Chapter 14 — Primal Qi Washes the Bones to Forge the True Body
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 3 of 3
He soon forgot the ache in his muscles. His speed kept climbing, and the primal qi within him ran ever faster, reaching his four limbs, reaching all his hundred bones, until at last even his hair, his nails, and the very grain of his skin began to take the qi in. By and by his speed surpassed the fastest he had ever run at full stretch — and even then Shen Mu did not know it, feeling only that the faster he ran the freer he felt, the faster he ran the more it delighted him. Sweat began to seep from the pores of his skin.
It was no clear sweat, but very turbid; in it, besides black grime, were white granules of fat — only Shen Mu noticed nothing of what was happening to his body. The Alchemist and the Village Head and the others each showed astonishment, and exchanged a silent glance. "Lord Huo, when did you first begin tempering your body with primal fire?
" the Alchemist asked abruptly. Lord Huo said in a heavy voice: "At the peak of the Spirit Embryo realm.
I was practicing my fists when all at once I struck out my first divine ability. My first divine ability was fist-gang tempering the body, the primal qi like an azure dragon wreathed in silk. "
The Alchemist looked at the Lame Old Man, who said: "Mine was the peak of the Spirit Embryo realm too.
That day I was running in the wind, trying to catch the gale.
I thought that once I caught it I would tread the wind's edges and walk through the sky.
And then I found the mystery of tempering the body with primal fire — the primal qi like wind blowing through a hundred orifices. In my delight I fell off the wind's edge and nearly broke my neck. "
The Alchemist sighed.
"The same with me. I meant to make the Primal Embryo Divine Treasury my elixir furnace and my own primal qi my medicine, refining myself into a single dose — and so I found the mystery of tempering the body with primal fire, the primal qi like fire burning the flesh. And little Shen has not yet broken the wall, and already he has begun to temper his body. "
The Lame Old Man laughed. "The Overlord Body is overbearing indeed.
We spirit bodies can only envy what we can never have. "
A strange look came over the Alchemist's face, and he said no more. Overlord Body? If it really were an Overlord Body, he would not have been so astonished.
The Lame Old Man and Lord Huo and the rest could lay it all at the Overlord Body's door; but he knew the truth — that Shen Mu, with a commoner's constitution, had achieved the tempering of the body by primal fire a step ahead of any spirit body.
It left even him, a strong man of deep knowledge, unable to keep from marveling.
"Little Shen's Overlord Body hasn't awakened yet," Granny Zhu said excitedly.
"If it did, and the primal qi of an Overlord Body could command and control things — heh heh — even the Imperial Teacher Jingping in his day probably couldn't have matched him, I'd say?
"
The Alchemist's heart sank. He glanced at the Village Head. The Village Head was silent too.
In this world there had never been any Overlord Body, and so of course no Overlord Body qi; ordinary primal qi could not command or control things. When that day came and Shen Mu found he could command and control nothing, the whole thing would be exposed. But before that, Shen Mu would first have to achieve the so-called "awakening of the Overlord Body," and to achieve that he would have to break the wall — the wall of the primal embryo.
How was a commoner to break the wall?
The Village Head's brows knitted.
Would drinking more Four Symbols Blood still help? How much longer could he keep it hidden?