“I’m not sure either. If it doesn’t work, let’s just try it first,” Gu Zhengchu said with a slight frown.
“Bro, what are you actually trying to do here? Stop keeping us in suspense and just tell us,”
Shen Jianyi couldn’t hold back any longer and spoke up from the side.
“It’s still that book Congcong gave me.”
As Gu Zhengchu spoke, he took out the small booklet, flipped to one of the pages, and pointed it out to clear things up for everyone. “Look here.”
The three of them leaned in together.
“What’s special about this?” Shen Cong asked, puzzled.
On the page, aside from a drawing of a person sitting cross-legged and a diagram of the acupoints on the body, there was also a line of small characters, characters they didn’t recognize.
“Dad, did you decipher the text?” She thought of another possibility.
“If only it were that easy,” Gu Zhengchu shook his head.
“But last night Xiao Kai and I worked on it together and managed to recognize part of it. At least we can roughly guess our way through.”
As he spoke, he pointed at several black dots next to the human figure. “Look at how these black dots are arranged, doesn’t it look like some kind of formation?”
The more he talked, the stranger it sounded.
Yet the three of them still couldn’t make heads or tails of it.
Shen Jianyi was the first to shake his head. “Everyone’s got their own specialty. This thing, Brother Gu, you’d better study it with Xiao Kai.
One of you understands meridians, the other understands classical texts. This is something only you two, father and son, can figure out.
Just tell us the result, let’s skip the whole process.”
What he said made Gu Zhengchu chuckle.
“After I got home last night, I thought it over some more and realized this should be a complete cultivation method. As for what effects it has after practicing it, I’m still not sure.
I’m not going to teach you this just yet. Let me study it some more first.
But the placement of those black dots on the side really does form an array. Look, there’s even a specific explanation down here.”
Gu Zhengchu pointed to the text at the bottom.
No one even bothered to look; they were all waiting for him to continue.
“It says here that you need to use jing stones, and that arranging them according to this array can gather vital energy.
I can’t quite figure out what these jing stones are supposed to be. I was thinking they might mean finely crafted stones? Or perhaps rare, scarce stones? The only thing that comes to mind is jade.
After all, this is an ancient book. From ancient times to the present, the thing our people have always liked the most, and considered truly refined, would probably be jade, right?”
“Or could it mean… stones that contain mental energy?” Shen Cong said thoughtfully.
“I think the jing in jing stones might not mean ‘exquisite’ at all. It could mean spiritual or mental energy.
If this array can extract the mental energy from the jing stones and allow the human body to absorb it, then my ability could be enhanced!”
The more she spoke, the more excited she became, her eyes shining brightly.
A twenty–square-meter space was far too small. If it could be expanded, many problems would be solved at once.
“Yes! That mental energy must be what the book calls vital energy! I was being too narrow-minded.”
After figuring it out, Gu Zhengchu was overjoyed.
“That has to be it! And this vital energy really can be absorbed by the human body!”
The more he thought about it, the more he felt Shen Cong was right.
So much so that he stood up excitedly, pointing at himself and then at the two potted plants on the table.
“Yesterday I dug out a pair of jade bangles Xiao Kai’s mom left behind, and I even smashed a jade ornament at home. I scraped together seven pieces in total and set up an array indoors according to this diagram.
Look at these plants! And I didn’t sleep a wink last night, yet I’m not tired at all, if anything, I feel even more energetic than usual!
This vital energy is definitely beneficial to both the human body and plants!
I came today mainly to discuss this with you all. Let’s try setting one up at home first. If it really works, I’m planning to make a trip to Pingchuan.”
“Pingchuan? To buy seedlings?” Shen Jianyi asked.
Pingchuan was the country’s largest base for cultivating Chinese medicinal herbs, and it also had the biggest traditional Chinese medicine market in the nation.
“Buying seedlings is one reason. There’s another reason too, Pingchuan produces jade. There are many jade-processing factories at the foot of Gushan Mountain, and I want to take a look.
We don’t need large pieces anyway. The leftover scraps from carving jade items should be more than enough. I’ll bring some back.”
“Let’s test it first. We can talk about the rest once we’re sure it actually works.”
