In the deep of night, the world was as dark as ink, and everything lost its color. The village was just a blurred outline in the darkness.
Qin Ming was working on a blood snake. This spiritual creature had skin that was incredibly tough to peel. Its scales were harder than fine iron, making a loud clang when struck with a hatchet.
If he wasn't careful, those bright red scales could easily cut his fingers, looking like pieces of refined gold. If made into armor, it would surely provide astonishing defense.
Qin Ming tossed the hatchet aside and decided to switch to a sharper tool. Two days ago, Mu Qingchuan had given him a long-handled black gold hammer and a short sword.
He tried the short sword. Although it wasn't as sharp as the long sword of the man with a dark complexion, it was still good enough to peel the snake skin after he tightened his grip.
Qin Ming focused intently. After peeling back the skin at one end of the snake, he pulled down hard, making the task much easier than cutting it directly.
Several sunstones glowed softly, illuminating the blood snake in a bright red light, as if it were a piece of polished jade.
As he peeled away the bright red snake skin, the flesh revealed underneath was pure white and delicate. The snake gall was not the usual dark color; it was a bright blue, clear like a gemstone.
Qin Ming noticed that both the snake meat and gall contained rich spiritual energy, glowing slightly, indicating they were high-quality nourishing items.
“No wonder people from Chixia City tear off their fake masks and kill for these,” he thought.
He cut the snake meat into pieces, cleaned them thoroughly, and quickly boiled some water. He wanted to achieve his second rebirth as soon as possible; he wouldn’t wait until the next day.
In this situation, he felt a sense of crisis. All sorts of strange creatures had arrived, and the big families and organizations from Chixia City were showing up. He didn’t know what else might happen in the mountains.
These people were all looking for the “nodes” in the mountains, special areas that came with unusual phenomena. The place filled with five-colored mist was especially coveted, with many willing to offer rare high-level scriptures for clues.
Since the magnetic field in the mountains had become chaotic, fires had gone out and reignited, leading to all sorts of strange occurrences.
“There’s a batch of high-level beings migrating from afar, bringing their families and seizing resources in the mountains,” Qin Ming pondered. “Could this migration just be a cover? What if these newcomers are also looking for something?”
The snake meat was now boiling, and as time passed, a rich aroma began to rise, pulling Qin Ming’s focus back and making his fingers itch to eat.
In the deep night, with the wind and snow raging outside, the fragrant snake meat filled the room, and Qin Ming felt a strong appetite, patiently waiting for it to cook through.
“It really smells good and is incredibly fresh.” After taking his first bite, his eyes lit up. This spiritual creature tasted far better than ordinary snakes, almost like a different species.
He had always felt a bit uneasy about eating snakes, but now he didn’t care at all. To him, this was “dragon meat” from the ground.
After just a few bites, he felt warmth rising within him, the effect was immediate; the spiritual substance was already working.
“The snake gall can be steamed or soaked in spicy old wine, but alas, I don’t have any wine at home, so no choice there.”
As he ate the snake meat, he placed the blue snake gall into the steamer, knowing it contained mysterious spiritual essence that he needed to watch closely.
Moments later, the gall, resembling a large blue diamond, was fully cooked. Qin Ming couldn’t focus on the snake meat anymore and began to enjoy the real “main course.”
“Oh my… mountain god, heavens, my heart aches!” After just one taste, he felt his tongue go bitter and numb. Looking in the mirror, he noticed his mouth had turned blue.
He knew the snake gall was bitter and had prepared himself, but the concentrated essence from the blood snake was far more bitter than he expected.
At that moment, the snake meat didn’t even smell good anymore; he was overwhelmed by the bitterness.
He quickly took a sip of the fragrant snake soup to wash down the bitterness, but it didn’t help much; the strong bitterness lingered in his mouth.
This thing was so bitter that even a dog wouldn’t eat it, and it was unbearable for someone trying to achieve a rebirth beyond the golden foundation.
Qin Ming didn’t swallow it all at once, mainly because the gall was large, and he thought chewing it would help him absorb the spiritual essence more easily for a faster rebirth.
His good mood from enjoying the delicacy was almost ruined by the bitterness. Looking at the remaining half of the gall, he gritted his teeth and decided to chew slowly.
After finishing the entire snake gall, he looked in the mirror again and found his lips were coated in a dazzling blue, giving him a strange aura.
“Good thing I’m eating this at night; if it were during the day, I wouldn’t be able to face anyone!”
But the effects of the snake gall were incredibly powerful. Not long after consuming it, he felt a heat rising throughout his body, as if he had a fever.
