Golden Meridians was an interesting technique. Like strands of spider silk, barely detectable even if you knew where to look, thin and transparent threads ran throughout my body. Starting from the middle of my chest where they were all connected, they spread out, two to each of my limbs where they branched further just like the blood vessels which I used as the template.

Qi flowed through them smoothly. Smoother than anything I have ever experienced before. And then I did something stupid. I cast a spell. A simple Fireball, sending the Qi from my chest through the newborn meridians.

They burned up in a flash of fire and pain, and my hand became crippled. Long Dong buried his face in his palms as I grit my teeth and shouted curses in my mind.

No words were exchanged, but I understood. They were not yet ready to be used. I had to remove the entire pathway and create a new one, which took me an entire day. One day for every one of the seeds.

The technique was complicated, requiring Qi to be compressed and stretched into a thin, nearly invisible strand, and then twisted, together with countless more, and fashioned into a sort of rope. And then that creation had to be held in place for hours on end, through each of my limbs, so it would take root.

And considering the final product was thinner than a hair, you could imagine how mind-numbingly boring the work was. Complete concentration was required for the entirety of the duration, usually enhanced by various stimulants for most Disciples to have even a chance to accomplish. Also one of the reasons only those at Golden Core Realm used the technique. That, and also because Golden Qi was required for its completion.

I just barely planted the seed and was already fed up with it. Just thinking how I would have to strengthen the Golden Meridians, layer after layer, month after month, made me wish there was a skip button. Unfortunately, there wasn’t one.

[Okay, it’s done. Now what?] I said after reconstructing the meridian for the second time. They were so insanely fragile, I failed the first few tries. It had been two weeks since the Lightning incident, and my leg was fully healed.

“For the love of everything that is holy, do not use your meridians for magic! I didn’t think that needed to be said, but clearly…”

[Yeah, yeah… I was curious. And besides, it’s just one extra day. Don’t be so grumpy.]

“Easy for you to say, at least you are doing something. I’m just sitting here, in the Thousand Faces Mask, slowly dying of boredom.”

It had to be said that the old ghost was surprisingly understanding, and was quiet for most of the last two weeks while I was training. It was actually in his interest not to bug me, since the sooner I was done, the sooner we would go out. Being stuck between four walls, with just a bed for company, didn’t exactly make for an interesting view.

“Now just use magic as you did before and let the meridians alone. They will slowly strengthen and become permanent, but you cannot damage them, or you will have to start from the beginning again!”

He especially emphasized the last part, making sure I understood. And believe me, I did. I was just as bored as him. It was time to get out into the sun and stretch my legs, and maybe find some of the herbs required for the Ether Blood while we were at it.

I suspected it was similar to the Mana Elixirs I used to drink since they both increased the concentration of Ether the blood could safely sustain. Though the herbs used were different, so maybe it wasn’t exactly the same.

Since eating all those Ether Crystals my capacity for Qi increased a bit. I had close to 800 points of Nascent Soul Qi. While the increase in the capacity wasn’t much, just about 10%, the quality was a big difference. I needed just a fraction of the energy for each spell due to the increased efficiency.

Actually, I began having a different set of problems. I had no magic that could make use of my ludicrously large energy stores, so most of it went unused. It was like having a mini with a fuel tank of a big rig. Complete overkill.

I guessed I could simply overwhelm my opponents with the quantity, but nothing beat a good quality spell.

Too bad all the extreme magic was locked behind Golden Qi. I internally sighed and pushed the greedy thoughts of power to the back of my mind. Some rules just couldn’t be broken.

I passed the invisible barrier to the Sect, immediately feeling the increased density in Base Qi. It made it much easier to recharge inside it than in the wild. It also had a nicer smell to it, and I wasn’t just talking about the fragrance of freshly roasted meat, though that was nice too.

“Oh, hey… It’s you again!” I heard someone call, and as I turned around I came face to face with Su Ker, the hired muscle of the White Minks. His thugs were right behind him looking at me funny when he extended his hand toward me.

“We’ve been looking for y-”

I expertly dodged his grab and moved to the side and threw out a punch, all in one swift motion. He went sprawling on the ground while I turned around and ran. The last thing I needed was those guys to sour my day.

Running through back alleys and picking random directions, I quickly lost anyone attempting to pursue me. Though I didn’t exactly see anyone running after me, it was better to stay on the safe side. The Sect was big and their group was small. Even if they had eyes and ears everywhere, the information still traveled too slowly to catch someone constantly on the move.

I decided against going to a restaurant for my meal in case I got cornered, and instead picked a snack from one of the many food stalls. And even though I had a lot of money, I didn’t splurge on things, instead taking the most economic stuff I could get. The money was for pills, not for pleasure. Well, at least not yet.

