Yin Na’s final thought as a Soul Orb was: “I wonder what rebirth feels like?”
The explosion brought by Yin Na’s Soul Orb breakthrough collapsed the entire realm.
Chaos suffused every square centimeter of his being. Temporary blackness, followed by short, violent epiletic flashes of light attacked his senses.
Just as quickly as it was violent, Yin Na lost sensation of time and direction; he couldn’t explain how he found himself back in the world of the living. However, what he could immediately observe was that he had no body of flesh and blood. Instead, his consciousness was trapped in the form of a Golden, spherical core.
This was the same 1 billion-li in diameter mass that he earned from winning the game in that realm, but here in the real world, he was about the size of a child’s fist! He hovered in empty space, before realizing with momentary panic that he was thrust into another black space.
“Don’t tell me I have to go through another trillion years of some other arbitrary ‘game!’”
But after a few breaths’ time, he realized with bemused relief: “Oh…I’m next to the lower intestine.”
Whose lower intestine?
His own, of course!
Yin Na’s consciousness had manifested somewhere near where his Dan Tian should have been!
“How fascinating! Although my organs show no signs of life, my consciousness is trapped within my Dan Tian area. In all of mortal cultivation history no one had ever actually observed the physical realm of a martial artist, since cultivators at Nascent and above could enter and exit their Dan Tians like a separate room, but a mere martial artist possesses only meridians. I get the feeling that I have one extra task left to do here.”
Yin Na traced a vein here, an artery there, avoided a large intestine there, until he felt snugly in place.
“This feels right. Here is my center of gravity. Here I go!”
Instinctually, Yin Na knew how to detonate his Soul Orb, as he felt his consciousness exploding, diffusing the billion-li Soul gains across the corners of his body.
Within the span of ten breaths, Yin Na felt vision, sound and smell returning to him. He opened his eyes, and felt intense pain.
“Ugh, it seems like one of my arms had been sliced off.”
Ying Er had managed to cut one of Yin Na’s arms off after death. Yin Na only had his left arm.
“Damn it, it’s my dominant arm too. And I’ve got a crushing headache!
“...Also, I’m evidently underground.”
Yin Na smelled dirt. He was rapidly losing air. He also felt a wriggling, burning pain on his missing stump of a right arm, which he had reason to believe were worms hard at work.
Yin Na frantically clawed through pebbles, roots and mud with his left arm until he could breathe oxygen.
Yin Na massaged his face with his left hand, before realizing: “It appears that my face is rather unsightly.”
Yin Na knew even without the assistance of a mirror that his nose wasn’t just broken. The facial bones on his handsome face were shattered and literally caved in. There was basically a big hole in his face, created from the speed of Chen Zixi’s fatal punch. And there were indeed, worms and all sorts of bugs eating away at the stump of his right arm.
“Even if I had both legs and testicles missing, I’d be grateful!” Yin Na laughed. “I’ve still got my eyes! I still can talk and smell (barely). Considering how much hatred I’ve garnered for myself, you’d think that my body would be desecrated and torn into a thousand pieces, but instead they just pathetically slice off one arm! They even had the graciousness to bury my body! How many cultivators can say that they’ve escaped death? I’ve devoured for more than a trillion years in the realm of the 9 Yin Jade Brick, one arm isn’t even worth the value of a Sun!”
Yin Na laughed triumphantly, and it sounded like a horrific gargling through his mouth, as it was missing a few upper teeth.
“Tian Ji Han is dead. Yin Na is still alive. The Dao of Benefits has indeed, won out!”
Still chuckling in giddy delight to himself, Yin Na tore a piece off his robe and wrapped his face, leaving only his two dark-pupiled eyes staring out like a mummy.
By the lack of decomposition on his body, Yin Na estimated that not even two nights had passed since he had been killed by Chen Zixi and buried. Even if he was being eaten by worms, any and all impurities were completely filtered out by the pulsating Golden Core within his Dan Tian, which even rehydrated his skin and cleared his facial pores. Perhaps the most powerful benefit was that the Golden Core assisted in the regenerative process, but he would still have to wear the bandages for a while.
In addition, the 1,000 year syrup wine he drank earlier still preserved its fire elemental effects on his meridians, even a month after his death. Combined with the unfair advantage of having a 100% Golden Core even as a Martial Artist, all of this made it easy for him to generate fire from his fingertips with the smallest amount of effort.
Yin Na concentrated, and his left palm became hotter than melting iron, as he burned the stump on his right arm, bones, worms, and all. Then he wrapped it dutifully in cloth as well.
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Standing tall in his ragged, dirty clothing, wrapped face and one arm, Yin Na sighed with satisfaction.
“I look like a one-armed freak. A perfect denizen of the Jiang Hu!”
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Tian Ji Han tried his best to adjust to his new life as a Spirit Budgie within the Heavenly Sword Sect
On paper, Xiao Feng’s new master was the domineering Golden Core Cultivator Chen Zixi. However, Chen Zixi was neglecting in his care and instruction, preferring to cultivate in solitude for the vast majority of the time. The majority of “training” he offered Xiao Feng was demanding him perform menial tasks and errands for him such as fetching tea or mopping his living quarters, with the occasional low level Sect mission for him to complete in order to earn a couple of measly Spirit Stones.
