Chapter 19 - Charm Making from the First Hunt

"Mnnnnngh~" I sleepily sounded out.

My pair of hands reached out unconsciously to secure Yan Yan to my soft chest as I rose my body from the 'bed', with one of my hands moving away to rid my eyes of dirt.

"Mnnngh. What time is it?" I murmured.

"Auuu Ai!" A cute voice cried out, as if to say good morning, while pointing at the sun obvious in the frame of the window.

"Ummh? Oh! Yan Yan~ You're awake! Good morning~" I cooed, using baby-talk.

"Aiii!" Yan Yan cheerfully responded with her right hand up. She then moved both her hands towards the window, facing the sun, and questioningly sounded out,

"Auuu?"

Gazing towards where she outstretched her arms with sleepy eyes, I spoke in a daze, "Oh. The sun is up already..."

The sun is up already...

The... sun? is up... already...?

The sun... is... up... already...

Suddenly snapping my eyes open, I shouted, "IT'S WAY BEYOND DAWN ALREADY! Wake up! Bai Bai! It's Morning!", shaking Wei Bai's shoulders back and forth.

Wei Bai, with his head shaking back and forth, dizzily woke up and spoke with his words cutting off, "What's- go- ing- on-n-n-n-n?"

"It's Morning! Don't you have anything to do?"

"Ugh, it can wait. I just want to sleep some more. My neck hurts..." Wei Bai rubbed his neck, massaging it with his right hand.

"Come on! Don't be a lazy bum. You're gonna set a bad example for Yan Yan!" I scolded while reaching out to Wei Bai's thighs with my fingers, intending to pinch him awake.

"There isn't anything urgent going on, just my daily routine, and we just got back from the First Hunt yesterday, and we were so worried. Plus, we need to make Yan'er's charm. I say we can catch a break for the morning." Wei Bai defended himself while hugging the both of us and went back to sleep, adjusting his body so he could finally rest his head on the only long pillow on the bed.

"Muuuuuh~!" I angrily pouted, but my eyes were drooping, and I tried to resist the smile tugging at the corners of my lips.

'Wei Bai can be so spoiled sometimes. But I like that he only shows this side of him when he's alone with me here... I hope. Oh. Yan Yan is here as well.' I happily harboured such thoughts.

"Auuu, Aii~!" Hui Yan cried out, grabbing at my breasts.

"See? Yan Yan's hungry. Now let me turn around, or you'll crush our daughter in that bear hug of yours!" I struggled a little, but still being careful not to hurt my daughter.

"Okaaaaay." Wei Bai sleepily slurred his words while softening his hug. I carefully flipped over and brought Hui Yan up closer to the swelling breasts of mine.

"Okay~ I managed to prepare some more just now. I'll continue making while you drink, so drink slowly today, okay?" I gently cooed.

Yan Yan, as always, manages to somewhere get what I'm trying to say, sucked slower than usual, and I began to work on the clan's milk improving technique.

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After drinking her fill of all my milk, Hui Yan closed her eyes, seemingly going to sleep.

'I'm a little worried about Yan Yan not having enough milk. She's very kind and understanding, and never pestered me for anything unreasonable.

I've always felt a little guilty since the time where I almost threw her off to her death, and now I also feel a little guilty about not having enough milk to feed Yan Yan...'

'At any rate, since Yan Yan is asleep, I should go and make her charm. I wonder how the blood soaking has gone so far..?'

I gently and carefully tied Yan Yan to the front of my chest with the cloth I used before, making sure the knot and Yan Yan is secure. I slowly and smoothly moved my body so Yan Yan wouldn't wake up, towards the clay pot we brought back filled with all the bones from the wolf that we hunted.

'Hmm. It looks like the blood soaking went well. Only a little bit of blood is left in the pot. It should be done by noon.

The blood treatment solution is really good stuff. It makes the blood really easy to fuse with, especially when the origin of the things for the blood to fuse with is the same. The best part is definitely the fact that it's edible, so I can make blood bone soup easily without the tedious mixing. Too bad the compatibility is a problem, otherwise, people would just use it to fuse a Divine Beast bloodline with themselves.' I haphazardly thought to myself.