***

I took out my little notebook and opened it to the page where I recorded the recipe for…

[What was that thing called again?]

“Ethereal Brew. But man, this place sure changed since I was last here. So many new buildings everywhere. There is not a trace of the last battle.”

[Last battle?]

“Oh yeah… There is, or used to be, this massive Dragon population further to the north. And while they are usually pretty quiet, once every century or so, the males have a massive mating season battle. It usually lasts anywhere between a month to half a year as far as I know, and during that time they are super aggressive, attacking anything that moves.”

[You are kidding...]

“No, I’m serious. Their aggression forces other beasts in the vicinity to migrate away, usually to the south, which leads to fights between the beasts there, cascading the problem further down the chain. Cultivators around these parts call that phenomenon a Beast Tide, and it lasts anywhere between a few months to a year. During that time the wilderness becomes much more dangerous and you can hear the beasts fighting almost constantly.”

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

My face scrunched up as I realized the implication of the old ghost’s words. I didn’t like it, I didn’t like it at all!

“Now that I think about it… There was one just before I… you know, changed, and there hasn’t been one since right? Things seem quite peaceful at the moment. Unless something happened to the Dragons, which is unlikely, I would expect to hear an announcement by the Elders soon.”

[Son of a bitch!] I loudly cursed and broke into a run.

“Hey, what’s going on?”

[I have seen this situation before.]

“You have?! Impossible, you are too young!”

[No, I mean I have read about it. It never ends well for the little guy!]

“Whaaaaat? No way, don’t compare stories to reality. As long as you stay in the… Oh, wait. Only the Core Sect gets protected by the barrier. Hmm, yeah, no… You are right, you are screwed. We are all going to die.”

[Could you show at least a bit of urgency please?]

“And do what? I have already lived longer than I should, and I’m bound to you. I literally can’t do anything on my own.”

[Search through that rotten brain of yours and get me a technique or something that will help me then!]

“Sorry, as much as I would like to, I did not lie. You need Golden Core Realm for them to be of any use.”

[Fuck!] I came to one of the many shops that were selling alchemy ingredients and entered with haste. They actually had a roof over the entrance, unlike many others that made you stand out in the open.

[Hello!] I greeted with the cupped fist and bow combo. [I’m wondering if you have any of these...]

I showed the list to the guy behind the counter and he gave it a glance before looking at me with a raised brow.

[An Elder gave me the list.] I quickly said, which was technically the truth. Long Dong was an Elder of the Sect.

“I see…” Senior Brother behind the counter just nodded and turned around to check the various drawers and small boxes for the required ingredients. Soon he had everything I needed neatly packed into a waxed paper box tied with a string. He placed it on the counter.

“437.”

[Hmm? 437?] I blinked a few times, my mind too distracted to process his words.

“Spirit Stone Shards, Junior. I assume you got the money?”

[Ah? Oh, yes of course...] I absentmindedly reached into my pouch and brought out nearly every single Spirit Shard I had. My face was expressionless, but my heart was tearing itself apart. Why was it so expensive?! Damn the old ghost!

“Pleasure doing business with you. Give my regards to the Elder.”

[Yes, likewise…] I took the box and slowly made my way out of the shop, feeling dead inside. I dragged my feet as I slowly made my way home with the parcel in my hands.

“Are you okay? You don’t look too good.” The old ghost’s words woke me up from my stupor and snapped me back to reality.

[Are you kidding me?! More than 400 Spirit Stone Shards?! What the fuck!]

“Hey, what did you expect? You are lucky the brew is easy to make because otherwise, you would have to buy it, and believe me, it would have been double that.”

[Seriously?! What are these prices?!]

“Relax, that’s for the special ingredients. Most common herbs are grown in the Sect and the pills made from them rarely go over 100 Spirit Stone Shards.”

I didn’t reply, but I did breathe out a sigh of relief. If they were any more expensive than that, I might just abandon the thought of using drugs to boost my power.

I quickly visited the Trade Hall and sold the Wind Crystal of the Howler. I once thought I might need it, but clearly, that wasn’t the case. I got almost 100 SSS out of it, so that was nice. It helped to soothe my bleeding heart.

[Now what?] I asked after leaving. I still had to make the Ethereal Brew.

“Get a cauldron for starters and a pouch of Pure Ether dust, then I’ll tell you what you need to do.”

I did as he asked and bought a small copper cauldron that could maybe hold 5 liters of liquid as well as a fistful of Ether Dust and returned home. There I filled the cauldron with water and set it over a fire on the tripod that came with it. After that, I took out the herbs and cleaned them up, before discarding the unwanted parts. I then chopped the goods nice and small, before tossing them in the water according to what the old ghost was telling me.

