“Xiaohei, where do you think you’re running?” “Run again? Let’s run! I’ll run you to death!” A little boy, wearing a large blue cotton jacket, stood on a tree branch with his hands on his hips, shouting at a monkey, while the monkey lay on the ground, panting with its teeth bared.
Too bad—it had no strength left to climb a tree.
“Hmph! You lost! Now I’m going to collect my spoils of war!” The little boy, carrying two gourds on his back, skipped joyfully toward a cave on a cliff, while the monkey snarled at the boy’s retreating figure from afar.
Soon, the boy emerged from the cliffside cave, exuding the scent of wine, his face flushed red, and leaped down with a somewhat wobbly posture—he had clearly gulped down too much monkey wine.
He ran toward the small village at the foot of the mountain, where only a dozen households lived, shouting behind him, “Old Master Tai Shugong has some wine to drink!”
“Little Black, where do you think you’re running?” “Run again? Go on, run! I’ll run you to death!” A small boy in a large blue cloth jacket stood on a tree branch, hands on his hips, shouting at a monkey lying on the ground, panting with bared teeth.
Poor thing, it didn’t even have the strength to climb trees anymore.
“Heh heh, off we go! You lost, now I’m going to collect my spoils!” The boy, carrying two gourds on his back, skipped and hopped toward a cave on the cliff. The monkey, still baring its teeth, grumbled from afar as it watched the boy’s retreating figure.
A while later, the boy emerged from the cave, reeking of alcohol, his face flushed red. He leaped down from the cliff, though his steps seemed a bit unsteady—clearly, he had drunk his fill of the monkey-brewed wine.
He ran toward the small village of just over a dozen households at the foot of the mountain, his voice trailing behind him: “Great-Uncle has wine to drink now!”
The boy lived in Huanglingkeng Village on Mount Shaohua in Jiangxi. Mount Shaohua, also known as Mount Sanqing, was renowned in ancient times as the “Peerless Blessed Land Under Heaven” and the “First Immortal Peak of Jiangnan.” It earned its name from the three towering peaks—Yujing, Yuxu, and Yuhua—resembling the three pure realms of Taoism: Jade Pure, Upper Pure, and Supreme Pure. The mountain stood at the junction of Jiangxi, Zhejiang, and Fujian provinces.
The boy’s name was Mu Lin, born in 1970. Since his parents were busy farming, he had been raised by his great-uncle, an old Taoist priest from the disbanded Xuanqing Temple, since he was eight months old.
The villagers only knew Great-Uncle Xuanming as an elder. No one knew his exact age, but all the elders in the village called him “Great-Uncle,” and even the younger ones addressed him the same way.
The villagers worked in the fields during the day and returned home at night, never paying much attention to Mu Lin. His parents had both passed away when he was two, leaving Great-Uncle to raise him. The villagers simply noted that the child grew up healthy and unharmed.
In truth, by the time Mu Lin was born, Great-Uncle Xuanming was already 136 years old. He had been recognized for his talent by his master at the age of 16 and ordained into Xuanqing Temple.
The Xuanqing lineage traced its origins to the Fangxian Taoist sect of the Warring States period, emphasizing the cultivation of both spirit and body. “Spirit” referred to the mind, while “body” meant the physical form. The practice involved self-discipline through specific methods to achieve the lofty goal of “controlling one’s own destiny, not leaving it to heaven.”
Their Taoist arts focused on “mountain” and “medicine.” The “mountain” aspect involved refining the body and spirit through diet, foundation-building, mystical texts, martial arts, and talismans. The “medicine” aspect utilized prescriptions, acupuncture, and spiritual healing to maintain health and treat illnesses.
However, since Great-Uncle had entered the priesthood later in life and was illiterate, his understanding of advanced martial arts and Taoist techniques was flawed. By the time he realized his mistakes, it was too late—he had missed the optimal age for martial training and could only practice basic strengthening techniques. Yet, unwilling to give up, he immersed himself in martial arts and Taoist studies. After his master’s passing, he neglected the temple’s affairs, and eventually, only a few scattered disciples remained, leaving him as the sole representative of the Xuanqing lineage.
In 1965, when the temple was disbanded, he returned to Huanglingkeng Village to live with his direct relatives, the Mu family. By then, he felt the path to enlightenment was beyond reach, his body deteriorating with age. He wanted to leave a successor for his sect, but under the political climate of the time, there was no one left to teach.
Coincidentally, Mu Lin’s parents married around this time. When Mu Lin’s mother became pregnant, Great-Uncle began supplementing her with medicinal tonics. By the time Mu Lin was eight months old, he started using his internal energy to lay the foundation for the child’s cultivation.
By the age of two, Mu Lin had completed the Small Heavenly Cycle, awakening his spiritual intelligence. He began learning to read and write. Fortunately, Great-Uncle had brought the temple’s scriptures with him when he descended the mountain; otherwise, the old priest would have had nothing to teach.
During the “May 7 Cadre Schools” era, one such school was established near Huanglingkeng Village, housing 26 students. Due to the village’s remote location and harsh living conditions, it became a place where high-ranking bourgeois intellectuals were “reeducated.”
Because of the treacherous mountain paths, accidents were common during the rainy season. Mu Lin’s parents died in a fall while descending the mountain to purchase supplies in June 1971. Later, two officials from the cadre school also perished in a similar accident while reporting to their superiors.
When the two officials responsible for the school’s affairs were reassigned, they failed to properly hand over the school’s management to their successors, as they hadn’t seen anyone from Huanglingkeng Village in a long time.
Without instructions from above, the intellectuals were forbidden to leave. Thus, Huanglingkeng Village’s cadre school was temporarily forgotten by the outside world, becoming an orphaned institution.
After Great-Uncle took over Mu Lin’s upbringing, the production team only provided them with basic rations, which were insufficient. To survive, they had to forage in the mountains.
Thus, while teaching Mu Lin about medicinal herbs and their properties, Great-Uncle also trained him in martial arts deep in the mountains. By the age of five, Mu Lin had completed the Great Heavenly Cycle, while Great-Uncle’s health began to decline. From then on, Mu Lin ventured out alone to gather food, shouldering the responsibility of supporting their household. Thanks to his martial skills, hunting and foraging came easily to him.
One day, while returning from gathering wild vegetables, Mu Lin found three men lying unconscious near the production team’s woods. They were foaming at the mouth, their faces turning blue. Recognizing the symptoms of poisoning from a local plant’s roots, Mu Lin administered an antidote he had prepared.