Tian Ji Han tried to fill the spiritual and moral void for Xiao Feng, as he continued to provide advice and secondary missions for Xiao Feng to perform in the interest of actually progressing his cultivation journey.
“Since Chen Zixi said that he wants you to grab eight jars of Guan Yu wine from the local village, on your path down the mountain try to do some kind deeds along the way.”
“What deeds?”
“Breaking up a public dispute. Saving a villager from mountain bandits. Helping a grandmother carry a jar of heavy liquid.”
“Okay.”
“And also, if you could, please buy some apples from the village.”
“Yes, master.”
Xiao Feng kept Tian Ji Han within his living quarters, where Tian Ji Han genuinely avoided the sight of the Heavenly Sword Sect members. He was given free reign within the tiny room, where he slept on a horizontal sword stand, ate food that Xiao Feng brought in, and defecated outdoors when the coast was clear.
Even though Tian Ji Han began providing missions and moral lessons to Xiao Feng who took care of all his living needs, he felt unfulfilled.
Tian Ji Han became restless as he paced back and forth on a window sill one morning.
“Master, what’s wrong?” Xiao Feng yawned as he woke up.
“Nothing!” Tian Ji Han sighed.
Xiao Feng was expressionless as his mind cleared from the fog of waking up.
Master’s great archenemy Yin Na had died anticlimactically in the hands of Chen Zixi. Although his life-long mission had been accomplished (even by the hands of someone else), he felt a growing sense of disquietude in his new life as a bird.
Tian Ji Han felt he lacked meaning in his life.
He had no ability to cultivate, and although they kept discussing about plans for Xiao Feng to eventually progress his cultivation journey to the point of becoming powerful enough to meet Immortals and find natural treasures and wonders to rebirth Tian Ji Han with a new body, these often amounted to nothing but empty talk and wishful thinking.
Without a great antithesis to his Dao of Benevolence, Tian Ji Han was bereft of inspiration or motivation. He had no people to save, no innocents to protect or befriend, and no enemy to fight, and it left him feeling empty inside.
This was the sad truth, which Xiao Feng always tried to ignore.
Also, the hope of romantic love was impossible for Tian Ji Han now.
Ying Er was never the same after recovering from fainting and coughing blood. She was rarely seen by Xiao Feng, Brother Sun Lu and Liu Kang as she tried to lose herself in doing Sect missions for her clan.
“It’s almost as if she’s ignoring us,” thought Xiao Feng.
The other day he had seen Ying Er on her way back from a mission. She politely but nervously greeted Xiao Feng.
“Hey, sister Ying Er,” Xiao Feng greeted. He had so much he wanted to say to Ying Er but now that he finally saw her after nearly two months he forgot all he wanted to ask.
“Hello, Xiao Feng,” she had clasped her hands rather stiffly. “How is Master Ji Han?”
“Master is fine, he’s maintaining a healthy weight and stopped shedding feathers, but I believe he is lonely and wanting some company.”
“Oh…i-is that so?”
Xiao Feng said nothing for a while. He could tell that Ying Er was highly uncomfortable. He sighed internally and dismissed himself.
“Yes. I should go…I need to cut these apples for Master.”
“Ah, yes.” Ying Er said. “Take care of your Master.”
In the present, Xiao Feng snapped out of his recollection.
“Don’t worry, master,” he said. “I’ll cultivate to Immortality, or come across some benevolent Immortal on my missions, or some lucky miracle fruit that drops from the Heavens… so I will be able to help you revive your body soon.”
“Yes, yes,” Tian Ji Han sighed. “Xiao Feng, you are a true successor of the Dao of Benevolence.”
He mastered his avian vocal chords to the point that he could now speak in his normal human voice with minimal effort. However, he remained a weak, defenseless bird. Even though his physical bird body got only more round and plumper, the tiny cultivation base within his center of gravity showed no signs of growth.
It was strange. Perhaps he didn’t know the right technique? Normally, a lot of Spirit Beasts had to go through a special process such as eating the right foods or exposing themselves to the moon for thousands of years before making significant progress in their cultivation. Tian Ji Han tried standing still for long periods of time, but he never felt any rotation in his cultivation base, nor any physical signs of change within him.
Now that Yin Na was dead, Chen Zixi felt like he had all the time in the world, but at the same time, he felt like he had no motivation nor energy to actually commit to anything!
Xiao Feng sensed the lack of urgency and drive from his former master. The most Tian Ji Han asked for were apples and sunflower seeds. Other than snacks to wear down his beak, he had no other personal requests.
The best thing Tian Ji Han could do was to give missions to speed up Xiao Feng’s growth, but he always prioritized benevolence and the helping of the common mortal over the obtaining of treasures or missions that rewarded big spirit stones.
Xiao Feng tried to think positive.
“I’m in debt to master Chen Zixi perhaps for the rest of my life,” thought Xiao Feng. “But at least master Ji Han is beside me and alive and well. What more could I demand from life?”
“Xiao Feng is so good to me, even as a bird,” Tian Ji Han thought, as Xiao Feng chopped up apples to beak-sized pieces and placed them before him to eat. “It feels a little… emasculating for my former disciple to be feeding me nuts and fruits and cleaning my feathers, but I should be grateful that I still have my life.”
“It’s not too good to want too much from life,” Tian Ji Han thought as he pecked at an apple. “After all, wanting too much ultimately led to Yin Na’s demise.”