After that day, life continued on as normal, except now more people came to visit their family. Sometimes his parents would have him participate in the entertaining of the guests, but he still mostly spent his time cultivating. The clan also slowly understood that Yun Tian wished to spend a lot of time cultivating and as he continued to rapidly rise through the realms no one said anything and was instead happy about his attitude.
Day after day went by. He still spent a lot of time with his parents and Shen Yu, but besides that basically all of his time was spent cultivating with even time for sleep being slowly reduced. Almost a year later, he had broken through four more layers at startling speed. He took a month for the second layer, two months for the third layer, three months for the fourth, and another five months for the fifth layer.
The third and fourth layers were for the meridians in both arms. The fifth layer was for the meridians in the head connecting down the meridians by the spine into the dantian. After every layer he got stronger and faster. His senses also got much better, especially his eyesight as he could easily see things far away or very small. He could also think faster and process things better now. Qi was gradually permeating his entire body. Even though he still couldn't use qi very well in a fight in the Meridian Opening Realm, his body itself grew dramatically stronger from the qi in his body.
Every time he broke through, his parents told the rest of the clan and everyone celebrated. With each celebration the news would spread about the genius in the clan and even guests from outside the clan came bearing gifts. They would come with broad smiles singing praises about both him and his family. Yun Tian was happy to see them being nice to him, but what he really loved and looked forward to was seeing his family happy each time he broke through and each time they received gifts, so he continued to spend time with them and cultivate arduously.
Seven more months passed and he had opened up the acupoint and meridians in his chest connecting to the rest of the body, this meant he had completed the sixth layer already.
He was currently opening the acupoint in his abdomen connecting directly to his dantian. He was sitting cross legged and controlling a countless time greater amount of qi than when he first started cultivating to drill into his acupoint. It took a few minutes, but he finally finished opening the acupoint. Qi rushed through his last opened acupoint and meridians as he felt his strength once again rapidly rise. He was so excited that he wanted to scream, but he knew he couldn't lose focus so he continued and directed the qi through the meridian. The qi flowed through the meridian finally ending in his dantian.
He had broken through to the final layer of Meridian Opening. All that was left was enlarging and strengthening the meridian before finally opening his dantian and breaking into the next realm.
Yun Tian was overjoyed. He had been cultivating in his room instead of in the garden to make sure he wasn’t disturbed.
Now that he was finished with his breakthrough, he quickly left his room and rushed into the garden. His parents and Shen Yu were there waiting for him.
They saw his excitement and immediately met him halfway with a big group hug together. His sister had become much more disciplined, but she was still a lively and cute girl who loved Yun Tian more than anything. She exclaimed, “Even though I started cultivating too, I just can’t keep up with you!”
Even though she said this as if she was jealous she was extremely happy for him. Their family spent the day celebrating by themselves with word of his breakthrough circulating through the clan the day afterward. Celebration ensued and the clan became extremely merry. With Yun Tian’s one breakthrough after another, they were all anticipating the day Yun Tian broke through into the Dantian Building Realm and then continued the trend. If that happened, Yun Tian would lead their clan into great prosperity one day in the future.
This was especially as the amount of resources gathered by his Grandfather in anticipation of Yun Tian’s breakthrough grew. Even if a normal Dantian Building expert had these resources they would be extremely useful, much less one who is extremely talented like Yun Tian.
Many people came to congratulate him and give gifts. They praised him even more than before since they thought with his talent that it wouldn't take long before he broke through again and became the rising star of the clan. They had to suck up to him early.
His parents were extremely excited and told him basically every day how proud they were of him. His father in particular was all smiles one day after breaking through to the mid Dantian Building Realm with the help of the recent gifts.
These gifts were indeed to his parents but the two of them had initially refused to use them and said they would save them for him. It was only when Yun Tian said, “I can cultivate thanks to you two and I also have Grandfather preparing a large amount of resources for me thanks to you two too.”
With that the two of them could only sigh at how good of a child they had and still only took them in the end when they thought of what the Yun Chen had prepared for Yun Tian.
His father’s breakthrough wasn’t that big of a deal considering his age, but everyone in the clan still congratulated him that day as he was Yun Tian’s parent.
Many celebrated with Yun Tian’s father, however the main topic of conversation was still Yun Tian and many tried to talk with him.
Every one of his family members, fellow clan members, and even those outside the clan were anticipating Yun Tian’s breakthrough and it was one of the most widely anticipated things in their entire town. Still, none could be more excited than Yun Tian himself. Even so he had to take his time and finish this layer first. This meridian was very important as it was the one that directly connected the dantian to the outside world. If the other meridians in his body could be compared to larger and smaller branches then this meridian although not exactly could be compared to the trunk.
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It was this meridian that would be of the most help when he cultivated in the future. Meaning, this meridian also had to be the largest and sturdiest out of all the meridians. It took him another nine months to finish this layer even with him constantly cultivating with larger and more qi strands being absorbed everyday.
It had been a few days since he felt his meridian and acupoint become almost unaffected by his cultivation sessions.
