Most of the disciples did not like that comparison. Most of them were also dumb. How could they not see the elegance of an art that would let even monkeys become powerful? While Chen Hao was zoning out, completely engrossed in thinking about his abyss art, Jun was eagerly listening.

“The art of formations is nothing more than drawing lines and leaving empty spaces. Natural formations would form thanks to rocks and sticks lying on a spiritual vein. Then, our ancestors would copy them down and imitate them. Now, the art of formation is dead. In reality, you learn about formations to break out of them and to make money,” he sighed, whacking a stick against his knee. Most of the disciples looked confused.

“What? Most cultivators take these things called cultivation flags, set them down in a specific order, and boom, the formation activates itself. Very useful for quickly laying down an illusion or a defensive formation. Also very expensive and incredibly easy to counter for a proper formation specialist. But who cares, those don’t exist anyways,” he wryly laughed.

“Well, someone has to make those things, and if you learn how to, you’ll be rich. Besides, there exist a myriad of different unique formations, and properly carving a formation is much more effective if you have the time. Let’s start with the basics. Today, I’ll be showing you how to draw a basic Spirit-Gathering Formation.”

What a wonderful thing formations were. Jun committed to memory every detail, and even though he couldn’t practise it on paper like the others could, he closely listened to every mistake the elder pointed out. He was pretty sure he had the formation down, but even there, his mortal nemesis was blocking his path. To activate a formation, one had to guide spiritual force into it.

“I am like a pond. Still, never disturbed.”

He was done with cursing. He had gone through the seven stages of grief and reached acceptance. In fact, he was like Buddha. No stupid spiritual force would disturb his peaceful mind.

That lasted until he left the hall and saw a loose stick lying on the ground. With the anger of a thousand devils, he pounced on it, unleashing a vicious bite attack. He carried the stick back home, laying it down in the corner of the room. It was his war trophy.

Chen Hao, as usual, went immediately back to meditating. He vowed to fully dedicate himself until he reached the first stage of Qi Refining. To do so, he needed to properly understand his cultivation technique.

Jun knew all about it. After all, he had secretly read the entire bamboo slip of the Ninth Abyss Lake Art. After fully reading through it three times, he had come to a simple conclusion—the cultivation technique was racist.

How else would you explain cultivating? There were three steps in actually converting spiritual force into inner qi. The first step involved circulating qi in a very specific pattern through your meridians. Human meridians, mind you. There was no helpful diagram showing how a dog might circulate spiritual force to cultivate the same technique.

Then, there was the visualisation process of it. This art required Chen Hao to imagine a pitch-black lake that emitted a vague sense of dread. Serene and eternally undisturbed, if one were to step into it, their very souls would freeze and get dragged down to the bottom, where they would nourish the lake for all of eternity. If one were to lay eyes on it, they would be forever transfixed, being drawn in uncontrollably.

During spare moments, Jun imagined the scene while trying to control spiritual force, but either the image was wrong, or it simply didn’t help with his current task.

The third step was simple—wait for the spiritual roots to do the rest. If you circulated it in the right order and visualised it properly, you would have inner qi.

None of this mattered to Jun now. After all, today was the day everything changed for the better. Once again, he snuck out of the room like he had done countless other times. He avoided everything and everyone as he made his way through the building, reaching the place where the servants stayed. There, in an unused room, lay his masterpiece. A brush, some bamboo strips, and a bottle of ink.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

He had laboured hard during the week to steal all of these, and then worked even harder to learn how to properly write with a brush in his mouth. Half of the room was ink-stained, and he had wasted more bamboo slips than he cared to admit. Despite a week’s worth of progress, the handwriting was utterly horrible, but somehow still barely legible.

Jun had thought long and hard about what to write. In the end, he chose three words. “Raising Magical Beasts.” It was logical for Chen Hao to be interested in it. He would be digging his own grave if he wrote “Dog Cultivation Methods”—they were a myth, a sham spread by the evil human cultivators to lure in innocent dogs.

