Chapter 98: Chapter 98: Harvest
The skill Wang Sheng improved the fastest was Medicinal Plant Cultivation.
Mainly because he spent a lot of time on this skill, especially as the consumption of Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pills increased. He deliberately extended the time he spent on planting medicinal herbs, which made his progress even faster.
However, as his skill improved and he could plant faster, the number of Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pills was always enough for his use.
But each time he used a large number of them.
As his strength increased, especially after reaching Refining Essence to Qi and obtaining strength comparable to a Grandmaster,
the effect of the Spiritual Medicine planted with “Breakthrough +4” Medicinal Plant Cultivation was no longer as significant for him, and he needed to consume a large amount of Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pills each time, grabbing them by the handful.
Afterward, it was not impossible for the medicinal effect to be so subtle that he could not feel it, which actually meant no effect.
However, he wasn’t particularly worried, as his “Medicinal Plant Cultivation” was about to Breakthrough again and would soon reach “Breakthrough +5.”
While it might not transform substantially again, according to the experience from “Breakthrough +3” to “Breakthrough +4,” the medicinal properties of the plants would definitely improve, it was just uncertain by how much.
“Hopefully it will meet the requirements, and other skills, give it some effort too!”
It wasn’t just “Medicinal Plant Cultivation”; a few other skills were also on the verge of breaking through.
“State—
Refining Essence and Qi. Producing Medicine: 48% Blood Qi Smoke: 15%
Cultivation Technique—
Inner Core Skill (Refining Essence to Qi): Breakthrough +3 (50%) Ba Duan Jin: Breakthrough +3 (65%) Five Elements Fist: Breakthrough +1 (40%) Yijin Scripture: Breakthrough +1 (63%)
Lifestyle—
Medicinal Plant Cultivation: Breakthrough +4 (99%) Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pill Production: Breakthrough +2 (97%) Beast Taming: 9 (98%) rice planting: Breakthrough +1 (15%) Forging: 3 (10%) Mechanical Techniques: 5 (65%)
Martial Arts—
Ba Ji Quan: Breakthrough +1 (45%)…”
The newly added skills were Mechanical Techniques and the complementary Forging, which were, of course, not at high levels yet.
Then, apart from “Medicinal Plant Cultivation,” the skills about to Breakthrough were “Beast Taming” and “Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pill Production.”
Beast Taming was because of the sheer amount of time spent on it, plus the occasional burst in growth like a gust of wind, so even just casually stroking Elder Bai during rest time, it was nearing a Breakthrough—only the post-Breakthrough effects of “Beast Taming” remained unknown.
As for “Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pill Production,” the progress was even simpler: he would make pills every now and then, and each time he made a whole lot of them. Progress was swift, going directly from “Breakthrough +1” to almost achieving another qualitative change in a few months’ time.
A qualitative change at “Breakthrough +3” was, frankly, what Wang Sheng was most looking forward to.
But looking at these skills, he felt a bit of a headache.
“There are more and more skills now!”
The number of skills he had was so many that he couldn’t see them all at a glance.
Inner Core Skill and Ba Duan Jin were still the main ones he practiced. Although progress was slow, the improvement was also significant.
But he couldn’t neglect the other skills, like Ba Ji Quan.
Without practicing Ba Ji Quan, he definitely couldn’t have defeated the Evil Flood Dragon so easily.
Relying solely on Qi Blood Power, it was uncertain how long the fight would have taken, or even whether he would have won in the end.
So, the final conclusion was only one.
“So, I still have to grind!”
The only way to relieve worries is to become stronger; the only way to become stronger is to grind to the extreme!
…
Time quickly passed, and two days went by.
These two days, Elder Bai found Wang Sheng strangely odd, coming over to stroke him for no reason, until today when he finally returned to his usual self.
Elder Bai couldn’t understand why Wang Sheng had stayed away, of course, because he had made a skill Breakthrough.
