There was no one else in the Dim Gold Hotel.

No patrons; the gates were barred, with cursed talisman paper hanging from braided yellow strings.

No proprietors or servants; the manager and his daughter, Xiu Jiujiu, were with the Dawn Dragon Throne cultivators watching the Flareful Empress trying to put wine berries in a lemur’s mouth.

No Su Yafeng; the maid had forcefully taken a holiday after being denied overtime pay by her capricious mistress.

Yung was seated cross-legged on a pillow on top of the enormous bed on the topmost floor of the hotel in front of said mistress.

Su Nanya.

She sat opposite him, sitting on a pillow too but with more maidenly grace. Her tail swished lightly; there were large dimples on her cheek. She slowly unhooked a pin on her shawls.

It fell off, sliding the contours of her supple skin, revealing her charming breasts and waist.

“I’m sorry, I don’t think I can do this now,” Yung said. He bowed his head low until it touched the bedsheets. Then stood up, hopped off the bed, and left the room.

Su Nanya was stunned, left there looking like a blanched chicken.

“M—.” The vixen whimpered, “Mooooooooooooooother!”

***

Yung left the Dim Gold Hotel. He walked a few hundred steps and looked back.

The building seemed to be shaking slightly. As if it was a volcano about to erupt.

Above it, the clouds swirled like a maelstrom. The wind was strong, blowing through the square with angst.

Nanya’s angst.

“What part of 'we need to talk' does she not understand?” Yung scoffed. Yung had been about to lay his feelings bare to her, how her actions had deeply hurt him, and how his own actions had pushed her to take such extreme measures.

He wanted to apologise.

But she kept stripping.

Each time Yung wanted to divert the talk back to the topic, she would act coy like a kitten, forcing him to smooch and snuggle her. Somehow the dynamics had flipped. In stereotype, weren’t it the men who kept trying to gloss everything over with sex while the women would beg and plead their partners to ‘listen’ and ‘communicate’ and ‘see a therapist together’?

She wanted to hoodwink him with her bombshell body rather than having a good old-fashioned conflict resolution!

Why? Yung had asked, trying his best to keep little Yung in his pants.

Nanya had giggled and squirmed.

So Yung left. He wasn’t breaking up, of course.

He just needed some space.

He definitely wasn’t stonewalling because he was furious at her.

The building deflated, as if cold water had been dumped onto a fire.

Despite the wind and the strangeness, the market square was still bursting with activity. Vendors sold their wares while the people bartered with gold coins and spirit stones.

The sect recruitments had successfully ended with fanfare. The lords of the region had fought back a 4th order voidfiend. The market was flush with meat and cores, and the foxmoths had returned.

The natives were happy, looking forward to a bright future. Those who came from afar to take part in the recruitments, both travellers and guests, merchants and warriors, stayed longer.

There was a lost plane to explore, after all. Unlimited riches, hidden ruins, cultivation techniques that might give them ascension!

Wherever Yung went, the people would part like the Red Sea. There were whispers of respect, fear, and disdain. It would have bothered Yung before, but now he simply brooded like a good teenager with girlfriend problems should, letting his hormones and emotions take over.

His feet took him to the Jade Slip Store.

“O-Oho, if it isn’t Young Hero Yung. H-How may this old man—” The insufferable old coot was grovelling like Yung was his grandfather.

So Yung interrupted him, “The meditation room.”

The old man led him down the shop. Wang Lihou wasn’t there today. The other pupils were hard at work. A few looked up; most pretended not to notice Yung.

Yung sighed. The Empathic Reading ability was mostly a blessing. But it did hell to his social interactions.

There was a stone door.

The old man held a token in front of it. A circle of qi lit up and dimmed, then the door rumbled open.

Inside, there was a medium sized room with a workbench, one of the fancy ones used by the Crafting and Formation Elders. There was a spring that bubbled with spirit water. A mat, a few zabutons, and of course, blankets.

On the floor, there was a qi gather formation and on the roof, a spirit calming formation.

