Han Xuhan sat inside his hut, on his bed, and stared at his two hands, which he had just used to clean his boss's toilet.

The trauma had better be worth it.

Regardless, it was a small price to pay when he had gotten such precious secrets and knowledge from his martial brother.

Zeroth layer of physique transformation realm? If you exist, I'm about to hit you up!

He had bought the equipment for rich beginners from the Treasury without a hitch. They had even given him a lucky coupon for his first purchase...with which he had hit the jackpot!

The prizes were a 'Thank You' note, a 2.5% discount (rounded down to 2%), and another lucky coupon which could only be activated if he visited them again within a week.

Han Xuhan had been awed, not at their shamelessness, but at their ingenious business scheme. This sect was truly a top-tier institution for education, real education.

Taking a deep breath, Xuhan busied himself with the instructions to operate the devices.

The first device was called...the qi cannon.

With a one-foot-long barrel that sported a pinhole-sized opening, this cannon would shoot bursts of liquified qi at its target. Since beginner cultivators were unable to smoothly attract qi towards themselves, rich families bought these watergun-no, qi cannons for their children. It provided the beginners with a highly malleable, maneuverable supply of moving qi, rushing right to their meridians!

This way, it not only helped them cultivate, but also trained them into sensing qi in the air and what it feels like to absorb it.

His second purchase was an ointment, to be applied on the skin before cultivation. It would open up the pores of his skin, letting the process of qi entering his meridians become smooth.

The third and final gadget was a giant funnel, its narrow end attached to a glass bottle. Intricately carved inscriptions and symbols crowded the body of the funnel, giving it a somewhat sinister, archaic appearance. This funnel would apparently attract the qi which he would fail to absorb into his body. With the qi cannon in front, and the qi funnel at his back, he could cultivate effortlessly without worry. However high the amount of unabsorbed qi became, it would be gathered up and processed inside the bottle, ready to be recycled as new ammunition for the cannon.

Once he had gotten a good grasp of the basics of practical cultivation this way, he could slowly practice without these 'training wheels'.

After going through the instructions, Han Xuhan placed the formation of devices accordingly and sat at the center of the room.

With a flick of a switch, the gears of the automated cannon began to move.

Click. HISSS!

Click. HISSS!

Click. HISSS!

With each shot, light red jets of qi (mint flavored) splattered on his naked body. The ointment was doing its job well. Xuhan's skin was crawling, as if tiny insects were all over his body, walking, biting, scratching...

It was time to concentrate fully on sensing qi.

Gritting his teeth, Xuhan bore with the discomfort, trying to get a good feel of the wet fluids dripping from his body.

He could sense the same thing repeatedly smacking on to various parts of his body.

Putting his full mental effort into it, he tried to exert some form of control over it.

Nothing happened. The cannon continued to fire away, his body began to shiver from the cold.

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Then, the ammunition of the cannon ran out.

Just as he was expecting the discomfort to go away, it became even stronger instead. The imaginary insects on his body were now bigger and bit harder, scratching him bloody...

Is it finally happening?!

Han Xuhan's chest began to heave as he tried to mentally picture a forceful absorption of the qi on him. His head hurt from the conscious, furious effort.

Beginning to feel breathless suddenly, his nostrils flared from trying to breathe properly, yet his windpipes seemed to have been blocked by solidified air.

In his panic, Han Xuhan tried to stop, but his limbs had gone numb at some point. Losing his balance, he banged his head on the bed frame and groaned one last time before falling unconscious.

...... .....

"Wake up, brother Xuhan."

Rays of bright sunlight hit his bleary eyes.

Han Xuhan blinked dazedly and jumped up from his bed. The memories of last evening came back in a flood of terror and confusion. Whipping his head around, he saw Xiao Wu staring at him with a rather strange expression.

"Martial brother, I didn't know you were such a smooth player. One day in the sect and you already...sigh, never mind."

"Wh-what are you talking about?"

"Hah, look at yourself first. You sure had a...rough night, hehehe."