‘It seems I have finally finished the entire Meridian Opening Realm. Now I only have to open up my dantian to break into the Dantian Building Realm.”
He didn’t attempt this immediately though and had a good night’s rest to return to his very peak condition.
The next day, their family ate breakfast together and then he suddenly told his parents, “Mom, Dad. I’m ready. It’s time for my breakthrough.”
Instantly, his parents and Shen Yu were shocked and excited. They all said some words of encouragement.
Shen Yu was the first to leave her chair and rush to him before hugging him and saying, “You got this!”
Then she backed off and gave a big smile but you could also see a bit of nervousness present on her face. She knew there could always be trouble in breakthroughs and she always worried whenever Yun Tian attempted one, especially one this big.
He didn’t notice her expression though as his parents basically dragged him out of his chair saying, “Yu’er wait for our good news.”
They walked with him to his room saying words of encouragement and advice along the way.
Shen Yu also followed behind them, but she didn’t go into his room with them. Yun Tian and Shen Yu didn’t exchange any words but as he looked at her one more time and saw her gaze suffused with encouragement and confidence in him it filled him with passion more than any words could.
The door closed and in his room, he sat on the bed with his parents sitting on the floor in front of it. They were there to make sure nothing went wrong while he was attempting the breakthrough, but from their faces you could tell that they had absolute confidence and belief in their son after all the talent he had shown so far.
Yun Tian flashed his parents a confident smile one last time before he closed his eyes.
He started drawing qi into all of his acupoints and along all of his meridians all at the same time. He was trying to build up as much qi as possible in his dantian. According to the method of cultivating everyone followed, he had to build up as much qi as possible and condense it into his dantian to form it. He did exactly that and his parents waited expectantly for the good news.
He was calm and just let the qi flow into his body into his dantian.
He kept doing this and nothing was happening so he thought, ‘Must not be enough,’ and he put his full effort and focus into drawing as much qi as possible into his body. It kept flooding into him from every acupoint he had opened, but he still felt no reaction from his dantian. In fact, he even felt some qi flowing back through his body again and some even flowed back out of him again.
‘I just need to keep trying,’ with that thought he didn’t give up.
Several hours went by and Yun Tian’s face slowly became more anxious looking. His parent’s absolute confidence slowly dwindled and turned into worry as his mother asked, "Tian'er, are you okay is there something wrong?"
Yun Tian opened his eyes and replied, "My dantian won't form no matter how much qi I pour into it. The qi just keeps on dispersing again."
Yun Tian so far had never had any real problems with cultivating so this caught him off guard. Even when others took multiple attempts throughout multiple days to break through a layer he always did so easily.
His parents knew their son had not faced any problems while cultivating so far, that added together with this being a very important breakthrough and they knew this could be a huge problem for him mentally. After waiting for so long with no breakthrough happening and after hearing what he said, his father thought, 'It is reasonable that he experiences a bottleneck while cultivating. I better advise him so he doesn't get nervous. Mental state is also very important and can influence everything.'
So, his father told him, "Don't worry Son, everyone faces bottlenecks while cultivating and just because you hadn't so far didn't mean that you never would. Just take this as your first bottleneck and try overcoming it. I'm sure you can do it."
His mother said similar words of encouragement, “It wasn’t easy for me or your Father to enter the Dantian Building Realm either. This is normal. Just take some time and keep on trying. You will break through eventually.”
Then, they left since a lot of time had already gone by.
Shen Yu had been waiting outside the entire time and had heard their conversation. So, after their parents came out, she rushed in and hugged Yun Tian. She told him, “It’s alright Brother, I know you can do it. It just takes time. You’ve seen how my breakthroughs go before too right? They always take me much longer than yours.”
After hearing everything they said, Yun Tian finally calmed down somewhat. He replied, “Thanks Shen Yu. I needed that.”
He set his mind back on track and for two weeks he tried accumulating qi everyday but no matter what he did nothing worked. His dantian refused to form. His parents judged something was wrong and took him to the clan leader to see if he could help.
His Grandpa was amiable as usual when he saw him but when he saw their anxious looks he grew more solemn and when he heard his situation he told them that he would call over some physicians to take a look at Yun Tian.
For the next month, his grandfather had all the physicians from the whole town called over. But all they said was, "I have no idea what is wrong.” Since that didn’t work he invited physicians from afar, even offering very generous rewards. But, In the end they all said the same thing as the first wave of physicians, "I have no idea what is wrong.”
There were no pills or anything else that could help with the Meridian Opening Realm or breaking through into the Dantian Building Realm, or at least there was none they could get their hands on. It was all based on talent and determination. The pills and other things they had were only for after you broke through. If used in the Meridian Opening Realm, your body wouldn't be able to handle it and you could become crippled or die.
After this incident, Yun Tian kept on trying to break through, but as he kept on failing everyone else in the clan gradually grew colder and colder to him. Even the clan leader had decided to focus on other children to nurture instead with the previously set aside resources now repurposed. Eventually it was only his parents and Shen Yu who still cared about him.