"Ren-er..."
…
"Ren-er..."
…
"Ren-er, you've finally awakened. Thank god, your mom was worried sick for you! If you want to brag about how strong you are, then fine, but why did you have to go duel with those people!?"
A kind and gentle voice sounded beside Jian Ren's ear. That voice was full of happiness and comfort, but towards the end, it also became choked with emotion.
Jian Ren slowly opened his eyes. His blurry vision gradually became clearer, and a woman's face appeared before him.
The woman appeared to be in her thirties, and she was extremely beautiful. However, in the corner of her eyes were some deep wrinkles that did not match up with her young age.
Currently, this woman was tearfully looking at Jian Ren with eyes that were full of love, making Jian Ren's heart feel a burst of warmth.
"Child, you scared your mom to death." As the woman spoke, her eyes became even redder, and her tears streamed down.
"Mom???"
Jian Ren looked at this familiar yet strange face. He doubtingly said this one word; his face filled with confusion.
"Child, don't scare your mom! Don't you recognize me?" The woman's face immediately became panicked.
At this moment, an elderly man appeared beside the woman. He examined Jian Ren and he said, "Mrs. Jian, Jian Ren suffered a blow to the back of his head so it's possible he will need to rest a bit to recover his memories. Don't be too worried; just now I gave the young master some medicine. The medicinal energy still hasn't completely dissolved, so just let the young master rest for a bit Jian-er."
Mrs. Jian worriedly looked at Jian Ren. Reluctantly, she nodded her head and followed the elderly man out of the room.
Jian Ren heard the elderly man advising the woman softly in the distance, "Mrs. Jian, the fact that young master Jian managed to return with his life is already infinitely lucky. Don't force it too much."
Mrs. Jian tremblingly replied, "Master alchemist's meaning is that my son will…"
The elderly man, who had been called an alchemist, sighed, "The young master's hindbrain received an acute shock. To tell the truth, being able to wake up is already extremely lucky; however, the repercussions will still be very severe. Losing his memory is quite possible in this situation…"
The two people gradually walked further away so Jian Ren could no Jian-er hear them clearly… But what was barely audible to him was the sound of Mrs. Jian's sobbing.
Jian Ren gazed blankly at the ceiling above as he felt the severe pains throughout his body, especially at the back of his head which was bursting with swollen, aching pain.
Just what happened? I'm Jian Ren, and so Mrs. Jian is my flesh and blood mother. How could I have such an unfamiliar feeling?
And all these confusing memories, where did they come from? I have memories that I'm an arrogant, exceedingly powerful person… but at the same time, I remember that I'm an often bullied and extorted bitter trash? I also have memories of being a spirit plum picker and that my parent had died the year before?
Sword God Jian Ren? Trash Jian Ren? Jian Ren, the spirit plum picker? Which is the real me? Am I the Sword God's reincarnation? Or am I a fusion of the Sword God's soul with a mixture of the two?
Jian Ren's mind was full of endless questions. "Whatever, it doesn't matter. I am Jian Ren. Whether I'm Sword God Jian Ren or the old, crippled Jian Ren doesn't mean anything right now. The most important thing is that I'm still alive.
"I have three sets of memories that have mixed together; how would I even try to fix this kind of insane problem? Instead, what I need to do now is to let myself recover as quickly as possible."
Sensing his body's current condition, he quickly located many fractures. He had three broken ribs, one arm broken in two places, and most severe of all, his hindbrain was injured to the point where a large portion of his scalp had caved in. He had been victim to an extremely vicious assault.
"Huh, although I have no way to condense energy, my Spiritual Strength appears to be extremely powerful. I can actually sense everything within thirty meters of my body."
Jian Ren was pleasantly surprised. According to his garbled memories, Spiritual Strength was invaluable, especially to pill cultivators!
Profit, profit! Whether he was the reincarnation of the Sword God or his soul just contained a mix containing the memories on how to refine pills, the present him had definitely greatly profited.
The Sword God had lived an entire lifetime already, and now that allowed him to possess an exceptionally strong soul; just what kind of awesomeness was this?
However, when he carefully examined his body, his expression changed.
His Spiritual root, Spirt bone and Spirit Blood had all gone missing and in it's place was a foreign object that looked like a claw made of jade, that sparkled with a cold light
"My Spiritual Root has been taken away. My abdomen's Spirit Bone is also missing. And my heart has a hole? Just who would be this ruthless and take my Spirit Root, Spirit Bone and Spirit Blood and leave me with this useless thing? No wonder I can't cultivate!"
His current Spiritual Strength was much, much stronger than his old self. It was now strong enough for him to immediately figure out the mystery of why he was a cripple who couldn't cultivate.
The Spirit Root was located in the Dantian; it was the foundation for all cultivators. Without the Spirit Root, there was no way to sense heaven and earth's spiritual energy, let alone absorb it for cultivating.
Spirit Blood was something that people were born with; it was a trace of blood that gave you innate talent. While basically all people were born with it, the majority of cultivators didn't know anything about it.
The Spirit Bone was found in the pit of a person's abdomen and slightly bulged out. Ordinary people wouldn't have a Spirit Bone. Even amongst cultivators, maybe only one in ten thousand would have one, which marked them as a genius.
His face became exceedingly unsightly. If his memories were not all mixed up, then how could he not remember who had done this to his body?
