Chapter 7: The Dew Restoration Pill
[Incense Offering Divine Ascension System
Host: Song Xuanqing
Divine Lifespan: 20/**
Identity: Feral God
Cultivation: Unranked (12.7%) +
Cultivation Technique: None
Divine Arts: Divine Might (Novice) +, Dream Entry (Novice) +, God-Merge (Novice) +
Domain: Song Family Village
Incense Value: 89.3
Evaluation: Not yet recognized by the Heavenly Dao, faith and incense offerings are meager. A Feral God with no Divine Rank or Divine Position — fate as adrift as a floating weed, power as thin as paper.]
Before him was a brand-new system panel.
Song Xuanqing studied it carefully. Compared to the half-finished panel from before, this one was far more detailed.
For one, his Cultivation now had a percentage progress bar after it.
Then there was a new Divine Arts panel.
And behind both his Cultivation and his Divine Arts entries, there was a plus sign!
With his past life's vast experience reading web novels, how could Song Xuanqing not know what that meant?
Stat allocation! It was finally here!
At this moment, Song Xuanqing desperately wanted to shout: "Deep Blue! Add points!"
His heart was racing, his hands trembling with excitement!
Full of anticipation, Song Xuanqing tentatively tapped the "+" next to his Cultivation.
Something changed! Something changed!
[Cultivation: Unranked (12.8%) +]
His Cultivation had gone up… by 0.1%.
At the same time, his Incense Value dropped by 1 point.
It was now 88.3.
Song Xuanqing: "……Hiss."
That adding points required Incense Value didn't surprise him — the system's very name made that obvious enough.
But that the Incense Value would be spent so quickly — that he hadn't expected.
1 point of Incense Value only increased Cultivation by 0.1%.
If he were starting from zero, pushing his Cultivation to the full completion of the Unranked realm would require a thousand points, wouldn't it?
Even now, with his progress already at 12.8%, pushing it all the way to 100% would still require 872 points of Incense Value.
Song Xuanqing's gaze fell on his pitifully small 88.3 Incense Value.
So pathetically little!
That 88.3 in Incense Value represented only a single day's worth of offerings from the villagers of Song Family Village.
But Song Xuanqing couldn't absorb Incense Value every day.
Barring special circumstances, under normal conditions he could only absorb Incense Value twice a month — on the first and fifteenth of each lunar month, when the villagers came to offer incense.
Even if someone burned incense for him on other days, he had no way to absorb it.
Moreover, Song Xuanqing didn't know about customs elsewhere, but in the area of Wan'an County where Song Family Village was located, the common folk only burned incense on the first and fifteenth of each month, aside from major festivals and holidays.
Song Xuanqing did the math. Including the few points of Incense Value he had already spent today, his total haul for the day came to just over ninety points.
With two absorption windows per month, even being generous, he could collect around two hundred points of Incense Value each month.
That meant he'd need roughly four months just to save up over eight hundred points to push his Unranked Cultivation to 100%.
And that was only for this one realm.
Song Xuanqing had no idea how much Incense Value the realms beyond Unranked would require.
And that was just the Cultivation cost — there were still the Divine Arts to consider.
The Divine Arts also had plus signs, meaning they too could be leveled up with Incense Value.
Except for Divine Arts, the points went toward proficiency.
Taken literally, higher proficiency should allow the Divine Arts to be used more effectively.
All three Divine Arts — Divine Might, Dream Entry, and God-Merge — were currently at Novice proficiency.
How much Incense Value would it take to raise a Divine Art's proficiency?
Steeling himself, Song Xuanqing experimentally dumped a full ten points of Incense Value into Divine Art: God-Merge.
Nothing. Not even a flicker of movement.
The proficiency was still at Novice.
Song Xuanqing even tried directly absorbing 1 point of Incense Value on his own.
The result: not even 0.1% was added to his Cultivation progress.
That settled it — using Incense Value through the stat allocation system was the correct approach!
After all that experimenting, his already-pitiful Incense Value had dwindled to just 77.3.
No more experiments! If he kept this up, he'd burn through every last point!
Feeling dejected, Song Xuanqing swiped across the system panel, intending to close it.
But it didn't close!
The system panel had turned a page!
Song Xuanqing's eyes went wide!
It could flip pages?!
Excited, he swiped again.
This time, no new page appeared.
So there were only two pages?
Song Xuanqing looked closely and realized that this second page was… the System Shop?!
[Shop Level: 1
Current Stock:
1. Dew Restoration Pill (Low Grade): A divine-path pill. Increases Cultivation by a small amount.
Price: 10 Incense Value
Purchase Limit: 0/1
2. Life Continuation Pill (Low Grade): Brings the dead back to life and restores flesh to bone. Usable by anyone with a physical body; limited to mortals or those of lower Cultivation.
Price: 1 Incense Value
Purchase Limit: 0/10
3. Immortal Yang Art: A divine-path Cultivation Technique of decent quality, suitable for cultivation by all gods. Balanced and harmonious, with eleven Divine Arts contained within.
Price: 1,000,000 Incense Value
Purchase Limit: 0/1
Next Rotation: 14 days, 2 hours, 13 minutes]
Staring at the price listed beneath the "Immortal Yang Art," Song Xuanqing's eyes nearly popped out of his head!
