"Spirit Roots are hard to come by."
Hearing this, An Jing couldn’t help but shake his head.
With so many conditions, it’s no wonder that even though both parents are high-rank cultivators and the child is abundant in the Five Elements and even possesses the Five Spirits, they might still not have a Spirit Root and thus lack the qualifications for cultivation.
No matter how abundant the Five Spirits are, their mutual generation and inhibition can still turn you into an ordinary person — you can only rely purely on luck.
Simply put, an ordinary person in whom the Five Spirits lie dormant might have an internal Five Elements attribute possibly amounting to 20 times 5. Let’s not even talk about generation and inhibition; they can’t even meet the basic requirement of having ’one active spirit’ among the Five Spirits.
Yet, a Clan Descendant of the Purple Mansion with all Five Spirits and each of the Five Elements attributes at 70 might, due to too balanced an inhibition among the internal Five Spirits, forcibly cancel out their own power, failing to manifest the Spirit Root, and thus still be without a Spirit Root.
Whereas a genius from the slums might have other attributes all at 20, but a single attribute at 50, meeting the threshold of ’having one active spirit.’ Furthermore, this setup does not impede the operation of that spirit, qualifying them to have a Spirit Root.
However, such Spiritual Root Seeds, with a deficient foundation, need nourishment to compensate. Generally speaking, such seeds discovered among commoners need to be carefully cultivated for a while to restore their true level of talent — perhaps that attribute’s score could go from 50 to 75 or even higher.
This is also why data shows that geniuses discovered among the common folk seem to have a higher average level compared to those from prestigious families: because prestigious families carefully nurture from a young age and have already developed the talents to their limits, making even some of mediocre ability seem impressive.
But the genius from the commoners truly needs to be a favorite of heaven, adorned with destiny to stand out. Otherwise, how could they compete with those from the big families?
Big families usually also absorb these commoner geniuses, incorporating them into their own power.
Of course, there are Secret Techniques that allow big families to enhance the aptitude of their offspring,
but the reason they’re Secret Techniques is that they’re too costly and difficult, beyond the reach of ordinary people.
"Speaking of the Heavenly Water Spiritual Root," at this moment, Nian Quan came out holding tea, and An Jing subconsciously focused on him as the Sword Spirit continued explaining: "It is when the Five Spirits are active within the body and the Water Spirit overwhelmingly dominates, possessing both ren and gui, and the cycle of generation is perfect — ’Water generates Wood,’ ’Wood generates Fire,’ ’Fire generates Earth,’ ’Earth generates Metal,’ and finally ’Metal generates Water,’ scoring a perfect ten."
"Besides, the date and month of birth, weather, and region, and even the name shouldn’t be inhibiting; otherwise, the score will not be a ten but just above eight, at most 9.9. While this certainly still qualifies as a Heavenly Spiritual Root, it’s not considered perfect."
"Should there be a chance, the Heavenly Water Spiritual Root might even break the upper limit, surpass ten, and transform into an ’Innate Water True Body,’ becoming a ’Immortal Water Spirit Root’."
"And this Heavenly Water Spiritual Root has the ’Cang Bo Morning Pupil’ not because of his lineage, but because his family’s ’True Pupil Technique’ was elevated by his Spirit Root, rising to become the ’Cang Bo Morning Pupil’."
"This is an Acquired Spiritual Pupil capable of sensing delicate changes in Spirit Qi, seeing through illusions and Illusionary Barriers, very suitable for alchemy and drawing talismans, with a success rate far surpassing others."
"...Is this what a Heavenly Spiritual Root is?"
An Jing was stunned as he heard, and even when Nian Quan brought the tea right in front of him, he thanked him a moment too late.
"How lucky can one get?!" He incredulously confided in the Sword Spirit in his heart: "Five Elements equipped, Five Spirits active, Five Elements mutually generating, the sequence all correct without any inhibition... even the name is Quan (Spring)!"
"Is there no justice in this world?!"
"This is divine favor by the Dao, otherwise why would we Cultivators value ’fate’ so much?"
But the Sword Spirit was indifferent: "As for the name, birth year, month, and region, these can be changed later. In the past, many discovered the talent of the fetus in the womb and would intentionally choose names and temporarily relocate to special Spirit Lands, use Secret Techniques and wait for the right timing for birth, adding a half to one point of Spiritual Rhyme."
"This is also why there were many Spiritual Root Seeds at that time. It’s just superior breeding, nothing more."
"Moreover, even with such a fortunate Heavenly Water Spiritual Root, cultivating is just three percent more efficient than what you have and primarily it means comprehension of Water Element Skills happens very quickly. Although these advantages become significant over time, they are not irreplaceable,"
"This indeed reflects the impartial nature of the heavenly Dao, suggesting that going beyond is not always better."
Alas. An Jing sighed in his heart. There were always lucky people in this world,
but... was the person before him truly fortunate?
He lowered his eyes to look at the slightly brownish tea in front of him—it was the most ordinary tea bag tea, non-poisonous, though the water was a bit hard; his Metal Spirit Qi had even reacted to it, evidently due to aging water pipes.
For an ordinary family in Xuanye City, it was quite luxurious.
Looking up, An Jing sized up the youth before him.
Nian Quan sat quietly opposite him; his eyes slightly red, likely from recent tears, must have guessed the fate of his mother before An Jing even arrived. An Jing’s mere presence confirmed it, thus he was relatively calm.
"Thank you for the tea." An Jing took a sip of the tea, then, turning the teacup in his hands, fixed his gaze on him and said, "What do you intend to know?"
"I originally had a lot of questions," Nian Quan stared at his tea, watching the steam rise, "but as I made the tea, I realized... these aren’t things I should know, at least not now."
"If my mother’s death was merely a collateral damage, you wouldn’t have come here, she must have..."
At this point, Nian Quan slightly shook his head, then turned to inquire An Jing, "It’s you, however, coming here despite the risks to inform me of my mother’s death, I am very grateful."
"But I also know, you have something you want to ask me, otherwise you wouldn’t have accepted my invitation... Go ahead and ask, I will tell you."
"Actually, I was also going to ask some rather sensitive questions."
An Jing looked around; the living space of Nian Quan and his mother was not very spacious, even somewhat cramped with old furniture and various books and Jade Slips stored in baskets and makeshift containers from food boxes, filled with the air of a simple life: "But now, I feel there’s no need to ask."
"Your mother did a very good job, no one would suspect you,"
There were no traces of a third person living here, just as he had speculated; the father had passed away early, leaving mother and son to depend solely on each other.
An Jing had planned to ask Nian Quan about details concerning his mother’s daily life to see if Nian Qin truly was a covert agent of the Guiyi Army, but seeing such a simple residence, he knew that Nian Qin had hidden it well.
You know, the compensation she earned from smuggling was over 7,000 Good Deeds, that’s more than 700,000 Credit Points; in his former world, that might even be enough purchasing power for a few million—while one cannot achieve major feats with it, setting a bit aside to improve one’s living conditions would truly be more than sufficient.
She even kept it a secret from her own son and dared not spend the money, obviously not exposing any flaws.
Hence, An Jing started to inquire about other minor details.
His eyes shifted back to Nian Quan, a bit curious he asked, "You clearly possess a Heavenly Spiritual Root, so why is life still so challenging for you?"
Nian Quan blinked, then with some realization said, "You’re not a city person, but a Wilderness person, right?"
An Jing’s lips twitched, beginning to find this a bit uninteresting—how could everyone guess that he wasn’t a city person but a Wilderness person? Was his rural bumpkin aura really that obvious? Are chips that convenient?
No, no, he was from another world, not some Wilderness person!