Though the sacred plant suffered calamity, its spirit remained unbroken; from the brink of despair, it launched a fierce counterattack, revealing its true strength.
Page (1/3)
Before the morning mist had fully dispersed, Shen Yi was jolted awake by the scorched stench of the Seven-Star Vines.
Barefoot, he rushed to the edge of the medicinal field. His boots still hung upside down from the crooked locust tree, where he had flung them the night before because they had been in the way while he was stimulating the vines to germinate.
Now the tender shoots entwined with star patterns had all turned a charred brown, curling in the morning dew like butterfly wings singed by fire. Several crooked, mud-caked footprints marred the furrows, their edges shimmering with the blue-green cast peculiar to ice crystals.
“Leng Xuan’s Ice-Soul Martens.” Shen Yi used his spirit hoe to lift half a withered leaf. The sneer caught in his throat and dissolved into searing pain.
All twelve Seven-Star Vines meant for the competition had been destroyed—and the Spirit-Plant Tournament would begin in seven days.
The stream reflected the boy’s clenched fist. Suddenly, the treasure on his wrist burst into starlight, and the newly unlocked Spirit-Plant Rewind function activated automatically.
Within the hazy radiance appeared a scene from three minutes past the Hour of the Tiger: three snow-white spirit martens darted into the medicinal field, the ice spikes between their claws piercing the star-patterned nodes of the Seven-Star Vines with uncanny precision.
The voices of disciples making their rounds drifted over on the wind.
“I heard Senior Brother Leng specially changed into gloves made of Ice-Silkworm thread...”
Shen Yi clenched his other hand and shattered the rewind illusion. The scattered stardust branded four tiny words into his palm—Insufficient Evidence—scalding him so badly that he nearly cursed aloud.
“System, retrieve every spirit seed in storage.”
The instant the light screen unfolded in response, the clouds above the medicinal field suddenly churned into leaden gray.
Shen Yi raised his head and watched the first drops of acid rain begin to fall. At last, he understood why Leng Xuan had chosen to strike that very morning: the Bone-Eroding Rain that visited Qingzhou City only once every thirty years was the bane of wood-element spirit plants.
Scarlet fruits clattered against the hastily erected vine awning. Crouching in the mud and water, Shen Yi inventoried his possessions: five Seven-Star Vine seeds swollen from the acid rain, three bags of low-grade spirit soil mixed with gravel, and half a flask of Moonlight Dew that Ya’er had secretly drunk as though it were sugar water.
“Senior Brother Shen!”
A girl with twin buns charged into the rain, a clay basin balanced on her head and a glazed bottle clutched tightly to her chest.
“I stole all the morning dew from the dining hall’s fish pond!”
Ya’er proudly shook the bottle. Inside, a koi thrashed its tail furiously against the glass.
Shen Yi flicked away the strand of waterweed clinging to the girl’s bangs, then suddenly froze as he stared at the ice crystals gathered at the ends of her hair.
The six-sided frost flowers had somehow remained perfectly intact in the acid rain, their edges glimmering with the same幽 blue radiance that flowed from the Ice-Soul Martens.
The bracelet on his wrist suddenly rang with a clear chime. The fragment of spiritual power he had extracted from Mo Yu the night before floated into the air of its own accord.
When the demon-seed aura touched the ice crystals in Ya’er’s hair, the two suddenly merged into a pale violet mist. Within the curtain of rain, it traced half of a broken map—the precise course of the underground spirit veins beneath the Spirit-Plant Tournament grounds.
“So the Heart-Eroding Lotus needs earthfire to nourish it...” A dark glint flashed through Shen Yi’s eyes. With a turn of his hand, he pressed the mist into the spirit soil.
To his astonishment, the soil infused with demon-seed aura began to glow with golden-red patterns beneath the acid rain. In the blink of an eye, the five spirit seeds sprouted into seedlings three inches tall.
Ya’er, terrified, dropped the glazed bottle.
“That’s dark magic!”
“Shh.” With mud-smeared fingers, Shen Yi pressed them against the girl’s lips. The acid rain splashing onto the back of his hand was suddenly swallowed by the star patterns. “A grand gift from Leng Xuan should be put to good use.”
The treasure on his wrist was frantically absorbing the Bone-Eroding Rain. The drops that ought to have been lethal sank into the star patterns and transformed into sweet rain capable of nourishing spirit plants.
When the final drop of acid rain struck a newly unfurled leaf of the Seven-Star Vine, Shen Yi suddenly groaned and dropped to one knee.
