Chapter 440: The Sea Could Not Wash His Name Clean
Translator: Sparrow Translations Editor: Sparrow Translations
"Master, can we think of some other way to help the couple?" Xiao Yan pulled a long face and said, "This is too…"
Lin Feng replied with a plain expression, "Too what?"
Xiao Yan stuttered a little and was speechless. Lin Feng said simply, "If your mind is clean, then you will see the clean side of things as well. No matter what that is, if you can maintain a normal mind then you can treat everything equally."
"In the end, this thing, along with your Black Cloud Flag, your Grand Sun Primordial Fire, your Nefarious Spectral Primordial Fire as well as the Energy Gathering Pill that you consumed during your cultivation, are just small parts of the myriad of things on this Earth. What difference is there?"
Lin Feng’s posture was straight and exuded a kind of elegance. He stretched out his palm, and a leaf floated down from the Black Heavenly Treasure Tree. The leaf, which was originally gargantuan in size, minimized in no time and landed on Lin Feng’s palm after a spiraling descent.
"All things under the sky, from everybody’s perspective and no matter who that person is, are all independent and unique beings and are different from the rest," Lin Feng spoke slowly. "However, if you depart from individual perspectives and you perceive things from the point of view of the world, everything plays a role in the fate and destiny of all living beings."
He looked at Xiao Yan and flashed a tranquil smile. "As for our kind of cultivation, the aim is to detach ourselves and transcend this kind of normality that plagues the great majority."
Even if one were to take a macro perspective of the fate of the world, it was still unique and different from the rest.
"One has to learn and understand this kind of normality and ordinary life before that individual can detach himself or herself from it."
Lin Feng handed the leaf from the Black Heavenly Treasure Tree to Xiao Yan as he spoke and Xiao Yan accepted the gift. He still looked a little confused, and replied only after a long moment, "I made a mistake. Thank you, master, for reminding me."
"It doesn’t matter what function the item serves – after all it’s just a kind of pill."
Lin Feng nodded his head in approval at Xiao Yan’s words, and he gave himself a victory gesture in his mind. "Another successful round of bullshitting!"
Xiao Yan pondered momentarily, but began to feel something was not quite right, and turned back to look at Lin Feng with an embarrassed expression. "However, master, no matter what you have to keep my secret. You can’t let anybody else find out – they don’t possess your level of wisdom and understanding, so it’s inevitable that they may misunderstand me."
"If news of this reaches the ears of my grandfather and Zhener, they will murder me."
Lin Feng laughed and said, "It’s not as if you’re using it yourself. What are you afraid of? Are you saying that you also want to try?"
Xiao Yan’s brain began to shake like a rotating drum. "How is that possible… Master, please don’t crack this kind of joke."
"If that’s the case, then please hurry along." Lin Feng waved his hand to dismiss Xiao Yan, but realized that Xiao Yan was still rooted to the spot. He could not help but ask curiously, "What else do you want?"
Xiao Yan’s face was one of extreme awkwardness, and he stood at the same spot for a long while. He opened his mouth to speak but nothing coherent came out and in the end he stuttered, "Master, the prescription…"
Lin Feng’s expression was calm as he said, "There is no prescription. I have never forged this kind of pill before. This task has been given to you, so it’s entirely up to you to investigate and mull over it."
Xiao Yan’s mouth gaped open and instinct told him that he had been conned. "Mas… Master?"
Lin Feng nodded his head. "Everything has been handed over to you. I will lie in wait for your good news."
"Okay, then…" Xiao Yan nodded his head with exasperation and said meekly, "Then, can you give a name for this new medicine?"
Lin Feng’s eyes rolled around. "A name, huh?"
He thought for a little while and the corner of his lips curled into a smile. He chuckled and declared, "We shall call it ‘My Love For A Stick Of Firewood’."
Xiao Yan was extremely perplexed. "Huh? ‘My Love For A Stick Of Firewood’… What does it mean?"
Lin Feng was rolling over the floor laughing on the inside, but he pulled a serious face and replied calmly, "Ask no more. That shall be its name."
