So it’s a premature birth.
Not exactly difficult to treat, but...
Yin-Yang Stabilization Pill, Primordial Qi Fortifying Pill, Root-Securing and Vitality Nourishment Pill...
Looking at the names of the required medicinal pills and the general materials needed to refine them, Li Fan shook his head inwardly.
The Embodiment Transformation Dao Sect is a minor sect hidden in the wilderness, without any pill refinement techniques to its name. Moreover, it's rather impoverished with limited financial resources. Even knowing that these pills are effective, they might not be obtainable.
Besides, whether these pills even existed thousands of years ago is another question entirely.
Li Fan examined the remaining information one entry at a time. Nearly all proposed treatments relied on rare natural treasures to replenish the body’s deficiencies. However, the environment in which Tian Yang had grown up was simply unsuitable for nurturing such treasures.
A constitution weakness as severe as Tian Yang’s from birth was exceedingly rare among cultivators.
Since the reestablishment of the Myriad Immortals Alliance, only a handful of similar cases had ever been recorded. As a result, it was classified as a standard yet complex ailment, leaving Li Fan with very few references to draw upon.
Is breaking through to the Golden Core realm still the only solution?
Wait.
How could I have forgotten this?
Li Fan froze for a brief moment before sudden realization dawned on him.
Activating the Unity of Dao Transformation and Mind secret art, he rapidly searched through the Heavenly Physician’s Immortal Scripture within his consciousness.
Though he had memorized the entire medical classic, its contents were vast beyond measure. Most of it remained store within the blue crystal of his mind, not readily accessible at will. Thus, he had instinctively overlooked it altogether.
As expected, the profound and all-encompassing Heavenly Physician’s Immortal Scripture did not disappoint.
Before long, Li Fan found the passage corresponding to Tian Yang’s symptoms.
...Drowsiness, stunted growth—such manifestations all originate from a deficiency of prenatal essential qi.
To treat this condition, there are three methods.
The first: Supplementation
The second: Crisis
The third: Toxin
Li Fan read through the three methods carefully, marveling inwardly.
The path of medicine truly cannot be underestimated.
The so-called Supplementation method was exactly what he had already uncovered through the Tianxuan Mirror—using rare natural treasures to replenish prenatal essential qi.
The other two methods, Crisis and Toxin, however, were far more intriguing.
According to the medical scripture, although those afflicted by this condition were born with prenatal deficiencies, as long as they survived one full year after leaving their mother’s body, their postnatal constitution would stabilize and form an independent system.
The human body possessed endless hidden reserves and limitless potential. Yet these reserves could not be stimulated through ordinary means. Only during deep sleep, in a state of unconsciousness, could the body’s vital energy act on instinct, using the postnatal to compensate for the prenatal.
This was precisely why individuals with prenatal constitutional weakness often remained in prolonged slumber.
The Crisis and Toxin methods were both founded upon this principle.
Their operating principles were essentially the same, though Toxin was more extreme, while Crisis was more conservative and moderate.
Both involved administering special medicines to forcibly stimulate the body’s latent potential, decisively compensating for prenatal deficiencies in a single stroke.
If essential qi and vitality were likened to water, then congenital weakness was land downstream, cracked and parched by years of drought.
The hidden reserves within the human body were a vast reservoir upstream.
The Toxin method was equivalent to blowing up the reservoir itself, a desperate gamble that sought life amidst certain death. It was suited only for the gravest circumstances, when no other options remained.
The Crisis method, by contrast, involved periodically opening the floodgates, releasing controlled flows to replenish essential qi, while simultaneously diverting water from other tributaries.
Though these two methods sound almost inconceivable, each possesses its own internal logic.
When pushed to the brink, people often unleash strength far beyond their usual limits.
The hidden reserves within the human body... Could this be the Heavenly Physician’s path to attaining the Dao?
Perhaps while cultivating and studying arrays, I should also devote time to researching the Heavenly Physician’s Immortal Scripture .
Having identified a possible solution, Li Fan felt no urgency to use the Eternal Remnant Will again.
Instead, he turned his attention to the battle records of Zhang Qianmo of the Purple Firmament Sect within the Seated Dao Discourse sector.
Ninety-eight victories, twenty-eight draws.
Still undefeated.
As Zhang Qianmo’s streak lengthened, the attention surrounding him only grew. Naturally, the challengers became increasingly formidable as well.
One cultivator who called himself “I Am Invincible,” seemingly a character modeled after himself, had launched five or six consecutive challenges.
Though defeated every time, the duration of each battle steadily increased.
After their most recent match, he excitedly sent a message claiming he had already devised a method to defeat Zhang Qianmo and would return to challenge him again as soon as he completed his training.
Li Fan found himself rather looking forward to it.
Based on Return to Truth’s description of the memory simulation from the Eternal Remnant Will, Li Fan had formed a theory as to why he remained trapped within Ningyuan City of the Fallen Immortal Realm.
It must also be due to the influence of an obsession.
Just as I was unable to leave Tian Yang’s cave dwelling... unless this obsession is resolved, I will never be able to leave Ningyuan City.
As for whose obsession it was, or what it entails, the most likely possibility at present points to Zhang Qianmo.
Perhaps defeating him will trigger some kind of change.
I only hope this “I Am Invincible” truly lives up to his name and doesn’t disappoint me.
With that, Li Fan closed the Seated Dao Discourse function and shifted his attention to Xiao Heng’s situation.
After receiving instructions from Senior Skull, Xiao Heng had already begun taking action.
Su Xiaomei officially entered the Bone Vanguard Realm and received Formless Hex of the Six Desires passed down by Li Fan. Once she stepped into the Qi Refinement realm, her cultivation advanced by leaps and bounds.
Su Changyu had yet to complete the purification of Immortal-Mortal Miasma within his body. However, perhaps due to his youth, his progress was far faster than before. At this rate, it was estimated that he would successfully draw qi into his body within one or two years.
Meanwhile, Xiao Heng secretly brought the wandering Yin sisters to the deserted island and taught them methods to dispel the Miasma in their bodies.
Zhang Haobo received the same treatment.
However, during this process, a small incident occurred, one that left Li Fan torn between amusement and exasperation.
Because Ye Feipeng was often out alone, behaving suspiciously with no one knowing what he was doing, and because Xiao Heng frequently failed to reach him, Xiao Heng ended up handling everything on his own.
Thus, when Ye Feipeng finally flew back to the deserted island wearing a triumphant expression, only to suddenly see Zhang Haobo standing silently on the beach, calmly watching him, the guilt-ridden little fatty immediately assumed that his theft of Zhang Haobo’s opportunity had been exposed, and that Zhang Haobo had come seeking revenge.
Ye Feipeng was terrified out of his wits.
Facing the “Dao Unity Immortal Venerable” from his previous life, he did not even entertain the thought of resistance.
Instead, his first instinct was to flee.
He fled a thousand li without looking back, moving several times faster than when he had arrived.
Only after he believed himself completely safe did he finally stop, his mind still trembling with fear.
Zhang Haobo was left standing alone on the beach, utterly bewildered.
Although Ye Feipeng later communicated with Xiao Heng and cleared up the misunderstanding, he no longer had the face to return to the deserted island.
Instead, he continued roaming the Congyun Sea, chasing the stormfloods like before.