After a while, the men regained consciousness but were too weak to walk. Mu Lin helped them back to their quarters, arriving just as their meager meal of watery vegetable soup was being served.
Looking around, Mu Lin saw that the group was emaciated, their skin stretched tightly over their bones, resembling walking skeletons. He had never seen such pitiful people, even in the mountains or among the production team.
Heartbroken, Mu Lin prepared the game he had caught, cooking a fragrant broth that soon drew the starving men around him.
When the soup was ready, Mu Lin was surprised to see them form an orderly line. Despite their hunger and the threat of death, they had not lost their dignity or intellect.
As they drank the soup in silence, Mu Lin could sense the profound gratitude in their eyes.
When he returned home and told Great-Uncle about the encounter, the old man explained that these were highly educated individuals—equivalent to great scholars in ancient times. He left it to Mu Lin to decide how to help them, testing the boy’s character.
Mu Lin resolved that, at the very least, he would ensure they had enough to eat.
From then on, his workload increased. As they grew familiar, the intellectuals began speaking to him. Mu Lin proved to be a quick learner, and the idle professors, eager to pass on their knowledge, poured everything they knew into him.
Through treating these men and the villagers, Mu Lin honed his skills in traditional Chinese medicine, including herbal prescriptions and acupuncture. He practiced Western surgical techniques on monkeys, who soon fled at the sight of him.
Eventually, any animal that recognized him would either run or play dead, resigned to being poked and prodded. “What kind of person doesn’t know we’re protected animals?” they seemed to grumble.
Villagers and teachers alike, upon seeing Mu Lin, would immediately puff up their chests and declare how healthy they were, denying him any opportunity to “treat” them.
Within a radius of several miles, no large animals remained. Without their interference, crop yields improved, solving the basic food shortages for both the village and the cadre school.
Under the professors’ one-on-one tutelage, Mu Lin mastered modern physics, chemistry, and computer science. He became proficient in Western and Chinese painting, music, and played the flute and xiao beautifully. He learned aristocratic languages like Latin, along with English, French, Russian, German, Japanese, Arabic, and 12 others. He also mastered 25 Chinese dialects.
With no research opportunities or freedom to leave, the professors devoted all their energy to Mu Lin, who, in turn, absorbed their knowledge voraciously.
By the time Mu Lin had drained them of their expertise, five years had passed. Their gratitude for his earlier rescue allowed them to teach him in secret, never speaking of it to others. From a distance, they appeared no different from the village farmers.
In 1980, two major events occurred in Mu Lin’s life. First, Great-Uncle passed away. Villagers and cadre school members alike came to pay their respects. Before his death, he gave Mu Lin a ring—its significance known only to the boy.
The second event was the departure of his teachers. Universities had reopened in 1977, but it wasn’t until early 1980 that the shortage of senior faculty reminded authorities of these 26 renowned scholars. After a search, they were finally located.
Before leaving, the professors warned Mu Lin never to reveal their teachings, fearing it would bring him trouble. They themselves remained silent until years later, when the political climate had truly changed. By then, Mu Lin had already left the village for distant lands.
With Great-Uncle and his teachers gone, Mu Lin’s world grew quiet—a change he found unsettling. Yet it gave him time to reflect.
His teachers had introduced him to another way of life. They had all studied abroad, achieving great success. The contrast between foreign and Chinese lifestyles intrigued him.
Great-Uncle had shared his lifetime of experience in both living and cultivation. The storage ring he left behind confirmed the reality of immortal cultivation. But this knowledge left Mu Lin conflicted: Why had cultivators, with power far beyond ordinary humans, remained absent during the nation’s greatest trials, while common people stepped forward?
For now, he decided to focus on forming his Golden Core. Great-Uncle had never achieved it, lingering in the Postnatal Realm. Had he reached the Innate Realm, he might have extended his life by 180 years. A true pity.
Another year passed, filled with hunting, gathering, and training—a simple yet fulfilling life.
During this time, Mu Lin explored every corner of Mount Shaohua, eventually discovering two ancient cultivators’ caves. After respectfully burying their remains, he inherited their belongings.
One was a martial cultivator’s cave, yielding a belt-sword made of an unknown metal-jade alloy and a manual titled *Secrets of Martial Insight*, which elevated his understanding of martial theory.
The other belonged to an alchemist, containing *Golden Needle Gleanings (Vol. 1)*, *The Golden Elixir Classic*, a set of golden needles, a medicine cauldron, and dozens of pill bottles. Among them, the Vitality Restoration Pills accelerated his cultivation, allowing him to complete the “Three Flowers Gather at the Summit, Five Qi Converge to the Origin” stage two years early and finally condense his Golden Core, reaching the early Core Formation stage.
After three more months with no progress, the idle Mu Lin decided to travel and broaden his horizons. Only now did he understand that, before forming a Golden Core, all a cultivator’s achievements were illusory.
The prospect of extended life was an irresistible lure for those only slightly stronger than ordinary humans. Everything else could be set aside—except cultivation. Only after forming a Golden Core could one truly be called an immortal cultivator; before that, they were merely martial artists or adepts.
Now, with ample time ahead, he wanted to see the world his teachers had described, compare his people’s lives with those of foreigners, and seek out other cultivators Great-Uncle had mentioned.
One question haunted him: How had ancient people, with their limited technology, discovered meridians, invented acupuncture, and compiled rigorous medical classics like *The Yellow Emperor’s Inner Canon*?
As a modern-minded cultivator, he hoped to find the answer beyond the mountains.
The little boy’s name was Mu Lin. Born in 1970, his parents worked in the fields, so at just eight months old, he was entrusted to his great-uncle, Old Taoist Master Xuan Ming, a former priest from Xuanqing Temple who had been sent back to the village.
In the village, everyone called him “Great Uncle,” though no one knew his exact age. Even the village elders addressed him as such, and the younger generation was expected to do the same.
The villagers worked in the mountains during the day and returned home at night, paying little attention to Mu Lin. His parents both passed away when he was two, and it was Great Uncle who raised him. The villagers simply noticed that the child grew up healthy and unharmed.
In truth, Old Taoist Master Xuan Ming was already 136 years old when Mu Lin was born. At sixteen, his master had recognized his talent and taken him into Xuanqing Temple.
The Xuanqing Temple lineage originated from the Fangxian Daoism of the Warring States period. Its cultivation focused on refining both mind and body. “Xing” referred to the spirit, while “Ming” referred to the physical body. Cultivation involved mastering both through specific methods, ultimately achieving the lofty goal of “my fate is mine alone, not dictated by heaven.”
