Chapter 74: Second Tribulation Refining Essence Human Immortal
In the quiet room, several days passed.
Fang Shu silently circulated the qi and blood within his body. Under his urging, the thick medicinal power continuously merged into his physical body and penetrated into his bones.
Suddenly, the muscles and tendons on his body trembled fiercely, crackling loudly.
Fang Shu abruptly opened his eyes, immediately feeling the qi and blood in his body unprecedentedly active.
Raising his head to look at the sky again, it was exactly the moment when the moon was high in the sky.
And on the Dao Talisman in his mind, the text in the realm column had already changed to:
【Can Pass Through Tribulation（99%）】
As he expected, after carefully grinding his qi and blood, with the abundant spiritual energy and medicinal power in his body as assistance, the success rate of this tribulation could reach nearly 100%.
Thus, Fang Shu no longer hesitated. His figure moved, swiftly darting about at the bottom of the well.
Gurgle gurgle!
A large vat was trembling unceasingly at the bottom of the well due to his darting movements.
The vat was filled with sixty percent mercury, now swirling restlessly, forming a vortex, and emitting sounds like wind and thunder.
For this Marrow Refining tribulation, Fang Shu used a different method from the previous Scorpion Basin tribulation. It mainly adopted the Marrow Refining method recorded in the Lead Skill.
Compared to the Insect Skill’s Entering the Dao followed by gradual Poisonous Blood Marrow Refining over days and months, the Lead Skill during tribulation required drinking mercury into the body, straight to the bone marrow.
Such a practice was terrifying just to hear about. Mortals would die upon contact, and ordinary immortal cultivators would easily be maimed or killed, shortening their lifespan and harming them for life.
If Fang Shu had not obtained this opportunity and had the Dao Talisman monitoring his physical body to correct him, allowing him to know his physical condition like the back of his hand at all times, he would not dare to do it.
And such an extremely fierce Marrow Refining secret technique naturally had its own benefits.
According to the Lead Skill, using this method for tribulation could further elevate the spiritual root, cultivate Bronze Tendons and Iron Bones, refine a mouthful of silver mercury treasure marrow, far surpassing ordinary Marrow Refining tribulations.
In the future, even if the bones were shattered, the treasure marrow inside could immediately seep out, enveloping the bones, keeping them stable and intact, and the broken bone injuries could heal completely within a day.
Such intense bones and powerful bone recovery ability were the wonders of Lead Skill Marrow Refining!
In addition, because mercury also carried strong toxicity, mortals would be injured just by smelling it, even dying suddenly.
Fang Shu refining such poison into his body perfectly matched the Insect Skill’s Poisonous Blood Marrow Refining wonder, greatly increasing his physical body’s poison resistance. After successfully passing the tribulation, he could also obtain the Insect Skill Marrow Refining wonder.
These two cultivation methods, one primary and one auxiliary, complemented each other perfectly.
Fang Shu now increasingly felt that he had not chosen the wrong cultivation method.
Gurgle!
In the quiet room, Fang Shu was as swift as wind and as blazing as fire. Two-zhang-high qi and blood essence smoke rose and burned in the quiet room.
Finally, with a crisp crack.
The huge vat shattered, unable to withstand the rotating mercury. The vat body turned into fingernail-sized fragments, scattered all over the ground.
But the mercury in the vat did not spill onto the ground. Instead, it formed a shiny silver mercury ball, continuing to rotate rapidly in the quiet room.
Fang Shu darted forward, his two hands and all the muscles and tendons of his body continuously infusing qi and blood to maintain the high-speed rotation of this mass of mercury, preventing it from scattering on the ground.
The mercury itself was like a grindstone, crushing and grinding the qi and blood Fang Shu infused into it, chewing it fiercely before spitting it back out into Fang Shu’s physical body.
This process was a key step in grinding the qi and blood. The longer it persisted, the more impurities could be ground away from the tribulation qi and blood, yielding even purer qi and blood.
Relying on the abundant spiritual energy and medicinal power in his body, Fang Shu whipped the mercury ball like a top, using his arms as sticks and qi and blood as whips, maintaining its rotation for three hours.
In these three hours, his whole body’s qi and blood had been ground several times, and the originally lush qi and blood had become much withered.
But the ground qi and blood now had a silvery hue, possessing a metallic sheen, clearly extraordinary at a glance.
Meanwhile, the vat-sized mercury ball itself continuously evaporated, turning into highly toxic mercury vapor that filled the quiet room.
In Fang Shu’s hands, only a small lump of medicinal power essence the size of a human head remained, still spinning nimbly.
He stood in the mercury vapor, and even a casual breath made his lungs feel sweet and his mouth and nose numb.
Even with his physical body’s poison resistance, in such an intensely toxic environment, he was starting to struggle. If it were a mortal, they would die on the spot within three breaths.
But since he had endured it, what harm was there in breathing a few mouthfuls of mercury poison? It would only become assistance for elevating his spiritual root and increasing his cultivation!
