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Chapter 27: "Keeping it Clean."

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Yungfan met Shae as she walked out of the inn's dining room and into the dim twilight. "Wise Shae, are you ready to show off your-? Ah, you seem upset, is something the matter?"

Shae was frowning. "Wise Yungfan, can I ask you a question about other cultivators?"

"Of course!"

"What the eff is wrong with sword cultivators?"

"Ah-ha ha-ha ha-ha," she giggled, "I see you've been talking to Elder Bai." She nodded knowingly. "Yes, they can be quite strange. Truthfully, I am not sure why that is."

Shae shook her head then exhaled with a pout. "Is there somewhere where this will be easier? Black sludge and all?"

"I believe most of these inns have a dedicated room, but I have already asked mine to prepare a room, they have several." She led them a few doors down to one of the more expensive looking buildings, the sign was a near-white metallic tortoise.

"You're staying here? I would have expected somewhere a bit more conservative."

"Because we are monks? Some do go the pauper route. Mostly as a means to a certain type of enlightenment. Still, nearly any organized group of cultivators can outbuy a small town. We cultivate to challenge the heavens, so to make your own fortune is a simple task."

"Ah, fair point."

They passed through hallways to the back of the building and found a room without windows, but there was a skylight that opened to circulate air. There was also a small fireplace against the inner wall that didn't have wood or ashes in it. Yungfan walked to the fireplace and charged a qi formation around it.

Shae investigated it and found a small draft sucking air up the chimney. "Ah, smart! How did you...?" She wiggled a finger at the formation.

"Activate it? Well, not at your stage I am afraid, you would need a qi crystal or a spiritual tool to let you do it.

Shae gestured to her hair pins and raised an eyebrow.

"Needs to be neutral qi or air qi. A crystal would be a waste though, ask one of the attendants to do it, if you need to." She gestured to the rest of the room. "If you would."

Investigating the center of the room, the girl found a very clear location where cleansing was done. A worn patch of stone floor with a bag of sand and sawdust nearby. "Hmm, not sure if the lightning will ground out properly here, but I'll do a few short tests anyway."

"Have you decided what locations you will use as test sites?"

"Oh, umm, not really. Probably, along my ribs, there are a few spots where the lightning left very erratic patterns. Oh, I guess you should check it now, get a solid before and after "

Yungfan lowered her eyes as Shae loosened her clothing, then she stood behind the girl. "Hmm, around here? Between the second and third ribs?" She tapped the girl in the indicated location, and helped her adjust clothing away from that area.

"Sure, but I can't pick super specific locations yet."

"Ah, yes, we should work on that at the same time. One way is to use a small cut as a reference location, but any constant stimulation will work. So I will press gently at a point. Try cleansing that location first."

"Hmm, first? I usually work out from the existing cleansed flesh."

"Ah, right, you mentioned that. Hmm, well, work directly towards it then. You can also work on your fine control by making the path smaller."

Shae started breathing slowly and evenly to prepare for meditation. Then set out her pins, arranging them to catch the lightning that was a byproduct of her cleansing. "Hmm. Not sure how this will work, mind the lightning after it starts."

Yungfan smiled, "I'll be fine, core stage, remember." She patted the girl's shoulder.

Shae nodded and closed her eyes, beginning the session.

Since the morning, she had been quite excited to try this again. The earlier conversation with Yungfan was enough to convince her that properly attuned personal qi was something she was missing out on. So she had accepted all the dense demigod qi that resulted from the enlightenment ritual and drawn it into her Dantian.

It hadn't converted instantly, but she could tell a small amount of it was different. It was the first to respond when she called for it, so it was what she used to do the spinning ring trick at dinner. Upon first accepting it into her Dantian, she had noticed that the divine qi wanted to merge and change it all at once, but she had resisted flow, pushing the kinds of qi apart. Her Dantian was hers and she would not let the valuable divine qi burn itself out just to speed up the natural process of converting qi to her personal flavor. It was an interesting trick keeping them separate. Like with the gravity first pulling the marbles down, she had to warp her way of thinking to accommodate the odd behavior she wanted.

She now held two storms within: a central storm of dense demigod qi with a small eye of personal qi, and a smaller storm of clouds that was her divine tribulation qi. The marbles soared around both, punching through the central storm more often. The lightning ribbons fluttered through, amplifying the sense that it was a storm and not just colorful clouds.

She drew out some of her personal qi, a bit of unconverted tagging along. Then remembering how the demigod qi worked with neutral qi. She reached out and pulled in as much neutral qi as she could at once.

Yungfan took that as a signal that she was ready because she felt the monk touch the spot on her side.

There was at least twice as much neutral qi as she needed, so she cycled it around to see if it would balance out quickly. After a few cycles she moved the excess neutral qi into her Dantian, pushing it into her central storm.

