Chương 16: Cut Open the Dantian

The rest of the week passed in a blur for Paike. His days consisted of going from one class back to cultivation, then to the other class, and back to cultivation again. Luckily, cultivators didn't need as much sleep because he wasn't sure if he got a single wink of it. Every time he thought he had everything under control, something happened to nudge his cultivation off. Either he uncovered a new imbalance, found more impurities, or maybe he just got better at recognizing what was wrong.

Still, every time he fixed something, he did feel stronger—better? Cultivation became easier, and he knew he was getting close to advancing. Even his physical cultivation was getting close to awakening. Around half the physical cultivation class had awoken at some point or another. Each one was a notable event and almost evenly spaced out through the increasingly difficult challenges that Elder Ji was having them do. But Paike wasn't quite there yet. He was close, though.

The whole week, he had been singularly focused. His only interactions with people were brief exchanges of words with his sister in passing and a few minutes scarfing down food with Guan Li, who had graciously taken up shopping for groceries for both of them. Paike funded the whole thing, so it seemed about even. But for the most part, he focused purely on his cultivation. And it wasn't in vain, either.

As he unpacked more and more of the recovered power into his dantian, the stretching feeling grew until, eventually, he couldn't assimilate anything more from the ancient spirit. Part of that was because every time he broke down the more powerful qi, it split and became twice as much qi, but in a lesser form. One of the things he had discovered as he worked was that the qi didn't need to divide just once. That first division had got him out of immediate danger, but he still hadn't brought it down to his level yet.

For the first time since awakening, he hadn't had to rely on his rather janky method of cultivation. Just breaking down the qi into its component parts had been more than enough to fuel his growth. Now, the pressure from his dantian was preventing him from splitting down the mostly refined qi. It wasn't close to endangering him, but it was still uncomfortable. So, he finally prepared to cultivate external qi again.

He waited until after the physical cultivation class when he'd have the most time to repair any damage he might do. He couldn't help the smile that snuck onto his face. It had been six days of orientation, and so far, he might be the first to break into the Middle Ruby stage. There was one more day of classes before things would change. The elder still hadn't fully explained what was going to happen when the truce ended, but, well... it seemed like more power was going to be helpful.

Many of the other students had been forming factions. No one had tried to get him to join. But his sister was a prime target for recruitment. It didn't bother him. The Kong liked to stand alone. He was practically giddy with excitement. Could he be the first in this new batch to advance? That seemed so unlikely. If someone had told him that at the beginning of his time in the sect, he would have laughed or cried, but no one would have believed it.

Sure, he was lagging a little bit behind in physical cultivation, slightly below average, but his spiritual cultivation? Well, judging from the comments made by Elder Chu, it was progressing nicely. There was just the minor detail about the odd aspect his qi had taken on. He'd done his best to investigate it with his cultivation but hadn't had time to go to the library yet. He still found out something new every time he examined it.

There was earth, dark dampness, and then there were emotions, too—somewhere in this foreign aspect there was a bit of aggression. But that wasn't all. Behind that aggression, there was the patient steadfastness of a hunter. Perhaps a hunter was the wrong comparison. Maybe it was like a boulder unwilling to be moved. That still wasn't right, but Paike couldn't put it into words yet. The more he examined it, the more he felt that it suited him.

Whether that was him changing to match the qi or the qi having miraculously matched his personality, he wasn't exactly sure. He'd have to talk to his sister about this. She should have less biased insight into who he was before than he did. After all, there was a reason why a lot of fire cultivators were hotheads. Realizing he had been stalling in his own thoughts, Paike reached out with his mind and grabbed as large a section of qi from the chamber as he could get.

It was significantly larger than the time he'd done it on the carriage ride here; his power and control had grown, even if his speed had not. He gently pulled it into his dantian, intentionally severing the membrane beforehand to prevent tearing. Yanking in the tendril, he coiled it around the edges of his core, even as he began to patch up the membrane. If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. He split his focus into two parts.

The first thread of thought was taking the qi and cycling it through his organs and channels, flushing everything slowly, pushing it so that it assimilated and became his. The second and more important part was stitching together the dantian membrane before he spilled his spiritual guts all over the floor. Slowly, the new qi became his, and the pressure built. It was a delicate balance. He wasn't even sure if he could walk the tightrope, but he had to try.

