After My Rebirth, I Ended Up Happily Ever After with the Saintess - Chapter 3

The deathly silence in the small hut didn’t last long, quickly broken by the faint sounds of distant clamor and footsteps. Ye Li, propping up her weak body, listened intently. It was the wailing of Old Woman Wang and Li San, mixed with the Night Wolf’s characteristic, furious curses, heading in this direction.

Clearly, the vile servants had fetched reinforcements.

In her current state, let alone the Night Wolf, even two more strong attendants would mean certain death. That intimidating aura and tricky maneuver she used earlier were completely ineffective against absolute numerical superiority and difference in power.

I can’t stay here!

The thought was crystal clear. A cold light flashed in Ye Li’s eyes; she didn’t hesitate. Gritting her teeth and ignoring the tearing pain all over her body, she abruptly rolled off the bed. Her body slammed onto the cold floor, making her vision blacken and nearly causing her to faint.

“Cough…” A mouthful of metallic sweetness rose in her throat, but she swallowed it down fiercely.

Can’t leave any traces. Her gaze swept over the bloody wood splinters and scattered bloodstains on the ground. Using a corner of the tattered cotton quilt, she laboriously and quickly wiped away the blood and kicked the splinters into the deepest part under the bed. After finishing all this, she was breathless, and cold sweat had soaked her thin clothes.

Must leave immediately!

She stood up, leaning against the wall, staggering. With every step, a stabbing pain shot through her chest; the friction of her broken ribs made it nearly impossible to move. She scanned the humble room. The original owner had nothing, so there was nothing she needed to carry.

The only way out lay in the blurred impression deep within the original owner’s memory, concerning a secluded spot on the back mountain.

She took a deep breath, suppressing the surging blood and Qi. Relying on her powerful Divine Soul energy to forcefully suppress the pain of her physical body, she slowly shuffled toward the back window. The window was old, and the latch had long been broken. She used the last of her strength to push it open a crack, and her thin body painstakingly squeezed through, falling into the weeds behind the hut.

Almost the instant her figure disappeared behind the window, the hut’s dilapidated wooden door was viciously kicked open and completely shattered!

The Night Wolf charged in with a face full of malice, followed by Old Woman Wang, who was tearfully holding her bandaged hand, and Li San, who was whimpering with unhealed blood on his forehead, along with a few collateral family members who had come to watch the excitement or offer support.

“Ye Li! You piece of trash! Get out here!” the Night Wolf roared, his gaze sweeping the room like a venomous snake.

However, the room was empty. There was only cold air, the faintly visible, unswept bloodstains on the floor, and a very faint, lingering smell of blood in the air.

“Where is she?!” The Night Wolf turned abruptly, glaring ferociously at Old Woman Wang and Li San.

The two were also dumbfounded. They had only left for a moment; how could that heavily injured piece of trash be gone?

“Wolf… Young Master Wolf, she was just here…” Old Woman Wang stammered.

“Trash! Can’t even keep an eye on a half-dead person!” The Night Wolf slapped the other side of Old Woman Wang’s face, making her see stars, but she dared not utter a sound. His eyes were sinister as he scanned the empty bed and the opened, dilapidated back window. He snorted coldly, “She must have run off! She can’t have gone far! Search for her! Even if you have to turn this entire servant quarter upside down, you must drag that little bitch out! How dare she injure my people? I’ll make her wish she were dead!”

A crowd surged out of the hut and began a massive search nearby. The sounds of cursing and ransacking broke the silence of the area.

At this moment, Ye Li, relying on her keen sense of danger and the original owner’s familiarity with the area, was already inching toward the back mountain along the darkest, most inconspicuous corners and paths.

Her speed was very slow; every step felt like walking on knives. Her body was extremely weak, her vision sometimes clear and sometimes blurry, sustained only by a determined will not to collapse.

Avoiding patrolling guards, dodging servants at work, and bypassing small paths that might have people. She was like a silent shadow, moving through the desolate edges of the Ye Manor in the deepening twilight.

Her wounds reopened during the movement, and fresh blood seeped out, staining her clothes. Cold sweat dripped down her pale face and into the dust. Her lungs rattled like bellows; every breath brought excruciating pain to her chest cavity.

But she kept her teeth clenched, her eyes cold and resolute, slowly but surely approaching the destination in her memory.

Finally, as the sun completely sank below the horizon, leaving only a dark red glow in the sky, she pushed through a patch of waist-high thorns, and the scene before her suddenly opened up.