He had even heard that some in the world used mercury to pour over bones, flay skin and pour into the body, such ruthless methods for metamorphosis tribulation. Compared to that, his current tribulation method was already mild and harmless.
In the quiet room, Fang Shu’s gaze was like lightning. He stared straight at the spinning mass of mercury before him, chanting lowly from his mouth:
“Two qi spiritual splendor, mercury flowing crystal. Heaven and earth profound wonder, enter my body form. Lead suppresses bone prison, yin and yang harmonize. Meridians flow smoothly, physical body renewed…”
He chanted the tribulation incantation, immediately raising the refined mercury, letting it roll over his sturdy physical body, from hands to shoulders, shoulders to back, back to abdomen… finally rolling to the chest, gurgling into the mouth, shrinking slightly, then continuing to roll.
Though the mercury entered his mouth, it did not go into Fang Shu’s abdomen. Instead, it sprayed out from his nasal passages like smoke.
This was one of the key secrets of Lead Skill tribulation. Those who did not understand it would either die or be crippled!
Even though Fang Shu had entered the Dao, cultivated Purple Lead Poisonous Blood, with strong muscles and abundant internal medicinal power, he was still just a Human Immortal, with fragile organs. Once swallowing large amounts of mercury, the risk was even greater than Shi Hou’s previous Poisonous Blood drinking, no less than “swallowing gold to commit suicide”.
Therefore, he had to pretend to swallow the mercury like smokers inhaling from a water pipe, actually using qi and blood to drive it, with mouth as furnace, throat as bellows, nose as smoke path, clacking teeth like drums, rapidly evaporating the mercury, circulating it once in the body’s cavities before timely expelling it.
This way, the mercury was kept out of the body as much as possible, while allowing the physical body to absorb the medicinal and metallic properties of the mercury, minimizing poison harm.
However, this tribulation method still placed a huge burden on the cultivator’s lungs. Without a robust physical body and profound cultivation method, it could injure the lungs, leading to chronic cough and asthma.
Fortunately, Fang Shu was such a person with a robust physical body and profound cultivation method.
One mouthful after another of medicinal refined mercury, under his qi and blood burning, continuously turned into smoke and was expelled from the physical body, gradually dyeing his entire physical body silver-white.
Internally and externally interwoven, Fang Shu could feel his whole body’s bones itching and burning, waves of heat accumulating in his body, as if about to make his whole person explode, truly unbearable.
But this also meant that the bone marrow in his body was metamorphosing to an unprecedented degree, and the bones themselves were refined with lead and mercury qi, becoming both hard and tough, no longer mortal bones.
At this moment, if someone took out Fang Shu’s bones and tapped them with a hand, they would hear a clear metallic clanging sound.
Finally, when the human-head-sized mercury ball was completely swallowed and expelled by Fang Shu, the mercury vapor in the quiet room had thickened to the point where even his hair condensed mercury dew drops.
Fang Shu stopped swallowing and breathing, holding his breath, punching and kicking in the quiet room.
He stirred the mercury vapor in the quiet room into rotation, grinding against the walls, emitting sounds like rolling stone mills, like wind and thunder.
After fully holding his breath for a quarter of an hour, he suddenly shouted loudly: “Cha!”
Crackle crackle, the bones in his body resounded again, densely layered, clanging metallically.
The swirling mercury vapor around was blasted apart by this shout, scattering into mist.
At this time, Fang Shu suddenly inhaled deeply, as if to suck all the mercury vapor in the quiet room into his chest.
The unsucked mercury vapor seemed triggered, tiny mercury particles trembling and condensing into droplets of mercury beads.
The next moment, Fang Shu stood in the quiet room, exhaling and chanting, his voice trembling like iron:
“I now pass through tribulation knocking on the second gate, feast on lead drink mercury spew golden smoke.
Burning body scorching marrow holds no fear, shedding shell changing bones even more like immortal.”
Patter patter patter!
Mercury beads poured down like heavy rain, splashing on his hair and shoulders, making the quiet room floor entirely silver-white.
Fang Shu withdrew his technique, standing with hands behind his back in the quiet room, looking up at the sky, where the bright moon was no longer visible.
But his own body shone brilliantly, draped in silver frost and white dew. As he strolled leisurely, it was as if bathed in moonlight, just emerged from a moon pool.
At this point, Fang Shu’s physical body had successfully passed through the “Soft Bones and Tender Flesh” tribulation, of superior quality, his body like Bronze Casting and Iron Forging, future qi and blood like a Fierce Tiger, whole body muscles and tendons connected as one, not even a fly could land.
He could travel a hundred li without fatigue, carry a thousand jin without issue, and in movement or rest, achieve treading snow without trace, walking on water without sinking; crossing mountains and rivers was commonplace.
This realm was “Second Tribulation Refining Essence Human Immortal”.
Note: Happy Mid-Autumn Festival to everyone!
