Name: Max Oxford Level: 4 Cultivation: Body Tempering 3rd Stage Age: 23 Progress: 24/86 Progress: 6/150 Status: Weakened Body Titles: System Pioneer

Realm Walker

Cultivator Traits: Quick Learner

Cultivation Body Skills: Analyze

Common Tongue HP: 49/49 SP: 2/53 CHI: NA Stats (Multiplier:1.3x) Strength: 9 Perception 13 Constitution: 20 Intelligence: 22 Dexterity: 11 Spirit: 1 Endurance 13 Vitality: 9 Free Stat Points: 0

Reviewing the character sheet, Max remembers his stamina was at 8 when the hawk had died. Now it’s at 3.

He wasn’t sure how much stamina was used while working on the bird nor how much it took coming up and down the path. He made a mental note to keep track of it in the next hike. It was also nice to see that his HP had been steadily regenerating, and was already back to two-thirds full. Of course, this was partly because HP had also regenerated when the points were added to Constitution. Scanning the rest of the character sheet, his cultivation had progressed by 1. When he checked the sheet after defeating the hawk, it was still at 0.

‘So whatever caused it to progress has to be something I did after.’

Suddenly, it all clicked. The current stage was called “Body Tempering”, which likely meant all the physical activities he’s been doing contributed to tempering his body. Thinking back to his cultivation time in the cave, each time his stage increased, the only stats that increased were the physical ones.

‘So why did my cultivation increase when I was absorbing the Chi from that massive Chi Stone? Maybe Body Tempering needed a jumpstart? And the Chi stone served that purpose?’

At this point, not knowing all the answers were expected. He had only been in this world for half a day and there are still a lot of things to figure out.

Max was fairly sure that working out should progress his cultivation. Either way, with what happened in the morning, there wasn’t a downside in getting stronger. He planned to do some experiments later. Having a goal in mind, Max felt less lost and helpless. Back on Earth, Max had always been a goal-oriented person. He enjoyed the grind and testing out different things, but found that most personal growth came when there was a clear goal in mind.

‘But first thing is first, food.’

With all the climbing and prepping, another protest came from the stomach. The only thing he ate was a handful of moss and that was nowhere close.

Using the smaller Chi-Infused rock, strips of meat were cut off the leg of the hawk. After some time, there were ten strips of meat, each finger length laying on the grass. He made sure it didn’t have any of the skin since it was extremely tough and wasn’t sure he could even chew through it or his stomach could digest it.

Max needed his hands dry to make the fire, which he had some experience doing. When he was younger, all the kids in the neighborhood got together and decided to be mischievous. One of the older kids that just came back from a camping trip where his dad taught him how to make fire. That day half of the dumpster in their little community mysteriously caught on fire, there were literal dumpster fires around town. Somehow none of the adults found out, and no one got into trouble. Or maybe it just got swept under the rug. The kid that started all this was the son of some bigshot that worked in finance. Thinking back to that time, there were bound to be cameras around the dumpsters.

Max stripped the bark off a large branch. Using the Chi-Infused rock, he cut out a stick that was a foot long and about as thick as a quarter. Laying the large barkless branch flat on the ground, Max used the stick to slide back and forth along the branch. After five or so minutes, the friction created enough heat to light some small embers. The embers were transferred to a pile of dried leaves that Max had prepared beforehand. Gently stoking the embers, they ignited. More sticks were added to the fire until it was large enough to cook with.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

Each strip of meat was placed on its skewer and stabbed into the ground near the fire. He made sure to rotate each skewer every few minutes so they cooked evenly.

As Max let the meat cook, he decided to be productive with his time by doing pushups, situps, and squats. There was no better time to start his experiments than right now. The routine he came up with was to cycle through each workout 10 times and then rotate the skewers 90 degrees. It took him about two minutes to complete the entire cycle of workouts and about 15 minutes to finish cooking.

Four cycles in, Max was already exhausted. Pulling up the character sheet, stamina had bottomed out again. Unfortunately, there was no progress on the cultivation front.

‘That’s okay, I wasn’t expecting it to be that easy.’

For the next while, Max just sat there recuperating and making sure to turn the skewer every two minutes or at least what he thought was two minutes. Towards the end, the skewers were turned every time they looked like it was about to catch on fire. After a couple more turns, Max ripped a piece off one of the skewers. Since there was no red in the middle, he judged it to be done.