This was the deepest part of the Ye family’s back mountain, rarely visited. Ancient trees towered all around, covered in vines. The air was filled with the humid scent of rotting plants and soil. And not far ahead, beneath a slippery, moss-covered stone wall, there was indeed an extremely concealed indentation.

If one didn’t look carefully, it would be impossible to discover.

Ye Li pushed aside the dangling vines and stumbled inside. The entrance was narrow, barely allowing one person to pass, but once inside, it was a world of its own—a small space only two or three zhang (about 6-9 meters) square.

As soon as she entered, Ye Li keenly sensed that the temperature here was distinctly lower than outside, and the air was permeated with a strange, refreshing coolness!

Her gaze was instantly drawn.

In the corner of the stone wall, a small, elegant grass, entirely emerald green, was quietly growing. It had three oval leaves with crystalline veins, seemingly twinkling with flowing light. And in the center of the three leaves, a transparent, dewdrop-like liquid was about to condense, emitting an extremely faint but pure lustrous glow in the dim light.

“Condensing Dew Grass!” Ye Li’s heart stirred as she recognized the spiritual herb. Although it was only a lowest-grade First-Rank Spiritual Herb, the pure Yin energy it contained was undoubtedly a lifesaver for her current state! Especially since this one was about to mature, making its medicinal effect optimal.

What surprised her even more was that next to the Condensing Dew Grass, right against the base of the stone wall, there was a small pool of clear water, no bigger than a washbasin. Wisps of visible white cold mist were rising from the pool, causing a thin layer of white frost to condense on the surrounding stone walls.

Cold Spring!

Ye Li suppressed her excitement, crouched down, and gently touched the water with her finger.

The bone-chilling coldness instantly spread up from her fingertip, almost freezing her! But at the same time, this extreme cold seemed to carry a strange vitality, stimulating her nearly numb body.

This is it! This Cold Spring was definitely not ordinary water; it must contain some kind of Yin-attribute Spiritual Essence!

This place, as expected, was her hope for a fresh start in this desperate situation!

She no longer hesitated. The Condensing Dew Grass wasn’t fully mature yet, and prematurely picking it would greatly reduce its effect. But this Cold Spring was exactly what she needed right now.

She needed to use this extreme coldness to stimulate this nearly lifeless body and forcefully draw Qi into her body!

The process was bound to be excruciating, even life-threatening. But she had no choice.

Ye Li sat cross-legged by the Cold Spring, took a deep breath of the freezing air, and her eyes showed absolute resolve. Slowly, she closed her eyes, focused internally, and began to follow the instructions of the basic methods in the Netherworld Emperor Scripture to try and sense the incredibly thin Spiritual Origin Qi existing in the surrounding world.

However, the first step was incredibly difficult.

The body’s aptitude was too poor, and the meridians were severely blocked, like a river channel clogged with silt, unable to form an effective circulation. Her Divine Soul perception was far beyond ordinary people; she could clearly “see” the faint light spots (Spiritual Origin particles) in the air, but she couldn’t induce them, let alone absorb them into her body.

She tried several times, all ending in failure. Her body remained still, with only the continuous pain from the wounds and broken bones, draining her spirit.

I can’t wait any longer!

Ye Li suddenly opened her eyes, a fierce glint flashing within. She extended both hands and resolutely immersed them into the ice-cold water of the spring!

“Hiss—!”

The extreme coldness instantly plunged into her palms like countless steel needles, spreading wildly up her arms! Excruciating pain! Pain beyond description! It felt as if her blood and bones were about to freeze and crack! Her body uncontrollably trembled violently, her face instantly turned purple-blue, and her teeth chattered loudly.

This was practically self-abuse!

But precisely under the stimulation of this extreme cold, her body, which was on the verge of collapse, seemed to be forcibly activating a sort of survival instinct! Blood and Qi (though weak) began to flow faster, attempting to resist the external frigid temperature!

Now is the time!

Ye Li desperately maintained the last shred of clarity in her Spirit Platform, frantically running the Qi-Drawing Method of the Netherworld Emperor Scripture! Her powerful Divine Soul energy, like the most precise carving knife, guided the faint Qi and blood that had been activated by the cold stimulation, while simultaneously struggling to pull the sparse Spiritual Origin light spots in the surrounding air!

The pain was magnified ten-fold, a hundred-fold! The stabbing pain brought by the cold, the bloating pain of the meridians being forcefully impacted, the fatigue of the soul pulling energy… all kinds of pain intertwined, almost tearing her consciousness apart!