With the rest, she moved it to where she felt Yungfan's touch, then moved it again as she realized she was also holding her shoulder. The converted qi responded much faster, dragging the unconverted and neutral qi around with it.

She let it seep into the desired area, trying to thin the connection and hone in on the target point. She even felt like she was getting more information back from her senses. Remembering how much she had sharpened her senses during the enlightenment ritual, she stopped attributing that to the denser converted qi.

Finally she pushed her intent into the qi, telling it to pull out the impurities, and improve the flesh like the divinely cleansed flesh that it was also connected to.

With the much smaller area than what she had done before, the ripple through the qi was much faster. She also thought it was less painful, but that could also be because of the smaller area.

Yungfan removed her hand as the qi triggered, but Shae felt no lightning qi build-up. Instead she focused her senses on the small area and tried to watch it being cleansed. It happened faster than she could follow and exited her meditation with disappointment.

The smell of toxins greeted her, not as strong as the last few times, but maybe more distinct because her sense of smell wasn't overwhelmed. "Well?" She asked.

The monk leaned in to look closer. "Hmm, you need to work on your control."

"I know. I mean, how does the cleansing compare to the others?"

"Ah, right. Just a breath." Yungfan wiped away a few drops of impurities, she checked the other areas Shae had cleansed on her own, and the tribulation cleansed flesh. Concentrating with her eyes closed and a hand over each spot. "Ah, hmm, it looks better?"

"You sound confused."

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"Yes, there is something... different about the divine flesh. It's almost as if... No, I'm not sure."

"Go on, you can say it, I won't mind."

Yungfan smiled and nodded. "It feels like someone else's limb. Like it's been grafted onto you, but the transition is too smooth."

Shae raised an eyebrow, and pointed to the erratic patterns the lightning had made.

"Messy, yes, but smooth."

Shae turned her head in thought. Something Yungfan said tickled her memory. "Uhm, huh, Auntie did say it 'wasn't my hand anymore.'"

"Your aunt looked it over?"

"No, Auntie Mei, here in town."

"You know Miss Mei?" Yungfan looked surprised for half a breath. "Of course you know her."

"I met her before all this nonsense started. She was always really kind to me. And it helped that she's outside town."

"She has a knack for meeting significant people early in their journey."

"Aww, don't say that." She put a hand over her face. "That's worse than saying you expect great things from me."

Yungfan leaned in. "Oh, Heavenly Shae, we are all-"

Shae tackled the teasing monk. "Don't even!"

Yungfan started laughing while Shae tried to cover her mouth. The core stage monk could easily overpower the girl, but let her struggle and eventually succeed. Her laugh had reduced to a giggle, but Shae had worked herself up from a smirk to resisting her own giggles.

The two stopped with Yungfan sitting comfortably and Shae in an awkward position covering Yungfan's mouth with both hands.

"Are you going to be good?" Shae asked.

'I'm always good.' Yungfan sent via silent message. 'Some say the best!'

The girl's jaw dropped open. "That's cheating!"

'Is that so?'

"Definitely."

'Punishment?' She raised a challenging eyebrow.

Shae inhaled slowly, then nodded to herself and blushed slightly. "Nope. Your punishment will be delivered by the heavens." She declared with nose upturned. Then as she was removing her hands from the monk's mouth, she used her right hand to flick her forehead.

That just set the woman giggling again.

Shae quickly turned and sat back in the center of the room, and tried desperately to get her heart rate and breathing calmed down again. So she could meditate. She exhaled, "Hwuaa- so the arm and leg are way different... Because of the divine qi, and maybe because it wasn't my personal qi?"

"Hmm. Yes, that seems like the best guess."

"So, if it is so different from my own body, whose body is it?"

"Ah. That is a very good question." Yungfan suddenly grew very serious.

"Eh? C'mon it's not that serious? It was just the obvious follow up."

"Right." The monk paused. "Anyway, the new qi works well. You should keep working with that. I did notice some lightning qi leaking out, but it's not as bad as what it sounded like."

"Mhm, when I got it before I was using a lot more qi. Should we try a larger area?"

"Yes, that is what I would suggest next, as well. We'll work in the same area, and I'll use my fingers to mark out a circle. Try to clear everything in the circle."

"Mhm!" Shae nodded and fell back into her meditation.

Several breaths later, she drew in more neutral qi, and pulled out the matching ratio of her dense demigod qi. She took longer to circulate it around herself, just to keep the same pattern of actions. If it was not a useful step, Yungfan would probably tell her.

She looked through her mindscape for the woman's touch and soon found it. She tried to estimate the area she was covering and guessed she was using one hand and splaying her fingers fully apart, a much larger area. Again, she still used the opportunity to sharpen her senses.

