Chapter 309: Incense-Making Craft, An Unbroken Inheritance

After staying at the Deer Sanctuary for a few days, Ning Fei returned to Qingfeng Temple.

The sika deer fawns were clearly adapting well to the environment at the Deer Sanctuary. They bounced around every day and looked to be in great spirits.

Naturally, Xiao Yu the Deer remained the most popular among them.

Its antlers had grown a little more, and the new sections were still a crystalline, translucent white.

Ning Fei guessed that Xiao Yu the Deer was a mutated sika deer breed. Moreover, it was inherently spiritual, making it a rare treasure.

When the owner of the deer farm who sold the animals to Ning Fei found out, he was sick with regret. But the contract was already signed, leaving him with no options.

Upon returning to Qingfeng Temple, Ning Fei first went to the Three Purities Hall to sweep the dust and offer incense.

Whenever he was at the temple, offering three sticks of incense in the morning and three at night was the tradition of Qingfeng Temple.

While offering the incense, Ning Fei noticed that their supply was running out.

Seeing this, he knew it was time to make more sacred incense for worship.

Ning Fei walked out into the courtyard and spoke to the viewers in his live stream.

"The incense in the Three Purities Hall is almost gone," he said.

"Ever since Qingfeng Temple was founded, the incense has been made by hand by the Temple Master or Vice Temple Master."

"So, today I plan to craft some sacred incense for our offerings."

The viewers were quite surprised by his announcement.

"Making incense?"

"How do you even make that stuff?"

"I'm actually really curious about how sacred incense is crafted."

"Isn't it all made by machines nowadays?"

"Back in the old days, they didn't have incense-making machines. They had to make it bit by bit by hand."

"Yeah, traditional Huaxia customs require worship during every festival, so the consumption of incense is massive."

At this point, Ning Fei calmly explained.

"In ancient Huaxia, incense making had already developed into a comprehensive theoretical system that shared the same lineage as traditional medicine and Daoism's external alchemy. It is an inseparable part of traditional Huaxia culture."

"Incense can nourish the nose with its fragrance, soothe the spirit, maintain health, and open the mind to wisdom. From the early Qin and Han dynasties to the late Ming and Qing eras, it won widespread popularity across all social classes."

"Most of the incense on the market today is a product of chemical engineering. Modern incense-making pursues aromatic scents but has completely abandoned the health-nourishing properties."

"Furthermore, to increase production efficiency and lower material costs, many chemical additives are used, which damages the quality of the incense."

"Using that kind of incense for worship is considered disrespectful here at Qingfeng Temple."

Whenever Ning Fei spoke about traditional Huaxia culture, his image and temperament seemed to carry an innate halo of authority.

The antique elements and traditional charm of his demeanor naturally drew people in, capturing their attention with his every move.

Much like his videos of making oil-paper umbrellas and carving stone steles, which had garnered exceptionally high like counts online.

People simply loved watching these things.

Moreover, Ning Fei's looks and disposition were top-tier. Even if he did nothing at all, a whole crowd of people would still be willing to just watch him.

As Ning Fei made his preparations, his stream exploded with popularity as usual.

With his current standing, he wasn't just the top streamer on Douniao Live anymore; he was the undisputed number one streamer across all platforms.

Recently, as the New Year approached, a "Most Influential Streamer" ranking had been organized online, and Ning Fei dominated the first-place spot with an overwhelming lead.

His influence score far exceeded the second-place streamer, Jiuri Baobao.

After learning the rankings, many of Jiuri Baobao's fans clamored about the unfairness in his stream. In response, Jiuri Baobao told his fans on stream, "Screw you monkeys, don't stir up trouble for me! That Temple Master is practically a god. Even I admire him endlessly. Don't drag me down!"

In the past, when upgrading his equipment in games, Jiuri Baobao used to pray to Brother Ma. Now, he would always say, "I'm begging Temple Master Ning to bless me with a +18 enhancement! I'll kowtow to you!"

The entertainment value was dialed to the max.

In third place was the positive-energy 'beauty' streamer Zhang Daxian. Back in the day, his looks were considered heavenly, but he had long since embarked on a one-way trip down the path of weight gain. In-game, he would shout, 'Once Frozen Heart is built, the game is over!' while in real life, he had gradually built 'tank gear' on himself.

Daxian also highly praised Ning Fei, complimenting him on stream: "I might be called Daxian, but he's a true immortal. All I can say is that I have nothing but respect."

An outdoor streamer surpassing gaming streamers in Popularity Points was a first in history.

By this time, Ning Fei had already started making the incense.

"The first step in crafting incense is selecting the raw materials. The vast majority of ingredients today use elm bark powder as a binder, adding in other components to form an incense paste before pressing it with tools."

"Besides the elm bark powder, the remaining ingredients are the key."

"The raw materials for Qingfeng Temple's incense are as follows:"

"Figwort, lychee peel, pine nut kernels, nutgrass flatsedge, cloves, licorice, a little angelica root, and a bit of cinnamon."