Xuhan looked down and saw that he was nearly naked, with his underwear sporting a large tear from being stretched. His bed was messy, but he himself was on the floor, and his head sported a considerable bump upon touching, which he discovered the hard way after slapping himself there.

"Tell me the truth, brother. Who was it, eh? She sure roughed you up..."

As pissed as he felt about the situation, Han Xuhan swallowed all the rage and described his experience of trying to absorb qi to Xiao Wu.

Xiao Wu looked more disappointed than surprised.

"Isn't that normal? Qi isn't something you can absorb that easily on your first attempt. You probably tried to absorb too much and received a backlash. Although it seems a bit exaggerated in your case, it's a good thing that you managed to get going on the path to becoming a cultivator. The deadline is coming closer every day for you.

"Now that I think of it, who gave you these obsolete gadgets? The models are so old..." Xiao Wu's eyes suddenly widened.

"Wait a damn minute, did you hook up with an elder?!"

"...No! I bought them from the Treasury! And what do you mean these devices are old?"

"Damn, martial brother. You got scammed again! Look at the paint on the gadgets, look at the blurred inscriptions on the qi collector! And this bottle of ointment-" Xiao Wu sniffed the mouth of the bottle as he added," this ointment is about to go bad soon, martial brother. Did you really take the stuff on display in the treasury without checking?!" Xiao Wu gasped.

"I...how the hell was I supposed to check? I don't know anything about how these things work!" Han Xuhan said, his expression darkening at the revelation.

"You could've just asked me for help! I may not be much of a cultivator myself, but I hail from a family of cultivators. I told you that already!"

"...I didn't think of that," Han Xuhan muttered.

Indeed, he had assumed he could trot his way forward in this foreign world without the direct help of others. Reading too many such novels about loners had truly harmed his way of thinking.

Man was a social being, not just due to his own interest, but also due to the interest of other men. Being a loner meant he would just get taken advantage of.

"What's done is done. You should focus on your progress now. How does your body feel? Can you sense the heaviness in your meridians?

Han Xuhan furrowed his brows and tried to sense the changes in his body. Surprisingly, his perception of his own physique seemed to have improved by a great margin.

All across his body, he could feel the existence of alien threads, creating a complex, three-dimensional network.

So these were his meridians, finally caught in his perception after being filled with qi!

Awesome!

So awesome!

In his delight, he decided to forgive the senior disciples who had sold him those old cultivation gadgets.

"Feels quite satisfying, eh?"

Xiao Wu chuckled seeing Xuhan's invigorated expression.

"Yep, I feel so full though." Xuhan rubbed his stomach with a satisfied expression.

"Probably because you tried too hard and went overboard. The first time doesn't usually provide one with much qi."

"Now, my next step should be the cycling of the qi, right?" Han Xuhan laughed it off.

"No, now you'll have to learn how to control qi first. Do you think the spirit qi is a sentient creature that's going to listen to you or something? It's really difficult to move and control their flow with mental commands. I am at the second layer of the physique transformation, but even I have trouble completing a whole cycle, let alone you, a beginner."

Han Xuhan was stumped. He was already about to envision grand fantasies of commanding an army of skeletons screaming "BANZAI!". But it was dashed before he could even decide on the details of the scene, like how many damsels in distress would be present in the scene, and which type of waifus would be the first one to be saved...

"And that's where our lessons come in. The elders will teach you everything you want to know since you're a...top-tier student, from an economical viewpoint of course.

Check your schedule, we have lectures just an hour later. Let's go together. I have a feeling that the disciples from other mountain peaks might not hold us in a very high regard. We black sheep must stick together. "

Xuhan was delighted. At least something good came out of that shitty loan scam! Together with Xiao Wu, he came out of his hut and took in the gloomy, wintry scenery from the mountain peak. White snowflakes had covered the ground, more were drifting along the wind.

The two boys carefully walked down from the snow-covered mountain peak to attend their first-ever official lesson on cultivation.