Qin Ming remained calm and continued to eat the snake meat, not only to suppress the bitterness but also to add more spiritual fire to his body.
In the end, his body began to heat up, like a vibrant furnace, pushing back the cold of winter, and he was glowing all over.
“Food supplements, medicinal cuisine, the effects are coming!” Qin Ming stood up, grabbed the long-handled black gold hammer, and went outside to practice the killing moves from his sword manual.
In an instant, the snow on the ground flew into the night sky, mist swirling around him, a faint light flowing over his body. His vitality surged as he swung the hammer, creating sounds like thunder.
Qin Ming felt his energy and spirit rising continuously. He knew the second rebirth had begun. It was a process, not something that happened all at once.
But he could clearly feel the changes; his strength was increasing, his tendons felt stretched, his senses were sharpening, and his vision was improving.
“Every rebirth process is so intoxicating. Feeling myself growing stronger, even the thick darkness of night seems to lighten a bit.”
A large amount of active energy surged within him, as if he were being purified and baptized, his bones vibrating and rumbling.
Under the night sky, he felt like a furnace, glowing brightly.
It was as if a secret flame was burning in his flesh, cutting away the old impurities, promoting rebirth, refining his energy and spirit, accelerating the flourishing changes within him.
Qin Ming swung the long-handled black gold hammer in the courtyard, continuously exhausting himself until his hair was damp and his body was covered in sweat before he finally returned inside.
He sat quietly in the room, silently feeling the changes within him.
Then, he wondered if his body would grow again after the second rebirth. According to Old Liu, the chosen techniques and meditation methods could lead to very different changes in the body.
Next, he would test the effectiveness of the “wild path” he practiced and see what kind of changes it would bring to his body.
Qin Ming was already taller than most, and after his first rebirth, he had grown nearly two inches more.
That evening, while chatting with Old Liu and Xu Yueping about rebirth, they both felt his height hadn’t changed much, as some people could grow a whole head taller.
Old Liu, with his rich life experience, had been close to older mountain patrollers in his youth and had heard many stories about rebirth.
“Some techniques, once practiced, cause the body to expand like a balloon with each rebirth, getting taller and taller. But only part of it becomes a solid golden body; much of it is just clay. So many rebirth methods have to suppress the body from growing too tall at a certain stage,” Old Liu explained, sharing one of the cases.
He emphasized that some secret techniques were extremely precious; practicing them could lead to mysterious changes, like developing a third eye, which was the origin of certain sacred legends.
Such secret manuals were too rare, and even many big families couldn’t access them.
While drinking, Old Liu reminisced and shared stories from the old mountain patrollers, along with some special rebirth methods and various strange changes and effects that came with them.
Finally, he mentioned that one rebirth method required maintaining the golden height ratio of the body from the very beginning, not allowing it to grow wildly.
Old Liu looked at Qin Ming, slightly drunk, and said, “I think your height change isn’t that obvious.”
Qin Ming remained calm, knowing he just needed to wait two days to see what kind of rebirth method he had practiced.
For the first time, he felt that staying here made him a bit isolated from information. He guessed that the rebirth practitioners in Chixia City were well aware of these things, while he was piecing together bits and pieces.
Moreover, some people didn’t rely on rebirth at all; there were other paths to take, which felt too distant for him to understand.
After sitting quietly for a long time, he felt hungry. The changes from the second rebirth were very noticeable, so he quickly started eating snake soup to replenish his body with the rich spiritual food.
Finally, after washing himself with cold water, he fell into a deep sleep in the stillness of the night.
Before sleeping, he vaguely saw a “golden silk jade robe” reappearing on his body, covered in silver light, with golden threads intertwined, looking quite extraordinary.
Qin Ming drifted from light sleep to deep sleep, then to a state between dreaming and waking.
He felt himself in a deep slumber, his body and mind completely relaxed, getting a good rest, but part of his consciousness remained active.
In this half-awake state, he seemed to see a dusty black cloth blocking his subconscious, obscuring his vision and preventing him from seeing what was behind it.
But during the second rebirth process, the dust gradually blew away, and a corner of the black cloth was lifted, revealing a glimpse of his younger self.
Though in a half-dreaming state, Qin Ming realized that the second rebirth was enhancing his entire being, even strengthening his mental awareness, bringing back memories that had faded from his childhood.
In a daze, it felt as if someone was whispering in his ear: “This method… although it has a great origin, it cannot be fully mastered.”
Then, through the corner of the lifted black cloth, Qin Ming saw a rough large hand holding a thin ancient book, opening it to the first page in front of his younger self…