The voice came to an abrupt halt.
Xiao Yan's pupils shrank suddenly as he stared in disbelief at the emerald-green spiritual energy flowing within the flames. It wasn't ordinary wood-attribute spiritual energy at all; every strand of energy contained a dense life force, behaving like countless tiny vines that were soothing the violent karmic fire until it was perfectly obedient.
"Your wood spiritual root..." Xiao Yan grabbed Li Nanzhu's wrist, his voice trembling rarely, "How can it have the power of vitality?"
Suisui also leaned in curiously, mimicking Xiao Yan by placing its bone claw on Li Nanzhu's wrist, its soul fire dancing joyfully.
Xiao Yan released his hand and tapped the fan's rib against his palm three times before finding his voice again. "Ordinary wood spiritual roots can only guide external vitality, but yours..."
Li Nanzhu looked at her hands in surprise and couldn't help asking, "Aren't all wood-attribute cultivators like this?"
"How could that be!" Xiao Yan looked at Li Nanzhu in astonishment. The folding fan in his hand snapped shut, and his fingertips unconsciously rubbed the cloud pattern on the fan's rib.
"My spiritual root was tested during the Immortal Ascension Assembly... there was nothing unusual about it," Li Nanzhu said, rubbing her wrist where it had been pinched red. Under the flow of the life force, the skin there was rapidly recovering. "The source of my vitality is the technique I practice..."
"What technique do you practice?" Xiao Yan blurted out, his fingers tightening instinctively. Then, realizing his loss of composure, he quickly cleared his throat twice. "Ahem... your master isn't trying to pry into your sect's secret transmissions..."
"It's just the basic technique of the Five Elements Dao Sect," she replied softly while circulating her spiritual energy, letting a wisp of emerald vitality flow in her palm. "And the Wood Vitality my master had me practice additionally."
"Wood Vitality?" Xiao Yan's brows furrowed even tighter, and the rhythm of the fan tapping against his palm significantly accelerated. "I have never heard of such a technique."
Suisui suddenly spat out a string of green bubbles. The bubbles floated around the wisp of life force in Li Nanzhu's palm, spontaneously beginning to orbit and rotate.
Looking at this wonderful sight, Li Nanzhu said quietly, "At that time, my master had my eldest senior brother bring these techniques to me. I later searched the sect's Library Pavilion but couldn't find the original manuals."
"It couldn't be something he snatched again, could it..." Xiao Yan tapped his brow in distress. After thinking for a moment, his eyes suddenly lit up. In the next instant, his fingertips glowed with blue light, sketching the phantom of a spiritual plant in the air. "When you circulate the technique, does the spiritual energy flow like this?"
The spiritual energy in the phantom flowed along specific pathways, forming the shape of a small tree.
Li Nanzhu nodded in surprise. "How did Master know?"
"As I thought." Xiao Yan wore an expression of 'it all makes sense now.' "This isn't Wood Vitality at all, but..." He hesitated for a moment as if recalling something before continuing, "...the Azure Wood Longevity Sutra."
"Azure Wood Longevity Sutra?" Li Nanzhu looked down at her hands, quite amazed.
"That master of yours..." Xiao Yan's fan suddenly slapped his own mouth, forcefully changing the subject. "In any case, this technique suits you perfectly. However, would it be convenient for me to check your spiritual root?"
Li Nanzhu nodded without hesitation and directly offered her wrist to Xiao Yan.
As Xiao Yan's fingertips touched her skin, Li Nanzhu felt a wisp of gentle spiritual energy enter her meridians. She instinctively wanted to call upon her own energy to resist but immediately remembered this was Xiao Yan's power and forced herself to relax again.
Xiao Yan's expression, however, grew increasingly solemn. "Strange..."
"What's wrong, Master?"
"Your wood spiritual root..." Xiao Yan withdrew his hand, a rare look of confusion on his face. "It's actually producing vitality on its own?"
Suisui suddenly clicked excitedly, its bone claw pointing from Li Nanzhu back to itself, its soul fire jumping wildly.
