noffsinger Chapter 19 [Dantian Full of Qi]
Chapter 19 [Dantian Full of Qi]
"The fetus is the root of innate constitution; the breath is the mechanism of creation."
Humans are born from the essence and blood of their parents, but through acquired means, they lose their true nature. If one can return to the origin, to the state before the separation of the pre-natal world, then fetal breathing will arise naturally, without needing to seek it externally.
He had read the opening passage of the "Embryonic Breathing Sutra" dozens of times, but now, as he calmed down and read it again, he still felt that it contained profound meaning and that he had gained some insight.
Chen Bai didn't rush to read on. Instead, he put down the jade slip, closed his eyes, and began to ponder.
"The fetus is the root of innate constitution, and the breath is the mechanism of creation."
In other words, fetal breathing is something I originally possessed, but it was acquired and obscured by something, which is why it cannot be manifested?
He recalled what Fairy Yueyi had said when she preached.
She said that the reason why ordinary people can cultivate themselves is because everyone has a bit of innate potential hidden in their body, but it is covered by acquired turbidity, like a bright pearl covered in dust.
The essence of cultivation is to wipe away the dust and impurities, allowing that innate potential to reappear.
"The principles of the Embryonic Breathing Sutra are actually the same as what Fairy Yueyi said."
It's just more thorough—it doesn't teach you how to "polish" a pearl, but directly tells you that the pearl is inherently bright, and you only need to realize this, and the brightness will naturally appear.
"I possess a bright pearl, long locked away by worldly cares. Now, the dust has settled, its light shines forth, illuminating countless mountains and rivers!"
This sounds very mysterious.
However, when Chen Bai went through the ordeal of "capturing the spiritual light," he almost perished, both physically and mentally.
Between life and death lies great terror.
He also benefited from the misfortune, gaining initial insight into his own mind and nature, and thus becoming familiar with this kind of "direct pointing to one's true nature" method. Back then, in that vast and dark chaos, he did nothing but wait quietly, and his innate spiritual light spontaneously emerged.
"Let's give it a try."
He put down the jade slip, cleared his mind of all worldly concerns, and began to try to enter a meditative state.
A moment later, as soon as Chen Bai closed his eyes and his spiritual light settled slightly, he felt a slight tingling sensation coming from the four major acupoints around his body. When he was cultivating in that low-level cave dwelling before, he had to actively guide the spiritual energy with his innate spiritual light for it to slowly enter his acupoints.
At this moment, because the first-class cave was already rich in spiritual energy and had a set of spirit-gathering formations engraved on it, Chen Bai only needed to enter a state of tranquility for a short while. The spiritual energy that was confined to the ground and almost turned into mist made him feel like a fish in water.
"You really do get what you pay for," Chen Bai thought to himself.
He didn't rush to circulate his cultivation technique. Instead, he first followed the mantra of "accepting all who come and letting go of those who leave" in the Embryonic Breathing Scripture, opening up all the acupoints in his body and allowing spiritual energy to freely enter and exit.
The feeling was peculiar—it was as if the body had become a bamboo basket, immersed in a stream, with water flowing in and out from all directions. The basket itself held nothing, but every bamboo strip of the basket was soaked in water.
After about half an hour, he felt that his limbs and bones had been "moistened" by spiritual energy before he began to formally draw energy into his body.
This time, he did not deliberately distinguish the five elements of spiritual energy in advance based on the innate spiritual light.
Whether pure or impure, metal, wood, water, fire, or earth, all come together and are drawn into the dantian from the four major acupoints.
If it were a regular exercise, with so many zodiac signs mixed together, one would have already experienced surging blood and swollen meridians.
However, the method of operation of the "Fetal Breathing Sutra" does have its unique features - after the spiritual energy enters the dantian, it does not conflict with each other, but instead intertwines with each other in a way that he cannot yet understand, forming a delicate balance.
Chen Bai looked inward at the slowly rotating ball of spiritual energy in his dantian, and a metaphor came to mind: "Like a chaotic egg, its insides unclear and ambiguous, just hanging there steadily."
This analogy may not be very elegant, but it is certainly apt.
