Chapter 393 (1/2)
Chapter 393: The Very Last Qi
The main dish for today was the pork braised in brown sauce.
Ning Que crouched at the entrance of the cave, holding his bowl and chewing the greasy pork. He looked at the steep cliff scenery and asked, ”Chen Pipi will definitely come for a free meal as long as he can smell the meat. However, he came to see me less than before this month and always left in a hurry. What has he been up to recently?”
Sangsang pushed the meat aside to one half of the pot with a ladle to pour some meat sauce onto her rice. Then she held her bowl and crouched beside him. She thought for a while and answered, ”I don't know either. But Tang Xiaotang told me he was helping her with her difficulties in cultivation when she came to play.”
Ning Que was baffled, thinking back to the conversation about who was the real monster two months ago. He sneered and said, ”Working out the difficulties in her cultivation? I'm the one who needs his help, not that little girl. Taoism and the Devil's Doctrine are irreconcilable. Now who's the monster on the back of the mountain?”
Sangsang was unable to understand what he was talking about.
Ning Que turned around and looked at her, ”I heard that the Great Divine Priest of Revelation had visited the Scholar's Mansion.”
Sangsang nodded and went on eating.
Ning Que asked, ”You didn't go back this time?”
Sangsang murmured in confirmation.
Ning Que looked at her dark forehead and asked in a low voice, ”What's your plan for this? The Divine Hall may be taking you, the successor of the Great Divine Priest of Light, more seriously than any other previous successors in the past, considering how they've sent a Great Divine Priest to pick you up.”
Sangsang asked, ”What's your opinion?”
Ning Que thought for a while before saying, ”Although I don't like the West-Hill Divine Palace and I still consider this to be ridiculous, I never expected you to become a Great Divine Priest of Light. Though I have to admit, it's truly a great honor, it would be a pity to not take it.”
Sangsang suddenly put the bowl down and glared at him seriously. ”What we should be most concerned about is how you can break out of here.”
Even the clumsiest bird will eventually find its way out of the woods, and even an idiot can gain success if he tries hard enough.
Despite being driven to exhaustion and madness for days, Ning Que showed his incredible perseverance and patience. Just like back when he was fighting for survival in Min Mountain, struggling with cultivation in the old library, and coming upon a flash of inspiration in the rain, he finally achieved this impossible mission and completely mastered the essential characteristics of the Qi of Heaven and Earth.
It meant he could eventually convert the Great Spirit inside him to the natural Qi of Heaven and Earth. With this, he could finally walk out of the cave without triggering the inhibition set by the Headmaster.
He was completely sure that he could now do this.
After repeatedly being slammed back into the cave by the inhibition, he had gradually become increasingly pale and desperate. Yet he had also gained a new understanding of the manipulation of the Great Spirit.
He was right. The aura left by the Headmaster of the Academy at the entrance of the cave no longer reacted to his Great Spirit. However, he was surprised when he then crashed into an invisible and indestructible wall just as his right foot was about to go across the line.
What the h.e.l.l was it now?
In the deep cave, Ning Que slumped his head between his legs. It took a long time to suppress the new wave of desperation and self-pity in his heart before he could start thinking intently once again.
Suddenly, he figured it out. The very next moment though, he became disappointed once again.
Once the aura left by the Headmaster of the Academy at the entrance of the cave sensed the Great Spirit or any unnatural aura, it would trigger the inhibition, which would summon all the Qi of Heaven and Earth around the cliffs. It would coagulate a vast and bl.u.s.tering ocean to engulf every person who tried to break through it.
On the other hand, it would turn into a wall or a fence instead when someone with no unnatural Qi of Heaven and Earth tried to pa.s.s through it.
Comparing to the bl.u.s.tering Qi ocean, this static wall was not that horrible. However, it was still no easier to go through the aura left by the Headmaster of Academy.
There was a way it could be that easy.
Despite only being in the Lower Seethrough State, Ning Que stood a chance to forcibly break through the inhibition by increasing the Great Spirit. What was more, he had learned how to refresh Qi according to the last section of Origin on Primordial Qi of Nature. As long as he could enhance his Great Spirit, even by a little, he might be able to break the wall.