If he was not fast enough at assimilating the qi, he would be poisoned, and whatever influences and impurities the environmental qi had in it would linger with him for too long. On the other hand, this process ramped up the pressure that he had to race against. He carefully closed up the self-inflicted spiritual wound. If he was too slow with the stitching, the dantian would rip, and he would split in half, possibly even losing his cultivation.

Fortunately, because of how his qi moved, he had much more time to fix this environmental qi, meaning he could take in a larger batch and process it later. If even a talented cultivator tried this insane procedure, they would surely die. But then, there was no reason for them to use such drastic measures when they could just cultivate on the time frame of hours rather than months. That wasn't to say he could afford to waste time. The amount of qi he had pulled in was just about at his limit.

Most cultivators cultivated a small amount of qi at a time but at a continually fast pace. He just didn't have the talent for that. But, well, he also didn't know how much qi he needed. But he viewed taking too much as less of a risk than continually cutting open his dantian over and over, so he would rather do this once than risk exploding time after time. Perhaps he was just being greedy and ambitious, but he felt that he needed to take risks to keep up with everyone.

With the last mental stitch finished, Paike did a once-over of his sutured dantian membrane and found that it was satisfactory. The tautness was pulling at the injury, but not to the point of breaking it. So he dove in further, pushing his qi in an even faster rhythm. With all his might, he forced it to become his, expelling impurities and influences. As it spread, the pressure on the edges of the dantian grew and grew until it suddenly gave out and snapped.

At first, he thought he had just destroyed his own cultivation. Still, he realized that the sudden jerking wasn't a tearing or breaking but an expansion. His eyes snapped open and blazed with blinding light and triumph. Strength and weakness coursed through his body and blended into one confusing surge. In a sudden moment, he'd gone from Early Ruby to Middle Ruby and now had plenty of space for the qi he had pulled in. Still, he couldn't stop, as he had a thousand tasks to do.

Every corner of his foundations needed to be shored up. His cultivation needed to be checked. Qi needed to be cycled, and he still had a significant amount of qi left from a higher realm that he had been breaking down since last week. Diving back into his meditation he lost himself in the painstaking process, reviewing every detail dozens of times, slowly correcting imperfections or mistakes he had made, and finding new ones.

Each correction shifted the balance slightly, forcing him to go over everything all over again. But each time was easier. His sense of the qi was now in a different realm.

"Good morning," Guan Li said, and Paike could sense a significant amount of hesitation in his voice. Paike was already waiting at the kitchen table with a massive grin on his face that refused to go away. He had very faint shadows under his eyes but otherwise looked good. In fact, better than good—there was a certain healthy glow about Paike that he couldn't suppress.

"Good morning," Paike responded in a cheery tone.

"Everything all right?" Guan Li asked.

"Yes. Can't you tell?" Paike asked. Guan Li shook his head.

"No. What happened?"

"I advanced," Paike said with a slight laugh.

"You're looking at the first Middle Ruby of our class. That I know of, at least." Guan Li blinked.

"That's what you've been doing?" Paike tilted his head in mock confusion.

"Yes, I've been cultivating, and if you cultivate enough, you advance. Usually. Especially in lower realms. Were you not paying attention in Elder Chu's lessons?"

"What? No," Guan Li said.

"I thought you were trying to purify qi and stay alive. I didn't realize you were working towards advancement." Paike waved his hand back and forth in a non-committal way.

"They're practically the same thing. It's in all the stories, you know. Take a massive risk, and if you survive, you come out better for it." Guan Li shook his head.

"Those aren't the stories I remember growing up with." There was a certain bitterness in his tone that Paike would need to look into but now wasn't the time.

"Yeah, so... Well, everything was risky, but I think I came out better for it. At least I'm staying ahead. Not fully out of danger yet." Guan Li sighed, putting his hand on his heart dramatically.

"Well, thank the spirits. Now you can finally get your sister off my back." Paike frowned.

"What? Is Liming okay?" Guan Li snorted.

"Liming is fine. She's just been worried about you."

"I've been talking to her," Paike defended himself. THey had exchanged words everyday. Guan Li gave him a look.

"Yeah, well, tell her to stop bugging me about how you're doing." Paike grumbled but didn't lose his smile.

"Fine. I'll talk to her. You ready for our last class?" Guan Li nodded.

"Yeah. I'm interested in what Elder Chu has in store for us."