Cultivation by Trial and Error

Visualization, this was the foundation of Taoist Skill cultivation.

Ever since that day by the little river, when Chen Hai haphazardly practiced and glimpsed that terrifying entity.

Each time he entered meditation and delved into visualization, he could feel the vague shadow of that horror lingering in his mind.

Though the shadow was blurry and indistinct, it carried an innate mystique.

After each session of visualization and cultivation, the strange knowledge that had flooded his mind when he first spied upon that entity granted him additional insights and understandings.

Not long ago, while he was in school, he would study the Taoist knowledge in his mind during the daytime classes.

Cultivation through visualization and soul departure were relegated to the night.

Perhaps it was because of his mind's chaotic state, filled with distractions, he found it impossible to settle down.

Seated in the lotus position in his room, he tried for a long time to enter the state of visualization for cultivation, yet he could not quiet his mind enough to truly commence his practice.

"Now, as dusk approaches and the sun is about to set, the power of the sun at this time should be nearly depleted!"

"Should I try soul departure now?"

"If I can barely withstand the glow of this setting sun, perhaps, I could step into the Day Tour Realm more quickly!"

The saying goes, you won't die unless you seek death. Eager to achieve a Realm Breakthrough and to grow stronger, a bizarre idea suddenly surfaced in Chen Hai's mind.

In the Night Tour Realm, the soul can't wander in daylight.

Although the ancient books described it so, without having truly experienced the terror of the sun, he had no idea what consequences the sunlight would ultimately bring.

Of course, he hadn't been reckless enough to attempt soul departure when the sun was at its zenith and the sunlight most fierce.

Now, as twilight fell, the remnants of the sunset could not penetrate directly into the room.

After much hesitation, Chen Hai finally summoned the courage to risk an attempt.

"Not good, why is this setting sun so intense!"

The moment his soul left his body, he could not help but exclaim in alarm.

To him, the entire world seemed to become a blazing furnace.

There was fire red everywhere, and swirling heat waves engulfed everything.

"Sizzle! Sizzle! Sizzle!" He could feel his soul rapidly dissolving in these rolling heat waves.

In just an instant, his body had nearly disintegrated completely.

The giant leech that his soul had transformed into wailed and screamed in agony within the heat waves.

The only fortunate thing was that he managed to return to his body before his leech Soul Body was completely obliterated.

When he returned to his own flesh, taking refuge within the Physical Body's protection, the world finally returned to calmness.

The only difference for Chen Hai was that in the span of this ordeal, he felt nearly drained.

Large beads of sweat the size of soybeans rolled down his forehead, and he gasped for air with heavy breaths.

"Does my leech Soul Body actually possess some Undying Characteristics?"

"If it weren't for this trait and the extreme tenacity of my life force, my life might have been lost in just that brief moment!"

Feeling extremely fortunate, Chen Hai was overwhelmed with a feeling of dread.

He lay crookedly on his bed without uttering a word.

For at that moment, speaking was out of the question, even moving a little finger felt extraordinarily difficult.

Not long afterward, Chen Zhonghua and Jiang Meixian, who had either gone out or were busy with something else, finally returned home.

"Hai, what's happened to you?"

When Jiang Meixian saw Chen Hai's condition on the bed, her face turned pale.

Without thinking, she rushed over anxiously.

At that time, Chen Hai's face was deathly white, devoid of any color.

The entire bedsheet on the bed seemed as if it had just been pulled out of the water, already soaked through.

If it weren't for this, Jiang Meixian and Chen Zhonghua wouldn't have instantly noticed something was wrong with Chen Hai.

Though they had been reprimanding Chen Hai for a while over his test scores,

when they saw their son suddenly become like this, Chen Zhonghua and Jiang Meixian immediately felt as if their hearts were being torn apart, their minds thrown into complete disarray!

"Dad, Mom, it's nothing serious, I just need to rest for a while, and I should be fine!"

Chen Hai replied weakly.

Though he had been resting here for a while,

he still felt waves of exhaustion; just responding to his parents made him feel incredibly taxed.

"Zhonghua, quickly take out our cart from home and take the child to the hospital!"

Anyone could tell there was something wrong with Chen Hai in this state.

He said it was nothing? How could Jiang Meixian believe him.

Turning to Chen Zhonghua, her face filled with urgency, she shouted.

"Dad! Mom! There's no need to go to the hospital, I really don't have any issues!"

"If I get a good night's sleep tonight, I'll be up and about tomorrow, I promise!"

Forcing some energy, Chen Hai quickly responded.

Chen Zhonghua, on the other hand, clearly looked troubled and did not pull out the cart as Jiang Meixian had directed.

At this moment, Jiang Meixian also seemed to have remembered something.

"Ah! Let's wait and see tomorrow!"

"Zhonghua, if Hai is still like this tomorrow, you take him to the hospital. I'll make a trip back to my parents' home to see if I can borrow some money!"

After pondering for a moment, Jiang Meixian let out a long sigh and did not insist any further.

Listening to his parents' conversation, Chen Hai felt all kinds of discomfort in his heart.

"Chen Hai, oh Chen Hai, how can you be so useless, always causing worry for your parents!"

He berated himself incessantly in his heart.

After watching over Chen Hai for a while, seeing that other than looking pale and being quite weak,

he didn't complain about pain here or itching there, Chen Zhonghua and his wife finally breathed a sigh of relief.

It was not until after ten o'clock at night that the two of them returned to their own room and turned off the lights to sleep.

As soon as his parents went back to their room, Chen Hai also grew restless.

Harmed by the masculine energy contained within the sun, he could not fully recover with simple rest alone.

"Soul departure!" As the chilly breeze howled, Chen Hai's entire soul leaped out of his body.

However, his soul was extremely weak,

and after taking the form of a leech, it was at least a lot thinner than before.

He even felt that the slightest breeze outside might blow him away and scatter him in all directions.

Biting his teeth, Chen Hai took one slow step after another, floating towards the outside of his home.

The moon tonight was not very round, merely a crescent hanging in the sky.

Nonetheless, when Chen Hai's leech form was exposed under this moonlight, he still felt refreshing and crisp.

Beams of moonlight fell from the vast void above, shining on him.

They penetrated every pore on his body and soaked into his interior, giving him a strange sensation of floating towards immortality, so comfortable he almost wanted to hum.

The sunlight belonged to Pure Yang, while the moonlight was Extreme Yin.

After being burned by the Pure Yang Qi within the sunlight, the Extreme Yin Qi from the moonlight came to repair it, and this process naturally contained a sense of Yin-Yang balance.

As time slowly passed, the feeling of fatigue and exhaustion in Chen Hai's body finally began to slowly fade away.