Another night passed, and Han Li rose at the crack of dawn, heading straight for the herb garden. He wanted to see whether those few medicinal plants had undergone any change.
Before he even entered the field, a rich, heady fragrance of herbs suddenly hit his nostrils.
Han Li froze for a moment, but then a thought struck him: "Could it be…?"
He quickened his pace almost involuntarily, and at last stood before those intensely fragrant plants.
Were these really the same herbs from yesterday? Han Li could scarcely believe his eyes. He slapped his still-groggy face hard several times, only stopping when the stinging pain finally registered.
"This Yellow Dragon Grass — its leaves are turning purple. The Bitter Lotus actually has nine petals now. And the Forget-Worry Fruit has gone black. Ha ha! Ha ha!" Han Li could no longer contain himself. Normally he prided himself on keeping his mind as still as water, but now he threw his head back and roared with laughter.
"I've hit the jackpot! Over the span of a single night, herbs that were only one or two years in potency have all jumped to the appearance of decade-old growth. The leaf color, the fruit shape, the fragrance of the petals — it all matches rare herbs that have been maturing for years." Han Li inspected each plant once more, confirming that they matched every description in the herbal manuals. These were genuinely precious medicinal ingredients with many years of accumulated potency.
"If I can keep maturing herbs this way, won't I have as many rare ingredients as I could ever want? And any herbs I don't need I can sell to others. There's no amount of silver I couldn't earn!" Han Li could no longer hold back his excitement. His mind began to race with wild possibilities.
The more he thought, the more thrilled he became, and the further his thoughts wandered. He felt certain he had stumbled upon a true treasure. All at once, he cartwheeled across the ground several times — the picture of calm was completely gone, and he looked for all the world like a giddy fourteen- or fifteen-year-old venting his exhilaration.
It took a good long while before Han Li came back to his senses and his customary sharpness returned. He began to consider the problems he would face in swallowing this windfall that had fallen from the sky.
First, while the herbs appeared fine on the outside, their actual medicinal properties still needed to be tested. After all, they had been transformed by that strange liquid. Who knew whether some mutated component lurked within? He had seen with his own eyes what happened to those rabbits yesterday — caution was the wiser course.
Second, the green liquid in the mysterious little bottle had been used up. He did not know whether the bottle would continue producing those drops or whether this phenomenon would recur. It might well be a one-time thing. He needed to check again tonight.
If both of those concerns proved unfounded, he would still need to master the specific details and steps of the process, gaining complete control over this incredible method of accelerating growth.
After deep reflection, Han Li arrived at these problems that demanded resolution. Without solving them, this grand windfall would be nothing more than a moon reflected in water, a mirage in the fog.
Having thought everything through, Han Li set to work.
First, he went to the main kitchen outside the valley and bought two more gray-furred rabbits from the steward. The steward was both pleased and puzzled by the boy's visit — why did this youngster keep buying live rabbits? Was he planning to slaughter them himself to practice his cooking skills?
Han Li couldn't care less what others thought. This time he did not tether the rabbits in the herb garden. Instead, he tied them right outside his own door so he could observe them closely at all times.
Then he went to the herb field and carefully harvested the accelerated plants. He processed them into several doses of bone-and-sinew-strengthening medicine, mixed the preparations into the rabbits' favorite food, and fed them three times a day — a test to determine whether the herbs harbored any poison.
Once all of this was done, Han Li waited anxiously for nightfall. After what felt like an eternity, darkness finally descended as he had wished.
The moment the sky turned dark, Han Li rushed outside, pulled the small bottle from his pouch, and set it on the ground. He focused his entire attention on the bottle, watching for any change.
A quarter of an hour passed. The bottle was motionless.
Half an hour passed. Still no movement.
Three-quarters of an hour…
As time trickled by, Han Li's heart sank lower and lower. He waited nearly until dawn, and the bottle showed no sign of any unusual activity.
He was thoroughly deflated. Was this bottle truly a one-time-use consumable? Or had he done something wrong?
Han Li forced himself to perk up and studied his surroundings.
"Nothing suspicious — except that it's a bit dark," he muttered to himself.
Then he froze. His head snapped upward toward the sky. It was pitch-black overhead, utterly opaque, with nothing visible at all. The phrase "a bit dark" struck him like a bolt of lightning.
"Could it be because it's overcast — no stars, no moon?" Han Li remembered that the bottle's previous transformations had all occurred on clear nights, when the sky was unobstructed and the stars and moon were visible. But tonight the sky had been blanketed by thick clouds.
A plan formed in his mind and his spirits lifted slightly. Then he noticed the sky beginning to lighten toward gray, and he knew nothing would happen tonight. He put the bottle away, resolved to try again once the weather cleared.
But contrary to Han Li's expectations, the sky did not clear up in the following days. Instead, a fine, drizzling rain set in, and this weather persisted without interruption to the present day.
Han Li gazed at the soft, misty rain outside and felt his frustration mounting. The more anxious he was for the skies to clear, the more relentlessly the rain fell, with no hint of letting up.
He glanced back at the two rabbits sheltering from the rain inside his room. They were hopping about energetically, which only deepened his vexation. Ever since eating the food laced with medicinal herbs, the rabbits had not only shown no ill effects — they looked more vigorous than before. Over the past ten days and more, Han Li had inspected them carefully each day, confirming that they exhibited no symptoms of poisoning whatsoever. If anything, the bone-and-sinew tonic had made them sturdier than ever.
This good result, instead of cheering him up, only left him torn between hope and anxiety, unable to calm himself in the slightest. For him, whether the bottle could produce more green liquid had become the key to every single question — and this maddening, endless drizzle had locked that answer away, refusing to let him reach it. How could Han Li not be utterly dejected!
(End of chapter)