Chapter 14: Sucking it all dry
“This Purple Crystal can even absorb the energy of herbs? Yes! The herbs must contain some ‘herbal essence’ and it itself must be some form of energy?”
“A warrior will become stronger after eating herbs. This is because their body absorbs the herbal essence, transforming it into energy.”
Yi Yun felt enlightened. He had been doing numerous experiments the past few days. He had used fire, hot water, static electricity from rubbing clothes, objects that Yi Yun felt “contained energy”. However, the Purple Crystal could not absorb these “energies”.
The known energies the Purple Crystal could absorb were starlight, desolate bones, herbal essence, and the Yuan Qi from Lian Chengyu’s attack.
Thinking carefully, these energies, besides the weak starlight, were all highly relevant to this world’s cultivation of martial artists.
Maybe even starlight was related to cultivation. This world might even have a cultivation technique that absorbed starlight.
As for the desolate bones and herbs, it was needless saying that they were good items that enhanced a martial artist’s body.
It seems the Purple Crystal could only absorb energies that aided in martial practice.
However, after the Purple Crystal absorbed the herbal essence in the Dan Guo, would the Dan Guo still be useful?
It’s probably useless!
The Dan Guo still looked perfect, but it was in actual fact, worse than herbal dreg.
Yi Yun knew that items like Dan Guo could not be eaten directly. A special procedure had to be done to brew it.
And the brewing procedure was only known by the upper echelons of the tribe.
Besides the Dan Guo, all the other herbs in the Lian Clan Herb Mountain would be poisonous when eaten. Not only did it lack any benefits, it would be hard to digest, causing a person to bleed to death!
If not for that, the Lian tribal clan would not have so easily let the poor pick herbs from the mountain. If they had eaten the herbs for themselves, how would anyone know?
However, after the Purple Crystal absorbed the herbal essence from the Dan Guo, it nourished Yi Yun’s body without causing any toxic effect.
This was the magical property of the Purple Crystal.
It converted chaotic energies into energies simple people could absorb. It could allow Yi Yun to absorb all the herbs on the mountain without anyone knowing!
It was totally undetectable!
Upon realizing this, Yi Yun could not help laughing.
“Yun-er what are you laughing about,” shouted Jiang Xiaorou. She was anxious over Yi Yun, worried he would fall. It would be a terrible outcome if he were to fall onto the rocks from such a high height.
“Sis Xiaorou, look what this is?”
Yi Yun plucked and threw the Dan Guo which had lost all its essence down.
“Dan Guo? It’s huge!”
Jiang Xiaorou was pleased, but felt a sense of sadness. A twenty-year-old Dan Guo may be good, but her brother had no opportunity to use it. It would only be brewed by the old men in the tribe before letting Lian Chengyu soak in it.
With mixed emotions, Jiang Xiaorou stored the Dan Guo in the herb basket.
Their mission was to pick 8 ozs of herbs per person. The required weight was based on the lowest graded herbs. This twenty-year-old Dan Guo would be considered more. With the good luck they had today, they could keep their rations.
It was such a pathetic state. Risking her and her brother’s life to pick herbs, even if they had fate defying luck by picking all sorts of rare herbs, they would all be handed over to others for nothing.
“Yun-er, just do it adequately. Don’t climb up any further.”
Jiang Xiaorou shouted worriedly seeing Yi Yun climb more than ten meters high. The herbs won’t for themselves, so it was pointless to risk their lives.
Yi Yun pretended not to hear her because he had seen a light float above a tall pine tree nearby. There were herbs there!
Yi Yun climbed over easily, with one hand on the branch, he plucked off an umbrella shaped herb from the pine tree’s roots.
“Black Fungus is more valuable than Dan Guo.”
Yi Yun was delighted, he absorbed without reservations all the energy from the Black Fungus. That hearty feeling was felt once again. Yi Yun knew that the energy from the Black Fungus had entered his heart and traveled to every part of his body, nourishing his muscles. This feeling was so comfortable for Yi Yun.
Afterall, Yi Yun had been in a constant state of hunger these past few days.
After his Blood Cleansing, Yi Yun felt hungrier than ever before. Yi Yun’s body was in rapid growth and was desperate for energy, but he was not capable enough to hunt alone.
Eating large amounts of food could provide the energy, but how could normal food compare to herbs? This Dan Guo and Black Fungus were timely assistance to Yi Yun!
Yi Yun noticed that after absorbing the Black Fungus and a few rounds of blood circulation, the herbal property of the Black Fungus had given him plenty of strength and improving his eyesight. He could see the head and six legs of ants about ten meters away.