Their Taoist arts mainly emphasized “Shan” (mountain) and “Yi” (healing). “Shan” involved nourishing the body and mind through diet, foundational training, cultivation classics, martial arts, and talismans. “Yi” focused on maintaining health and curing diseases through herbal medicine, acupuncture, and spiritual healing.
Since Master Xuan Ming had entered the Taoist path later in life and was illiterate, he often misinterpreted advanced martial techniques and Taoist doctrines. By the time he realized his mistakes, it was too late—he had missed the optimal age for training and could only practice basic physical conditioning. Still, he was unwilling to give up, devoting himself deeply to martial arts and Taoist techniques. After his master passed away, he had no interest in managing the temple, eventually leaving only a few scattered priests and himself as the last heir of Xuanqing Temple.
“Little Black, where do you think you’re running?” “Still running? Run, run! I’ll run you to death!” A little boy in a large blue cloth jacket stood on a tree branch, hands on his hips, shouting at a monkey. The monkey lay on the ground, panting with bared teeth.
Too bad, it didn’t even have the strength to climb trees anymore.
“Heh heh, off we go! You lost, now I’m going to collect my spoils!” The boy, carrying two gourds on his back, skipped and hopped toward a cave on the cliff. The monkey, still baring its teeth, grumbled from afar as it watched the boy’s retreating figure.
A while later, the boy descended from the cave on the cliff, his body reeking of alcohol, his face flushed red. His steps were slightly unsteady—clearly, he had drunk his fill of the monkey-brewed wine.
He ran toward the village at the foot of the mountain, which had only a dozen or so households. “Great-Uncle has wine to drink now!” His words drifted behind him.
The boy lived in Huanglingkeng Village on Mount Shaohua in Jiangxi. Mount Shaohua, also known as Mount Sanqing, was historically referred to as the “Peerless Blessed Land Under Heaven” and the “First Immortal Peak of Jiangnan.” It earned its name from the three towering peaks—Yujing, Yuxu, and Yuhua—resembling the three pure realms of Taoism: Yuqing, Shangqing, and Taiqing. The mountain stood at the junction of Jiangxi, Zhejiang, and Fujian provinces.
The boy’s name was Mu Lin, born in 1970. Since his parents were busy farming, he was taken care of by his great-uncle, an old Taoist priest from the disbanded Xuanqing Temple, starting from eight months old.
The villagers only knew Great-Uncle Xuanming as an elder. No one knew his exact age, but even the older villagers addressed him as “Great-Uncle,” and he insisted the younger ones do the same.
The villagers worked in the fields during the day and returned home at night, paying little attention to Mu Lin. His parents passed away when he was two, leaving Great-Uncle to raise him. The villagers simply noted that the child grew up healthy and unharmed.
In truth, by the time Mu Lin was born, Great-Uncle Xuanming was already 136 years old. At sixteen, his master had recognized his potential and took him in as a disciple at Xuanqing Temple.
The Xuanqing lineage traced its roots to the Fangxian Taoist sect of the Warring States period, emphasizing the cultivation of both spirit and body. “Spirit” referred to the mind, while “body” meant the physical form. The practice involved self-discipline through specific methods to achieve the lofty goal of “controlling one’s fate, not leaving it to heaven.”
Their Taoist arts focused on “mountain” and “medicine.” The “mountain” aspect involved refining the body and spirit through diet, foundational exercises, mystical texts, martial arts, and incantations. The “medicine” aspect utilized herbal formulas, acupuncture, and spiritual healing to maintain health and treat illnesses.
However, since Great-Uncle had entered the priesthood later in life and was illiterate, his understanding of advanced martial arts and Taoist techniques was flawed. By the time he realized his mistakes, it was too late—he had missed the optimal age for martial training and could only practice basic strengthening techniques. Frustrated yet unwilling to give up, he immersed himself in martial arts and Taoist studies. After his master’s passing, he neglected the temple’s upkeep, and eventually, only a few scattered disciples remained. By 1965, the temple was disbanded, and he returned to Huanglingkeng Village to live with his direct relatives, the Mu family.
By then, he felt the path to enlightenment was beyond reach. His body weakened with age, and he longed to pass on his teachings. But in the political climate of the time, there was no one left to teach.
Coincidentally, Mu Lin’s parents married around this time. When Mu Lin’s mother became pregnant, Great-Uncle began supplementing her with medicinal tonics. After Mu Lin was born, he used his internal energy to lay a foundation for the child’s cultivation.
By age two, Mu Lin had completed the “Minor Heavenly Cycle,” awakening his spiritual intelligence. He began learning to read and write. Fortunately, Great-Uncle had brought the temple’s scriptures with him when he descended the mountain; otherwise, he would have had nothing to teach.
During the “May Seventh Cadre Schools” era, a school was established near Huanglingkeng Village, housing twenty-six intellectuals. Due to the village’s remote and harsh conditions, it became a place for “reeducating” high-ranking bourgeois intellectuals.
The treacherous mountain paths, especially during the rainy season, often led to accidents. In June 1971, Mu Lin’s parents died in a cliff fall while descending the mountain for supplies. Later, two school administrators also perished in a similar accident.
When the two officials overseeing the school were reassigned, they failed to properly hand over responsibilities for the Huanglingkeng branch, assuming it was no longer active.
With no instructions from higher authorities, the intellectuals were forbidden to leave. The Huanglingkeng school was forgotten, becoming an orphaned institution.
Raised by Great-Uncle, Mu Lin and the old man were not primary laborers, so the production team only provided them with basic rations—insufficient to fill their stomachs. They had to forage in the mountains for food.
Thus, while teaching Mu Lin about herbs and their properties, Great-Unque also trained him in martial arts in the deep mountains. By age five, Mu Lin had completed the “Major Heavenly Cycle,” but Great-Uncle’s health began to decline. Mu Lin then took on the responsibility of gathering food alone. Thanks to his martial skills, hunting and foraging were easy for him.
One day, while returning from gathering wild vegetables, Mu Lin found three men lying unconscious near the production team’s woods. They were foaming at the mouth, their faces blue. Recognizing the symptoms of poisoning from a local plant, Mu Lin administered an antidote he had prepared.
After a while, the men regained consciousness but were too weak to walk. Mu Lin helped them back to their quarters, arriving just as their meager meal of watery vegetable soup was being served.