The larger area was more painful and produced some lightning qi that arced off into the pins. Since it took longer to complete, Shae was able to keep a close eye on the process. She got a sense for just how bad her senses were because she couldn't detect the impurities until they had been grouped up just before exiting her skin.

Once the process was near to finished, she exited her meditation.

"Ah, you're out already?"

"Hmm? Shouldn't I be? It mostly works by itself, I can leave meditation once it's started."

"Oh? That is a bit odd, most methods require some attention. You said you were trying to copy the divine qi cleansing?"

"Yea, Elder Ghon said divine qi had its own plans. So, I just kinda tell the qi to copy what the divine qi did. Probably helps that I have divine qi mixed into my qi." Shae shrugged. "Oh! It stings a bit too, is it supposed to hurt?"

"Pain or discomfort is common. If it is very painful that would be concerning. Elder Ghon is correct about divine qi. To the best of my theory knowledge, it should provide the best cleansing, but is very painful. Body focused cultivators believe that progress cannot be achieved without pain or struggle."

"Hmm, all this pain talk reminds me of the lightning qi cleansing, when I drew the excess lightning back in to reuse it. Should we try replicating that?"

"Oh, the angry qi? Yes, but first, we should examine this attempt."

"Right, right, we didn't do that yet." She held up her arm for the monk to examine her ribs. "I tried to watch with my senses but could only see the impurities as they were leaving my skin. How does that compare to others starting out?"

Yungfan nodded. "That is what most see at first, but if the process is automatic, you should have more mental energy to focus on it and improve. You will have to go over some exercises for that, and your control."

"Ugh, is that bad too?"

She bounced her head left and right. "Not bad, you are able to grab an impressive amount of qi from around yourself. Given how early into your journey you are, I might compare that to a high grade spirit root. However, that is a guess. We rarely get to examine those cultivators so I am extrapolating from low and mid grade information."

"Ahh, so the precision is lacking? The old man said that would happen because I started on the mountain."

"I see, yes, that is likely why you seem stronger when drawing qi in."

"Oh, Elder Bai gave me a qi gathering pill to show me the wealth of the sect or whatever. Should I use that tonight?"

Yungfan shook her head right away. "Not tonight, not yet at least. If you wanted to cultivate all night afterwards it might be a good idea."

"Might? What's the catch?"

"If you can draw in a lot, and your Dantian isn't near empty, you could fill it quickly, thus wasting some of the pill. Also, the qi in the area might not be able to sustain the flow. Hmm, though, I don't think that will be an issue unless many others are also cultivating tonight."

"Shouldn't they? There are lots in town now, the newbies too."

"The new members of the groups here just started and won't draw in much. We may need to test your endurance and how full your Dantian is. You just drew in all that dense qi, yes?"

Shae shrugged. "Yes, but it doesn't feel very full. Not sure how much it can handle, seems like there is a lot of room in there."

"If you've not filled it before, it can be quite hard to tell what completely full is like. One thing at a time, though. Let's get back to this, then try with the lightning."

Shae nodded excitedly.

They spent almost another hour going over different versions of Shae's cleansing process. The fastest was using the excess lightning qi, with a spiritual hairpin in an acupuncture point to let the lightning qi move directly back into her channels. It was more painful than without the extra, but much less than the first time she tried it. Using the hairpin in an accu-point also meant the return path of the lightning caused much less pain.

The major hang-up with that style was Shae didn't know her acupuncture points at all. So Yungfan had to set the pins, and she only had the three, meaning the area they could work with was quite small.

They still made progress comparing the methods, and Shae felt like her senses were slowly improving. She had used up all of the converted qi and a good chunk of her dense demigod qi.

"So, any advice for what I should do next?"

"Ah for the rest of the night?"

The girl nodded.

"You plan on working through the night?"

She shrugged and gave half a frown.

"Hmm, you could work slower with what you have left. Then use the pill tomorrow afternoon or evening. You'll need a break at some point, you can't go constantly even if it feels like you can. Or call it a night here, get some sleep and use the qi pill tomorrow morning."

"Oh, hmm, I had plans for tomorrow. And some sleep probably would be good. Using the pill tomorrow night does sound good. Hmm, I should get a better baseline, though. To know how the pill changes drawing in neutral qi." Shae bobbed her head side to side a few times. "Yea, couple more hours, then call it a night, oh I can probably go to my inn for that too."

"This room is reserved for the full night here if you would like to stay. Though, I do imagine falling into your own bed is much nicer than the floor here."

She nodded, "Mmmmm, bed! And a bath first! Yea, I'll head back. Thanks so much for the help, Wise Yungfan! We'll have to go over those exercises tomorrow."

"Mhm, yes, thank you for reminding me, Wise Shae."

The two said their goodbyes and parted ways for the night.

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