Black Fungus could improve one’s eyesight. Yi Yun wasn’t well versed in pharmacology, but he understood that such low grade herbs did not have such amazing results. The old fogies in the tribe would have to use large quantities of herbs to conjure up the medicine to have any effect.
But using the Purple Crystal, the results were immediate and very notable.
This Purple Crystal might have increased the effectiveness of the herbs!
Yi Yun threw the “high grade herbal dreg” Black Fungus to Jiang Xiaorou.
“Black Fungus! Yun-er, how could you have such good luck!”
Jiang Xiaorou felt incredulous. Such a high grade herb might be picked once in the entire day, but Yi Yun managed to pick two. He was too lucky!
Yi Yun laughed without responding. With the Purple Crystal, as long as he neared the herbs, he would see light dots rise up, like a lighthouse leading him to them. How could he not pick valuable herbs?
At this point, Yi Yun had already climbed more than ten meters high. But after perfectly absorbing two of those herbs, he felt more energetic than usual, and climbing more than ten meters was an easy task.
However, Yi Yun didn’t want to be too alarming, and climbed down.
He changed locations and carried on picking herbs!
Yi Yun strategy of absorbing, picking and finishing the herbs was like a hurricane sweeping through.
He discovered that this Lian Clan Herb Mountain was like his own treasure ground.
He had been starving for days, and had worried that he didn’t have the strength to cultivate himself. However, this Lian Clan Herb Mountain had solved this big problem of his.
Yi Yun climbed up a cliff. This cliff was extremely high, and few could get up there. From Jiang Xiaorou’s angle, she couldn’t see what Yi Yun was doing.
“Yun-er, be careful!”
Jiang Xiaorou’s voice came from the bottom of the cliff and was distorted by the mountain winds.
“Sis Xiaorou, don’t worry, I know myself.”
Yi Yun was jumping up the rocks easily, even a four meter wall was overcome by Yi Yun with a single kick.
In his field of view, he noticed that a baby-fist sized light was emitted from a boulder’s cracks.
This light was ten times brighter than any of the light dots Yi Yun had previously seen!
“Oh? This is!”
Yi Yun was shocked. To be able to emit such a bright light, the herb within the boulder must be extremely valuable.
Yi Yun pushed the boulder away and found a crooked Purple Jade Ginseng. It was well hidden at the top of a cliff few could climb. So it had grown for years without being discovered.
This was too good for Yi Yun.
Yi Yun made no reservations in sucking the Purple Jade Ginseng’s energy with the Purple Crystal.
The Purple Crystal was filled with purple light which gathered within Yi Yun’s body. Yi Yun felt a surge of warmness that spread through his meridians, and heated up his limbs before rising to his head. It made Yi Yun’s five senses more keen and made his limbs feel like they were floating.
This feeling was the same as being drunk. Yet, his body was extremely warm. Yi Yun felt like he had infinite energy that needed venting!
Yi Yun’s body was itchy and uncomfortable. He looked up and saw a boulder that seemed to weigh 300 lbs. Yi Yun felt as if there were millions of ants crawling on him, so he had to vent.
He came to the boulder and lifted it up.
Once! Twice! Thrice!
After lifting the boulder more than ten times, his body broke out into warm sweat, but felt extremely content.
He didn’t feel it was thrilling enough and started carrying the rock to do deep squat jumps. After jumping for twenty times, his feet grew numb. The sweat on him had all evaporated.
It feels great!
Yi Yun moved his body and all his joints cracked!
When a martial artist practiced, he would consume desolate bones, soak his body in herbs to strengthen his mind and body!
After strengthening, by supplementing it with daily training, without the resources or willpower, it would be impossible to amount to anything.
Yi Yun didn’t touch that Purple Jade Ginseng. Such a high grade herb would cause a commotion. Furthermore, he had already absorbed all its medicinal properties and didn’t want trouble for himself by picking it.
A normal person without rest might not be able to pick 8 ozs of herbs, but with the Purple Crystal leading him, and his keen senses, he could see the herbs from far. So in two hours, he had picked the required 16 ozs of herbs for both Jiang Xiaorou and himself.
Of course, all the herbs had been sucked dry by the Purple Crystal. Although they looked fine on the surface, they had already became herbal dregs.
Yi Yun passed the herb basket to Jiang Xiaorou, ordering her not to hand over the herbs too early to prevent suspicion.
“Yun-er…how did you do it so fast…” Jiang Xiaorou felt that regardless of anything, her brother had finished picking the herbs at an astonishing speed. “
“My luck was great. Sis Xiaorou, I’ll go down now for something. You just need to be here to act busy. I’m leaving!”
Saying that, Yi Yun had tore down the mountain.