'At any rate, I guess I should meditate a little. I'll have to ask Bai Bai for some blood essence to mix with mine and place it on the charms I'm planning to make.' I thought while making designs of a charm that would suit Hui Yan very well.

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2 (double)hours have passed since An Xin started to meditate.

"Uuugh... What time is it now...?" Wei Bai muttered, rousing from his sleep.

"It's been 2 hours. It's noontime already, sleepy head~" An Xin replied after hearing Wei Bai call out, waking up from her meditation.

"I...see. How's your progress going? Anywhere nearer to breaking through?" Wei Bai curiously asked.

"Not very good. I have a lot of pill toxins deep in my body that's very stubborn. Unless I go for a trial by fire, or use a marrow cleansing medicine, it would take quite some time for me to clear away the impurities. It doesn't help that my water attribute Qi is too gentle."

"I see, so breaking through to Foundation Establishment is going to be difficult huh."

"Why don't you help me? Your fire attribute Qi is perfect for burning away the impurities. It's how you did for your own body." An Xin asked.

"It'll be very painful... Having your meridians burning is not a good feeling, and I barely controlled the fire Qi enough so that I wouldn't cripple myself. I already had quite a lot of impurities removed during my life or death battles in the war after recovering. I barely got through it thanks to your helpful healing of my meridians." Wei Bai tried to dissuade his wife.

"It's okay. I can take pain. We should prepare and do it sometime after Yan Yan weans off my milk." An Xin stubbornly said.

"But it will be difficult to heal yourself. Plus, you have to burn the impurities in the dantian at the very least in order to properly breakthrough to Foundation Establishment.

One wrong move and you'll injure your dantian and cripple yourself unless you got an amazing healing technique, or a medicinal pill. It might be even more expensive than getting a cleansing pill."

"But the cleansing pill also has its own pill toxins. It's going to leave a mark."

"At the very least, it will clear away the impurities in your dantian by a lot. It's safer as well."

"Enough. We will talk about this another time. Let's focus on making Yan Yan's charm first."

"Fine."

"So, I was thinking of bracelets at first, but if Yan Yan uses fist techniques, the bracelets might come off, so I thought of making ankle bracelets instead. Let's separate the bone pieces into 2 sets, where one set has the demonic core and the other set has the shadow pearl. One set will be made into an ankle bracelet, adding up to 2 for Yan Yan. The wire to hold the bracelet together, I want to use elastic silver iron as the material. What do you think?" An Xin excitedly explained her vision.

"I think it's great, quite practical, but how are you supposed to put those leg bones and the spinal cord on a bracelet?" Wei Bai questioned

"Eh... The leg bones I intended the grind it down into powder and then mix it with the leftover blood. You know how like there's always a teeny tiny bit of blood left on the bottom of the pot? I was going to mix that with bone powder and coat the fangs and claws with it... but now that I think about it, it's kind of a pity to break the spinal cord apart..." An Xin contemplated.

"How about we make a neck bracelet instead. the spinal cord will form the back, while the demonic core and shadow pearl will be placed at the 2 ends of the spinal cord, then separated by the teeth and claws of the wolf. We will do as you say for the other bones." Wei Bai suggested.

"That's not a bad idea either. In fact, it's pretty great! It will go well with the scarf I'm going to make. Speaking of which, I should prepare the hide and fur. Could you help me get some hide tanning solution? The high-quality one that makes the hide very soft and comfortable to wear, and yet still makes it quite tough, flexible, and stretchy." An Xin begged Wei Bai with her apatite gem-like puppy eyes.

"...I-I-..."

*Stares with tears threatening to spill out of puppy eyes*

*sigh*

"...Fine. Why don't you go and prepare the bone powder? I'll go get the tanning solution and elastic silver iron." Wei Bai relented, unable to resist the ultimate weapon used by his wife, the puppy eyes!

'There goes half of my fortune. I was going to buy the Meridian Cleansing Pill, but it looks like I can only go for the Dantian Cleansing Pill. Maybe I'll just practice making it instead at the Alchemist Association. There should be some people who posted such jobs...' Wei Bai sorrowfully thought as he walked out.