By creating new holes in the ground Max was able to move the skewers away from the fire so they wouldn’t become burnt. Max took the first bite of real food in this world, the moss didn’t count. It tasted like a day-old dried turkey from Thanksgiving. He wasn’t mad, not at all. For a morning’s work, it was very respectable. Munching on the skewers, he hoped that good morning life and death fights were the exception and not the norm here.

In the middle of eating his fifth skewer, Max got a new notification.

Status effect - Minor Enhance Regeneration

For consuming the flesh of a spirit beast, gain a 5% increase in health and stamina regeneration for the next hour.

‘Nice!’

Max continued to eat, when he finished the tenth and last skewer, the same notification came up.

Opening up his character sheet, there was a new entry under Weakened Body, “Minor Enhance Regeneration”. Focusing on his new status, the timer showed two hours.

‘That’s good to know, it didn’t increase the regeneration percentage but the duration instead. Also interesting to know that the hawk was classified as a spirit beast.’

Max was feeling good. He had gotten a new lease on life and had a full stomach. He hadn’t fully recovered from the morning attack and still had the Weakened Body on his status, but that was fine, those debuffs would resolve themselves soon. But the next thoughts turned darker, he was a long way from home, and his family and friends probably thought him to be dead. The thought of never seeing the people he cared about quickly soured his mood. He was once again affected with a deep sense of melancholy. Max let himself wallow in the sadness for a while, if he wanted to get over it, pushing his feelings away was not an option.

Sitting in front of the fire, Max let the warmth bathe him. Taking deep breaths, the world started to fade around him again. He knew meditation wouldn’t help his cultivation but could help him steady his mind and allow him to refocus.

In

1,2,3,4,5

Hold

1,2,3,4,5

Out

1,2,3,4,5

Max let himself feel the sadness and slowly accepted his situation. Little by little he felt the negative emotions slide off him. Opening his eyes, the sun had already moved past its peak and started its journey downwards. Checking the character sheet, the Minor Enhance Regeneration status was gone and both health and stamina were already topped off.

Realizing that it might turn dark soon, Max started prepping more meat. He didn’t want to cook at night; the light might attract danger. This time, he prepared twenty strips of hawk legs. It would be both dinner and breakfast. After removing the last strip, the leg had gotten noticeably smaller, but it should still be enough for multiple meals, the only concern was whether the meat would spoil by then.

Max rekindled the fire and started cooking again. After setting the skewers around the flame, Max began his workout routine.

This time, with full stamina, he was ready to make it through the entire workout. Three cycles in, another problem came to light, dehydration. He hadn’t had anything to drink the whole day and was likely dehydrated.

Max was reminded of the bowl that was left in the cave but doubted it collected enough water for his needs. Looking around, he went back to the moss and started scrubbing the moss from the trees. After eating the Moss, Max was still thirsty. He grabbed a low-hanging branch and started plucking the leaves from it. With a fist full of leaves, Max cupped them in his hand and tilted his head back while opening his mouth. He squeezed the leaves. There was a good 5-10 drops of water from each fist full of leaves.

Max went back and forth from the fire to the tree. When his thirst was finally quenched, an entire branch of leaves was missing, at the same time, the skewers looked to be mostly ready.

While there was still plenty of light, the sun had already started its descent. Max spent the last remaining sunlight moving materials back up the cliff. He didn’t want to sleep in the clearing and felt much safer in the cave where there was at least a Formation protecting him. He picked out the largest feathers and used them as makeshift wrappers to increase his load capacity. The items that had to be moved up the cliff weren’t heavy per se, but they were awkward to carry.

With the time left, Max was able to make three separate trips up and down the cliff. He made sure to check his stamina each time. It took more stamina on the way up than it did on the way down, which made sense since he was also carrying things up. On average, it took him around 20 stamina each trip.

Halfway through the second hike downwards, Max also noticed that his cultivation progress had increased from 1 to 2.

After finishing a third and final trip, Max was spent. Sitting down he took stock of his inventory. There were twenty skewers of hawk, ten fist-size bundles of moss and leaves, enough dry wood and branches to make two fires, all the feathers that came from the hawk, and lastly his trusted Chi-Infused stones.