"Oh yes – the physique of the dragon race is naturally extraordinarily strong. Do consider this factor when you forge the pill, so the strength of the medicine can be increased."
Xiao Yan took his leave and returned to the Inferno Precipice with the task of creating the "My Love For A Stick Of Firewood". The more he thought about it, the more he believed that something was off. He heaved a heavy sigh and thought, "Forget it, forget it. In the end, I’m not the one using it. I’ll just treat it as helping out a fellow human… No, helping out my fellow dragon."
He did not even have a prescription and had to rely entirely upon himself to investigate and contemplate. However, he had never touched medicines of similar qualities, so everything had to be done from the very beginning.
In reality, this was not really that big of a challenge. This kind of medicine was accidentally invented by cultivators who forged pills a long time ago, and Xiao Yan’s skills at forging pills was pretty good. It was not before long that he made some headway, but he was mostly just scratching the surface.
The pill that was initially produced could probably only arouse normal people. Even beginner Qi cultivation stage cultivators could suppress the medicinal effects, let alone a Demonic Lord stage being from the dragon race like Jieyu.
Still, the starting steps were usually the hardest, and once the direction was right then the speed of progression was bound to improve drastically. He only had to investigate a way to increase the power of the medicinal effects.
"No matter how I try to convince myself, I feel like there’s something fishy about it all." Xiao Yan debated with himself incessantly while he produced another batch of pills at the same time. He would definitely not try the pill himself as he could simply probe with his mana to estimate the pills’ medicinal strength.
"Oh, the medicinal effects are getting stronger and stronger. However, with the current set of resources, I have reached a bottleneck. I need to add new materials in to further increase its medicinal effects."
Xiao Yan kept the pills. He felt like he forgot something, and pondered for a while before he slapped his forehead in realization. "Oh yes, I need to send a new batch of Ice Amber." He extinguished the furnace and walked out of the Celestial Golden Pavilion.
Forging pills and medicine used to be morally upright, but when Xiao Yan exited the door he meticulously cleaned up the medicine room and made sure not a trace of his materials, be it the smell or whatnot. Only then did he push open the door sneakily – he even took the precaution of looking left and right to make sure that nobody was around – before he opened his stride.
At this point, Xiao Yan was on high alert. He was extremely afraid that his movements would be detected by somebody.
"The more I think about it, the more I think master conned me…" Xiao Yan muttered under his breath as he arrived outside Hu Yanyan’s pavilion and declared his purpose. Once he obtained her permission, he walked in.
Xiao Yan enveloped the Ice Amber with his mana and lowered it on the ground. He did not want to loiter any long and placed his fist in his palm towards Hu Yanyan’s direction. "Farewell, I’m taking my leave."
He was not sure if it was just an illusion or that he somehow felt that Hu Yanyan was extraordinarily charming and moving today.
"Oh no, I have been inhaling the odors of the medicine for too long – it must have affected me to a certain extent. " Xiao Yan realized what was going on and refused to hang around any longer and was almost back on his way. Most of his personal mana was currently being used to suppress the Primordial Fires, so his self-discipline was weak and if he stayed any longer he was going to humiliate himself.
However, at this moment, Hu Yanyan’s nose twitched all of a sudden and her ears trembled a little.
Her usual cold expression suddenly turned a few degrees colder, as if there were layers of ice and snow on her face, and the gaze she shot at Xiao Yan was extremely intimidating.
Even her six fox tails were shimmering behind her.
"Turns out you’re just a dirty pervert! Obscene!"
Hu Yanyan squeezed out a few words from between her teeth. Xiao Yan could clearly read "disdain" in her left eye and "contempt" in her right.
Xiao Yan’s tongue tied into a knot and his mouth gaped open. He suddenly recalled that even though Hu Yanyan was a glamorous individual, she was direct and straightforward with her words. However, in the end she was of the fox race and even if she had never eaten pork in her entire life she was, by nature, destined to watch pigs run.