The system’s light screen flashed a crimson warning:
[Demon-Seed Contamination: 15%]
A dull pain twisted through his dantian as though vines were tightening around it.
Grinding his teeth, he pressed the fragment of spiritual power against his heart. At Ya’er’s startled cry, he gave a soft laugh.
“Looks like I’ll have to try another method...”
By nightfall, twelve crooked clay pots had appeared in the medicinal field.
Page (2/3)
A shard of ice crystal was embedded in the bottom of each pot, while the star patterns on their sides intertwined with the demon-seed aura to form bizarre totems.
Shen Yi chewed on the osmanthus cake Ya’er had filched from the dining hall as he watched the acid rain condense above the clay pots into a spinning dome of mist—an exact miniature of the Bone-Eroding Rain clouds.
“Senior Brother Leng would never imagine,” the boy said, tossing the last half-piece of cake to the koi in the glazed bottle, his eyes reflecting the abnormal dark-gold veins of the Seven-Star Vines, “that the droppings of those Ice-Soul Martens he sent me...”
His deliberately raised intonation startled the night owls from the branches. In the darkness, a lurking shadow staggered and snapped a dead branch beneath its foot.
With his back to the source of the sound, Shen Yi’s lips curved into a smile. The spirit hoe hidden in his sleeve was humming and trembling.
The Seven-Star Vines, ripened by the demon-seed aura, stretched their leaves in the darkness. What flowed through their veins was no longer starlight, but a dark-red radiance somewhere between molten lava and blood.
Shen Yi crouched beside the clay pots until well past midnight, the hem of his robe soaked through with night dew that formed dark patterns like ink-painted bamboo.
The vines of the Seven-Star Vines, twined with demon-seed aura, curled and unfurled strangely beneath the moonlight, much like some primordial creature breathing in its sleep.
“You certainly know how to enjoy yourself.” He flicked a finger against a leaf, and the vine immediately curled around a shard of ice crystal and offered it to him.
Ever since they had absorbed the cold poison within the Ice-Soul Marten droppings, the spirit plants had been able to draw in moonlight and condense it into icy dew.
The system’s light screen suddenly appeared on his wrist.
[Mutated Seven-Star Vine Maturity: 65%]
Beside the progress bar, a blood-red skull symbol had appeared.
A faint jingling suddenly came from outside the shed. Shen Yi pushed the clay pots into the shadows with the back of his hand.
Gao Yao stood beyond the fence, holding a glazed lantern. Frost flowers formed from the night mist clung to the hem of her plain white dress, and she held a sandalwood box wound with golden wire against her chest.
“I heard your spirit field was struck by the Bone-Eroding Rain.” Her gaze swept over the blackened furrows before pausing on the crooked clay pots. “This is a thousand-year-old spirit marrow from Azure Luan Hall...”
Before she could finish, the boy’s mud-stained fingers tapped the sandalwood box. When Shen Yi tilted his head, the ice crystals at the tips of his hair pattered onto the back of her hand.
“Lady Gao, coming out so late at night to offer warmth—aren’t you afraid people will accuse you of consorting with demonic cultivators?”
The skull symbol on his wrist flickered faintly beneath the glazed lantern.
Spiritual power gathered at Gao Yao’s fingertips as she prepared to investigate, but a bead of acid rain fell from the roof of the shed and struck her wrist.
Shen Yi seized the opportunity to grip her vital point and pull her into the shed.
When the two of them tumbled onto the pile of dry grass, half a piece of osmanthus cake slipped from the boy’s sleeve and landed neatly on the carved eye of the Azure Luan engraved on the sandalwood box.
“You carry demonic aura.” Gao Yao formed a sword with two fingers and pressed it against his throat, only to see the star patterns on his Adam’s apple devour the spiritual energy leaking from her blade.
The pure spiritual power, after passing through the star patterns, transformed into nourishment for the plants in the clay pots.
Shen Yi lazily raised a hand still dusted with pastry crumbs.
“Why not try a piece of this specially prepared osmanthus cake for demonic cultivators, Lady Immortal?”
As he spoke, the clay pots outside suddenly erupted with dark-golden radiance. All twelve Seven-Star Vines unfurled at once, their tendrils catching each falling bead of acid rain with pinpoint accuracy.
Gao Yao stared blankly at the strange sight of the vines dancing in the rain, and the pressure of her sword-fingers slackened unconsciously.
