Chapter 9: Feng Nu. Li Tian Sword (Last Part)_1

This chapter is a bit longer. The feature promotion will start on time at 12.05, everyone strive hard! Let's help Xiao San rise in the rankings, haha. Many thanks, brothers and sisters.

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"Feng Nu, what do you eat every day? Why is it just rice?" Nian Bing asked, puzzled.

Feng Nu lowered her head, somewhat embarrassed, and said, "I drink porridge every day! It was the same when my teacher was here. My teacher said that porridge is the easiest to digest. Sometimes, we also buy some vegetables, tear them into pieces, and cook them in the porridge. My teacher said that's enough for nutrition. I finished eating the vegetables yesterday, I'll go buy some now. What do you need?"

"Just porridge?" Nian Bing looked at Feng Nu, dumbfounded, and smiled bitterly, "Your life is truly simple. You don't need to go buy anything, let's go out first."

The two walked back to the courtyard, Feng Nu looked at Nian Bing, and said with embarrassment, "I originally wanted to invite you for a meal but I forgot about the lack of vegetables. I'm sorry."

Nian Bing shook his head, smiling, a hint of pity rose in his heart, "It's okay, I have a solution. If I can't even overcome this, I'm not worthy of being the disciple of Ghost Chef." As he spoke, his gaze wandered to the sky. Soon, he spotted his target on the wall. A flash of blue light shot from his eyes, and two bolts of blue light vanished as he pointed at the wall. Suddenly, two pigeons that had been playing on the wall fell to the courtyard, pierced by the blue light.

Feng Nu looked at Nian Bing in surprise, "Can you do martial arts too? Why did you kill those two pigeons? They were so pitiful!"

Nian Bing said, "I don't know martial arts, that was just a low-level Ice Magic Arrow Technique. It can't kill a person, but killing a pigeon is not a big issue. Feng Nu, you should know, in the eyes of a chef, anything edible is an ingredient. Since there are no ingredients here, I had to find some myself."

Feng Nu glared at Nian Bing discontentedly, "I didn't expect you to be such a cruel person."

Nian Bing gave a faint smile, and said, "Am I cruel? Then just don't eat later." As he spoke, he walked to the corner, picked up the two pigeons. After eight years of cultivation, his spiritual power had reached a high level, and the Ice Arrow he had shot earlier had directly shattered the heads of the two pigeons, not letting them suffer much.

He carried the two pigeons and walked past Feng Nu. Seeing her somewhat dazed looking eyes, Nian Bing said with a smile, "Pigeon has very rich nutritional value and is beneficial for strengthening the body and the kidneys. If you think I'm cruel, don't watch how I handle this." Having said that, he headed straight for the kitchen.

"No, I want to watch." Feng Nu defiantly glared at Nian Bing and followed him into the kitchen.

Nian Bing took a basin, poured some water, returned to the courtyard and quickly plucked all the feathers from the pigeons. He then removed their innards and cleaned the pigeon meat.

Approaching the bloody scene unfolding, Feng Nu frowned in utter disgust but managed to stay beside Nian Bing and watch onwards. Nian Bing gave a slight smirk, a flick of his wrist drew out the Morning Dew Knife from his chest. Under the command of his spiritual power, his magical power effortlessly coagulated the blood and innards in the basin into ice. Tipping the basin upside down and lightly tapping it, the ice came out. Grasping two cleaned pigeons in one hand. Nian Bing started chanting, "Scorching fire, unleash the passion within you. Erupt between the earth and the sky, Blast Flame Technique." A solid fireball appeared in front of him. A glint appeared in Nian Bing's eye, and the five-inch-diameter fireball of Blast Flame shot out fiercely. With a 'bang', the whole block of bloody ice had completely vanished. Other than a faint flow of water vapor, no trace of it was left.

Feng Nu stared at Nian Bing in astonishment, "Do you, do you master both magic? Ice and Fire? How is this possible?"

Nian Bing responded with a smile, "There's nothing impossible in this world, as long as you dare to think and dare to act, fantasies may become reality. In my learning of cooking from my master, we often use this method to obliterate waste, how about it, didn't leave any trace on the ground, did I? Ice and blazing fire, they would turn into water vapor. When I froze that bloody water before, I had already completely merged the pigeon's innards with the ice. Naturally, it'll vanish under the bombardment of the Blast Flame." Blast Flame - a third-ranked magic, which could only be cast by an intermediate mage and had an extremely strong explosive force.

Bringing the pigeons back to the kitchen, Nian Bing grabbed the leg of one of the pigeons and lifted it. Her earlier favorable impression of him had considerably lessened due to his cruel treatment of the pigeons. Leaning against the kitchen door, she continued watching him to see what he intended to do. To her surprise, Nian Bing transformed as soon as he held the pigeon with his left hand. He was standing there, as steady as a rock, his sharp gaze entirely fell on the pigeon. It was as if he was observing something? Suddenly, he moved. Feng Nu only saw a streak of cyan light splendidly displaying its brilliance. Nian Bing's right hand was moving so fast it was almost ghostlike, constantly flipping and flashing as a constant stream of equally sized strips of meat piled up on the cutting board beneath him. Although she couldn't see the knife's trail clearly, Feng Nu was flabbergasted to find that, within that flashing cyan light, the pigeon in Nian Bing's hand had gradually transformed into just a skeleton. Within a few blinks, Nian Bing had already switched to another pigeon. As the cyan light continued to flash, as soon as the two skeletons appeared on the cutting board, there was already a pile of evenly stripped meat beside them. Nian Bing took out a piece of white handkerchief from his bosom and carefully wiped the blade of the Morning Dew Knife. Frosty mist circulated around it, without leaving a trace.