Her body shook like a leaf in the wind, veins bulged on her forehead, and cold sweat instantly froze into ice crystals by the surrounding chill. Her lips were bitten through, and the blood flowed out and instantly solidified.

But she never took her hands out of the Cold Spring!

Willpower! The rock-solid willpower of the Venerable Li, honed through tens of thousands of years of trials, played a crucial role at this moment! She treated all the pain as tempering and transformed all her unwillingness into strength!

She didn’t know how much time had passed. Just when she felt her consciousness was about to be completely drowned by the cold and pain, and her Divine Soul energy was about to be exhausted—

The fragment of the Cycle Mirror, which had been dormant deep within her soul, subtly trembled once again.

A stream of cool Qi, clearer than before, sprinkled onto her Divine Soul like sweet dew. Her perception, which had become dull due to extreme fatigue and pain, instantly became sharper! The precision of her control over that faint thread of spiritual Qi within her body suddenly increased by a notch!

It was as if a person with poor eyesight had suddenly put on suitable glasses; the previously blurred internal state of her meridians and the trajectory of the spiritual Qi’s movement became clearer. She could control that thread of spiritual Qi more precisely, avoiding the most fragile areas, choosing the path of least resistance, and even more efficiently utilizing this thread of spiritual Qi to impact the blockages!

The efficiency instantly increased!

“Puff!”

As if a barrier had been breached, accompanied by a sudden, indescribable pain and a rush of relief, that thread of ice-cold spiritual Qi finally, laboriously but successfully, pierced through the most crucial segment of the first blocked meridian!

Although it was only an initial breakthrough, incredibly narrow, and only a short section was completed, it meant that the Spiritual Origin Qi could finally form a faint circulation within her body!

Drawing Qi into the Body, Success!

Almost simultaneously, the sparse Spiritual Origin light spots in the world began to spontaneously and slowly converge toward her body. Although the speed was still lamentably slow, it was no longer a state of complete isolation.

She had officially stepped into the first realm of cultivation—Elementary Spirit Realm, Initial Stage!

“Hoo… Hoo…”

Ye Li abruptly pulled her hands out of the Cold Spring, utterly exhausted, and fell backward, collapsing onto the cold ground, gasping for air. Her hands were frozen blue and purple, almost devoid of sensation.

The foul-smelling sweat that had been expelled from her body was almost instantly frozen by the cold air here, making her look quite disheveled.

But her eyes were surprisingly bright!

I succeeded! In this desperate situation, she had finally pried open a sliver of hope for herself!

She carefully assessed the changes in her body. Although she was still weak and her chest still ached, an unprecedented feeling of lightness was slowly spreading from the initially opened meridian throughout her body. It was as if an invisible, heavy shackles had been removed.

Within her body, a subtle, almost imperceptible force seemed to be flowing.

She struggled to sit up, her gaze once again falling upon the Cold Spring. After the exhaustion just now, the water seemed to have subtly—almost imperceptibly—lowered. At the bottom of the pool, near the crack in the stone wall, she faintly saw a trace of extremely weak, deep dark blue glow, different from the reflection of the water, flashing and disappearing.

“What is that…” Ye Li’s heart leaped. Could there be something hidden at the source of this Cold Spring? Was it some kind of Yin-attribute mineral? Or was it connected to a smaller Spiritual Vein deeper within?

This discovery brought a slight warmth to her heart. It meant that this place might be able to sustain her for a longer period of cultivation.

She looked again at the Condensing Dew Grass. The dewdrop in the center seemed a little more solidified, and the luminous glow was slightly brighter. She estimated it would be fully mature in another day or two.

Hope was right before her eyes.

Ye Li sat cross-legged, no longer relying on the self-abusing stimulation of the Cold Spring. She began to try actively operating the Netherworld Emperor Scripture, absorbing the sparse Spiritual Origin Qi in the air, slowly nourishing and widening the meridian she had just opened, and healing her severely damaged body.

With the occasional cool Qi from the Cycle Mirror fragment assisting in stabilizing her Divine Soul and enhancing her perception, her control over the spiritual Qi, though still difficult, was far more precise and efficient than that of ordinary beginners.

The speed of cultivation was still frustratingly slow, but ultimately, it was no longer hopeless.

The night completely enveloped this hidden space, with only the Condensing Dew Grass emitting a faint glow, reflecting the girl’s pale yet determined face.

She was like a young beast in hibernation, silently licking her wounds, accumulating strength in the stillness and coldness, waiting for the moment of her emergence.

The clamor and searching of the distant Ye Manor seemed to have nothing to do with this world.