Chapter 763: Chapter 743: Meditation
This room was inside the one we were just in, and the young man put her in and then lit an oil lamp, "There’s no electricity here, be careful with the fire."
Luo Qianqian nodded, and after the young man pointed out where the books were, he left.
This room was noticeably smaller, only a bit larger than the meeting room from before, with a bookshelf that sparsely held a few dozen books. There was also a desk, a chair, and a mat on the floor, woven from some grass. It looked tattered, as if it had been used for a long time.
Luo Qianqian casually opened a book to see what was inside. What was this, a Meridian Map? And each page was different, getting more complex towards the back?
When she turned to the first page, she only saw the big characters for "meditation."
Luo Qianqian curled her lips in disdain. Generally speaking, shouldn’t the first few pages be the table of contents? Without even that, it’s a thumbs-down from me, definitely a thumbs-down! The customer experience here really sucks, and the key point is, what’s the deal with this tiny oil lamp? Did I travel back to a century before electrical circuits were widespread?
After her rant, she continued to look at the rough cowhide paper, raising an eyebrow, "Has Simplified Chinese been popular that long ago? Such a half-hearted counterfeit!" As a native, she knew what the old text used to be like. Faking it without any sincerity? Negative reviews, absolutely, not even a neutral rating.
And then there’s the handwriting, clearly penned with a fountain pen or something similar. Where does it seem like the brush calligraphy of old times? It just screams modernity.
And why not just print the damn thing? It’d be a lot easier to mass-produce and distribute copies than scribbling them out in this tiny room.
After sweeping through it with a glance, Luo Qianqian became even more convinced that she was looking at a ten-dollar "Tathagata Palm" from a movie. What does ’empty your mind, Hold the Primordial, Guard the One, perceive everything’ even mean?
Isn’t that just zoning out with closed eyes?
Zoning out is something she could do without closing her eyes, thank you very much.
Sitting down on the grass mat with resignation, Luo Qianqian pouted, took a deep breath, inhaled, exhaled, inhaled, exhaled, inhaled, and... farted.
She crossed her legs in an unladylike manner, privately glad she wasn’t wearing some form-fitting long dress. Otherwise, the only options for sitting would be on a chair or kneeling. Ridiculous, she wasn’t Ryukyuan, why would she do that? Hurt her own knees?
With the book resting on her legs and her shoes off, Luo Qianqian followed the instructions, which said "Five Hearts Facing the Origin, both palms and soles are centers, empty everything, think of nothing, close your eyes, and sense..."
Just as she was about to fall asleep, Luo Qianqian suddenly felt something was off. It seemed as if there were colorful particles surrounding her?
Like... bacteria...
The ones encircling her were black. Luo Qianqian raised her eyebrows. Were they suggesting she could rock a gothic look?
She preferred the multicolored ones that floated all around her anyway.
Black, what did it represent?
Luo Qianqian pondered deeply. There were red, yellow, green, white, blue, and purple around her, seven colors in total if she included black. No, there was also a colorless one that she couldn’t see but could feel, like rain, where you can see something drifting in front of you but can’t pinpoint its exact location.
According to the book’s explanation of the Five Elements Yin Yang, that would be Metal, Wood, Water, Fire, Earth, with Wood, Fire, Earth as Yang, and Metal, Water, Earth as Yin. But that didn’t seem right either. That would only account for five colors, at most? And shouldn’t Metal, Wood, Water, Fire, Earth be gold, green, blue, red, yellow? There’s no gold here. So if yellow is Metal, then Earth... Oh right, besides yellow earth, there are also red and black soils... Red is Fire, so black would be Earth?
... I feel like I’ve got brain damage.
Luo Qianqian opened her eyes and flipped through the book, only to be surprised to find that there were descriptions below!
Metal as white, Wood as green, Water as mysterious, Fire as vermillion, Earth as yellow, Wind as cyan, Thunder as purple...
Huh? What about the transparent one?
Vermillion is red, mysterious is black. Luo Qianqian felt an inexplicable sense of joy. Indeed, there’s a reason why girls are said to be made of water.
She flipped to the next page, only to see a single big character: Earth.
It really is about the earth...
Luo Qianqian put the book back on the shelf, intending to find one related to water, but then she had a sudden whimsical thought and sat down—would she have to face the difficulty of choice again if there was more than one book?
Rather than that, why not let the magical element tell her the answer?
She sat quietly; the posture of Five Hearts Facing the Origin had become very familiar to her. She emptied her mind and felt the elements.
Intentionally turning toward the direction of the bookshelf, she realized she couldn’t feel the rainbow-colored particles anymore; instead, directly through her closed eyes, she could see a book shining, but its location was...
Luo Qianqian opened her eyes in confusion, stood up, and walked over to the bookshelf. She crouched down, reached under the shelf, and fished out a book covered in dust and looking quite worn.
Luo Qianqian chuckled, "That’s more like it."
Although the calligraphy on the cover was also in a hard style, it looked obviously older than the one she had just seen. Even if it was artificially aged, at least it had some feel to it, right?
She opened the book, only to find that it didn’t say Water but ’None’.
Luo Qianqian furrowed her brows, thinking of the colorless little guy from before, pursed her lips, and tried to flip through the book...
Well, it wouldn’t budge. The pages were as though they were locked in place, immovable despite Luo Qianqian’s flipping, biting, and stomping, not even a corner was torn.
Luo Qianqian furrowed her brows, looking at the book in front of her. Did this thing require a key?
But there was no keyhole, was there?
No, no, stay calm, stay calm...
Luo Qianqian vaguely recalled that the original gaming king, Wang Yi, had been able to open the glowing book she found from the very start... Ah, no, what was going on now? Was she not the right person? Then why did it glow?
Luo Qianqian rubbed her hair, her face full of confusion.
She casually reached for the bookshelf and pulled down another book, looking at the character for Water on it, and finally she breathed a sigh of relief. She could open this one this time, right?
Indeed, it opened easily.
She had never even considered that she had also opened the Earth one easily, with absolutely no resistance. This was the only book that she couldn’t open.
"I’m freaking..." Luo Qianqian stared at the words on the book; for a moment, she was at a loss for words. Who could tell her, what does ’qi’ mean? The ’qi’ in getting angry?
She recognized every character, but putting them together, she couldn’t understand. For a moment, she felt like a primary school student looking at a high school textbook, but after careful thought, it seemed she was a college student, wasn’t she?
She started to analyze the text word by word, sentence by sentence.
The young man outside sighed, "She really knows how to cause me trouble. Doesn’t she know how important beauty sleep is to an old man?"
He casually turned on the computer, skillfully launched the game, and began playing.
Shi Bahao had already gone to bed; the following matters were completely out of his hands to assist with, no matter how willing he was. After all, he was only half-skilled.