Looking around, Mu Lin saw the group was emaciated, their skin stretched over bones like living skeletons. He had never seen such pitiable people in the mountains or the village.
Moved by compassion, Mu Lin prepared a meat stew from his own hunt. The aroma soon drew the starving intellectuals, who lined up quietly despite their hunger, maintaining their dignity.
When Mu Lin returned home and told Great-Uncle about the incident, the old man explained that these were highly educated men—equivalent to great scholars in ancient times. He left it to Mu Lin to decide how to help them, testing the boy’s character.
Mu Lin resolved to ensure they would never go hungry again.
From then on, his workload increased. As he grew closer to the intellectuals, they began speaking to him. Mu Lin proved to be a quick learner, and the idle professors eagerly poured their knowledge into him, treating him as their prized student.
Through treating the villagers and the intellectuals, Mu Lin honed his skills in traditional Chinese medicine, including herbal remedies and acupuncture. He practiced Western surgical techniques on monkeys, who soon fled at the sight of him.
Eventually, all animals that recognized him would either run or play dead when he approached, resigned to being his unwilling patients. “What kind of person doesn’t know we’re protected animals?” they seemed to grumble.
Villagers and teachers alike, upon seeing Mu Lin, would puff out their chests and declare themselves in perfect health, denying him any chance to “treat” them.
Within a few years, large animals vanished from the area. Without their interference, crop yields improved, solving the village’s and the school’s food shortages.
Under the professors’ one-on-one tutelage, Mu Lin mastered modern physics, chemistry, and computer science. He became proficient in Western and Chinese painting, music (especially the flute and xiao), and sixteen languages, including Latin, English, French, Russian, German, Japanese, and Arabic. He also learned twenty-five Chinese dialects.
With no research opportunities and forbidden to leave, the professors devoted all their energy to Mu Lin, who absorbed their knowledge voraciously.
By 1980, two major events occurred in Mu Lin’s life. First, Great-Uncle passed away, with the entire village and the school members attending his funeral. He left Mu Lin a ring, the significance of which only Mu Lin understood.
Second, the professors departed. Universities had reopened in 1977, but it wasn’t until 1980 that the shortage of senior faculty led authorities to recall the twenty-six scholars. Before leaving, they made Mu Lin promise never to reveal their teachings, fearing repercussions. Only years later, when the political climate eased, did they dare speak of him and search for him—but by then, Mu Lin had left the village.
With Great-Uncle and the professors gone, Mu Lin’s world grew quiet, leaving him unsettled yet with time to reflect.
The professors had introduced him to another way of life—one shaped by their studies abroad. He longed to see the world they described, to compare his people’s lives with those of foreigners, and to seek out other cultivators as Great-Uncle had mentioned.
One question haunted him: How had ancient people, with their limited technology, discovered meridians, invented acupuncture, and compiled rigorous medical texts like the *Yellow Emperor’s Inner Canon*? As a modern-minded cultivator, he hoped to find answers beyond the mountains.
Great-Uncle had shared his lifetime of wisdom and cultivation experiences. The storage ring he left behind confirmed the reality of cultivation. Yet Mu Lin couldn’t help but wonder—why had cultivators, with power far beyond ordinary humans, remained absent during the nation’s darkest hours, leaving ordinary people to suffer?
No matter. First, he needed to form his Golden Core. Great-Uncle had never achieved it, lingering in the Postnatal realm. Had he reached the Innate realm, he might have lived another 180 years. What a pity.
Another year passed, filled with hunting, gathering, and training—a simple yet fulfilling life.
During this time, Mu Lin explored every corner of Mount Shaohua, eventually discovering two ancient cultivators’ caves. After respectfully burying their remains, he inherited their belongings.
One was a martial cultivator’s cave, yielding a belt-sword made of an unknown metal-jade hybrid and a manual titled *Secrets of Martial Insight*, which elevated his understanding of martial arts.
The other belonged to an alchemist, containing *Supplementary Notes on Golden Needles* (Volume One), *Classic of the Golden Elixir*, a set of golden needles, a medicine cauldron, and dozens of pill bottles. Among them, the “Primordial Replenishment Pills” accelerated his cultivation, allowing him to complete the “Three Flowers Gather at the Summit, Five Qi Converge to the Origin” stage two years early and finally condense his Golden Core, reaching the early Core Formation stage.
Three months later, with no further progress, the restless Mu Lin decided to travel and broaden his horizons. Only at this stage did he realize that before forming a Golden Core, all a cultivator’s achievements were illusory.
The promise of extended lifespan was an irresistible lure for cultivators only slightly stronger than ordinary humans. Everything else could be abandoned—except cultivation. Only after forming a Golden Core could one truly be called a cultivator; before that, they were merely martial artists.
Now, with ample time ahead, Mu Lin wanted to explore the world his professors had described, compare different ways of life, and seek out other cultivators.
And perhaps, along the way, he would find answers to the mysteries that had eluded him.
Coincidentally, Mu Lin’s parents married around this time. When Mu Lin’s mother became pregnant, Master Xuan Ming began giving her medicinal supplements. When the child was eight months old, he started cleansing him with herbal baths. At two years old, Mu Lin completed his infant microcosmic orbit and his intelligence awakened. He began learning to read and write, fortunate that his master had brought the sect’s scriptures with him when he descended the mountain.
“Little Black, where do you think you’re running?” “Still running? Run, run! I’ll run you to death!” A little boy in a large blue cloth coat stood on a tree branch, hands on his hips, shouting at a monkey. The monkey lay on the ground, panting with bared teeth.
Too bad, it didn’t even have the strength to climb trees anymore.
“Hmph, hmph, off we go! You lost. Now I’m going to collect my spoils!” The boy, carrying two gourds on his back, skipped and hopped toward a cave on the cliff. The monkey, still baring its teeth, grunted from afar at Mu Lin’s retreating figure.
A while later, the boy descended from the cave on the cliff, his body reeking of alcohol, his face flushed red. His steps were slightly unsteady—clearly, he had drunk his fill of the monkey-brewed wine.
He ran toward the village at the foot of the mountain, home to only a dozen or so households. “Great-Uncle will have wine to drink!” His words trailed behind him.
