Old Man Sun shook out his tattered Daoist robe and tottered back toward his bedroom, his movements slow and shaky.
Before he disappeared inside, he threw a final sentence over his shoulder.
“You don’t need to count. There are exactly thirty-two hens here capable of laying eggs.”
He paused, then added, “The one in your hand isn’t ready yet. It’s still a year short.”
“Ah… yes, yes, understood!”
Wang Ba stood stunned, his heart in turmoil.
Is this… a Golden Finger?
After suffering so much hardship, do I finally have a cheat?
He withdrew his hand in disbelief.
The translucent light screen before his eyes—invisible to anyone else—instantly dissipated.
He hurriedly reached beneath the hen’s belly again.
The screen shimmered back into existence.
[Target Lifespan: 19.2 years] [Current Body’s Remaining Lifespan: 71.7 years] [Consumable Items: None] [Absorb/Deposit?]
“It’s real! It’s actually real!”
Trying to stop himself from trembling, Wang Ba glanced back at Old Man Sun’s room.
Once he was sure the old man could not see him, he took the hen back to his room.
He shut the door and windows tightly.
The room was so cramped that he pressed the hen onto his bedding, heedless of whether it would get dirty.
“Absorb… Deposit…” he muttered, his eyes darting between the options. “Let’s try absorbing first!”
Wang Ba gently tapped ‘Absorb’ in his mind.
Immediately, a progress bar popped up in his vision. As he mentally dragged the bar, the numbers on the screen shifted.
[Target Lifespan -10 years] [Body Lifespan +1 year] [Current Body’s Remaining Lifespan: 72.7 years]
“Cluck cluck…”
The large hen twisted its head around, looking at Wang Ba with a blank, confused expression.
It dimly sensed that it had lost something, but lacked the intelligence to understand what.
“Ten years of a Rare Fowl’s lifespan only exchanges for one year of mine?”
“Still, that makes sense. How can a chicken compare to a person?”
He closed his eyes, trying to sense the change in his body.
He waited.
Nothing happened.
“That’s it?” Wang Ba opened his eyes, feeling a wave of disappointment. One extra year of life didn’t feel like anything.
“Then… what about depositing?”
He hesitated, then dragged the progress bar in the opposite direction.
[Target Lifespan +11 years] [Body Lifespan -2.2 years] [Current Body’s Remaining Lifespan: 70.5 years]
Still, there was no physical sensation of draining.
However, Wang Ba noticed the math immediately. When converting his lifespan into the chicken’s, the ratio became 1:5.
“Is there a loss during the conversion process?”
Wang Ba felt a sting of heartache. “This back-and-forth just cost the Rare Fowl five years of total lifespan.”
But to his surprise, the hen pinned beneath him seemed to have… changed.
Its feathers, which had not been particularly attractive, seemed a little brighter.
Even its struggles had become noticeably stronger, forcing Wang Ba to press down harder.
“Cluck… cluck…”
The hen twisted its neck, letting out a series of low noises.
Maybe it was an illusion, but Wang Ba felt the bird was almost pleading: Gently… do it gently…
Damn it!
Wang Ba shook his head violently. I’m losing my mind!
Focusing back on reality, he stared at the bird. Were these changes real?
He decided to push it further. He dragged the progress bar again.
[Target Lifespan +1 year] [Body Lifespan -0.2 years] [Current Body’s Remaining Lifespan: 70.3 years]
This time, the change was undeniable.
The hen visibly grew rounder and plumper.
It turned its head, eyes half-closed, and bobbed its head rhythmically. It seemed… purely content.
“Cluck~~”
Its cluck sounded mature and rather seductive.
Wang Ba was speechless.
But more than anything, he was excited!
He had a feeling he had found a use for his Golden Finger.
Accelerated Maturation!
It consumed lifespan, and nearly half was lost in the process.
But he could take lifespan from other chickens and concentrate it in a batch of breeding birds.
He could speed up their maturation.
Then they could breed quickly!
That offered a way to meet the sect’s monthly tribute quota!
With Old Man Sun here, though, I can’t be too reckless, Wang Ba thought. It would be easy for him to notice something wrong.
He would have to proceed cautiously.
He marked the large hen, which was still lying blissfully on his bedding, and tossed it back outside into the coop.
He wanted to see how the hen fared before deciding what to do next.
He had lost 1.4 years of his own lifespan today. But if this experiment confirmed his theory, it was a cheap price to pay.
Wang Ba closed his door again.
He shoved the soiled bedding aside and lay on the hard wooden planks, tossing and turning, unable to sleep.
Suddenly, a thought struck him like lightning. He sat up abruptly in the dark.
“Wait! Since I can obtain lifespan… does that mean I have a chance to master the Physique Strengthening Scripture?”
“Even if reaching the thirteenth layer requires 8,191 years… factoring in the conversion loss, that’s just over eight thousand Rare Fowl!”
Eight thousand Rare Fowl.
They were immensely valuable and might be difficult to obtain elsewhere.
Here on the chicken farm, however, there would be plenty of opportunities!
Provided, of course, that he could stay here.
He quickly got out of bed and picked up the Physique Strengthening Scripture from the foot of the bed again.
He flipped through it page by page.
The Physique Strengthening Scripture was not complicated. It contained only a dozen or so postures, but steady practice could achieve what dripping water did to stone.
Wang Ba tried the postures. They looked easy, but took considerable effort.
He practiced through the entire night. By the time the roosters began to crow, he had barely managed to grasp the basics.
But that was only a start. Mastering the first layer would still require a year of hard practice, without missing a day.
Just then, the light screen popped up unbidden.
[Current Body’s Remaining Lifespan: 70.3 years] [Consumable Items: ‘Physique Strengthening Scripture’ Layer 1. Based on Comprehensive Aptitude and Root Bone, conversion requires 9 years.]
Before he could feel pleased, the lifespan cost shocked him.
“Nine years?!” Wang Ba gasped. “Didn’t the manual say it only takes one year?”
The consumption was exorbitant.
It was nine times the time required for normal practice.
Wang Ba hesitated. Nine years of life was a heavy toll.
But he chose to spend the lifespan.
He had no choice.
Was he really going to wait eight thousand years? Who knew what might happen in all that time?
[Body Lifespan -9 years] [Current Body’s Remaining Lifespan: 61.3 years]
The next second, a strange sensation flooded his body.
His arms, his thighs…
A faint swelling sensation rippled through his muscles, giving him a feeling of explosive power.
But deep within his core, a thread of hollowness and weakness intertwined with that strength.
The mingling of strength and weakness even made him feel a little nauseated.
The light screen remained impassive.
[Current Body’s Remaining Lifespan: 61.3 years] [Consumable Items: ‘Physique Strengthening Scripture’ Layer 2. Based on Comprehensive Aptitude and Root Bone, conversion requires 18 years.]
After a moment’s hesitation, Wang Ba closed the screen.
He could explain mastering the first layer overnight by claiming he had already practiced before.
But going any further? That would be conspicuous.
Even though Old Man Sun was the only other person here, Wang Ba did his best to avoid exposure.
He climbed off the bed.
His back was stiff from sitting all night. He opened the door.
To his surprise, Old Man Sun was standing in the courtyard.
The old man was holding a plump, rounded hen.
His usually indifferent face was full of bewilderment.
“It shouldn’t be…” the old man muttered, staring at the bird. “How did it suddenly lay an egg…”