Feeling resigned, Lin Jiu closed her eyes again, continuing to guide the flow of aura within her body. Atop the karma lotus, something strange appeared—a slight tremor in the two petals, like baby birds eagerly waiting to be fed.
Following her instinct, Lin Jiu attempted to channel a strand of aura into the veins of the petals, essentially giving the aura she had just received back to the karma lotus. The moment the aura touched the petals, Lin Jiu felt an overwhelming sense of joy ripple from her spiritual sea. To make an inappropriate analogy, the feeling was akin to a newborn drinking its first drop of milk.
‘Could it be that no one has ever tried to feed aura back into the lotus?’ Lin Jiu was slightly startled.
As a non-native, she didn’t realize how painstakingly cultivators accumulate aura, bit by bit. Typically, after establishing their foundation, a person would have to meditate for days just to gather a tiny sliver of aura, and their mind couldn’t afford to wander even slightly during this cycle, or all efforts would be wasted. Cultivation, in essence, was a practice of enduring endless solitude and hardship. After working so hard to accumulate aura, who would be willing to squander it recklessly like Lin Jiu?
Most people, if they were to obtain the karma lotus, would undoubtedly try to squeeze every last bit of benefit from it, instead of squandering the valuable aura on such a ludicrous speculation!
But Lin Jiu was different. Her initial cultivation had come to her without lifting a finger, the Stalactite Spiritual Essence was given to her without asking for it, and the aura from the karma lotus was also obtained for free. Since she had obtained everything so easily, she couldn’t really cherish them.
That’s just human nature at work.
…
Lin Jiu once again channeled a strand of aura into her spiritual sea. The two solitary lotus petals trembled slightly, like plants that had finally been nourished after a long drought, gently distributing the aura throughout their body.
She noticed that the karma lotus was becoming more solid. In the beginning, the lotus resembled an ink lotus sketched on the water surface, seemingly on the brink of fading away. But now, with the nourishment of aura, the petals began to shine with a metallic luster which gave them tangible textures.
Lin Jiu’s heart skipped a bit. Her instinct told her that as long as she continued to solidify the petals with aura, they would no longer wilt and close from a lack of malice!
She couldn’t help but gasp, her heart racing. The thought of the karma lotus’s backlash terrified her. She truly didn’t want to go through that again! Although she had barely escaped this time, who could guarantee that someone would be ready to deliver malice to her next time?
If the Wang family members weren’t here today to provide her with urgently-needed malice, would she have to act like the villainess side character Lin Qiu from the book, finding someone with a lower cultivation base to torture and harvest malice from, just to keep the karma lotus from closing?
Once she crossed that line, there would be no turning back—the moment she broke her bottom line, there would be a thousand more breaks to follow.
Lin Jiu steadied her mind and slowly guided the aura in her meridians toward the karma lotus.
It didn’t matter if her cultivation improved slowly. Right now, the only person who posed a threat to her was Wei Liang—as long as Wei Liang decided to protect her, no one else in the world could harm her. On the other hand, if this man wanted her dead, then possessing this bit of aura wouldn’t make any difference.
And so, Wei Liang watched as Lin Jiu, under his guidance, continued to let her cultivation drop step by step, without hesitation.
Wei Liang: “…”
“…” Even the still-present disciples of the Wanjiangui were rendered speechless. There really are people this clumsy?! Even with the Sword Monarch personally guiding her, she still managed to regress in her cultivation!
After circulating the aura a few more times, Lin Jiu’s cultivation steadily returned to the early Foundation Establishment stage.
Lin Jiu felt her mind clear, and her entire body brimming with vitality. Inside her spiritual sea, the two lotus petals had solidified completely, their dark golden light quietly illuminating the space. She could clearly feel that, although her current cultivation was temporarily at the early Foundation Establishment stage, both her physical strength and power far exceeded what they had been when she first arrived in this world.
What further delighted her was that the dark golden karma lotus in her spiritual sea had begun to slowly rotate. As it turned, the lotus emitted a mysterious pull, causing the surrounding aura to seep into her body automatically. While the process was slow, it was steady and consistent.
At this moment, Lin Jiu had no idea about what it meant to absorb aura while doing nothing—even when eating and sleeping, she was cultivating!
Lin Jiu blinked her eyes innocently and stared straight at Wei Liang, who had a gloomy look on his face. She knew that this man would never lay a hand on her before she formed her Golden Core. The side effects of dual cultivation on her would be far too obvious, and as a hypocrite, Wei Liang would never ruin his reputation as the so-called leader of the righteous faction!
‘You like a soft and pliable body, huh? Serves you right!’ She smiled smugly.
Wei Liang slowly stood up, his expression calm as he said, “Besides Essence Solidifier Herbs, Yunshui Plain also has the Aura Conduit Stalk. Consuming it can increase your cultivation by two hundred years. It is rare, only appearing once in a thousand years, but if I want it, I can find it.” He suddenly leaned closer, his voice fell into a faint whisper audible only to her: “The Wang family’s main house happens to have one.”
“…” In that instant, a popular meme from her previous life popped into Lin Jiu’s mind—‘It’s getting cold, time to bankrupt the Wang family!’1
’Wei Liang is truly a bane for the Wang family. Does he take bankrupting them as his life mission?’
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- 天凉王破 (Tian Ling Wang Po) is a popular internet saying, taken from a novel where the character is portrayed as a powerful figure that can bankrupt an entire corporation with a whim. And yes, the name Wang Tianpo (王天破) is rhyming with Tian Ling Wang Po, even written with the same Chinese characters, which is why Lin Jiu feels a deja vu when hearing this name two chapters ago.