“Okay, now gently reach in with your Qi, I said gently! Damn it kid, gently! Now mix in the Ether dust, careful not to burn the stuff, and lower the flame just below the boiling point. Good, now keep stirring it around until it all blends together. Just keep stirring it with your Qi and infuse the liquid with it, gently!”

The process was nerve-wracking with him shouting in my mind all the time, but eventually, I succeeded. I let the brew cool down a bit before tasting it. There was about one liter of it left in the end.

“Alright, now take note of the time. You have to take one sip three times a day in equally spaced intervals until it’s empty.”

[Seriously? That’s going to take me a whole week.]

“It should be 10 days, but yes, a week is also reasonable. What did you think, this is a one-time thing?”

I wanted to say yes, but then again, medicine oftentimes needed a while to work.

“By the way, this is going to spoil in a few hours. You’d better get some wax and make it into pills.”

[Now you tell me? Are you serious?] I immediately ran to get a wax ingot and then extracted enough water from the brew to get a bright green paste which I then shaped into small spheres and encased in wax. There were exactly 24 of them, enough for 8 days.

I threw the first one into my mouth and stored the rest. I then washed the cauldron and tried to store it in my pouch, but alas, it was too big to fit through the opening. Having no other choice, I placed it inside my mostly empty house.

It had been a few minutes since I ate the pill when I began feeling it work. A weird sensation spread from my stomach and through my body as the concoction was absorbed into my bloodstream and began changing my blood from the inside.

It was an automatic process and I didn’t have to think about it. I just sat on the ground and circulated my Qi as I began my Body Cultivation session. I didn’t even bother with Soul Cultivation since it was so slow, and besides, I just had to kill to receive a boost.

Supposedly people needed about 18 months of Cultivation to advance just the first level in Nascent Soul Realm, and I believed it to be true because when I did Cultivate, there was barely a smidgen of improvement. Manually Cultivating was for sure going to take me over a year just for this one step. I would need at least two decades to reach Golden Core on my own, and that simply wasn’t viable. Especially if there was a potential Beast Tide coming.

“Oh, come on, it’s not that bad. There usually aren’t even that many beasts in the Spirit Realm. Most of them are only Golden Core and below.” The old ghost tried to console me. Yeah, as if that would fucking work. Even the Elders were in danger during the Beast Tide, much less the Disciples.

It was one of the reasons the Dragons there were still alive. They were fucking unkillable! If the strongest beasts that ran away were in Spirit Realm, then what about the Dragons?

“The really old ones are in the high Sky Realm, and who knows, maybe one or two of them even reached the Demigod status. It was never confirmed though. Anyone that went to those lands either came back empty-handed or didn’t come back at all.”

[Is this supposed to comfort me? You are just making it worse!]

“What I’m trying to say is that worrying about it is unproductive. If they attack then most Sects on the continent will be wiped out. It’s as simple as that.”

I wanted to protest, I really did. The old ghost basically told me there were beings with the powers of a nuke just roaming around. But he was right. If they wanted to crush us, we would have no way of defending ourselves. It’s like worrying about a meteor falling on your head. It’s not like you would see it coming or could do anything to prevent it. If it happened, it happened.

I stuffed the worry to the back of my mind and circulated my Qi. I didn’t like to admit it, but it was starting to feel good. There was still pain from cell damage, but most of it was getting replaced by a dull ache, making me feel slightly bloated, like getting a good pump in the gym.

It was evidence of my body getting used to the stress I was putting it through, so I increased the intensity.

There was a single thought I had in my mind when Cultivating. And that was compress. When Qi filled my cells and they tried to expand, I would focus my mind and contain them, forcing them to bear the pressure while trying to make them smaller. They didn’t actually shrink, but they did become slightly denser and resistant to damage. The change was barely noticeable after one session, and if not specifically looking for it, there would appear to be no change at all.

But after weeks and months, the results would show themselves as I steadily gained weight even though it didn’t seem like it on the surface.

After finishing that, I still took some time to train in Scales of the Earth as well as the Turtle Breathing technique to steady my Aura. I already achieved some success with it, and I had noticed other kids were also training in various Aura-hiding techniques, so most people in the Sect appeared as simple Mortals if observed through Magic Eyes. The only thing distinguishing us were the clothes we wore as well as our age. Though that too could be manipulated with the Divine Complexion Pill making you look younger. But that was something really expensive and almost exclusively used by women.

And so, having my plate full, I continued with my solitude and Cultivated for the following week until the pills were gone. I guess you could say I was in a closed-door-Cultivation. I just shook my head at the thought.

I was slowly becoming a real Cultivator.