Seizing the moment, Shen Yi poured the spirit marrow into an empty clay flask, mixed it with the koi’s stolen morning dew, and drank it all in one swallow.
“Many thanks for the sponsorship, Lady Immortal—”
The roguish smile on his face stiffened as he wiped his mouth. The system’s light screen exploded across his vision in a blood-red warning:
[Demon-Seed Contamination: 30%]
A tearing pain ripped through his dantian. Shen Yi staggered and caught hold of one of the clay pots.
Gao Yao instinctively reached out to support him. When her fingertips touched his back, she was startled to see several vine-like ridges protruding along the boy’s spine.
Those dark-red veins flickered in and out of sight in rhythm with the swaying Seven-Star Vines, resembling some kind of symbiotic curse mark.
Page (3/3)
“You’re feeding the spirit plants with your own vital blood?”
Gao Yao abruptly formed a hand seal and summoned her bonded spirit sword. Wherever its radiance swept, the Seven-Star Vines in the clay pots let out shrill cries like those of infants.
Shen Yi seized the blade with his bare hand. Blood ran along the star patterns and seeped into the soil. The vines, originally dark gold, instantly faded into a pure moon-white.
The boy scooped up a handful of spirit soil with his bloodstained hand.
“Watch closely.”
The drops of blood in his palm collided violently with the demon-seed aura within the soil. Beneath the moonlight, they condensed into a miniature star map.
At the end of each of the twelve star paths stood one of the clay pots. Inside them, the spirit plants visibly unfurled a seventh star-patterned leaf.
Gao Yao’s sword clanged to the ground.
Looking at the reckless smile on Shen Yi’s pale face, she suddenly remembered seeing him three days earlier, enduring a lightning tribulation to save a spirit sparrow in the medicinal field.
He had been just as gravely wounded then, yet he had broken his last Grain-Repelling Pill in half and given it to the shivering fledgling.
“The assessment in seven days...” Her voice was as soft as a sigh as she bent to retrieve her sword. “The Grand Elder of Azure Luan Hall despises unorthodox arts.”
Shen Yi was toying with a tuft of Ice-Soul Marten fur he had somehow obtained. At her words, he suddenly poked the tip of the fur into one of the clay pots.
The Seven-Star Vine immediately coiled around the silvery tuft. The star patterns on its leaves began to rotate in reverse.
“Then let them see—”
As the vines surged upward, a molten-dark-gold radiance flashed through the boy’s eyes.
“What true rebirth from destruction looks like.”
At dawn, Ya’er bounded into the shed carrying a clay jar filled with morning dew, only to be so shocked by the scene before her that she fell hard onto her backside.
The twelve clay pots formed a constellation array in midair. Every Seven-Star Vine had bloomed with a seven-colored bud of glasslike brilliance.
Shen Yi hovered with his eyes closed at the center of the formation. The ice crystals gathered at the ends of his hair transformed with every breath into drifting specks of stardust.
“Don’t touch the ground.” Gao Yao’s voice came from the roof beam.
Only then did Ya’er notice that the entire floor of the shed had become a writhing mass of dark-red mycelium. Every three breaths, the fungal threads spewed clouds of sulfur-scented spores.
Shen Yi suddenly opened his eyes and dropped from the air. Wherever the hem of his robe swept across the mycelium, star-patterned flowers burst into bloom.
Amid the successive explosions of blossoms, he caught the clay jar from Ya’er’s arms and swallowed the last half-piece of hardened osmanthus cake with the morning dew.
“It’s time to return Senior Brother Leng’s gift.”
When the first ray of sunlight pierced the clouds of acid rain, the boy drew a jade box riddled with holes from inside his robe.
Within it, Ice-Soul Marten fur and fragments of the demon seed writhed in a fierce struggle. The sparks they flung onto the mycelium blossomed into star-patterned flowers of the same lineage as the Seven-Star Vines.
Gao Yao watched as he buried the jade box in the largest clay pot. Suddenly, she sensed the earth veins beneath the entire medicinal field trembling faintly.
The withered vines corroded by the acid rain had somehow re-rooted themselves deep underground. Following the course of the spirit veins, they were silently spreading toward the tournament grounds.
“What exactly are you...”
“Shh.” Shen Yi raised a finger stained with mycelium. The skull symbol on his wrist had transformed into a resplendent golden star. “This is a surprise for the judges.”
As he bent down, half of a blue dragon scale flickered within the star pattern hidden at the nape of his neck.
It was unmistakably the mark of the dragon vein beneath Qingzhou City.