Cultivation begins with ice harvesters

Chapter 19: A Blessing in Disguise

Not to mention low-level cultivators like Tong Bingfeng at the third level of Qi Refining, even powerful Foundation Establishment cultivators and Golden Core cultivators who have become sect leaders are still bound by fate.

Time marches on, and what's done is done.

Time is the cruelest yet fairest thing; it does not change according to the will of any cultivator, especially in the Northern Ice Region.

Although it was cold during the day, the sunlight and the support of the cultivators' magical power kept it within a manageable range.

But once night falls and the sun sets, the temperature in the entire northern Xinjiang ice region drops to an astonishing level.

Not to mention cultivators who are only protected by robes and have lost their magical power, unable to move, even other demonic beasts living and multiplying on the icy lands of the Northern Frontier must hide in their respective lairs to avoid danger.

Tong Bingfeng lay paralyzed on the island, his hands and feet covered in ice crystals. Only his left arm, which had been irritated by snake venom, remained swollen, showing no signs of frostbite.

Once the low temperature tries to penetrate this area, the bloody patches caused by the snake venom on the arm always dissolve in time. Under the confrontation of the two forces, the snake venom is still firmly controlled on the left arm and has not spread to the core areas such as the heart and stomach.

Although cultivators in the Qi Refining stage are nourished by spiritual energy during their cultivation, and their entire bodies receive relatively comprehensive nourishment and improvement, their internal organs are still relatively weak and cannot withstand the erosion of such intense snake venom.

At this moment, in order to cope with the erosion of the snake venom, the Water Spirit Technique automatically circulated its Great Circulation, forcibly drawing out the magic power in the dantian and doing its best to limit the spread of the snake venom to the left arm.

Without the melting and resistance of magical power, relying solely on the natural cold of the northern icy region is simply insufficient to contain the snake venom.

Although the Water Spirit Technique he cultivated did not have any particularly outstanding features in daily life, it was excellent in its balance and tranquility, and the water-attribute spiritual power it refined was also quite pure.

Water benefits all things without striving, and water-attribute spiritual power also has an excellent dissolving effect on snake venom. It was due to the combined effect of various factors that Tong Bingfeng did not perish from the erosion of snake venom and always retained a little bit of vitality.

As time passed, the first-grade high-quality ice flower that had been forcibly swallowed before it fell into a coma finally began to show its effects and value.

Although the Ice Flower grows in the icy northern frontier and feeds by absorbing and refining the free-floating ice-attribute spiritual energy between heaven and earth, after being purified by the flower itself, what is stored in the flower is genuine attribute-free spiritual energy, which any cultivator can refine without leaving any trouble.

With just a little bit of their own magical power as a guide, cultivators can easily replenish their magical power by channeling it into their dantian through the Great Circulation.

Tong Bingfeng, who was in a deep coma at the moment, was naturally unable to actively guide the process. However, the lack of mana in his dantian and the passive operation of the Great Circulation accidentally started the refining of the Ice Flower.

Streams of pure, attribute-free spiritual energy, guided by the Great Circulation of the Water Spirit Technique, rapidly flowed into the meridians. Most of it didn't even have time to return to the dantian before it rushed towards the left arm to entangle with the white snake's venom.

The remaining small amount of Ice Flower spiritual power naturally replenished the dantian, which was rapidly depleted, and was once again filled with pure water-attribute blue magic power.

Moreover, compared to the spiritual power that Tong Bingfeng usually receives daily through the limited supply of first-grade low-level spiritual vein in the courtyard, as well as the spiritual power refined from a small amount of first-grade low-level Qi Refining Powder, the first-grade high-level Ice Ling Flower is superior in both quality and quantity.

The blue, gaseous magical energy within his dantian possessed a superior sense of heaviness. With the continuous input of pure water-attribute spiritual energy, his dantian was further nourished and moisturized, seemingly ushering in a crucial step in his growth.

As for snake venom, although it is a major consumer of the Ice Flower's spiritual energy, under the blockade of this pure water-attribute spiritual energy, it has also begun to gradually collapse from its original unstoppable momentum, being firmly sealed in the left arm, and its range of movement is also naturally suppressed.

The white snake comes from the Ice Flower, and the two have a special relationship that complements each other. This first-grade Ice Flower also contains a small amount of special components that can restrain snake venom.

As time passed, Tong Bingfeng's swollen left arm had returned to normal, and the fist-sized bloody patches had also begun to fade.

In short, before he fell into a deep coma, the ice flower he forcibly swallowed with the last bit of clarity in his mind was becoming a lifeline.

"Huff, huff, huff"

As the snake venom dissipated and was expelled, Tong Bingfeng's originally weak vital signs began to stabilize and were effectively strengthened.

Under the corrosive effect of the low temperature, the entire body would occasionally tremble abnormally and at a high frequency, and a thin layer of ice crystals would form on the outside of the body.

It is obvious that as the snake venom melts, the unique low temperature of the northern ice region has become one of the main factors eroding its life. If it cannot be awakened in time, its Qi Refining Level 3 cultivation is not enough to withstand the extremely low temperature at night.

Fortunately, the Ice Lotus was of excellent quality and had not yet been completely consumed. It continued to provide Tong Bingfeng with a steady stream of pure water-attribute spiritual energy, protecting the cultivator's internal organs and preventing the rapid depletion of his life force.

Similarly, as the character's condition improved, most of the water-attribute spiritual energy dissipated by the Ice Flower was replenished into the dantian through the Great Circulation.

The pure water-attribute spiritual energy in his dantian not only recovered to its original state, but its quantity and quality were also better than before he encountered the snake venom.

Even while unconscious, Tong Bingfeng could clearly feel a swelling sensation emanating from his dantian, which was due to the abundance of magical power within it.

In fact, for any cultivator, this is a kind of happy trouble. Only by reaching this level can one be said to have touched the bottleneck of the next cultivation level. If one wants to improve their cultivation, one must go further and break through this bottleneck that limits the capacity of the dantian in one go.

If Tong Bingfeng were in a conscious state, with the guidance of his divine sense and the continuous flow of magical power, the difficulty would not be high.

Unfortunately, the cultivator was still unconscious at this moment, and everything depended on the accumulation of spiritual energy in the dantian and the control of a few instincts in the body. This made it much more difficult than before.

Furthermore, once the dantian reaches its limit, if the magical power within it fails to combine and break through this bottleneck, the dantian will likely suffer a certain degree of backlash, ultimately becoming a typical case of putting in a lot of effort for little reward.

Overall, behind this series of events, for a struggling rogue cultivator like Tong Bingfeng, it can still be considered a blessing in disguise.