Chapter Eighty-Seven: Ancient Books and Literary Power

That night, Song Mu did not know whether he had spent the whole time cultivating, or whether he had simply fallen asleep in a daze sometime after midnight. He only vaguely remembered dreaming that he was battling demons.

When he opened his eyes, Song Mu let out a breath of stale air and got out of bed feeling refreshed and clear-headed. At that moment, the literary power within him also began to surge with his movements, leaving him brimming with vigor and in excellent spirits.

Song Mu smiled knowingly, quickly washed up, and took up his books as he headed out.

But just then he suddenly stopped, a look of surprise crossing his face.

In that instant, he realized that the ancient book in his mind seemed to have changed.

The radiant old volume appeared to have grown thicker again.

Song Mu stood by the doorway with his eyes closed, focusing his mind to examine it carefully. One look was enough to make his mouth fall open.

Inside him, the ancient book had actually acquired a chapter on literary power.

Song Mu opened his eyes and scanned the surroundings, then returned to the bedside to search carefully. Yet the volume on literary power that he had brought back yesterday was nowhere to be found.

He checked once more against the ancient book in his mind, and it was indeed the very content of last night’s volume on literary power.

Only now it contained not just the writings of the great scholar Zhang Ce, but also some annotations by Scholar Sun.

And all of it had been greatly condensed. It was as though the ancient book had automatically helped rearrange the volume, leaving the same three sections but making the content more concise and precise.

The last time Song Mu had encountered such a thing was when the ancient book in his mind had broken apart the annotations on the Song Clan's ancient sayings...

And now this volume on literary power appeared after the new method of mental power, each character shining brilliantly with a dazzling luster.

Song Mu did not know whether to laugh or cry. This was not something passed down by his ancestors, but something given to him by his senior brother; in time, he might well have to return it.

But where was he supposed to find a copy of the book covered in his senior brother’s annotations now?

After a long sigh, Song Mu could only resign himself to it. It should not count as a bad thing. If worst came to worst, he would copy out a version for his senior brother following the arrangement in the ancient book in his mind.

With that thought, he set the matter aside for the moment, took the two books, and left the house. After his morning reading, breakfast, and a greeting to Kong Zong, Song Mu returned once more to his room.

As soon as he finished reading, the thought that had occurred to him before rose again.

When the new method of mental power first appeared, Song Mu had already formed a suspicion: if the ancient book could absorb certain classical texts, perhaps it could bring even more marvelous uses.

At the time, however, he had tried all manner of books on the Great Way, and none of them had worked. Only today did a new guess occur to him.

Namely, perhaps the ancient book could only absorb methods and formulas related to mental power or literary power.

Song Mu happened to have brought one such text with him, so he returned to his room and tried it at once.

He read the ancient formula aloud, recited it, and even held it against his forehead while reading it backward, but the ancient book in his mind remained utterly unmoved.

After several fruitless attempts, Song Mu had no choice but to give up.

Sitting at the desk and pondering for a while, Song Mu still wore a deeply furrowed brow.

He would probably not be able to figure out the nature of this ancient book for the time being. He would have to take things one step at a time.

Thinking of this, Song Mu simply gave up on the idea of absorbing formulas, and instead returned to studying the content on literary power in the ancient book in his mind.

He had already become somewhat familiar with the opening chapter on gathering qi after using it for so long the night before, so this time he turned his attention to the second chapter, the chapter on exerting power.

The characters on the ancient book shone brilliantly. Guided by his thoughts, Song Mu read straight through it. By the time he finished, he was somewhat astonished.

The method of controlling literary power described in the volume was in fact rather profound.

In truth, the vessel of literary power was not paper or brush, but the ink that spread and blurred.

Within that ink lay literary power. When writing, it resonated with the literary qi of heaven and earth, and then, under the deliberate guidance of the practitioner, it could provoke all manner of marvelous effects.

This was indeed somewhat subtler than what Master Xun and the others had explained to him before.

Of course, part of that may also have been thanks to the ancient book’s reformatting.

Song Mu did not think too much of it. He simply stood up, poured some clear water into the stone inkstone, and ground the ink stick.

While he recalled the method of using literary power that he had just seen, he also tried to draw forth the literary power within his body.

Before long, a wisp of literary power rose slowly upward and, following his thoughts, reached his fingertip.

Song Mu took a writing brush from the brush rack, unfolded a sheet of white paper, dipped the brush in ink, and with a sharp expression, put brush to paper.

Literary power first seeped from Song Mu’s fingertip, then gathered at the brush tip, and finally merged into the ink, so that as the ink marks formed, one character after another appeared upon the paper.

"Beyond the places the daylight never reaches... it too learns to bloom like a peony."

Song Mu wrote out Moss Flowers once again from memory. At that moment, a subtle change also arose in the mental power within his mind, and a wisp of it likewise flowed from his head toward the paper.

Mental power and literary power did not repel one another. On the contrary, as Song Mu’s brushwork gradually grew more fluent, they began to凝结 together.

Intertwined, they fell together. Song Mu seized the right moment and, just as he finished the final vertical stroke, scattered the literary power outward.

In the next instant, the poem was complete. Literary qi trembled upon the verse, and mental power spread in a misty haze.

The surroundings fell utterly silent. Song Mu held the brush in his hand, staring blankly at the poem before him, then looked around again.

There was no change in the room at all.

Song Mu blinked, puzzled. Just then, however, he saw a trace of green slowly climbing up from somewhere on the lantern stand nearby.

The green color kept spreading, appearing around the desk and across the tabletop. Then within that green, moss began to emerge, and after that, upon the brush rest, a thick patch of moss slowly gave rise to a tiny flower.

A white blossom no larger than a grain of rice quietly unfolded, carrying with it a faint, fresh and cool sensation.

Song Mu’s mouth unconsciously fell open. He blinked again, and the sight before him vanished without a trace.

A wave of unprecedented freshness surged into Song Mu’s heart. The scene he had just witnessed was still vivid in his mind, and that wondrous vision left him lingering over it in fascination.

Was it an otherworldly realm? Or some strange phenomenon?

Could literary power and mental power be used together, and was this the result?

Thinking this, Song Mu looked back at the desk, only to find it exactly as before, nothing changed, as though what had just happened had never occurred.

Even so, Song Mu did notice that one thing was different.

The brush rest where the little flower had bloomed seemed to have dried and cracked.

Looking more closely, he found that the section of the hardwood brush rest had indeed become extremely parched, with fine fissures appearing across it.

Clearly this was the marvel brought about by Moss Flowers. Even this auxiliary battle poem could produce such a strange sight.

Song Mu marveled inwardly. This poem was only an auxiliary battle poem, yet to achieve this level was already no small feat.

With that thought, he picked up his brush and continued experimenting.

...

By evening, Song Mu had finally reached a conclusion: his ancient book allowed him to use poetry and verse far more smoothly, and mental power could intertwine with literary power to produce most peculiar effects.

However, he also discovered one more thing.

When the poems he wrote were not his own, they could still work, but the ancient book brought him no assistance whatsoever.

The joint use of mental power and literary power became exceedingly awkward.

It seemed that only his own original poems could cause the ancient book to respond.

This result left Song Mu somewhat troubled.

Could it be that from now on, he would have to exhaust every possible means just to compose original poetry?

If that were the case, the ancient book would become rather limited in usefulness.

...