A room to ruminate and meditate.

In other words, to brood.

Though the folks here called them cultivation caves, it was really a time-out zone.

Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

“I have food. Don’t disturb me and send all visitors away,” Yung told the old man. Some folks had been really eager to send daughters his way recently, like that minister.

Yung snorted. He had somehow gotten used to ordering people around. Perks of having a strong girlfriend.

Yung frowned suddenly. “Please,” he added.

The old man nodded so hard his head was about to fly off.

The door closed.

Yung sat down on a zabuton on the straw mat.

There was a meditation room far better than this one at the Dim Gold Hotel too, the one built alongside the Jade Carving workshop where Yung had made the first Communicator Token.

But Yung needed space from Su Nanya who was like the cat that always sat on the keyboard when you worked.

He took out a bunch of scrolls from his storage artefact, followed by some jade slip tokens and bound books.

Yung caressed the storage artefact as he did so.

It was a ring. Silver band and a cat’s eye jewel. He wore it on his thumb since it was a tad too big. Apparently, higher class artefacts, those at the Rare and Epic classes, could change to suit the wearer's size.

The ring couldn’t.

“Shall you not kneel for us? We may grace you with the wealth of the heavens. The love of the goddess,” Nanya had said. Fox Nanya. She then gnawed on the ring for a while and afterwards, the internal capacity of the ring had increased from that of a small carry-on bag to a larger check-in luggage. But it was still the same class.

Yung missed her. It’s only been a few hours. Was this really love or was he simply addicted to always having her by his side?

Yung shook his head and slapped both his cheeks with his palms.

Concentrate! He repeated to himself.

The scrolls, slips, and books were about cultivation.

From basic knowledge to ones specified for Faith qi such as the Foxfire Creek Heart Sutra that he cultivated now.

That strange feeling of withdrawal rose again.

Yung squashed it.

He breathed in, then out.

Om in, om out.

Before going through the books though, he had to ascertain something.

His heart qi roiled, the refined faith qi bubbling up from a physical and metaphysical sphere on the right side of his chest. Apparently, dantians had a physical manifestation too.

Yung had seen drawn diagrams. They looked like organs made out of glass, but they still retained the squishy properties of flesh.

Yung’s mind went inside. To his sea of consciousness. The dantian and the sea of consciousness, two halves of his spirit root.

Inside, the golden lake was not calm. There were waves, gentle, but they weren’t flowing in the same direction.

Like many rivers meeting. Not like a confluence where they peacefully merged, but more chaotic, as if colliding from opposite sides.

Yung missed his girlfriend.

In the distance, the mysterious soul boundary. There were many shapes etched onto it, like projections of shadows. A strange concept.

That’s how the grand dao was made one’s own.

From Dao Insight, to Dao Aspect Shards, to Dao Aspects, to Unfolding Heavens.

And above, the golden constellation, what he assumed was a Dao Aspect.

Yung took it all in.

The quantity of True qi in the lake, the amount of Dao Insights, the quality of it and much more.

He frowned.

“Faith Refining… 6th Stage.” The first time he kissed Nanya, he broke through to the 4th stage. When he made out with her more intimately, he arrived at the 5th stage. After many weeks of entwining bodies but never taking the final step of dual cultivation, he was at the peak of the 5th stage.

After the ordeal with the foxmoths and Youjin Fuqiang, he had successfully become a Faith Refining 6th stage cultivator.

The final stage of the median stages. Almost at Ziyou Ling and Youjin Chun’s level.

In the martial sphere of this world, he could be counted as a respected cultivator of the younger generation, with boundless prospects.

Yung went out of his sea of consciousness.

He read the books on the fundamentals of cultivation.

The Nine Esoterics of True qi.

Star Water of the Heavens: The Nothingness of Qi.

How to Build a Proper Foundation - A Grounded Daoist’s Guide.

Yung unfolded the scrolls and scried the slips.

Foxfire Creek Heart Sutra.

Elementary Verses of the Zheng Confucian.

Scrolls of Piety.