The boy lived in Huanglingkeng Village on Mount Shaohua in Jiangxi. Mount Shaohua, also known as Mount Sanqing, was famed in ancient times as the “Peerless Blessed Land Under Heaven” and the “First Immortal Peak of Jiangnan.” It earned its name from the three towering peaks—Yujing, Yuxu, and Yuhua—resembling the three pure realms of Taoism: Jade Pure, Upper Pure, and Supreme Pure. The mountain stood at the junction of Jiangxi, Zhejiang, and Fujian provinces.
The boy’s name was Mu Lin, born in 1970. Since his parents were busy farming, he had been raised by his great-uncle, an old Taoist priest from the disbanded Xuanqing Temple, since he was eight months old.
The villagers only knew Great-Uncle Xuanming as an elder. No one knew his exact age—everyone in the village, young and old, addressed him as “Great-Uncle.”
The villagers worked in the fields during the day and returned home at night, never paying much attention to Mu Lin. His parents had both died when he was two, leaving Great-Uncle to raise him. The villagers simply noted that the boy grew up healthy and unharmed.
In truth, by the time Mu Lin was born, Great-Uncle Xuanming was already 136 years old. He had been recognized for his talent at sixteen and ordained into Xuanqing Temple.
The Xuanqing lineage traced its origins to the Fangxian Dao of the Warring States period, emphasizing the cultivation of both spirit and body. “Spirit” referred to the mind, while “body” meant the physical form. The practice involved self-discipline of both to achieve the lofty goal of “controlling one’s fate, not leaving it to heaven.”
Their Taoist arts focused on “mountain” and “medicine.” The “mountain” path involved refining the body and spirit through diet, foundation-building, esoteric texts, martial arts, and talismans. The “medicine” path used prescriptions, acupuncture, and spiritual healing to maintain health and cure illnesses.
Having entered the priesthood late in life and being illiterate, Great-Uncle Xuanming had misunderstood some advanced martial and Taoist techniques. By the time he realized his mistakes, it was too late—he had missed the prime age for martial training and could only practice basic strengthening techniques.
Yet, unwilling to give up, he immersed himself in martial arts and Taoist studies. After his master passed away, he neglected the temple’s affairs, leaving only a few scattered disciples and himself as the last remnant of the Xuanqing lineage.
In 1965, when the temple was disbanded, he returned to Huanglingkeng Village, his ancestral home. By then, he felt the grand path was beyond his reach, his body deteriorating with age. He longed to pass on his teachings, but in those turbulent times, there was no one left to teach.
Coincidentally, Mu Lin’s parents married around that time. When Mu Lin’s mother became pregnant, Great-Uncle began supplementing her with medicinal tonics. After Mu Lin was born, he used his internal energy to lay the foundation for the boy’s cultivation.
By age two, Mu Lin’s minor heavenly circuit was complete, and his spiritual intelligence awakened. He began learning to read and write. Fortunately, Great-Uncle had brought the temple’s scriptures with him when he descended the mountain—otherwise, he would have had nothing to teach.
During the “May 7 Cadre Schools” era, one such school was established near Huanglingkeng Village, housing twenty-six intellectuals. Due to the village’s remote location and harsh living conditions, it became a place for “reeducating” high-ranking bourgeois intellectuals.
The treacherous mountain paths, especially during the rainy season, often led to accidents. In June 1971, Mu Lin’s parents died in a cliff fall while descending to purchase supplies. Later, two school administrators also perished in a similar accident.
When the higher-ups reassigned the two officials overseeing the school, they failed to properly hand over the responsibilities for Huanglingkeng Village’s branch. Without orders, the intellectuals couldn’t leave. The village’s cadre school was forgotten by the outside world, becoming an orphaned institution.
Raised by Great-Uncle, Mu Lin and the old man weren’t considered primary laborers, so the production team only provided them with basic rations—barely enough to survive. They had to forage in the mountains for food.
Thus, while teaching Mu Lin about herbs and their properties, Great-Uncle also trained him in martial arts deep in the mountains. By age five, Mu Lin’s major heavenly circuit was complete, but Great-Uncle’s health began to decline.
Mu Lin took on the responsibility of gathering food alone. Thanks to his martial skills, hunting and foraging were easy for him.
One day, returning from gathering wild vegetables, Mu Lin found three men lying unconscious near the production team’s woods. Foaming at the mouth and faces turning blue, they had ingested poisonous roots. Recognizing the symptoms, Mu Lin fed them his homemade detox pills.
After a while, they regained consciousness but were too weak to walk. Mu Lin half-carried, half-dragged them back to their quarters, arriving just as their meager meal of watery vegetable soup was being served.
Looking around, Mu Lin saw a group of emaciated figures—skin stretched over bones, resembling walking skeletons. He had never seen such pitiful people, even in the poorest parts of the village.
Heartbroken, Mu Lin prepared his hunted game into a stew. The rich aroma soon drew the starving intellectuals, who lined up quietly despite their hunger, maintaining their dignity.
Though no words were spoken, Mu Lin sensed profound gratitude in their eyes.
When he told Great-Uncle about the incident, the old man explained that these were highly educated individuals—equivalent to great scholars in ancient times. He left it to Mu Lin to decide how to help them, testing the boy’s character.
Mu Lin resolved to ensure they never went hungry again.
From then on, his workload increased. As they grew familiar, the intellectuals began speaking to him. Quick to learn, Mu Lin became their prized pupil. Eager to pass on their knowledge, they poured everything they knew into him.
Through treating them and the villagers, Mu Lin mastered traditional Chinese medicine, including prescriptions and acupuncture. He practiced Western surgical techniques on monkeys, who soon fled at the sight of him.
Eventually, all animals that recognized him would either run or play dead when he approached, resigned to being poked and prodded. “What kind of person doesn’t know we’re protected animals?” they seemed to grumble.
Villagers and teachers alike, upon seeing Mu Lin, would puff up their chests and declare themselves perfectly healthy, denying him any chance to “treat” them.
Within a few miles of the village, large animals vanished. Without their interference, crop yields improved, solving the basic food shortages for both villagers and the school’s intellectuals.
Under one-on-one tutelage, Mu Lin absorbed modern physics, chemistry, and computer science. He became proficient in Western and Chinese painting, music (especially the flute and xiao), and sixteen languages, including Latin, English, French, Russian, German, Japanese, and Arabic. He also mastered twenty-five Chinese dialects.
With no research opportunities and forbidden to leave, the professors devoted all their energy to educating Mu Lin, whose boundless curiosity kept them occupied.
By the time Mu Lin turned fifteen, he had exhausted the knowledge of all twenty-six professors. Their gratitude for his earlier rescue allowed them to teach him in secret, maintaining their cover as ordinary villagers.