Hu Yanyan could not be more familiar with the scents and smells of items like "My Love For A Stick Of Firewood". People of the fox race had their own foxy smell, which had a similar effect. Even though Xiao Yan cleaned himself up, a single trace of the smell, even if it were just a little bit, could be detected by Hu Yanyan’s sensitive nose.
At this point, even the sea could not wash his name clean.
He pretty much escaped from Hu Yanyan’s stone room with his tail between his legs and he was devastated. "Master, you have really ruined me this time!"
Once he passed on the task of creating the medicine to Xiao Yan, Lin Feng pushed the matter to the back of his head.
He was currently laughing bitterly at the version of the Acalanatha Tathagata Mantra that he had derived inside The Library.
From the broken text and remnants of the Acalanatha Tathagata Mantra that he had obtained from Liang Yuan through Shi Tianhao, Zhu Yi and company, Lin Feng managed to derive and infer the entire original text. However, what made him upset was that, like the Vairocana Mantra that was printed upon the Robe, even though the foundational text was now complete, there was lack of outline and backbone.
The outline was the core of the foundational text. However, it was simultaneously independent of the foundational text. With the outline, deducing the foundational text was a piece of cake, but the outline could not be deduced from the foundational text.
The Vairocana Mantra’s outline was the handprints of the ten forms of the Vairocana Zen Palm, while the outline of the Acalanatha Tathagata Mantra was the Seal of the Acalanatha Supreme Secret Manual of Mantra Origins. This seal was the origin of all Buddhist mantras, and even though its battle prowess was inferior to that of the Vairocana Zen Palm, it was the foundation of Dharma and its potential was endless.
From a different perspective, its value was far greater than that of the Vairocana Zen Palm.
Lin Feng sighed and muttered to himself, "Forget it. I’ll leave it for now, there will always be an opportunity."
He glimpsed at the Buddhist relic that Zhu Yi obtained from the Heavenly Lake Sect and thought to himself, "I have already extracted the core and meaning of the Acalanatha Tathagata Mantra from it, so this relic is no longer of any use to me. I should return it to where it belongs."
Lin Feng guided Mount Yujing and once again descended upon the realm of the Great Zhou Empire and arrived in at the location of the Great Thunderclap Temple.
Lin Feng travelled through the void and arrived at the side of the mountain on which the ruins of the Great Thunderclap Temple resided. He looked around him and could not help himself and laughed. "Oh yes, Song Qingyuan of the Heavenly Lake Sect is still being imprisoned on top of the mountain. Cao Wei must be really worried by now?"
"I shall let him worry for a little while longer. If I release Song Qingyuan and let him return, his progression should be almost adequate."
Cao Wei could feel that Song Qingyuan was still alive, but he had no way of confirming his exact location. At the place where Song Qingyuan disappeared, Lin Feng appeared nearby at the same time, so Cao Wei suspected that Song Qingyuan had been captured by Lin Feng but he had no proof.
After the battle of the Northern Polar Sea, Cao Wei was seriously injured and had no choice but to return back to his mountain to treat his wounds. In the meantime, he had no power to look for Lin Feng.
As one of the prodigal talents of the Heavenly Lake Sect’s younger generation, Cao Wei could not ignore the fact that he was missing.
Lin Feng contemplated to himself as he arrived at the back of the Great Thunderclap Temple’s mountain where the ruins of the mass of towers were at. He took in the sight of all the devastated pagodas and towers and heaved a heavy sigh. He waved his sleeve and a deep hole appeared in the ground.
Lin Feng took out the relic and tossed it into the deep hole, and after channeling his mana again the deep hole disappeared. The gravel and soil closed up and the ground returned back to its original state.
Just when he was prepared to leave, a system prompt appeared in his head.
"Visitor, you have triggered the side quest, Return to Nirvana!"
Lin Feng was taken aback. He investigated the description of the system notice and it read: "The host’s second visit to Buddha’s doorstep and the returning to the ruins of the mass of pagodas has triggered the side quest, Return to Nirvana!"