Chapter 106

On the futon, Fang Yuan feeds primeval stones one by one into a fist sized ball of light, working toward the rank two Moonglow Gu. When the last stone dissolves, the light ball explodes and the three fusing Gu worms scatter; the fusion has failed. Fang Yuan calls back the Moonlight Gu and one Little Light Gu, both dimmer for the failed fusion, but the second Little Light Gu dissolves completely on the ground and is gone within a few breaths. He is not troubled, since a dead Little Light Gu is cheap to replace from the shop, unlike the Moonlight Gu, and he judges an injured Gu needs about three days to recover before another attempt. ^{ch. 106}

Turning to the Nine Leaf Vitality Grass on his palm, Fang Yuan plucks all nine leaves free and sets them aside, leaving only the bare stem. Growing each new leaf back costs twenty percent of his primeval essence, and with only forty-four percent currently filling his sea, he can grow two leaves before he must stop and recover with primeval stones. Working in this rhythm, recovering to forty percent before nurturing another leaf, he spends about half a day regrowing the grass to a full nine leaves. He keeps the plant whole rather than plucking this new growth, bagging only the nine leaves plucked earlier. ^{ch. 106}

Each vitality leaf sells for around fifty primeval stones, so the nine leaves he plucked are worth about four hundred and fifty primeval stones, leaving him roughly four hundred in profit after costs. He judges the Nine Leaf Vitality Grass his most valuable asset of all, cheap to keep since it needs only water and sunlight. He reasons the clan leaves him to keep it in peace only because it already owns five other Nine Leaf Vitality Grass as collective property, tended by Gu Masters assigned to grow vitality leaves in bulk. ^{ch. 106}

Three days later, Fang Yuan’s fusion succeeds, and the rank two Moonglow Gu floats free, a crescent of water blue crystal roughly twice the size of the Moonlight Gu. A single Little Light Gu doubles a moonblade’s power, but fusing in two Little Light Gu still only doubles it once; the boost is not additive. Even so, the finished Moonglow Gu strikes three times as hard as a bare Moonlight Gu, while its range holds at ten meters. Fang Yuan notes other paths from the same base Gu: the Moon Scar Gu doubles range to twenty meters at unchanged power, Qing Shu’s Moonwhirl Gu curves the moonblade’s path, and Fang Zheng’s Moon Raiment leads, at its upper limit, to the rank five Moonlight Treasure King Gu. ^{ch. 106}

Fang Yuan reflects that higher ranked fusions grow far less reliable. He recalls that in his previous life the rank six Spring Autumn Cicada, needing all rank five Gu worms to fuse, succeeded at under one percent after countless failures and deaths. A vital Gu is the one exception: whatever the outcome, it can only be injured, never destroyed, which is why the Spring Autumn Cicada becoming his vital Gu once mattered so much to him. Even now, unable to use it to its full potential, Fang Yuan judges the Spring Autumn Cicada his greatest treasure, worth far more than the Flower Wine Monk’s inheritance. ^{ch. 106}