Even the Severed Yang Fire Qi Circulation Technique.

Yung read everything. His feelings about the Severed Yang Fire Qi Circulation Technique were complicated. If his grandpa really was some sort of mastermind, then would he really be hoodwinked?

Yung pushed those thoughts aside and refocused on the matter at hand.

After a few hours of going back and forth between his Sea of Consciousness and checking and double-checking all the examples and theory, Yung came to a conclusion.

His foundation was subpar.

I messed up, Yung sighed. His foundation was shit.

The quality of his True Qi was good. Great, even. The rate at which he progressed through the ranks was eye-opening.

Even talents who had Harmonious Heaven Grade Physiques and Affinities might not do better.

And he had a good supply of Faith Qi, given by all the worship the Fortune Fox Totem received on a daily basis from both Madlanders and townsfolk.

Heck, he had so much that he even needed the Pink Heart Ring to offload the excess qi.

The abilities under his command were so mysterious that, according to Nanya, perhaps Harmonious Heaven Realm powerhouses would not be able to see through them.

And the golden constellation inside his sea of consciousness. Yung was quite sure it was what was behind his Empathic Abilities; it was Moira’s grace, his cheat in this isekai, and it had many more layers who could still unwrap.

Last, but not least, his girlfriend. Her sexy body was like the best cultivation supplement. Not to mention, she seemed to go above and beyond trying to act as his sugar momma.

Yung would not be in want for spirit stones in the near future.

But his foundation was still lacking.

Because he could not refine his true qi fast enough at will.

Will. That was the keyword.

The entire process felt sluggish, like moving tar through his veins. When he concentrated on the faith qi, it was easy to send it to the pink heart ring, but without Nanya’s touch, it felt exhausting to send it to his dantian and then refine it into True qi that would augment his cultivation base.

He had zero willpower, cultivated specifically for this purpose.

My true qi isn’t directly refined from pure faith qi either, Yung didn’t panic. He had identified the problem, at least a symptom of it; he just had to solve it.

If I simply cultivate according to the Foxfire Creek Heart Sutra, it would take maybe four of five more years for me to reach the next realm. That’s… bad. The real kicker, turns out my cheat all along is Nyanya. Yung missed his girlfriend. It was strange, as if she was some kind of opioid and Yung was going through withdrawal. Yung continued to think the problem through.

Her Extreme Yin physique, her primordial yin essence qi is what makes me cultivate so fast without ruining the quality. My faith qi, because I am a man, is tinged with the tiniest of Yang. But even that amount of Yung’s yang, when ‘coupled’ with Nanya’s Yin flavoured essence qi, would just blush and flush and implode into itself like a shy maiden being hit on. Into true qi.

And like any shy maiden, it was of the highest quality.

But suppose there was no Nyanya, there was usually a process to turning spirit qi, origin qi, and heart qi into true qi.

It was gruelling. It took time. You had to concentrate fully, hence it was called True Qi Meditation. You could meditate on the dao, increase your understanding of dao principles and etch more appropriate dao insights onto your Soul Boundary.

Through this process, with blood, grit, and sweat, you would have true qi.

One drop at a time.

And it would be the cultivator’s own true qi, with a high understanding of how to use it, how to circulate it. As time went on, and as practice increased, this speed would get faster and easier.

The cultivator would encounter limitations, errors, and mistakes. They would mess up, go back and fix that, then move on to the next step.

Each iteration would take time. Each mistake would bring pain and suffering. Each milestone passed would showed them with the joy of accomplishment.

Carrot and stick.

Reward and punishment.

Dopamine.

Willpower.

Experience.

They would cultivate. Fight. Compete. Craft. Live. Kill. Lose. Gain.

All these were crucial.

Mayhap the cultivator might even come up with his own method of cultivation.

Yung skipped through all that and more.

His face slowly paled.

With his natural talents, or lack thereof, it would take decades of practice to build that kind of willpower from the ground up.

Damnit. Yung was finally panicking. Should have listened to mom. Never take shortcuts!