Nian Bing flashed a light smile, walked to the stove, his left hand sent a fireball hurtling at the firewood, flames ignited. The pot on the stove was still relatively clean. He threw the two pigeon skeletons directly into the pot, then poured in the clear water nearby, stopping just as it covered the skeletons. With the utmost care, covering the pot, he smiled and said, "Cooking the original food with the original soup, for complete nutrient absorption."

Feng Nu was staring at Nian Bing, mouth agape, "Are you really not a Martial Arts practitioner? Your knife is so fast." She was certainly aware that although she cultivates Fighting Qi, she didn't possess the lightning speed that his wrist showed.

Nian Bing said with a laugh, "My knife technique is merely for chopping vegetables and meat, and it's just a plain knife. Unlike you, who have cultivated Ancestor Hua Tian's Jiu Li Fighting Qi. It's just a pity that I want to concentrate on magic cultivation, otherwise, I may have asked you for some knowledge about Qi. You only have salt here, so I won't make stewed pigeon. I'll keep it simple and make you some pigeon meat rice." As he spoke, he took out a square little cloth sack from his waist, spread it on the cutting board and it opened to reveal little bags where each of them had something covered. The sizes varied greatly, the biggest was a small knife, and the smallest was a long needle. All in all, there were more than ten items, mostly needle-like stuff.

Feng Nu asked curiously, "What are all these things for? They look like Physician's tools. You can't possibly know how to practice acupuncture, can you?"

Nian Bing said with a faint smile, "Needles aren't just for acupuncture, they're also good for cooking." As he spoke, he took a basin from the side, scooped up some rice, simply rinsed it with clear water, and set it beside him. His left hand pinched a grain of rice, his right hand took out the second finest needle from the sack, once it touched his hand, the needlepoint immediately turned red, emitting strands of heat. His wrist shook and the needle that was reddened by fire magic directly pierced the raw grain of rice his left hand was holding. Simultaneously, his left pinky nudged a strip of meat and it passed through the hole at the end of the needle, just like a thread. It exited from the other end of the grain of rice, which was subsequently threaded by the meat strip. Immediately after that, Nian Bing's movements speeded up, grain after grain of rice was continuously strung onto the needle, ingeniously strung into a string on the meat strip. What was even more amazing that caused Feng Nu's astonishment to intensify was that this wasn't cooking at all, it was clearly like crafting a perfect work of art.

The complex task was being unfolded continuously in Nian Bing's hands, his hands extending and contracting like illusions, without the slightest hesitation or mistake. However, even with his speed, it took nearly half an hour to thread all the strips of meat through the grains of rice. Looking at the beautiful lines of the grains of rice, Nian Bing laughed, this technique of threading meat strips through rice was something he was able to complete by integrating magic. Without the red-hot fire needle, it would be impossible to thread each grain of rice so evenly. It looked like a beaded curtain, lying flat on the cutting board. Nian Bing turned around, lifted the pot lid, and the soup that had been boiled with pigeon bones gave out a faint fragrance amidst the billowing steam. He picked up a spoon from the side and carefully picked out the two sets of pigeon bones from the pot, looking at the cream-colored soup, he hesitated for a while. He then turned back around, murmuring something. A faint blue light enveloped the grains of rice on the cutting board, then astonishingly froze the rice that had thoroughly penetrated the meat threads together into one piece. The Morning Dew Knife appeared and lightly picked up the block of frozen rice, and directly popped it into the pot. He evenly sprinkled a thin layer of salt on the ice block, closed the pot lid, sheathed the Morning Dew Knife back, turned around and said to Feng Nu who was already dumbfounded, "Alright, let it cook for about half an hour more, and then we can eat. While the pigeon meat rice tastes quite good, it's a bit time-consuming, I'm sorry to keep you waiting again."

Feng Nu was looking at Nian Bing with a strange expression in her eyes, "Are you, are you cooking? If an ordinary chef was doing this, I'm afraid it would take him a day."

Nian Bing chuckled, "A whole day? If it took a whole day, the pigeon meat slices would have gone bad a long time ago. It's of no practical significance to just make it look good, wait until you've tasted it to make a judgment."

Both of them left the kitchen, Feng Nu's earlier displeasure had long since evaporated amidst Nian Bing's magical cooking skills. She brought two wooden stools over, and they sat down in the courtyard. Nian Bing seemed a bit tired, squinting his eyes and staring at the tall old tree outside the courtyard wall. Stringing meat through rice required absolute concentration of the mind, doing so many all at once was like controlling a large magic spell. Even he himself did not know why he would make such a complicated pigeon meat rice for Feng Nu. Although it sounded simple, the simpler the cuisine, the more it showed the skills of a chef.