My Portable Spirit Farm: Rise of the Humble Servant

Since advancing to the Foundation Establishment realm, Chen Ping had identified a significant bottleneck in his routine.

Time. He simply didn’t have enough of it.

The logistical demands of alchemy were becoming a nightmare. Pills were the currency of the cultivation world, and his needs were insatiable. He needed pills to barter for Tier 3 Spirit Spring water. He needed pills to exchange for Spirit Stones. He even needed to consume them daily for his own cultivation.

When he ran the numbers, the result was alarming: nearly one-third of his month was consumed by the furnace.

Once the alchemical fire roared to life, it demanded hours of unwavering mental focus and the continuous expenditure of True Essence. This massive time sink was encroaching on his core priorities—comprehending techniques, cycling his Qi, and accumulating True Essence.

“This is unsustainable,” Chen Ping muttered, his brow furrowing as he reviewed his schedule.

The path of cultivation is like rowing a boat against the current; if you don’t advance, you fall back.

Squandering precious time on repetitive labor was, in itself, a shackle on his progress. He needed a way to liberate himself from the furnace.

Ideally, he should restrict his personal involvement to refining only Tier 2 Pills. As for Tier 1 Pills… he needed to find an assistant to handle the grunt work.

Cultivation knows no years; seasons cycle in the blink of an eye.

One year passed.

Inside the silence of his meditation chamber, Chen Ping slowly exhaled, ending his session.

Deep within his Dantian, in the turbulent Sea of Qi, a seventh drop of viscous liquid had finally condensed.

This newly formed drop of True Essence was slightly smaller than the others, its hue a shade paler, yet the pure, vibrant vitality pulsing within it stemmed from the exact same source.

It drifted downward, merging with the Dao Foundation. It joined the other six drops, forming a protective, nourishing shroud around his core.

After a year of grueling asceticism, the Foundation Establishment chapter of the Evergreen Art was complete. He had successfully broken through from the tenth layer of the Qi Condensation logic to the eleventh layer.

Although the growth of his True Essence remained slow—like small streams converging into a vast sea—every new drop signified that the stele of his Dao Foundation had been solidified just a little more.

He was inching closer to the intangible barrier that separated him from the Second Layer of Foundation Establishment.

With a thought, Chen Ping shifted his internal rhythm. A distinct, aggressive aura began to circulate through his Meridians.

The Whale Swallowing Technique.

After a year of dedication, he had finally mastered the entry level of this secret art.

At this stage, the “swallowing” force was still immature. Chen Ping estimated it increased his digestion speed of pills to roughly ten times the normal rate. While this fell short of Zhao Yuanqi’s terrifying theoretical claim of “refining dozens in a day,” it was still a revolutionary improvement.

But power always came with a price. To verify the technique’s limits—and specifically its tolerance for Pill Toxin—Chen Ping had spent a fortune.

Six months ago, a small auction in the Marketplace had caused a stir with the appearance of five Supreme-grade True Essence Pills.

Pills of such flawless quality rarely saw the light of day. When they did, the competition was fierce.

Chen Ping hadn’t hesitated. Adopting an attitude that screamed “money is no object,” he crushed the competition with a bid of four thousand Low-grade Spirit Stones, sweeping all five pills into his pocket.

Eight hundred Spirit Stones per pill.

It was a price that would make most Foundation Establishment cultivators vomit blood. It wasn’t that they couldn’t afford it; it was that the cost-to-benefit ratio was insane for a normal cultivator.

But Chen Ping wasn’t normal. He needed these specific pills to stress-test the Whale Swallowing Technique without killing himself.

In the dim light of the quiet room, Chen Ping retrieved a white pill the size of a longan fruit. Three distinct pill veins encircled its surface, glowing faintly.

A Supreme-grade True Essence Pill.

Merely holding it, he could feel the dense, pure energy radiating from it.

“Hoo…”

Chen Ping took a deep breath, his eyes sharpening with resolve.

He triggered the Whale Swallowing Technique.

Immediately, a bizarre suction force erupted from the depths of his Dantian, spreading rapidly along a specific network of Meridians.

He tossed the Supreme-grade pill into his mouth.

It didn’t crumble; it melted. There was none of the acrid bitterness or dryness typical of lower-tier alchemy. Instead, it felt like a draught of warm, sweet spring water, sliding effortlessly down his throat.