Although these three things were precious to him, they wouldn't have any use once they left his body. If they wanted to harm him, why did they have to use such a harsh method? Using this kind of method was practically causing him to live a life worse than death!
However, anger only brought on more anger, and since he was already missing them, being angry did not have any use.
You better not let me find out who did this.
Jian Ren couldn't help but gnash his teeth in anger. This was an extremely great blow to him. With him possessing a Spirit Bone, even if he had been an idiot, he would still have been an absolute genius.
But now some despicable bastard had caused him to become a useless person who was incapable of cultivating, causing him to be humiliated and receive condescending looks from practically everyone.
Just when Jian Ren was about to furiously erupt, the door of the room was gently pushed open, and a pretty thirteen-year-old maiden walked in. This was Jian Ren's maid who was called Fei-er.
"Young master, it's time to take some medicine."
"Medicine? What medicine is it?" Jian Ren nose sniffed slightly as he asked.
"This is something Mrs. Jian paid an enormous price for. It's a Tiger Bone Pill that can quickly heal young master's injuries." Fei-er replied.
She opened the small, elaborate case in her hand, revealing the medicinal pill inside. "It is said that this medicinal pill came from grandmaster Yun Qi. The medicinal strength is very strong."
Looking at the thing, Jian Ren's face became a bit strange. Even this kind of plaything could be called a pill? Its shape was extremely uneven and seemed more like a meatball.
Even not talking about the shape, its colour was completely black and there wasn't even a trace of lustre. If it wasn't emitting a very faint medicinal aroma, then Jian Ren might even suspect that it was a ball of sheep dung.
After staring at the thing in his hand for a Jian time, Jian Ren finally sighed. Someone who had ending up losing over eighty percent of the medicinal pill's essence could still be called a grandmaster? Jian Ren bewilderedly wondered how someone could have created something so soft and mushy.
Pills could be divided into five grades: low grade, middle grade, high grade, top grade, and peerless grade. As for the pill in his hand, it couldn't even count as one of the five grades. Jian Ren suddenly realized that this was just a defective good. It was a trash pill. Normally, alchemists would definitely not sell these kinds of medicinal pills since they couldn't afford to lose their customers. Oftentimes, they would be turned into medicinal liquids or just directly thrown out.
"Young master, don't daydream. To obtain this precious pill, Mrs. Jian already sold off her own precious jewellery. You should hurry and take it," urged Fei-er.
Jian Ren couldn't help but feel some pain in his heart. His impression of his mother was that she loved him very dearly to the point where it was like he was drowning in love. It had reached the point where his mother would basically never refuse any of his requests.
His mother had done everything and anything for him. She had given birth to him while she was still young. She had been gifted with great beauty growing up, but now she was barely thirty-something years old and already had wrinkles in the corner of her eyes. Seeing those deep wrinkles, Jian Ren knew that she had already sacrificed far too much for him.
Looking at the medicinal pill in his hand, he observed that even though it was a defective good, at least the medicinal ingredients inside it were not bad. Impurities took up over eighty percent of it, but it wouldn't have any problems healing his injuries.
Taking the medicinal pill, Jian Ren ordered Fei-er to not leak any news of him out, excluding to his mother of course.
Although Fei-er didn't really understand why, she still trusted Jian Ren and obediently nodded.
After taking the medicine, although Jian Ren had no way to use cultivation to absorb the medicinal strength, he managed to guide the medicinal energy to his wounds by using his formidable Spiritual Strength, allowing him to recover extremely quickly.
The second day, Jian Ren slowly opened his eyes. He had a smile plastered on his mouth as he exercised his muscles.
"Excellent! Although that medicine was pretty bad, the medicinal ingredients themselves were of high quality. Other than my hindbrain, the majority of my injuries have already healed, and the amount of energy left is more than enough to heal me completely."
He slowly walked towards the mirror. Looking at his reflection, he saw a nothing-out-of-the-ordinary, handsome youngster with eyebrows like swords and bright eyes. Jian Ren took a deep breath, "From today onwards, I, Jian Ren, will no longer be the previous Jian Ren. I will rise above others."
Although his body was still slightly weak, walking was no longer a problem. Jian Ren left the room and saw that the sun had already risen from the east.
After pondering deeply for an hour, he called over Fei-er and gave her a list of medicinal ingredients for her to find.
However, Fei-er's expression became a bit embarrassed. Jian Ren wondered what it was before quickly remembered that the current Jian family was extremely hard-pressed for money, and Fei-er had no method to get a loan.
Otherwise, his mother would not have had to sell off her own jewellery, a part of her exceptionally precious dowry. The present Jian family had already fallen into extremely dire straits.
Feeling around in his pocket, he found slightly over eighty silver coins. Although this wasn't a lot, it was enough to buy those medicinal ingredients on his list.
Fei-er worked diligently, and not even two hours later, she had managed to buy the medicinal ingredients. Jian Ren immediately set about to measuring and dividing them into different portions before boiling them in a large bowl.
Six hours later, a very thick medicinal liquid was releasing a medicinal aroma. As Jian Ren looked into the bowl with the cheap medicinal liquid, a smile appeared on his face.
"I, Jian Ren, will rise above others, starting from this one bowl of medicinal liquid."