In ordinary fetal breathing exercises, although there are no major requirements for the spiritual energy attribute before mastering fetal breathing, it is still necessary to distinguish the five elements and carefully guide the energy into the body through the twelve meridians, rather than in this "Fetal Breathing Scripture" which is unrestrained and draws energy into the body indiscriminately.
Then, relying on its assimilative ability to "encompass all things and primordial chaos", it tamed these spiritual energies of different attributes perfectly.
"No wonder this cultivation method doesn't require specific innate qualities," Chen Bai thought with a sudden realization.
With the help of the Fetal Breathing Sutra, his speed of drawing qi into his body was constantly increasing, almost comparable to those with the best aptitude for cultivation.
The following days were filled with repeated meditation and breath control.
Chen Bai didn't deliberately time things. When he was hungry, he would take a fasting pill; when he was sleepy, he would lean against the jade platform for a short rest, and then continue cultivating when he woke up. The cave was dark, with only the soft light of the pearls on the cave ceiling shining through, making time seem meaningless.
All he knew was that the spiritual energy in his dantian was growing stronger day by day.
At first, it was just a thin layer of mist, drifting at the bottom of the dantian;
About ten days later, the fog thickened and began to have a liquid-like texture.
Ten days later, the spiritual energy had become so thick that it resembled a ball of mercury about to solidify. It rolled slowly in the dantian, and with each rotation, a trace of grayish-white impurities was flung out and expelled from the body along the meridians.
After observing carefully several times, Chen Bai discovered that the expulsion of this impurity was a natural phenomenon caused by the rotation of the egg-shaped ball of spiritual energy in his dantian.
It's like stirring a glass of muddy water; as you stir, the clear water naturally rises to the top, and the mud and sand naturally fall to the bottom.
It is like the beginning of heaven and earth, where the clear and the turbid were naturally separated. Clouds are in the blue sky, water is in the bottle, each in its place, each fulfilling its function.
"We welcome all who come, and we do not keep those who leave."
He pondered these eight words again and gained a new understanding: "'Accepting all who come' means not being picky when accepting them, taking in the spiritual energy of all zodiac signs; 'leaving no one behind' means being ruthless when discarding them, driving away all the dregs."
One month later.
Chen Bai awoke from a long period of meditation, opened his eyes, and exhaled a long breath.
The breath was grayish-white, with a faint fishy smell, and condensed in the air, lingering for a long time.
He was used to it—every time he entered a long period of meditation, he would expel a breath of stale air.
This is a natural process of expelling impurities from the body during the later stages of Qi induction.
But he soon noticed the difference this time: the rotation of the spiritual energy in his dantian had stopped.
It floated there quietly, its volume reduced by almost half, but its texture became extremely solid, its color like silver mercury, deep and rich, radiating a faint, warm luster.
Chen Bai tried to touch it with his innate spiritual light, but he felt it was extremely heavy, like a drop of mercury or a piece of jade liquid that had not yet solidified.
At the same time, a warm sensation surged from the Yinqiao acupoint, and the kidneys felt as if they were being boiled.
Chen Bai's eyes suddenly lit up with golden light, and he heard the cry of a vulture. With each breath, he could feel a warm, soft, and comfortable sensation throughout his body, like a fresh bath in spring.
Along with the swirling spiritual energy in his dantian, it also stirred restlessly, seemingly about to circulate on its own.
This is clearly a sign of full Qi in the Dantian!
Chen Bai quickly calmed himself down and quietly adjusted his mindset. Only after all the signs disappeared did he feel relieved.
"Seventy-nine days."
After calculating with his fingers, Chen Bai smiled slightly, "It's almost twice as fast as the original estimate of one hundred days."
This speed might not seem like much to those exceptionally gifted geniuses.
But for a rogue cultivator like him with mediocre aptitude and mixed elements, it can only be described as "leaps and bounds".
This "Fetal Breathing Scripture" is indeed extraordinary. In his opinion, it is in no way inferior to the superior cultivation methods practiced by the true disciples of those immortal sects.
I wonder who created it. If I ever have the chance to encounter it in the future, I will definitely ask them for their knowledge.