How much?!
One million Incense Value?!
He gaped at the price tag under the Immortal Yang Art, then glanced back up at the Dew Restoration Pill and the Life Continuation Pill, deeply skeptical that these three items belonged in the same shop!
One priced at 10 Incense Value.
One priced at 1 Incense Value.
One priced at 1,000,000 Incense Value!
Just how highly did the system think of him, putting a million-point Cultivation Technique right in front of his face?!
Could he afford it?
Every last point of Incense Value he had couldn't even buy ten Dew Restoration Pills!
Even if he squeezed Song Family Village's villagers dry, he couldn't scrape together one-tenth of the cost of the Immortal Yang Art!
After a moment of stunned bewilderment, Song Xuanqing quickly pushed it out of his mind and stopped looking at it altogether.
If he couldn't afford it, what was the point of staring?
Better to focus on the Dew Restoration Pill and the Life Continuation Pill.
Actually, he didn't even need to bother with the Life Continuation Pill.
Song Xuanqing had no physical body — what use would that thing be to him?
Of the three items, only the Dew Restoration Pill was of any use to him.
And it was limited to one purchase per cycle.
Fortunately, looking at the next rotation timer at the bottom of the shop, the stock appeared to refresh every half-month.
Which, as it happened, aligned perfectly with his Incense Value absorption schedule.
The shop would update on the first and fifteenth of each month — exactly the days he could absorb Incense Value.
The system really knew how to run a business, rotating new stock right on the days he could collect offerings.
Unfortunately, Song Xuanqing simply didn't have enough Incense Value.
And precisely because of that, he was still agonizing over whether to buy the Dew Restoration Pill.
Ten points of Incense Value — if he put that directly into his Cultivation, it would add 1%.
He had no idea how much Cultivation the Dew Restoration Pill would grant when consumed.
If it added less than 1%, wouldn't that be a terrible deal?
Song Xuanqing rubbed his temples. Incense Value was too scarce, and he could only absorb it twice a month — he wished he could stretch every single point.
But before long, Song Xuanqing stopped agonizing.
Because someone had come to offer incense.
In the deep of the night, Song Mugen carried a torch, his children and wife at his side. The family of four brought incense and offerings to the temple.
By the customs of the time, worshipping and burning incense was generally done between morning and afternoon.
At this hour, it was far past the proper time for offerings.
But after Song Mugen and his son returned home and talked it over, they decided to come right away.
Lord Xuanqing had manifested and sent the cat demon into Wolf's Head Mountain that very night to save them.
If they waited until tomorrow, wouldn't that be disrespectful to Lord Xuanqing?
Not only did they need to come — Song Mugen felt his whole family should come to offer incense to Lord Xuanqing!
When they arrived at Xuanqing Temple, Song Mugen didn't go straight inside to burn incense.
Instead, he first pulled his family to kneel before the temple entrance and said respectfully: "Lord Xuanqing, please forgive us — we come at this hour with no intention of disrespect. We are simply grateful that Lord Xuanqing saved our lives today, and have come through the night to offer incense and fulfill our vow."
Only then did Song Mugen's family enter the temple.
Song Ming first arranged the offerings on the altar table: a live chicken, bound and barely conscious, and a plate of fruit.
In this era, for rural farming folk, a live chicken and fresh fruit were precious things.
Chickens were kept for their eggs and were never slaughtered for eating if it could be helped. Fruit was equally rare.
But to show their sincerity, Song Mugen's family had bound a chicken and brought the fruit they'd been saving at home.
The family lit their incense and knelt reverently before Song Xuanqing's idol.
"May Lord Xuanqing bless us…"
[Incense Value +8.5]
[Incense Value +8]
[Incense Value +8]
A total of 24.5 Incense Value credited — from Song Mugen, Song Ming, and Song Ming's mother.
Song Xiuxiu had already offered incense during the day and could not provide Incense Value again within the same day.
Song Xuanqing was delighted. Song Mugen's family was truly generous — each person contributing no less than 8 points of Incense Value.
Most of the villagers who had come during the day had offered around four or five points each, with some giving as little as two or three.
The moment this Incense Value was credited, he stopped agonizing over whether to buy the Dew Restoration Pill.
Of course, that wasn't the only thing Song Xuanqing was happy about.
He had also noticed something that could earn him far more Incense Value.
Song Family Village had twenty to thirty households and around a hundred people, but not everyone would come to offer incense to Song Xuanqing.
The local custom was that one person per household was sufficient.
Some would bring their young children along to pray for the child's wisdom and safety.
But most households sent just one person to offer incense.
So over the entire day, only about thirty-some people had come to offer incense to Song Xuanqing.
But — what if all hundred-odd people in Song Family Village came to offer incense to him?
The Incense Value he collected each time would increase dramatically!
The only tricky part was figuring out how to get all hundred-odd people in Song Family Village to come offer incense every first and fifteenth of the month.
He couldn't very well go around saying: "Come on, everyone, come burn incense for me!"
That would be far too undignified for a deity.
Human nature being what it was, it was best for him not to get too close to people.
Even though these villagers seemed honest and simple-hearted right now, Song Xuanqing — with his current lack of strength — had no desire to invite unnecessary complications.