“Beast Taming: Breakthrough +1”
The “Beast Taming” skill successfully passed its first limit, but Wang Sheng still didn’t know what abilities it would give.
“Elder Bai, come here a minute!”
“Roar~”
What’s up, you’re not coming over to pet me again, are you?
Elder Bai obediently came to Wang Sheng and laid down.
“Roar~”
Speed it up, I still need to cultivate!
Wang Sheng fell silent.
He seemed to be able to understand what Elder Bai’s roars meant, not just interpreting some feelings like before, but truly comprehending them.
It was clear communication with Elder Bai, without any need for interpretation.
“Is this the power of Breakthrough in Beast Taming? Enhanced communication?” he speculated on the effect of the skill’s Breakthrough, “Elder Bai, can you turn in place and then jump three times?”
When asking Elder Bai, Wang Sheng didn’t provide any visual clues or gestures.
Previously, if he wanted Elder Bai to do something more complex, it required some demonstration, like the time they looked for a wide training space, which took a bit of effort.
In other words, if it were Elder Bai from before, he wouldn’t have comprehended the command—it would have been unclear and ambiguous.
But—
Elder Bai proceeded to act.
Although it found the command odd, Elder Bai still obeyed, spinning in place and then hopping three times, stirring up some dust.
“Roar~”
Is there anything else?
“That’s all, you go on and cultivate!”
Wang Sheng now completely understood the ability of “Beast Taming” after the Breakthrough.
It was to strengthen communication, and this communication was bidirectional.
Although Elder Bai hadn’t noticed, its behavior was proof that it understood Wang Sheng’s instructions easily; or it could be said that Wang Sheng could now “communicate” normally with Elder Bai.
However, this ability—
“It seems cool, but in reality, it’s not especially useful. I shouldn’t have had too many expectations.”
The ability to communicate was good, but to be honest, it wasn’t very needed at the moment.
“`
“…” Wang Sheng fell silent for a while, then suddenly thought that Beast Taming was the only skill he hadn’t actively acquired but had gained passively.
That thought made him feel a lot better.
“I’m still looking forward to crafting the Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pill!”
…
Crafting the Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pill was a Breakthrough skill in itself, and he also had to combine it with medicinal materials. Even with just three percent progress left, it took Wang Sheng seven days.
“Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pill Crafting: Breakthrough+3 (1%)”
And before that, as a batch of medicinal plants matured, another skill had also made a breakthrough.
“Medicinal Plant Cultivation: Breakthrough+5 (1%)”
The two skills were interrelated, so the breakthrough times were about the same.
Even Medicinal Plant Cultivation had come a bit earlier.
Wang Sheng had already sown another batch of seeds. The next batch of medicinal plants would be “Breakthrough+5”, and their effects would be known after some time.
Now he needed to test his new skills.
“Let’s try crafting the Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pill after three Breakthroughs!”
He used some medicinal materials to achieve three Breakthroughs for the skill, but he hadn’t truly utilized the effects of a three-time Breakthrough.
However, as a knowledge-based skill, “Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pill Crafting” wasn’t like “Beast Taming” or “Five Elements Fist”, which required some personal exploration to understand. He could vaguely sense how to use this skill.
He laid out all the medicinal materials for the Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pill, then covered them all with his Qi Blood Power infused with “divinity”.
These materials, controlled by “divinity”, floated up and were crushed by the Qi Blood Power.
Under the influence of “divinity”, the dregs were separated from the essence of the materials. With a thought from Wang Sheng, all the essences combined in proportion and transformed into several small aggregations of medicinal essence.
Then, under the manipulation of “divinity”, these essence aggregations merged with the Refined Honey used to mold the pills.
Finally, he formed a brand-new Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pill.
Looking at the pills formed and placed on the table, Wang Sheng revealed a slight smile.
“I finally have a bit of the bearing of a Cultivator!”
Now, making the Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pill no longer required hand rolling. He could directly condense the pills with his Qi Blood Power infused with “divinity”.