The moment it hit his stomach, the technique engaged.

BOOM!

It was as if a calm river channel had its embankment suddenly breached!

The medicinal energy, originally gentle and mellow, was seized by the domineering vacuum of the Whale Swallowing Technique. Instantly, the gentle spring turned into a violent, roaring torrent.

The energy surged wildly into the specific Meridians Chen Ping had expanded for this exact purpose.

Agony exploded in his chest.

Beneath his skin, the Meridian pathways bulged visibly, tracing angry red lines across his body as the flood of energy hammered against the walls.

Sweat instantly soaked his robes.

Chen Ping gritted his teeth, veins throbbing on his forehead. He frantically operated the Evergreen Art, fighting to corral the berserk energy. He guided the torrent through the Circulation Cycle, crushing it, refining it, and forcing it to merge with the liquid True Essence in his Dantian.

The pain was far more intense than he had anticipated.

The entry-level technique lacked finesse. Its control over the medicinal flood was crude, a brute-force extraction rather than a refined absorption.

Hours passed in a blur of grit and endurance.

Finally, the last wisp of the Supreme-grade pill’s energy was assimilated.

In his Dantian, the seventh drop of True Essence seemed to condense further, becoming denser and more substantial.

Chen Ping opened his eyes. His face was pale, stripped of blood.

He immediately turned his Inner Sight inward.

There, clinging to the inner walls of the expanded Meridians, was a layer of faint, gray-black slime. It looked like drying sludge—transparent yet undeniably filthy.

Pill Toxin.

It was a minute amount, but its presence was glaring. In terms of volume, it was roughly equivalent to ten percent of the toxin found in a standard Low-grade True Essence Pill.

Chen Ping’s expression darkened.

Under normal cultivation methods, a Supreme-grade pill was prized because it was nearly pure; the residual toxin should have been less than one percent of a standard pill. The body would naturally flush most of it out.

But this technique was a tyrant. It stripped everything from the pill—essence and poison alike—and locked it all into the body. It refused to let even a single speck dissipate.

If he had used a Low-grade True Essence Pill just now…

His Meridians would already be clogged, perhaps even permanently damaged by the toxic sludge.

“As expected… the drawbacks of the entry-level Whale Swallowing Technique are severe.”

Chen Ping analyzed the data coldly.

Supreme-grade pills were 99% pure, but ‘pure’ was not ‘perfect.’ There was always a trace of impurity. The Whale Swallowing Technique magnified that one-ten-thousandth of impurity by concentrating it entirely in the Meridians.

He rested briefly, waiting for the throbbing pain in his channels to subside. Then, without hesitation, he swallowed the second Supreme-grade pill.

He needed to find the limit.

The technique roared to life again. The pain returned, familiar and sharp. The violent medicinal torrent scoured his Meridians, layering new sludge over the fresh deposits of Pill Toxin.

Several hours later, the gray-black stain had deepened.

Chen Ping assessed his condition. I can still take more.

He swallowed the third pill.

This time, the sensation of tearing within his Meridians was acute. As he ran his Circulation Cycle, the True Essence snagged and dragged against the sludge accumulation, causing sharp, stinging friction.

When the third pill was fully digested, Chen Ping halted the experiment.

Through Inner Sight, the gray-black deposits at the key nodes of his main Meridians were now clearly visible.

The total concentration was roughly equivalent to sixty percent of the toxin left behind by a single standard True Essence Pill.

Chen Ping nodded to himself. This result was within acceptable parameters.

As his mastery of the Whale Swallowing Technique deepened, the toxin residue would decrease. Furthermore, this amount of buildup would only take a day or two to purge completely.

The math was beautiful.

Without the technique, digesting a Supreme-grade True Essence Pill took a full week.

With the technique, he could consume three pills in a single day, then spend two days dissolving the toxin.

Three pills in three days.

Compare that to the traditional method: three pills in three weeks.

Seven times faster.

His cultivation speed had effectively increased sevenfold.

And this was just the beginning. As he leveled up the technique, the efficiency gap would only widen. In the future, he could be looking at ten times, perhaps even twenty times the standard cultivation speed.

Chen Ping’s composure cracked, the corner of his mouth curving up into a sharp, satisfied smile.

Zhao Yuanqi was a madman, but his theory was sound. It worked.