178: Taoist priests don't leave the mountain, incense comes to them

The morning in Black Rock Gully was wrapped in mist like a greyish-white veil, shrouding the crooked iron frames and collapsed wellheads in the ruins.

A cold wind blew through the broken walls, whipping up several yellowed sheets of paper—these were clippings from Su Qingzhu's 'Fire Seed Project' series of reports, plastered densely across the mottled brick wall.

The ink had become fuzzy from being soaked by rain, yet they remained stubbornly pinned there, like some kind of silent declaration.

A black off-road vehicle crushed through the mud and came to a stop.

The door opened, and leather boots stepped into the standing water, splashing up a ring of murky ripples.

Li Chengzhi stood still; the pressure of his Grandmaster Realm followed him like a shadow, making the air feel as if it had been tightened by an invisible hand.

His gaze swept across this dilapidated place, finally landing on the figure squatting in front of the stove—Zhang Xuanyi was slowly stirring a large pot, the scent of porridge mixed with the smell of firewood, steaming with warmth in the damp, cold air.

He did not stand up, nor did he offer a salute, simply scooping out a bowl without raising his head and handing it over: 'Eat something first? It doesn't taste good if it gets cold.'

Li Chengzhi frowned slightly, his tone cold and stern: 'Tianshi Mansion has been ordered to investigate the abnormal earth vein fluctuations over the past half year, and all the sources point to Your Excellency's tracks. Last night, the earth eye opened on its own, and the water veins surged in reverse; this is not something human power can achieve. Who exactly are you?'

'Who?' Zhang Xuanyi grinned, the bloodshot veins from staying up all night still visible at the corners of his eyes. 'Just a Daoist who cooks porridge.'

He took the bowl back and set it by the pot, his voice as light as if he were making small talk: 'You're talking about earth vein fluctuations? That thing is just like a person; it cries when it's hungry for too long. I just fed it a hot meal.'

Li Chengzhi's eyes narrowed.

Before he could speak, footsteps approached from the distance.

Su Qingzhu walked over quickly, her press pass hanging in front of her chest, her voice recorder already turned on. Her clear voice cut into the silence:

'According to the Public Regulations on Extraordinary Affairs, special envoys must accept media supervision when performing official duties. Does Tianshi Mansion acknowledge the legitimacy of "civilian-initiated maintenance of earth Qi"? Do you define such behavior as "illegal Qi gathering" or "disrupting the order of heaven and earth"?'

She did not speak quickly, but every word was like a nail, piercing straight into the weak point of the System.

Li Chengzhi's eyes flickered, but he did not answer.

He was a Grandmaster, not a politician.

But he knew that the pen in the woman's hand was harder to deal with than some Talismanic Incantations.

Just then, a dozen or so miners walked over one after another, holding lunch boxes, and stood not far away, watching in silence.

Someone whispered:

'Is this the Daoist who helped us get the water flowing?'

'I heard that last night, he stepped down, and the well sprayed water...'

'Don't let the people from above take him away! This land of ours relies entirely on him to hold it up!'

The crowd gradually gathered; although no one made a move, the silence, mixed with the smell of earth and anger, was like an undercurrent surging.

The atmosphere suddenly tightened.

Zhang Xuanyi stood up, his movements lazy, yet he carried an indescribable composure.

He picked up the entire pot, walked over to Li Chengzhi, and without a word, tilted it sharply—the boiling hot porridge splashed into the snow, steaming and instantly melting a large patch of mud.

Everyone was stunned.

Su Qingzhu's pupils contracted, and her finger almost pressed the pause button.

Zhang Xuanyi lifted his foot and stepped into the porridge mud without hesitation.

His cloth shoes were already worn out, the soles covered in rice grains and soup, but that step was like striking the drum heart of the earth.

He chanted in a low voice, barely audible: 'First step of Returning to Origin, the fire seed is not extinguished; second step, the pulse breathes... ninth step, the human world has roots.'

With every step, the ground trembled slightly.

At first it was subtle, but then, under seven abandoned wellheads, three collapsed foundations, and even the wreckage of a collapsed power distribution tower in the distance, extremely faint golden patterns emerged simultaneously—spreading like a spider web, and like a reviving Bloodline, instantly connecting to form a momentum.

This was not driven by a Talisman, not triggered by a Medicinal Pill, and certainly not produced by the System.

This was momentum.

It was every pot of porridge he had personally cooked during the thirty days of emergency repairs, the fist soul candy he had shoved into the hands of exhausted workers, the names he had silently noted down when old ladies cried about the water shortage, the faint light ignited by Su Qingzhu's articles, the determination of countless pairs of rough hands gripping shovels again—

These invisible things had been buried into this land by him in the clumsiest way, one scoop and one shovel at a time, through every word and every action.

Now, borrowing his aura of worldly life, it was brought to life.

Li Chengzhi's expression changed drastically; the Grandmaster True Qi in his body vibrated instinctively, and he almost moved to stop it.

But just as he was about to move, the golden patterns suddenly receded, and the earth returned to calm, as if everything just now had been an illusion.

But he knew it was not an illusion.

This kind of "conduit without contract"—no need for Talisman seals, no need to set up magic formations, no need to borrow external forces, simply using oneself as a medium to connect earth vein nodes—was a Realm that only legendary Earthly Immortals could touch.

And the person in front of him did not even show a qi sea, looking like an ordinary wandering Daoist.

'You... did not use any magic techniques.' Li Chengzhi finally spoke, his voice low.