Cheng Ru, who had been listening for quite a while, couldn’t wait any longer and spoke up.
“Since the book says jing stones and doesn’t specifically say jade, maybe gemstones could work too? Brother Gu, go ahead and set up the array. It’s still early, if it doesn’t work, Jianyi can rush out to a jade shop to buy some in time.
Set it up in Congcong’s room. Right now, she’s the one in our family who needs it the most.”
Naturally, the other three had no objections.
When they arrived at the bedroom Shen Cong shared with Gu Kai, Gu Zhengchu placed the seven pieces of jewelry in their respective positions according to the directions described in the book.
Then he stood up and sensed things for a moment before turning to the others. “Do you feel anything?”
The three exchanged looks, then all shook their heads.
Gu Zhengchu frowned deeply. “That’s not right. Yesterday, I felt something different as soon as I finished setting it up. Could it be that jade really is required? I’ll go get that jade ornament.”
As he spoke, he started toward the door.
“Dad, wait a second,” Shen Cong called out to stop him.
“Could it be related to the amount of energy?”
She pointed at the pair of gemstone earrings. “The gemstones on my mom’s earrings are too small. Could that be the reason? Let’s try swapping this one in.”
As she spoke, she took out the ruby pendant her mother-in-law had given her earlier from her storage space.
Although Gu Kai had previously agreed that she could pawn it together with the others, Shen Cong felt that, no matter what, it was her mother-in-law’s keepsake, and in the end she couldn’t bear to part with it.
Gu Zhengchu recognized the pendant as well. He took it, gently stroked it, and then placed it in one of the positions.
The earring that had originally been there was moved and placed together with the other one.
The moment he set the earring down, everyone in the room felt a cool breeze sweep through, leaving them indescribably refreshed.
“There really is a sensation!” Cheng Ru said in delight.
The others nodded again and again.
Shen Cong was happy as well, this proved that her earlier idea had been correct. So-called jing stones didn’t necessarily refer only to jade; any stone that contained energy should work.
That greatly expanded the range of possible choices.
Probably because the room wasn’t very large, the array took effect extremely quickly.
Not long after it was set up, people could clearly feel a faint coolness in the air, more comfortable than even turning on the air conditioner.
As a result, no one wanted to move, and they simply sat in the room and began discussing things.
“Jianyi, you should be pretty familiar with this village’s head, right? If we suggest buying the plot of land behind us as well, do you think he’d agree?”
Gu Zhengchu finally voiced the most important reason he had rushed over today.
“We’re fairly familiar. Come to think of it, he even has to call me ‘second cousin once removed.’ But buying land? Brother Gu, our house is already big enough. Why buy more land?”
The house was currently being reinforced, and renovating the existing space alone was already a massive project.
Hearing that Gu Zhengchu wanted to buy more land gave Shen Jianyi an immediate headache.
“The land behind us?” Shen Cong immediately stood up.
She walked to the window and pointed outside. “Dad, do you mean the plot right next to our backyard?”
Gu Zhengchu didn’t get up, but he nodded. “Yes, that’s the one.”
“Buy it!” Shen Cong said decisively, not giving her father any chance to object.
“Once we buy that land, we’ll tear down the iron fence in our backyard and build two walls to enclose both our house and that plot together, connecting them directly to the outer wall of the residential compound.
Dad, come take a look, this way our place becomes a single, independent unit. We can keep an eye on both the front and the back, and it’ll definitely be much safer!”
Shen Cong pulled Shen Jianyi over and gestured animatedly as she explained.
The Shen family’s villa sat in the very last row of the villa complex, with an open stretch of land separating it from the outer wall.
That area had originally been planned for landscaping, but because the houses didn’t sell well, the plan was eventually dropped, and the land was left abandoned.
This plot of land was quite large. If it were enclosed as Shen Cong suggested, the villa’s backyard would connect directly to the residential complex’s outer wall, becoming a relatively independent space.
Not only would it offer greater privacy, but if anything were to happen, it would also be much easier to defend, there would be no risk of being attacked from two sides.
And if it really came to a time of poor harvests, who would ever complain about having too much land at home?