In other words, what he needed to do now was strengthen the Great Spirit within him as much as possible.
However, the stronger Great Spirit that lay inside his body, the more dangerous it would be when pa.s.sing through the inhibition, and the greater the reaction from the bl.u.s.tering Qi ocean after the inhibition was triggered as well.
He was able to transform all of his Great Spirit into the Qi of Heaven and Earth of nature. It took him three months to do this, and it left him exhausted and fatigued. He had no more energy or determination to redo it, let alone to acc.u.mulate and transform even more Great Spirit.
As soon as he realized this, he stopped cultivating the Great Spirit. He acknowledged that if he went to continue doing this, he would not only continue suffering, but also end up the same way as his Youngest Uncle.
This possibility alerted him and even terrified him.
This was a contradiction.
This was the final test the Headmaster left for him.
Hope in desperation, while huge danger existed in hope.
How would he make his choice?
Choose to keep waiting for the dawn of a new day, even if that day that never comes?
Or to risk your life to bravely take even just one more step into the light, regardless of the danger?
Sitting on the ground, Ning Que painfully contemplated for a long time. He could not come up with any solution, only feeling more and more upset. He kept murmuring, ”Isn't this enough now?”
He had no idea to whom he was asking, whether the Headmaster of the Academy or G.o.d.
Then he spoke loudly, ”Isn't this enough now?”
He suddenly stood up and threw the bamboo chair beside him against the wall. The chair fell apart into pieces.
Being grounded in the cave for three months, searching for hope but always losing it, and repeating the process until he was desperate, he had completely broken down in the face of these tedious and disgusting emotions.
”ISN'T THIS ENOUGH NOW?!?”
Ning Que cried fiercely as he threw anything he could grab against the wall, including the chair, the bowl, the basin, the pan, and even the books. It seemed to be the only way he could abreact all his pent-up rage.
Everything in the cave was smashed to pieces, including a vase of wildflowers Sangsang had plucked from under the waterfall over the mountain just yesterday.
He fell on the flowers, looking upset and pathetic, like a lost boy who had lost hope of ever finding his way home.
Absentmindedly, he remembered the day he met the Headmaster for the first time.
They had met on the balcony of the Building of Pines and Cranes, and their meeting ended with the Headmaster's unreasonable sneak attack.
Ning Que never did figure out why such an honorable man like him would attack his own student as if he was a hoodlum on the street.
Now, he finally understood him.
The Headmaster's sneak attack reminded him of the law of the Academy.
The disciples of the Academy were always taught to differentiate well between right and wrong. So when they were in trouble, they would remain fearless and undauntedly go forward, using any means necessary to protect their beliefs. That was the law of the Academy.
In other words, when your enemy far outmatched you and you were unable to talk sense into him, then just didn't bother.
Ning Que raised his head and watched the exit of the cave.
At this moment, he did not look to his predecessors, because the only one on this road before him was his Youngest Uncle, and his fate did not end well.
He thought of the experts of Haotian Taoism, from the Tao Addict Ye Hongyu to the Great Divine Priests on the Peach Mountain, from the World Wayfarer Ye Su to the abbey dean of Zhishou Abbey, and finally, he turned his gaze to the blue sky that lay over the cliff.
”I shall continue to cultivate the Great Spirit and I shall keep trying. I don't care if I trigger the inhibition, or what consequences it may bring in the future.”
He murmured, ”I do not want to be grounded here anymore. I will definitely leave. Screw all of you!”
Sangsang was doing the dishes in the hut while she heard the voices from the cave. She had just stood up to see what had happened when she heard these four words. She couldn't figure out who had offended him so badly for him to be cursing them like this.
She moved to the cave and found it in a mess inside when she was about to step in. However, Ning Que was sitting on the ground peacefully like a statue of the Buddha in an ancient ruin.
For nearly two months, Ning Que had been transforming his Great Spirit, so he had only a small pool left in his deep lower abdomen as there was not much Great Spirit saved over.
But now, the Great Spirit seemed to respond his desperation as it started to churn.