Chapter 2 — The Four Poles' Spirit Marrow Enters the Body

cup. It held White Tiger spirit blood, and in his mouth it was like molten copper laced with iron dross—astringent, stabbing—and once it entered him, his whole body prickled with sharp pains. Not long after, the pain faded. "He is not a White Tiger Spirit Constitution." Granny Zhu shook her head, somewhat disappointed. "Shen Mu, the third cup," said the Village Head in a low voice. Shen Mu drank down the third cup, the spirit blood refined from the great azure serpent. It made his muscles bulge and strain, his blood swell and press, his organs squeezed until he felt miserable. Yet the distended feeling vanished as quickly as the others. Master Huo's face fell. "Not an Azure Dragon Spirit Constitution," he said, shaking his head. "Then he must surely be a Black Tortoise Spirit Constitution." For once the Pill Master allowed a faint smile, which made his face look all the more ghastly. Shen Mu drank the last cup, the Black Tortoise spirit blood. It made his body feel light and buoyant, as though he were soaking in the water of a great river. But this feeling, too, was soon gone. "He is not a Black Tortoise Spirit Constitution either." The Pill Master shook his head. The villagers by the bonfire all fell silent. The butcher said, "If that's so, then he is just an ordinary, run-of-the-mill person." Granny Zhu suddenly burst into tears and sobbed, "We are all old, all crippled. If we die, he cannot go on living. This place is so treacherous—he could not survive even a single day..." Shen Mu clutched her hand and murmured, "Granny, don't cry. Granny and the grandpas are all good people—none of you will die..." "Good people? Heh, heh..." Master Huo laughed at himself. "We broken wrecks were hounded into this Wasteland and have been hanging on by a thread ever since. The Wasteland is too dangerous; without us, Shen'er truly would find it hard to survive. We ought to send him out of the Wasteland—outside, it is much safer..." The butcher said coldly, "Send him out and our enemies will discover us. We will all die, and he, dragged down with us, will die as well." Hidden Remnant Village fell quiet again. Then, abruptly, the Village Head said, "Good." "What's good?" Granny Zhu was baffled. The Village Head smiled. "I said his constitution is good. He is a fine seedling." The butcher, the Pill Master, and all the rest were startled, unable to grasp his meaning. The Village Head laughed. "I think Shen'er carries a constitution of another sort, one that combines the virtues of all four—the Overlord Constitution!" "Overlord Constitution?" Granny Zhu and the others all wore dubious expressions. They were practiced, worldly people, yet not one had ever heard the name Overlord Constitution. "Indeed, the Overlord Constitution." The Village Head smiled. "Ordinary spirit blood can hardly rouse it. Only when the genuine blood of the four great spirit beasts has been gathered can it be brought to light. The Wasteland has no four great spirit beasts, but the offspring of spirit beasts are not hard to seek. Keep on catching tigers and serpents, refining spirit blood; once he has drunk enough of it, his Overlord Constitution will emerge of itself." The Village Head was a man of commanding prestige, and the one-armed, one-legged old men and women of the village all brightened at this. Granny Zhu laughed, "Tomorrow I'll go catch tigers with that good-for-nothing Lame Weng! And you, Shen'er, get to bed early—you've more spirit blood to drink tomorrow!" The crowd dispersed. The Pill Master and the Silent Smith carried the Village Head back to his room. The Silent Smith left, but the Pill Master lingered, and said under his breath, "There has never been any Overlord Constitution." The Village Head nodded. "I said it off the top of my head. If I hadn't, these villagers could hardly have gone on living." The Pill Master was taken aback. The residents of Hidden Remnant Village each had a past of their own, but all had been forced into the Wasteland, forced to come to this village, scraping out the dregs of their days. They had once hated heaven, hated earth, hated every living soul, and that grudge burned too fiercely. That they had lived this long, one could not deny, owed no small debt to Shen Mu. It was this little boy, whole of limb and sound of body, whose arrival had scattered the bitterness in their hearts. Everyone had helped raise him, each treasuring the boy as their own nearest and dearest. Shen Mu was the thread that held together the fragile hearts of Hidden Remnant Village. If the villagers ever learned that Shen Mu possessed only the most ordinary constitution and could not survive the Wasteland alone, those people would almost certainly lose their minds—and who could say what they might do? The Pill Master said, without expression, "But you cannot hide it to the end of your days. Sooner or later we will all die of old age, and Shen Mu alone will be left." "So you must never tell him that the Overlord Constitution never existed. Never tell him, not ever." The Village Head spoke with weight. "Let him believe he is the one and only Overlord Constitution!" The Pill Master was stunned, and studied his face closely. In the murky lamplight, the Village Head's face wore a strange fascination. "I want to see," he said, smiling, "whether an ordinary man, armed with a conviction beyond compare, can rise above the mundane and achieve what even we Spirit Constitutions could not! Who knows—in time to come he may truly walk out a road where the mortal body is the Overlord's body!" The Pill Master was dumbfounded. "Mortal body as Overlord's body?" The Village Head nodded heavily. "Where conviction exists, the mortal body is the Overlord's body!"