"If you want to make something like sleep-aiding meditation incense, you can also add some lavender powder and honey, depending on the situation."

"All of these ingredients must be ground into powder."

Ning Fei retrieved a grinding roller and crushed the ingredients bit by bit. He was incredibly patient and focused.

"Good Lord, is the incense used at Qingfeng Temple really this high-quality?"

"The raw materials aren't expensive; the hard part is the craftsmanship."

"Yeah, this is all about skill. Western perfumes, for example, pursue the pinnacle of industrialization, calculating ingredients down to the exact milliliter."

"Is there anything Temple Master Ning can't do?"

"He always surprises me when I least expect it. I really love this treasure of a streamer."

"A true all-around master!"

"I can't help but say it—badass!"

Ning Fei used the medicinal roller to crush the materials into fine fragments, then transferred the powder into a mortar to continue grinding.

The fineness and uniformity of the powder dictated the quality of the handmade incense.

"My master once said that blending, mixing, making, and using incense is a process of nourishing the heart, dispelling restlessness, and preserving health," Ning Fei said.

"It is also a form of cultivation."

Once Ning Fei finished grinding the incense powder, the viewers saw that the crushed material was as fine and uniform as salt. It looked incredibly soft.

Listening to his words, the audience gradually understood how Ning Fei had slowly cultivated his otherworldly temperament.

Ning Fei then fetched a gourd ladle of water.

"This is water from the well behind the Daoist temple. There's a well back there that has always been kept sealed; we just scoop out a ladle when we need it."

"The well water is clear, sweet, and ice-cold. It's groundwater that wells up after being naturally filtered through the mountain's body. It's absolute top-tier stuff."

Mixing the water and the incense powder together, Ning Fei took a small wooden stick and rapidly stirred the mixture.

"This step is crucial. The proportions must be appropriate and the stirring must be even. The blended material needs to form a single, solid block. That ensures there is no air inside the mixture during the crafting process, as air is detrimental to making incense."

Ning Fei spoke in a quiet, steady tone.

Far away in an ancient town somewhere in Jiangnan, members of a family with a long lineage of incense-making were also silently watching Ning Fei's live stream.

"Grandpa, what do you think of this guy?" a girl asked her grandfather, holding up her mobile phone like she was showing off.

The old man watched Ning Fei's incense-making technique on the screen and clicked his tongue in praise. "He has genuine skill. This young man isn't bad at all."

Hearing her grandfather's approval, the girl chuckled brightly.

"Of course! He's my 'idol' right now. He's seriously amazing."

In many places, countless people were watching Ning Fei's stream.

"The next part of the process is simple: pressing the incense and catching it," Ning Fei said.

Pressing the incense involved using a machine similar to a noodle press. He placed the material inside, then applied manual pressure, forcing the incense paste to extrude into long strips through a row of holes.

The visual of this was prone to reminding people of certain... appetite-ruining things.

He then placed the extruded incense into an Incense Screen.

An Incense Screen was essentially a wooden frame wrapped in a layer of gauze. The incense strips could be laid out on the gauze, making it easy to air-dry and cure them.

There were many ways to cure the incense: using a dryer, heating systems, heated brick beds, or natural air-drying.

Ning Fei placed the Incense Screen in the kitchen with the freshly made sticks laid out inside. Once the moisture gradually evaporated, the sacred incense for worship would be complete.

The entire process wasn't complicated, but it demanded patience and focus.

This was incredibly high-quality offering incense. Passed down through generations of Qingfeng Temple Masters, it ensured that the temple's incense smoke burned continuously without end.

"Now we just have to wait for them to dry completely, and the incense will be finished," Ning Fei told the stream.

"This kind of incense doesn't just soothe the spirit and calm the mind; it also helps people focus their thoughts."

"Huaxia's incense-making craft once enjoyed a golden age. Back then, the functions and categories of incense were incredibly diverse and complex, covering all sorts of effects."

"However, because the raw materials were complicated and Huaxia's traditional families always heavily guarded their secret incense recipes, coupled with the impact of industrialized perfumes, many incense-making crafts gradually faded into obscurity."

"In truth, the effects of many famous incenses are far better than perfumes. They're more natural and much more refreshing."

Ning Fei spoke with a hint of regret.

Shortly after, the viewers watched as Ning Fei walked into the Three Purities Hall, ostensibly to offer incense.

Before long, a few faint wisps of white smoke drifted out from the doorway, floating away into the distance.

Ning Fei felt deeply moved.

In that bygone era, the craft of incense-making bloomed like a hundred flowers. He didn't know how many of those techniques had actually been passed down to the present day.

Qingfeng Temple's incense-making method had been handed down from generation to generation. Its effects were far superior to what the viewers understood, capable of bringing a person's heart to a state of absolute tranquility.

This inheritance would never be broken.