"Ah! Right! Bai Bai! Give me a drop of your blood essence. I want to add it into the solution coating the bones as well as the core and pearl." An Xin ran out and shouted at Wei Bai.

"...At this rate, this charm is really going to become something super fancy, you know that right??" Wei Bai questioned as he then bit his tongue, spitting out a drop of shinning blood and caught it with his Qi.

"Here."

"Thank you~ I love you so much~!" *Muuuah~!* An Xin whispered in his ears and kissed him on the lips, then took out a jade bottle and scooped the blood up, and scampered away into their bedroom.

*sigh*

Wei Bai shook his head with a smile on his face as he set off to gather the things An Xin wanted, she took out 3 more jade bottles from her space ring.

'Powderizing Solution, Liquidising Solution, and Fusing Solution. I can't believe I'm using it on some bones instead of spirit stones. My colleagues would be choking me if they saw that. "Using formation making materials on a tradition, what were you thinking?!" they would say...' An Xin humorously thought, while taking out all the bones in the clay pot.

She separated the teeth, claws, and the spinal cord from the pile of bones and then placed them in her space ring.

She then took out her powder dish, a wide plate with the edges curving up and inwards to prevent the powder from spilling. She placed the bones in the dish, and slowly drip the Powderizing Solution on the bones, careful not to waste any.

After ensuring all the bones have been powderized with little waste of the solution, An Xin then took out the claws, fangs, spinal cord, demonic core of the wolf, and the shadow pearl from her space ring and started drilling a hole in all of them at the thickest part, above the powder dish using a hand boring drill. After boring all the holes she needed, she mixed all of the different powders up, so that she will get an even mixture.

She placed the Powderizing Solution jade bottle back into her space ring and gathered all the bone powder and poured it into the remaining blood in the clay pot and stirred it around. An Xin then bit her own tongue, and spit her blood essence into the mixture and took out Wei Bai's blood essence and poured it into the mixture. She then uncorked the Liquidising Solution, dripping the solution drop by drop and stirring the mixture with the solution until all of the mixture becomes liquid, using her water Qi.

Waiting for the solution to set a little, An Xin then took the claws, fangs, spinal cord, demonic core and shadow pearl, all with holes, and soaked them in the crimson bone solution. Stirring the mixture around and ensuring all the bones are coated with the solution, she then dripped in 10 drops of Fusing Solution.

'10 drops should be enough. It's a low-quality one, that only fuses the solution into the solid slightly beneath and around the surface, which is good enough. Now all that's left is waiting for the solution to soak in and the elastic silver iron wire.' An Xin thought as she kept all her bottles and tools into her space ring.

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An (double)hour later...

"I'm back! I brought the wire for you!" Wei Bai shouted from outside.

"Really? Great! I'm all done already, just waiting for the wire. The bones have turned out nicely!" An Xin excited shouted back, bringing the bones and spheres out to show her husband.

"It looks great. You even made a hole in each of them for the wire to go through." Wei Bai complemented after seeing her work.

"Of course. I put in a lot of effort to make this you know?" An Xin smugly smiled as she then proceeded to explain the whole process of making the bones and spheres, while taking the elastic silver iron wire from Wei Bai's hands, and started threading the spinal cord at the back, the demonic core and shadow pearl at both ends, with the fangs and claws alternating in the middle.

After finished explaining, An Xin asked, "Help me hold and heat up the ends of these 2 wires together until it almost melts."

Wei Bai complied, and An Xin took out her Fusing Solution. She carefully dripped 2 drops into the hot, molten elastic silver iron that was about to melt and drip onto the floor.

The molten silver iron gave out a sizzling sound, and slowly fused together into a single piece of wire, looking like it was always a circle of wire.

""Done!"" The couple sighed out together at the completion of their daughter's charm, her neck bracelet(?), that is the perfect size, just a little larger than the neck of an adult male.

"I'll give it to Yan Yan when she wakes up. For now, I guess it's more of a necklace than a neck bracelet." An Xin commented with a chuckle.

"Okay. Pass me the pelt, I'll go take it to the tanning house." Wei Bai assented.

That evening, a very jubilant baby, that was actually secretly watching the whole process, happily cried out in joy when An Xin placed the 'necklace' on her neck through her head.