“What would I have done if I hadn’t achieved a Breakthrough with Refining Essence to Qi?”
He didn’t believe that with the power of the progress bar, he couldn’t achieve the desired effect without reaching the corresponding realm. It was most likely that he would have used it in a manner similar to casting a skill in a game. Reaching the realm had simply allowed him to understand some of the principles.
Of course, this wasn’t the most important thing.
The important thing was the efficacy of the new Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pill.
Without hesitation, Wang Sheng picked up one and placed it in his mouth, then began to practice Ba Duan Jin.
After more than ten minutes, he stopped.
“The efficacy of a single pill has significantly improved compared to before… but…”
Looking at the leftover dregs and the decreased number of Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pills, he felt nothing was amiss.
He understood that the increased efficacy was not because the skill “Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pill Crafting” had improved the essence of the medicinal materials after three Breakthroughs, but because it had gathered more of the effective substances from the materials.
Simply put, if previously a pill contained an efficacy of 1 unit of Qi-Blood replenishment, now, with the ineffective residues removed, effective substances reached 2 or even more.
Of course, the trade-off was that the number of Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pills had decreased.
“Sure enough, to truly enhance the efficacy, I still need to look at Medicinal Plant Cultivation after five Breakthroughs!”
Certainly, having the “Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pill Crafting” skill at three Breakthroughs wasn’t useless.
The current Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pills were mostly made up of effective substances, the absorption rate was much higher than before, and theoretically, the enhancement of the effects of an individual pill was another way to achieve increased efficacy.
Overall, it was still a useful skill, unlike Beast Taming, which had shown significant use at the moment.
Or was it that Elder Bai couldn’t show its effectiveness?
The key to Beast Taming lay in the “beast”. To truly utilize it, he’d need to provide himself with a more useful animal.
In any case, the breakthrough of the two skills was somewhat helpful to Wang Sheng. Before training, he no longer had to consume handfuls of Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pills, but could take a few at a time instead. Moreover, he had learned a whole new method of Refining Medicine.
The new technique of Refining Medicine was his greatest gain.
…
Time moved on, and August arrived.
For Wang Sheng, it was a season of harvest. The Medicinal Plant Cultivation that had undergone five Breakthroughs had matured.
He promptly crafted new Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pills with the newly harvested materials.
As expected, the efficacy of the Medicinal Plant Cultivation that had undergone five Breakthroughs was much higher than before, at least several times that of the previous effect.
Using these pills for Cultivation felt almost the same as before, no longer requiring several at a time.
More importantly, he didn’t have to worry about the Ten-Complete Great Replenishing Pills losing their effect as his strength improved because the medicinal materials would evolve as well.
Not only had he harvested gains.
The villagers started their harvest too.
The rice in the fields had ripened, essential for the next year’s food supply, and the head of the village took it very seriously, even conducting a ritual to start the harvest. It involved leading the people in the village in offering sacrifices to the heavens, praying for sunny weather to follow.
As the harvested rice needed time to dry before storage, continuous rain keeping it wet, as when harvested, could cause it to go moldy and become unsuitable for storage, which would lead to a dire food shortage in the village.
For such life-dependent matters, the village head would lead everyone in offering sacrifices to the heavens.
After the ritual, the harvest began in earnest.
Whether it was the prayers to the heavens that worked or it was mere coincidence, the following ten days turned out to be sunny, with only a minor shower one evening that caused no trouble.
In any case, the rice harvest went very smoothly.
The village, having been tense for over a year, seemed to truly relax, filled with the atmosphere of a bountiful harvest.
The village head even held a simple celebration for everyone.
The maturing and successful harvest of the rice signaled that everything was getting back on track, certainly a cause for celebration.
Wang Sheng also attended the celebration, enjoying the new rice and fish from the rice fields, with a contented heart.
“This kind of life is really not bad at all!”
After the celebration, there would be a relatively long period of downtime in farming, and the village head started to pay attention to other matters.
The village children could now start training with the Body Tempering Liquid!
“`