It was not until a minute later that Lin Mu's screams became audible. By now the echoing sound of the explosion had faded away and the forest had become silent once again. Clearly the explosion had scared most of the beasts of the forest, thus one could not hear any more sounds.
Lin Mu was screaming in pain, but he could still think. His left hand was severely injured, with his fingers broken and his arm bones popping out of his elbow. Blood could be seen dripping out of his lacerated flesh.
The force exerted by the combination of vital energy and spirit Qi was too much for his body to handle, which resulted in his current predicament.
Lin Mu forcefully gained a semblance of his sanity and instinctively withdrew the bottle that contained the Four vessels restoration pills. He then used his mouth to pull open the cork and popped a single pill into his mouth.
As soon as the Four vessels restoration pill touched Lin Mu's tongue, it melted and was swallowed by him. When the liquefied pill entered his stomach, a cooling feeling spread all over his body relieving him of his anguish.
The pain faded away as if it was never there. The flesh of Lin Mu's left hand started wiggling and itching. The bones that were popping out of his elbow were slowly being pulled back into their correct place.
Lin Mu's fingers that were broken in multiple places were also being mended. His flesh that was torn and cut slowly started healing. After ten minutes, Lin Mu's hand was completely healed and as good as new.
"Heavens! I can never do that again. I don't want to feel that kind of pain ever again." Lin Mu said out loud.
If another person saw Lin Mu right now, they would see that he was drenched in sweat and was panting heavily.
'The effect of the Four vessels restoration pill is even more amazing than I guessed it would be.' Lin Mu thought.
Suddenly, Lin Mu felt a scorching feeling spreading throughout his blood vessels and meridians.
"Aargh! What is this? Why has the pain not stopped?" Lin Mu shouted.
Lin Mu felt as if his blood vessels and meridians were being scraped and pulled apart. This scorching feeling lasted for a few minutes, after which a comfortable warmth replaced it.
Lin Mu could sense spirit Qi flowing through his meridians. He sat down and chanted the severing heart sutra so that he could clearly sense the condition of his body. Lin Mu peered into his dantian and found out that his depleted spirit Qi was replenished, and even increased by a large amount.
Lin Mu observed his spirit Qi and estimated it to be around 500 wisps.
'My spirit Qi increased by such an enormous amount. This is definitely the effect of the Four vessels restoration pill.' Lin Mu thought.
'But the man in the restaurant never mentioned that the pill also has the effect of increasing one's cultivation.' Lin Mu wondered.
Pushing the unwanted thoughts to the back of his mind, Lin Mu instead chose to just take joy in the benefit that he had just gained. He then walked back to the hunting shack, as he had depleted the vital energy within his body.
Lin Mu reached the hunting shack after ten minutes and withdrew a large amount of beast meat, which he then set on the stove to cook. He was feeling very tired so did not even bother to season the meat with spices.
After the beast meat was cooked, Lin Mu first ate it slowly and then increased his speed as he gained more of his vital energy back. All the meat was soon consumed by Lin Mu and was being digested by his body.
Lin Mu had sat down to chant the calming heart sutra, so that he could restore his vital energy. While he was assimilating the vital energy, Lin Mu finally saw the changes within his blood vessels. They had expanded and looked much more tough than before.
'Did I break through to the 10th stage of the body tempering realm as well?' Lin Mu wondered to himself.
Only after Lin Mu had completed assimilating all the vital energy from the beast meat, did he confirm that he had entered the 10th stage of the body tempering realm.
"So not only did the Four vessels restoration pill increase my spirit Qi, but it also pushed me into the 10th stage." Lin Mu muttered to himself.
Now that Lin Mu was back to his optimum condition, or rather one could say better than before, he finally pondered on his previous misfortune.
Lin Mu understood that he had managed to obtain benefits through his misfortune and that he was incredibly lucky to have the four vessels restoration pills with him. If he did not find them in the spatial rift that day, he may not have been alive today.
"I can't use the combination of vital energy and spirit Qi again. At least not until I can figure out a solution for it." Lin Mu concluded.
'Even the normal form of the boulder collapsing fist is very strong for me to use in most situations.' Lin Mu thought.
After Lin Mu had organized his thoughts, his attention was pulled towards the black dots that were floating around.
'Since I have more than enough spirit Qi, I may as well open and check all these spatial rifts.' Lin Mu thought.
Lin Mu then stood up and walked towards a black dot that was a few feet away from him. He reached out with his right hand, as the black dot expanded into a spatial rift. He put his hand inside the rift and tried to find something.
Lin Mu's first attempt resulted in failure, as he did not find anything inside the spatial rift. He did not lose hope and went towards another spatial rift. This time he found something inside the spatial rift.
Lin Mu withdrew the item from his spatial ring and found it to be a small broken piece of metal. It seemed like it was part of something bigger, but could not be determined what.
Lin Mu checked all the black dots in his surroundings and only stopped when he could not find any more of them. He had opened a total of 17 spatial rifts that had used up around a hundred wisps of spirit qi.
Lin Mu discovered that some of the spatial rifts took more than 5 wisps of spirit Qi to open. After he had checked all the spatial rifts he was left with eight objects. Although all of them were useless to Lin Mu, some of them looked interesting to him.
The most peculiar item he had found in a spatial rift was a fully preserved bolster.