If we go by his understanding, the medicinal field in the painting is most likely depleted and needs to lie fallow for a period of time.

“Let the ancient painting rest first, so it can recover its fertility!”

Chapter 5: Body Tempering and Healing

Although the medicinal field in the ancient scroll can’t be used to grow herbs for now, Charles Bennett was still extremely delighted.

He now had three sets of herbs in his hands, and all of them were as high as grade six.

You should know that herbs above grade four aren’t even sold in the herbal shops of North Slope Academy. They’ve long been bought up at high prices by powerful families and large merchant guilds, never falling into the hands of commoners like Charles Bennett.

These three sets of grade six herbs would be of tremendous benefit to his body tempering cultivation.

Charles Bennett took one of the herbs, a grade six Red Blood Vine, and simmered it in a pot. After half an hour, it became a bowl of red medicinal soup.

“Red Blood Vine, grade six. Heals internal injuries, promotes blood circulation and removes stasis.”

Charles Bennett endured the pungent, spicy bitterness and drank it all in one go. A strong medicinal heat surged into his belly.

Immediately, he sat cross-legged and began meditating, channeling and absorbing the medicinal power.

Martial artists focus on tempering their physical bodies in cultivation. The students in the lower academy hit wooden stakes with their fists and feet every day, and even ram their bodies against them, all to train their bodies, increase resistance to blows, and boost their strength.

Daily stake training accumulates tiny ruptures in the meridians, commonly known as internal injuries. Tiny blood clots also remain in the blood vessels.

The higher the training intensity, the more severe the internal injuries.

A day or two isn’t a big deal, but over time, the tiny ruptures in the meridians spread, blood clots continuously block the vessels, and with muscle and tendon injuries, small wounds become big ones, eventually affecting the body’s constitution.

If you don’t take herbs to heal internal injuries and remove blood stasis in time, high-intensity training will actually cause your constitution to deteriorate rapidly.

After several years, if internal and external injuries aren’t healed in time and accumulate, it becomes irreversible, enough to cripple a martial artist and leave them suffering in bed for the rest of their life.

All martial artists understand this principle very well.

But many young martial artists from commoner backgrounds can’t resist the temptation to become stronger and are eager for quick results. At first, they train fiercely and make rapid progress, advancing a level each year. But lacking herbal nourishment for their bodies, their constitution quickly declines, and they end up stuck at the early or middle stages of body tempering.

Charles Bennett used to temper his body for two hours every day, which was already his limit.

Because of this, he had to desperately look for odd jobs at the academy to earn money to buy body tempering and healing herbs. But he could only afford grade one or two herbs, and such low-grade herbs had little effect on healing or tempering the body. If he overtrained, his body would feel terrible.

“Grade six healing herbs really are powerful!”

Charles Bennett meditated, channeling the medicinal power of the Red Blood Vine soup.

He felt the hidden minor internal injuries in his body, the tiny ruptured meridians, healing under the strong effect of the grade six Red Blood Vine. The places where blood clots blocked his vessels and caused dull pain quickly cleared up. His muscles no longer ached, the worn fascia felt nourished, and even the scars in his bone marrow tingled slightly.

“My previous training left a lot of hidden internal injuries, and I always worried about how to get rid of them. These grade six healing herbs seem able to completely eliminate them.”

Charles Bennett was overjoyed.

Actually, for a martial artist at the fourth level of the body tempering stage, using grade four herbs of the corresponding level is enough for tempering and healing—there’s no need to use such high-grade herbs. Charles Bennett using grade six Red Blood Vine to heal himself was a bit wasteful.

But there’s no denying the effect is truly remarkable.

“A little waste is fine, whatever! Once the hidden dangers are removed, cultivation after the fourth level of body tempering will go much more smoothly. I’ll be able to increase my training time and intensity to further strengthen my body!”

Charles Bennett meditated for an hour, then leapt up and threw a few punches—fierce and crisp, his whole body feeling incomparably refreshed, with no trace of stagnation in his blood and meridians.

“Next is taking the bitter ginseng! To nourish the foundation and strengthen my vitality.”

“And the snake gall fruit, to heal external injuries.”

Charles Bennett simmered a large bowl of sixty-year-old bitter ginseng decoction and drank it all in one go.

He boiled the snake gall fruit into a medicinal liquid and poured it into a large medicinal bath.

Then he took off his coarse clothes and pants, and with a “splash,” jumped into the scalding bath, meditating in the snake gall fruit solution.

The boiling medicinal liquid made Charles Bennett’s whole body burn with pain—he almost screamed, tears coming to his eyes from the pain.

Very soon, Charles Bennett felt a warm surge of bitter ginseng’s medicinal power in his belly, flowing deep into his bone marrow, and immediately felt as if every inch of his marrow was being nourished.

“Levels one to three of the early body tempering stage focus on training the skin, muscles, fascia, and bone marrow.”

“Levels four to six of the middle stage, the entire bone marrow becomes solid, and the blood and energy within grow stronger day by day... The stronger the blood and energy, the more they nourish the muscles, bones, and meridians, which in turn tempers the body. The martial artist’s strength also increases accordingly.”

Charles Bennett was now at the fourth level of the body tempering stage, the perfect time to focus on increasing the strength of his blood and energy.

The medicinal power of sixty-year-old bitter ginseng could maximize the intensity of his blood and energy.

Charles Bennett absorbed the bitter ginseng’s medicinal power with all his might, transforming it into blood and energy within his bone marrow.