From here, the course of action was extremely simple. Jun walked through the busy streets, heading closer and closer to the lake. Finally, he stood in front of a three-story building, a palace in comparison to the place they were living in. Most of the week had been spent sniffing around and finding this spot.

“This is the dog police! Open up! There’s illegal treats in there and we know it!” he shouted at the door, rearing up his body, standing on his haunches, and scratching it with his claws.

For a few moments, he feared this was the wrong place, but the figure that emerged from the doorway melted away his worries. At this moment, Li Xia was like an angel that descended from heaven. She even had golden hair!

“Who? Ah, it’s Jun,” she looked around before finally glancing downwards. “Look at you! You’re even cuter than before. Come here,” she said, abducting him from the ground.

Li Xia curiously looked around for a few seconds. “Where’s your master?” she muttered. Jun could only shrug.

Eventually, she gave up and brought him inside. Immediately, a powerful surge of spiritual force washed over him. Was there a spirit gathering formation present? He looked around, but there was nothing to suggest its presence. Instead, the first floor was like a warzone. Furniture was placed randomly, and a huge pile of belongings was scattered across the floor. Heads, furs, and skins of various beasts were mounted on the wall like a harrowing scene from a slaughterhouse.

“Ignore my roommate’s mess,” she said, gingerly stepping over various things and bringing him to the second floor.

The second floor was much cleaner. Li Xia led him into a room painted a gloomy beige grey, which was what his stupid eyes would have him believe. Fully activating his deductive reasoning, he concluded that the entire room must be painted pink. She just seemed like the type of person to do such a thing.

She had only a week to decorate the room, but it was already unique enough, proven by the fact that everything here was grey. For once, he thanked his colour-blindness. Otherwise, he would be on the receiving end of a sensory overload.

Silk sheets hung around her bed and on her windows, embroidered with pictures of various birds. Jade figurines of small cats and rabbits were meticulously placed on the table, arranged in a way that they were having a pleasant tea party. A huge painting took up most of the wall, depicting a scene of a tranquil lake surrounded by all manner of creatures. She even had a miniature garden where she took care of small trees.

Li Xia tossed Jun onto the bed and hugged him, rolling around like mad. Any other dog would have protested, but Jun put his dignity to the side. After all, he was a brave warrior on an important mission.

“I’m so sad I don’t have any tools yet. I ordered specific combs and scissors just for you. I’m going to make you even cuter!”

A shudder ran through Jun’s body. He wondered if this was worth it, his resolve crumbling by the second. God forbid she would make him into a poodle. His luscious golden fur was a point of pride! Having enough, he dropped the bamboo slip onto the bed, which she noticed for the first time. Curiously lifting it, she read the words before frowning.

“That bastard. He finds my house, and, instead of coming to visit me himself, he makes Jun carry this thing over. I’ll need to teach him proper handwriting as well,” she said, pondering over the words on it.

“If this was the inner sect, I’d have a lot of people to ask. Here in the outer sect, raising magical beasts isn’t very popular. Hmmm...”

“I’ll write a letter to my mom. After all, it’s to help a friend, not to gain an advantage for myself. Hold on.” She put him to the side before pulling out an elegant brush made from the hairs of some magical beast.

On the other side of the bamboo slip, she wrote her reply to “Chen Hao,” saying how it might take some time to get what he needed. In exchange, she asked him to let Jun visit more often and to come here himself once he wasn’t busy.

“There, done. You can carry this to your master,” she said, putting it on the table. Jun rose as if to stand up, but she pounced on him before he could.

“Aha! Did you think you would leave so easily? Let’s play tag! Then, you can play with Mr. Bunny and Mrs. Kitty here,” she said before playfully chasing him around.

“Forgive me, Mother, for I have sinned. For the first time, I have sold my body for cultivation resources,” Jun howled at the ceiling, confessing his wrongdoings.