Zhang Xuanyi patted the porridge mud off the soles of his shoes, looked up, and smiled: 'Magic techniques? I stopped using that stuff a long time ago.'

He looked at the cooking smoke rising in the distance and said softly: 'As long as people are alive and the fire is not extinguished, the land cannot die.'

Li Chengzhi was stunned.

In that instant, he suddenly realized something—

Those data on earth vein fluctuations, those unexplainable tides of Power Of Will, those rock layers that should have collapsed but miraculously stabilized...

It was never an anomaly caused by some mysterious treasure.

It was this person himself.

He was not borrowing the System, nor was he relying on Divine Ability.

He had already walked himself into becoming the breath of this land.

Chapter 179: Living Earth Eye

When the steaming heat of the porridge mud dissipated, Li Chengzhi's hand was still suspended in mid-air, the edges of the detention warrant already curled from the sweat in his palm.

He stared at Zhang Xuanyi's cloth shoe, which had stepped through the porridge and triggered the earth veins, his Adam's apple rolling slowly.

It was not a Talisman, not a formation, not the Thunder Method of the alchemy tripod, nor was it a strange treasure or technique produced by the System—this person had actually used his own flesh and blood as a guide, refining every bowl of porridge he had cooked, every hand he had held, and every sigh he had heard over the thirty days into a "Living Earth Eye" that connected the earth Qi.

Power Of Will was not a resource to be collected, but a resonance to be awakened; earth veins were not a tool to be manipulated, but a life to be empathized with.

He was not casting a spell; he was living.

The cold wind blew through the ruins, unable to disperse this moment of silence.

Li Chengzhi finally withdrew his hand, tore the detention warrant in two, and let it flutter into the muddy water.

He took out a golden, flowing Talismanic Incantation from his bosom, the seal script coiling like a Dragon and snake, with a faint sound of heaven and earth responding: 'Tianshi Mansion, in accordance with the opportunity of restarting the three-hundred-year closed-door ancestral teachings, specially invites Daoist Zhang Xuanyi to serve as a consultant. You are not bound by form, not limited in your actions, only for guidance at critical moments.'

As his voice fell, the entire Black Rock Gully seemed to tremble slightly.

This was the highest courtesy, second only to a direct summons from the Tianshi, meaning he did not need to enter the temple, did not need to keep pure precepts, and could control the hub of Luck in a region.

Zhang Xuanyi, however, did not take it.

He squatted back in front of the stove, scraped the last bit of scorched porridge from the bottom of the pot with a broken spoon, stuffed it into his mouth, chewed twice, and grinned: 'I won't take the Talisman, but if you really want to help... why not turn all the abandoned staff canteens, school kitchens, and construction site large stoves across the world into "Ash-Returning Stoves"—as long as someone cooks every day, the fire won't go out, the ash won't get cold, and the earth Qi will naturally wake up.'

Li Chengzhi's pupils contracted.

'Ash-returning?'

That was a secret folk saying—if the stove fire burns, the home is peaceful, and there is no disaster for a hundred miles; if the stove ash is kept, the Power Of Will gathers, and the earth veins can be sustained.

But nowadays, cities are filled with high-rise buildings, gas pipelines are installed in homes, who still burns a stove?

Who still remembers that handful of wood ash with sparks?

But wasn't this dead land regaining its vitality because of an iron pot the best proof?

'You are trying to... replace incense with worldly life?' he asked in a low voice.

'Incense is too expensive; ordinary people cannot afford it.' Zhang Xuanyi patted his trouser legs and stood up, his gaze sweeping over the miners gathered around. 'But anyone can afford a bowl of white porridge. When people are hungry, they cook; when the earth is hungry, it wakes up when it hears the sound of the pot.'

Li Chengzhi remained silent for a long time.

Finally, he put away the Talismanic Incantation, leaving only one sentence: 'Three-province pilot, approval within seven days.'

Within five days of the news spreading, the first batch of "Officially Certified Mutual Aid Stoves" were established in Jiangxi, Southern Sichuan, and Northern Hebei.

The government provided the venue and basic supplies, civilians spontaneously organized rotation cooking, a stove fire was lit every midnight, and the ashes were sealed in special pottery urns and buried in earth vein nodes.

Su Qingzhu wrote a new article overnight—"Who is Guarding This World".

On the day the article was published, it went viral across the entire internet.

There was no earth-shattering battle, no feat of a Flying Sword slaying demons, only a photo: in the morning light, a Daoist in ragged clothes squatted in front of a stove in the ruins, behind him were dozens of workers silently eating with lunch boxes, and the wall was covered with her yellowed reports.

The caption read: "We once thought salvation came from high altars, with thunder and lightning; later we discovered that true protection is having someone willing to cook one more pot of porridge in the coldest night."

Meanwhile, at a secret fishing village on the southern coastline thousands of miles away, the sea mist was like a veil, and the sound of the tide murmured.

On the beach, a few piles of wet seashells were scattered sporadically.

Zhang Xuanyi sat on the ground, holding half a piece of broken pottery in his hand, teaching a few barefoot children to arrange a strange circular pattern.

'The fire needs three legs to be stable...' he chanted in a low voice, placing three green shells in a triangular position. 'The first circle surrounds the Qi, the second circle nourishes the Spirit, the third circle—'

Before he could finish, a dull thud suddenly came from the distant sea surface, like some giant object sinking into deep water, and also like a sigh coming from the depths of the earth.

His movements paused, and he looked up at the horizon.

The fog was too thick; he couldn't see anything.

But he also knew that something was waking up on the seabed.