After hearing his daughter’s explanation, Shen Jianyi immediately took out his phone. “I’ll call Xingxue and ask whether the village is willing to sell this land. If it’s for sale, we’ll buy it.”
“If they won’t sell, leasing is fine too. Let’s rent it for five years first,” Shen Cong added softly from the side.
Hearing that Shen Jianyi wanted to buy land, Village Head Xu Xingxue was clearly taken aback on the other end of the line, apparently he hadn’t even figured out which plot the Shen family wanted.
He didn’t agree right away, saying he’d come over to take a look first, and then hung up.
Xu Xingxue arrived very quickly. In less than twenty minutes, he came wobbling over on a small electric scooter.
He was in his thirties, with a long face and a tall, slender build, a close-cropped haircut, and an air of shrewdness about him from head to toe.
As soon as he walked in, Xu Xingxue wiped the sweat from his forehead and smiled before speaking. “Uncle, your place has been lively these past couple of days!”
“Yeah. My in-laws’ place is being demolished, so they figured our house is spacious and came to stay with the two of us old folks for a couple of years.
Now Congcong and Xiao Kai are getting ready to go abroad together, and they feel uneasy about the three of us old folks living in such a remote spot, so they insist on helping us fix the place up a bit more.
To be honest, I keep telling them they’re worrying over nothing. Even if there aren’t many households in our complex, we’re still right next to the village. With you, Xingxue, and so many familiar faces in the village, what would we have to worry about in terms of being looked after?”
Shen Jianyi explained with a smile as he ushered him inside.
“That makes sense! With us around, there’s definitely no need to worry about safety,” Xu Xingxue quickly agreed.
Then he glanced at Shen Cong standing nearby and smiled again. “Still, Congcong and her husband mean well. Thinking this way shows filial piety, it’s a good thing. Fixing things up more is fine too; that way they’ll feel at ease when they’re away.
But… they’re going together? Didn’t you say before it would just be Congcong alone?”
“They’re going together. If Congcong went by herself, the family wouldn’t feel at ease. As a couple, they can look out for each other,” Gu Zhengchu said from the side.
Realizing that this man must be Shen Cong’s father-in-law, the in-law Shen Jianyi had mentioned, Xu Xingxue nodded repeatedly in agreement.
He didn’t pursue the topic further, instead asking:
“Uncle, you mentioned buying land just now. What land are you buying? Isn’t your house already big enough?”
“I’m the one buying the land. I want to buy the plot behind us, fix it up a bit, and use it to grow medicinal herbs,” Gu Zhengchu replied, picking up the conversation.
“You know my in-law has been running a medical clinic for years, right? With the house being demolished, the clinic can’t operate for the time being either.
And he’s not the type who can sit idle, so he wants to take advantage of this period to try growing some medicinal herbs. If it works out, he’s even thinking about renting a larger plot of land in our village later to expand the scale.”
“Oh, that’s a good thing!” Xu Xingxue immediately voiced his support.
Although he hadn’t had direct dealings with Gu Zhengchu, he had heard of the former head of the Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospital.
Moreover, since the village was close to the city, most young people had gone out to work, leaving plenty of idle land behind. Having someone willing to rent it was naturally a good thing.
“Renting land in the village can come later. Right now, I don’t have any experience, so I just want to get a small plot to practice on.
This land is right outside my door, I can treat it like a hobby and plant as I go. Do you think the village could sell it to me so I can try it out first?” Gu Zhengchu steered the conversation back to the main point.
All the land in this residential area belonged to the village anyway, and since property ownership certificates couldn’t be issued, at most you got residential usage rights.
To put it bluntly, whether they sold houses or sold land made little difference to the village.
What’s more, this plot was already right behind the Shen family’s house and had been left unused all along, keeping it served no real purpose.
Selling it would be, for the village, essentially free money.
After Gu Zhengchu finished speaking, Xu Xingxue had actually already agreed in his heart, but he couldn’t say so outright.
“This land… it can be sold. It’s just that I’ll need to go back and discuss the price with the village. Also, Uncle, you know this land can’t get a land-use certificate, right?”
“I know.”
“That’s good then.”
Xu Xingxue smiled. “We’ll go back and hold a meeting. Uncle, wait for my news.”