In 1980, two major events shook Mu Lin’s life. First, Great-Uncle passed away. Villagers and school members alike came to pay respects. He left Mu Lin a ring—its significance known only to the boy.
Second, the professors departed. Universities had reopened in 1977, but it wasn’t until 1980 that the shortage of senior faculty reminded authorities of the twenty-six missing scholars.
Before leaving, the professors warned Mu Lin never to reveal their teachings, fearing repercussions for him and themselves. Only years later, when the political climate eased, did they dare speak up and search for him—but by then, Mu Lin had left the village.
With Great-Uncle and the professors gone, Mu Lin’s world fell silent. The sudden solitude felt strange, but it gave him time to reflect.
The professors had described another way of life—overseas, where they had studied and thrived. Mu Lin wanted to see this foreign world and compare it to his homeland.
Great-Uncle had shared his lifetime of experience and cultivation insights. The storage ring he left confirmed the reality of spiritual cultivation. Yet it puzzled Mu Lin—why had cultivators, with power far beyond ordinary humans, remained absent during the nation’s darkest hours, leaving common folk to suffer?
No matter. First, he needed to form his Golden Core. Great-Uncle had never achieved it, lingering in the Postnatal realm. Had he reached the Innate realm, he might have lived another 180 years. A true pity.
For another year, Mu Lin lived a quiet life of hunting, gathering, and training.
During that time, he explored every corner of Mount Shaohua, discovering two ancient cultivators’ caves. After respectfully burying their remains, he inherited their belongings.
One was a martial cultivator’s cave, yielding a belt-sword made of an unknown metal-jade alloy and a manual titled *Secrets of Martial Insight*, which elevated his understanding of martial arts.
The other belonged to an alchemist, containing *Golden Needle Gleanings (Vol. 1)*, *The Golden Elixir Classic*, a set of golden needles, a medicine cauldron, and dozens of pill bottles. Among them, the “Primordial Restoration Pills” accelerated his cultivation, allowing him to complete the “Three Flowers Gather at the Summit, Five Qi Return to the Origin” stage two years early and finally condense his Golden Core, reaching the early Core Formation stage.
Three months passed with no further progress. Restless, Mu Lin decided to travel and broaden his horizons. Only now did he understand that before forming a Golden Core, all a cultivator’s efforts were illusory.
The promise of extended lifespan was an irresistible lure for those only slightly stronger than ordinary humans. Everything else could be abandoned—except cultivation.
Only after forming a Golden Core could one truly be called a cultivator; before that, they were merely martial artists or adepts. With a Core, time became abundant.
Mu Lin wanted to see the world his professors described, compare his people’s lives with foreigners’, and seek out other cultivators Great-Uncle had mentioned.
One question haunted him: How had ancient people, with their limited technology, discovered meridians, invented acupuncture, and compiled rigorous medical classics like *The Yellow Emperor’s Inner Canon*?
As a modern-minded cultivator, he hoped to find answers beyond the mountains.
Transportation was difficult, and during the rainy season, accidents were common. In June 1971, Mu Lin’s parents fell to their deaths while descending the mountain to buy supplies. Two senior cadres from the school also died in a similar accident while traveling to report their progress.
“Little Black, where do you think you’re running?” “Still running? Run, run! I’ll run you to death!” A little boy in a large blue cloth jacket stood on a tree branch, hands on his hips, shouting at a monkey lying on the ground, panting with bared teeth.
Too bad, it didn’t even have the strength to climb trees anymore.
“Hmph, let’s go! You lost. Now I’m off to collect my spoils!” The boy, carrying two gourds on his back, skipped and hopped toward a cave on the cliff. The monkey, still baring its teeth, grumbled from afar at the retreating figure of Mu Lin.
A while later, the boy, reeking of alcohol with a flushed face, leaped down from the cave on the cliff, though his steps seemed a bit unsteady—clearly, he had drunk his fill of monkey wine.
He dashed toward the village of just over a dozen households at the foot of the mountain, his words trailing behind him: “Great-Uncle has wine to drink now!”
The boy lived in Huangling Pit Village at the foot of Shaohua Mountain in Jiangxi. Shaohua Mountain, also known as Sanqing Mountain, was famed in ancient times as the “Peerless Blessed Land” and the “First Immortal Peak of Jiangnan.” It earned its name from the three towering peaks—Yujing, Yuxu, and Yuhua—resembling the three pure realms of Taoism: Yuqing, Shangqing, and Taiqing. The mountain lay at the junction of Jiangxi, Zhejiang, and Fujian provinces.
The boy’s name was Mu Lin, born in 1970. Since his parents were busy farming, he was raised from eight months old by his great-uncle, an old Taoist priest from the disbanded Xuanqing Temple.
The villagers only knew Great-Uncle Xuanming as an elder. No one knew his exact age—everyone in the village, young and old, addressed him as Great-Uncle.
The villagers worked the fields by day and returned home at night, paying little attention to Mu Lin. His parents had died when he was two, leaving Great-Uncle to raise him. The villagers simply noted that the child grew up healthy and unharmed.
In truth, by the time Mu Lin was born, Xuanming was already 136 years old. At sixteen, his master had recognized his potential and taken him into the Xuanqing Temple.
The Xuanqing lineage traced its origins to the Fangxian Taoist sect of the Warring States period, emphasizing the cultivation of both spirit and body. “Spirit” referred to the mind, while “body” meant the physical form. Through disciplined practice, one sought self-mastery over both, aspiring to the lofty ideal of “controlling one’s fate, not leaving it to heaven.”
Their Taoist arts focused on “mountain” and “medicine.” The “mountain” path involved refining the body and spirit through diet, foundational training, esoteric texts, martial arts, and talismans. The “medicine” path employed herbal remedies, acupuncture, and spiritual healing to maintain health and cure ailments.
Having entered the priesthood late in life and being illiterate, Xuanming had misunderstood some advanced martial and Taoist techniques. By the time he realized his errors, it was too late—he had missed the prime years for martial training and could only practice basic strengthening techniques. Yet, unwilling to give up, he immersed himself in martial arts and Taoist studies. After his master’s passing, he neglected the temple, leaving only a few scattered disciples and himself as the sole remnant of the Xuanqing lineage.
Disbanded in 1965, he returned to Huangling Pit Village, where his direct relatives, Mu Lin’s family, lived. By then, he felt the grand path of Taoism was beyond his reach, his body deteriorating with age. He longed to pass on his teachings, but in those turbulent times, there was no one left to teach.
