that, as the warmth spread through his body, his injuries started reacting to it. It wasn't a massive reaction, but it was still clearly visible.

His newer injuries were having a stronger reaction compared to his older ones, but that was understandable. His older injuries had been in his body for too long and had almost become chronic. Resolving them would be a far harder process.

He was more than satisfied to see his more recent injuries showing some signs of recovery. Even if these signs weren't anything significant, it was still a step in the right direction. Taking care of these younger injuries before they stayed inside his body long enough to become chronic was the best course of action.

A few seconds of bliss went by for Lao. As time passed, the warmth was slowly absorbed by his body until there was virtually nothing left. Eventually, the warmth disappeared entirely, returning his body to normal.

The results of these few moments were incredible. Several of his smaller and more recent injuries showed signs of healing. If he could repeat this process a few more times, he could certainly remove all the smaller problems in his body entirely, as well as improve the situation of his larger, more recent injuries.

His old injuries were mostly unaffected, though, and would have to wait for another solution to be dealt with.

Still, with these results from just a single sip of that liquor, Lao was beyond surprised.

He opened his eyes and looked straight at the old man in front of him.

The way he viewed the old seller had clearly changed, with a hint of respect in his gaze.

"I guess this isn't half bad, old man. I'll give you a passing grade."

As Lao finished speaking, he proceeded to take another jug.

The old man was feeling fairly pleased. As he expected, no matter how foul Lao's mouth may be, he would still end up eating his words and admitting the liquor's quality once he actually had it. The old man may not have much to smile about in his life, but if there was one thing he was proud of, it was definitely that liquor.

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Watching Lao contently chug down the bottle like it was some sort of precious elixir made him feel quite smug, especially after how hard Lao had tried to keep up his snarky and tough appearance earlier by giving him a half compliment.

As for Lao, he was currently entirely focused on his inner body.

He periodically took a swig from the bottle, spending a few moments afterward with his eyes closed, not bothering with anything else around him.

The old man thought he was simply enjoying the taste, but in reality, Lao was observing the changes inside his body. He watched the warmth spreading from his stomach to the rest of his body. From there, it would resonate with his internal injuries and start a healing process.

When the warmth faded away, Lao would open his eyes again and take another swig from the bottle.

This process continued for a few minutes. The old man didn't intrude once, seemingly convinced that Lao was savoring the profound tastes found in his liquor.

Once the final drop of liquor had been consumed, Lao gave his body one final survey.

The results were quite surprising.

His internal injuries could be divided into two categories: age and size. For age, his injuries could be classified as old if they were more than six months old and young if they were inflicted less than six months ago.

As for size, they could be divided into three categories: small, medium, and large.

As he had observed before, the liquor had no real impact on his older injuries. These made up roughly 65% of all his injuries and would require more drastic methods to be cured.

As for his younger injuries, the liquor managed to have an impact, with the healing effect depending on the size of the injury.

All of his smaller injuries had been completely healed. His medium-sized injuries were about a quarter of the way healed. As for the larger ones, the effect wasn't as noticeable, but he could say that those injuries had successfully been curtailed, meaning that as long as he took proper care of them, they wouldn't grow any larger nor become chronic in the future.

Overall, these results were a massive surprise to Lao.

Never did he expect that his decision to come to this small hut would lead him to find something capable of dealing with his internal injuries. In fact, he was expecting to only be able to start addressing them much later. It wasn't even on his radar at that point.

It seemed like all the bad luck in his body had been spent by his predecessor.

He opened his eyes again.

The old man hadn't moved an inch, still calmly watching Lao from behind the counter, probably waiting for Lao to break the silence.

'Now that I've found something this good, I can't leave this place without getting my hands on some more.'

Lao made some quick calculations in his mind.

'Taking into account the effect of one bottle, and considering the possibility of reduced effectiveness due to increased resistance from my body, I’d say about 10 bottles should be enough to get rid of all my medium-sized recent internal injuries.'

After collecting his thoughts, Lao finally stood up from his chair. He placed his empty bottle on the counter and, with a wide smile on his face, addressed the old man.

"Congratulations, old man. You certainly did bring me a liquor of acceptable quality. You barely managed to reach my standards. It would make a good drink to wash down some pork buns or dumplings."

A grin slowly crept up on Lao's face.

"I'll be taking 10 more bottles. That should be enough to entertain me for a while."