Li Nanzhu had a sudden realization. "So Suisui was close to me from the beginning because..."
"Because of the vitality in your body!" Xiao Yan slapped his thigh. "The Life-Giving Creation Pearl loves pure vitality most. No wonder the little bone would be so..."
He stopped mid-sentence, his expression becoming complicated.
He stared at the green light within Suisui's skull, then at Li Nanzhu, and suddenly lowered his voice. "Disciple, only those of us here should know about your spiritual root. Do not show it to outsiders."
Li Nanzhu nodded solemnly. She finally understood why Suisui had been so close to her from the start, showing no aggression at all—it wasn't because of any profound dark stone, but because of the special life force within her body.
Thinking of this, she couldn't help but pick up Suisui again and rub against it. "It really is destiny that we met!"
"Now, back to business." Xiao Yan flicked his sleeve, and the flames in the alchemy furnace flared up again. "Since your wood spiritual root can store vitality, fire control will be much simpler."
He conjured a stalk of red flame grass and threw it into the furnace. "Try to wrap the karmic fire with your vitality."
Li Nanzhu did as instructed, but the moment the vitality touched the fire, several sparks suddenly exploded, sending the nearby bottles and jars flying.
Suisui waved its bone claws frantically, barely catching three of the jade bottles. However, the fourth one hit it right on the skull, causing its soul fire to turn a mournful pale blue.
"Focus your attention!"
Having gained experience from the first try, Li Nanzhu was much more careful on her next attempt. Miraculously, after several attempts at fusion, the originally irritable karmic fire became docile, changing shape according to her will.
When the fire became too intense, the green light would automatically strengthen to absorb the excess heat; when the temperature was insufficient, it would release stored vitality to supplement it. This dynamic balance was more exquisite than any fire-control technique.
Even Xiao Yan couldn't help but marvel.
"You are quite simply a born alchemist."
Over the next two hours, Xiao Yan explained in detail how to use vitality to control fire. Li Nanzhu learned extremely fast and soon mastered the basic techniques.
Xiao Yan's gaze toward her became even more affectionate. Who wouldn't like a hardworking and clever little disciple?
"Since you have mastered the basic techniques," Xiao Yan said seriously, "I will increase the difficulty for you and let you try fine manipulation."
With that, he conjured a nine-layered exquisite pagoda, each level having tiny lattice windows. "Make the fire pass through the second window from the left on the third floor."
Li Nanzhu stared at the window, which was barely larger than her thumb, and fell into silence. Was this just 'increasing the difficulty a bit'? Ultimately, she said nothing, as she also wanted to test the results of her learning.
She concentrated her mind, and the red-gold flame moved like a spirit snake under her control. But as the flame neared the window, a few sparks suddenly crackled, and the fire instantly lost control and exploded.
Xiao Yan jumped away as if he had anticipated it, but he still couldn't prevent two holes from being burned into his sleeve by the sparks.
"Clack!"
The crisp sound of the fan rib hitting the top of her head made Li Nanzhu shrink her neck. She rubbed her forehead, looking at the two charred holes in his sleeve, and whispered softly, "You didn't dodge it yourself either..."
"You dare talk back?" Xiao Yan raised an eyebrow, making a gesture with his fan as if to strike again. But seeing his disciple's aggrieved eyes, he paused. Though he knew Li Nanzhu was faking it, he couldn't bring himself to follow through.
"Fine, fine. You can't even control basic fire, and you want to be an alchemist?" He turned away so Li Nanzhu wouldn't see his awkward expression and conjured another, even more delicate nine-layered exquisite pagoda. "This time, if you burn my clothes again..."
Li Nanzhu suddenly reached out and grabbed the corner of Xiao Yan's sleeve. "Why are you hiding, Master? Didn't you say a real alchemist has to experience explosions?" A small flame flickered from her fingertip, perfectly igniting her master's dangling hair ribbon.
"Vile disciple!"
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