Coincidentally, Mu Lin’s parents married around that time. When Mu Lin’s mother became pregnant, Xuanming began supplementing her with medicinal tonics. After the child was born, he used his internal energy to lay a foundation for Mu Lin’s cultivation.
By age two, Mu Lin’s minor celestial cycle was complete, and his spiritual intelligence awakened. He began learning to read and write. Fortunately, Xuanming had brought the temple’s scriptures with him when he descended the mountain—otherwise, the old priest would have had nothing to teach.
During the “May Seventh Cadre Schools” era, one such school was established near Huangling Pit Village, housing twenty-six students. Due to the village’s remote location and harsh living conditions, it became a place where high-ranking bourgeois intellectuals were “reeducated.”
With poor transportation and frequent accidents during the rainy season, Mu Lin’s parents died in a cliff fall in June 1971 while descending the mountain for supplies. Two school supervisors also perished in a similar accident while reporting for duty.
When the two officials handling the school’s affairs were reassigned, they neglected to hand over the school’s responsibilities to their successors, having lost contact with the Huangling Pit branch for too long.
Without orders from above, the intellectuals couldn’t leave. The Huangling Pit school was temporarily forgotten by the outside world, becoming a “motherless child.”
After Great-Uncle took over Mu Lin’s upbringing, the production team provided only basic rations for the two, as they weren’t primary laborers. The rations were insufficient, forcing them to forage in the mountains.
Thus, while teaching Mu Lin about herbs and their properties, Great-Uncle also trained him in martial arts in the deep mountains. By age five, Mu Lin’s major celestial cycle was complete, but Great-Uncle’s health began to decline. Mu Lin then took on the responsibility of gathering food alone. Thanks to his martial skills, hunting and foraging were relatively easy.
Once, returning from gathering wild vegetables, Mu Lin found three men lying unconscious near the production team’s woods. Foaming at the mouth and turning blue, they had ingested poisonous roots. Recognizing the symptoms, Mu Lin administered an antidote he had prepared.
After a while, the men recovered, though weak. Mu Lin helped them back to their quarters, arriving just as their meager meal of watery vegetable soup was served.
Looking at the group, Mu Lin was struck by their emaciated, skeletal figures—unlike anyone he’d seen in the mountains or the village. Moved, he prepared a meat stew from his hunt. The aroma drew the men, who lined up quietly, their gratitude evident in their eyes despite their hunger.
At home, Mu Lin told Great-Uncle about the incident. The old man explained that these were highly educated men—equivalent to great scholars in ancient times—now suffering unjustly. He left it to Mu Lin to decide how to help, testing the boy’s character.
Mu Lin resolved to ensure they never went hungry again.
From then on, his workload increased. As they grew familiar, the professors began speaking to him. Mu Lin proved a quick learner, and the idle scholars, thrilled, poured all their knowledge into him.
Through treating the intellectuals and villagers, Mu Lin honed his skills in traditional Chinese medicine, including herbal remedies and acupuncture. He practiced Western surgical techniques on monkeys, who soon fled at the sight of him.
Eventually, all animals that recognized him either ran or played dead when caught, resigned to his experiments. “What kind of person doesn’t know we’re protected animals?” they seemed to grumble.
Villagers and teachers, upon seeing Mu Lin, would proudly declare their excellent health, denying him any chance to “treat” them.
Within a ten-mile radius, large animals vanished. Without their interference, crop yields improved, solving food shortages for the village and school.
Under one-on-one tutelage, Mu Lin mastered modern physics, chemistry, and computer basics. He became proficient in Western and Chinese painting, music (excelling at the xiao and flute), and sixteen languages, including Latin, English, French, Russian, German, Japanese, and Arabic. He also learned twenty-five Chinese dialects. With no research or travel allowed, the professors devoted all their energy to Mu Lin, whose boundless curiosity kept them occupied.
By the time their knowledge was exhausted five years later, Mu Lin had absorbed everything from the twenty-six scholars. They dared teach him only because he’d saved them, conducting lessons secretly. To outsiders, they appeared no different from ordinary farmers.
In 1980, two major events occurred in Mu Lin’s life. First, Great-Uncle passed away, mourned by the entire village and school. He left Mu Lin a ring—its significance known only to the boy.
Second, the professors departed. Universities had reopened in 1977, but by 1980, the shortage of senior faculty led to the rediscovery of the twenty-six scholars. Before leaving, they made Mu Lin swear never to reveal their teachings, fearing repercussions. Only years later, when the political climate eased, did they dare speak of him—but by then, Mu Lin had left the village.
With Great-Uncle and the professors gone, Mu Lin’s world grew quiet, unsettling him at first. Yet it gave him time to reflect.
The professors had described life abroad, where they’d studied and excelled. Mu Lin longed to see this foreign world and compare it to his homeland.
Great-Uncle had shared his lifetime of experience and cultivation. The storage ring he’d given Mu Lin confirmed the reality of immortal cultivation. But it also raised questions: Why had cultivators, with power far beyond ordinary humans, remained absent during the nation’s darkest hours, leaving common people to suffer?
Putting such thoughts aside, Mu Lin focused on forming his Golden Core—a feat Great-Uncle had never achieved, lingering instead at the Houtian stage. Had he reached the Xiantian realm, he might have lived three sixty-year cycles longer. A true pity.
Another year passed in hunting, gathering, and training—a peaceful, fulfilling routine.
During that year, Mu Lin explored every corner of Shaohua Mountain, discovering two ancient cultivators’ caves. After burying their remains, he inherited their belongings.
One was a martial cultivator’s cave, yielding a belt-sword of unknown material and *Secrets of Martial Enlightenment*, which elevated his understanding of martial theory.
The other belonged to an alchemist, containing *Supplementary Notes on Golden Needles* (Volume I), *Classic of the Golden Elixir*, a set of golden needles, a medicinal cauldron, and dozens of pill bottles. Among them, the “Primordial Replenishment Pills” accelerated his cultivation, allowing him to complete the “Three Flowers Gather at the Summit, Five Qi Converge to the Origin” stage two years early and form his Golden Core, reaching the early Core Formation stage.
Three months later, with no further progress, the idle Mu Lin decided to travel and broaden his horizons. Only at this stage did he realize that before Core Formation, all a cultivator’s efforts were illusory.
The promise of extended life was an irresistible lure for those only slightly stronger than ordinary people. Everything else could be abandoned—except cultivation. Only after forming the Golden Core could one truly be called an “immortal cultivator”; before that, they were merely “cultivators” or “martial artists.” With immortality came ample time.
Mu Lin wanted to see the world his teachers had described, compare his people’s lives with foreigners’, and seek out other cultivators Great-Uncle had mentioned.
One question haunted him: How had ancient people, with their limited technology, discovered meridians, invented acupuncture, and compiled rigorous medical classics like *The Yellow Emperor’s Inner Canon*? As a modern-minded immortal cultivator, he hoped to find answers abroad.
After Mu Lin was raised by his great uncle, the two were not considered productive laborers, so the commune only provided them with minimal rations, barely enough to survive. They had to forage in the mountains for food.
Thus, Master Xuan Ming taught Mu Lin to identify herbs and their properties while training him in martial arts deep in the mountains. By age five, Mu Lin completed his grand cosmic orbit, while his great uncle’s health began to decline. From then on, Mu Lin ventured out alone to gather food, taking on the responsibility of supporting the two of them.
One day, returning from foraging, Mu Lin found three people lying near the commune’s forest, foaming at the mouth with blue faces. He smelled their breath and realized they had eaten the toxic root of Arisaema. He quickly gave them a detox pill he had prepared and revived them.
After a while, their condition improved, though they were still weak. Mu Lin helped them back to their quarters, where it was mealtime—each person had only a thin vegetable soup.
Looking around, Mu Lin saw emaciated figures, skin over bones, like walking skeletons. He had never seen such pitiful people in the mountains or the commune.
Moved with pity, Mu Lin took out his game, cooked it, and soon the aroma attracted the starving people. When the soup was ready, Mu Lin saw a neat line of people waiting. Despite hunger and death looming over them, these people still maintained their dignity and composure.
They drank in silence, but Mu Lin could see deep gratitude in their eyes.
When he returned home, Mu Lin told his great uncle what had happened. His great uncle explained that these were highly educated people—scholars in the Qing dynasty. Now they were suffering here. He asked Mu Lin what he would do, secretly testing his character.
Mu Lin decided that, at the very least, he would ensure they had enough to eat.
From then on, Mu Lin’s workload increased significantly. Over time, they grew closer, and the scholars began talking to him. Mu Lin was quick to grasp their teachings, and the idle professors treated him like a treasure, eager to pass on all their knowledge.
Through treating these people and villagers, Mu Lin practiced traditional Chinese medicine, acupuncture, and herbal remedies. He practiced Western surgical techniques on monkeys, making them run from him.
Eventually, any animal that recognized him would flee. But later, even running or fighting was futile. They would just fall to the ground and play dead, allowing him to poke and cut at them. “What kind of person are you? Don’t you know we’re protected animals?”
The villagers and professors would proudly strut around Mu Lin, pretending to be in perfect health, avoiding any chance for him to examine them.
Within ten miles of the village, no large animals remained. Without animals destroying crops, grain production increased significantly, solving the village and school’s food shortages.
Under the professors’ one-on-one guidance, Mu Lin mastered modern physics and chemistry, gained a basic understanding of computer science, and became proficient in Western and Chinese painting, music, and flute and zither playing. He learned Latin, English, French, Russian, German, Japanese, Arabic, and fifteen other languages, as well as twenty-five regional dialects. With no research or travel allowed, the professors poured all their energy into teaching Mu Lin, who, full of energy, found it a perfect way to spend his time.
With his awakened mind, Mu Lin absorbed the knowledge of all twenty-six professors over five years. It was because he had saved them that they dared to teach him, always in secret, speaking to no one else. If they saw someone approaching, they would act like ordinary farmers.
In 1980, two major events changed Mu Lin’s life. First, Great Uncle passed away, and both villagers and professors attended his funeral. He left Mu Lin a ring, the significance of which only Mu Lin understood.
Secondly, the professors left. In 1977, universities reopened, and by early 1980, the need for senior academics grew urgent. After a search, they finally found the twenty-six scholars. However, the professors warned Mu Lin never to reveal their teachings, fearing repercussions. They remained silent until years later when the political climate improved, allowing them to search for Mu Lin—but by then, he had already left the village for distant lands.
With Great Uncle and the professors gone, Mu Lin’s world grew quiet. He found the silence unsettling but gave him time to reflect.
The professors had shown him another way of life—studying abroad, achieving success, and living differently from the Chinese way. He wanted to see both.
Great Uncle had shared his entire life’s cultivation experience with him. The storage ring revealed the reality of cultivation, leaving Mu Lin confused. Why had cultivators with powers beyond ordinary humans vanished during the nation’s darkest hours, while ordinary people stood up and fought?
No matter—first, he had to form his core. Great Uncle had never succeeded, remaining stuck in the post-natal realm. Had he reached the prenatal realm, he might have lived three more centuries. What a pity.
A year later, Mu Lin lived peacefully, hunting, foraging, and practicing. He explored every corner of Shaohua Mountain, eventually discovering two cultivators’ caves. After respectfully collecting their remains, he inherited their treasures.
One belonged to a martial cultivator, leaving behind a belt sword made of unknown material and a book titled *Secrets of Martial Cultivation*, detailing various martial theories and elevating Mu Lin’s understanding.
The second was a healer’s cave, containing the first volume of *Golden Needle Forgotten* and *Golden Elixir Sutra*, a set of golden needles, a medicine cauldron, and dozens of bottles of pills. One bottle of *Essence-Replenishing Pills* accelerated his cultivation, allowing him to achieve the Three Flowers Gathering at the Crown and Five Qi Paying Homage to the Primordial Gate two years early, finally forming his core and reaching the early Core Formation stage.
Three months later, with no further progress, Mu Lin decided to travel and broaden his horizons. At this stage, he realized that before forming a core, everything was illusion.
Imagine having a goal that could extend life—how tempting for a cultivator only slightly stronger than an ordinary person. Everything else could be abandoned, except cultivation. Only after forming a core could one truly be called a cultivator. Before that, one was merely a martial artist or a cultivator.
Now a true cultivator, Mu Lin had time to explore the outside world described by the professors, compare his people’s lives with others, and visit other cultivators mentioned by Great Uncle.
One lingering question haunted him: under the technological and scientific conditions of ancient times, how had people discovered meridians, invented acupuncture, and compiled rigorous medical texts like the *Yellow Emperor’s Inner Canon*? As a modern cultivator, he hoped to find the answer beyond the mountains.
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