The night was still young, and the cave where Rinne had sought refuge was cloaked in silence, disturbed only by the distant calls of nocturnal creatures.

Not long after she had successfully refined the Verdant Meridian Pill, Rinne rested, her breathing slowly returning to normal after the intense alchemical process. Her body was exhausted, and her mind too, yet she felt a certain calm. The hardest part, the refinement, was over. Now came the more dangerous task.

As she sat cross-legged on the stone floor, she took a moment to mentally prepare herself. The brief hesitation she felt earlier—wondering whether the pills she made would truly work—had vanished. There was no room for doubt now. The moment the pill had been successfully refined, all hesitation was gone.

She whispered softly, glancing at the fifteen green pills neatly arranged before her.

"I must take this step! Before this trial ends, I will possess a spiritual root!"

With that resolve in mind, she shifted into a meditative posture, taking in slow, deep breaths to calm her racing heart. She picked up one of the Verdant Meridian Pills, examining it for a moment before swallowing it whole.

The effect was immediate.

As soon as the pill settled into her system, an overwhelming wave of energy surged through her body. It was a force unlike anything she had felt before in her current life. The energy roared through her veins, seeking out her meridians, but instead of empowering her, it brought with it searing, unbearable pain.

Rinne gasped, her body instinctively tensing as the pain spread, centering around her lower abdomen.

Her meridians, particularly those near her dantian in the pubic region, began to twist and burn as if being forcefully reshaped by the medicinal properties of the pill. Her vision blurred, her clothes already soaked with sweat. Moments later, thin rivulets of blood seeped from her skin, the crimson staining her ragged clothes.

The pain was indescribable, unlike anything she had endured before.

'Perhaps this is what childbirth feels like...'

She couldn't help but have the thought, though she had never experienced it herself. Each wave of agony was sharp, cutting through her body, threatening to break her. She clenched her fists so tightly that her nails dug into her palms, drawing blood. But she did not stop. She could not.

Compared to the backlash from the Gu worm that had nearly destroyed her in her past life, this was still bearable. She gritted her teeth and endured, repeating the mantra she had used for years:

'Pain is fleeting. Strength is eternal.'

The excruciating process lasted for an hour and a half, her body trembling as the pill's effect gradually began to subside. But she knew this was only the beginning. The transformation had started, but her spiritual root was still incomplete.

Without hesitation, Rinne reached for another pill and swallowed it. Her hands trembled as she crushed a piece of the large healing pill with a nearby rock, breaking it into smaller portions. Between the painful transformations, she chewed the healing pill pieces, using their properties to restore her battered body.

After taking the sixth pill, something inside her shifted.

It was subtle at first, a faint change in the air around her. But as she focused, the sensation became clearer. She could sense it—the flow of spiritual energy in the atmosphere. The invisible, elusive force that only cultivators could feel now coursed around her, filling the cave like a gentle breeze.

Her eyes widened as the familiar sensation enveloped her, the same feeling she had once experienced during her second life, after stepping into the world of cultivation. Her heart raced with a mixture of joy and disbelief.

'I did it... I can sense spiritual energy.'

Without wasting a moment, she turned her focus inward, using her newfound ability to examine her meridians. It was there—small, but unmistakable. A section of her meridians near her dantian had transformed. It had become her wood-attribute spiritual root, the key to cultivation. Though it was tiny, barely developed, it was enough to make her heart swell with triumph. She had succeeded.

But this was only the beginning.

'This root is still too small... it’s far from enough.'

Rinne's joy was short-lived. She knew that a small, barely formed spiritual root wouldn’t be enough for her to cultivate effectively. She needed more—more transformation, more strength. Without pausing to celebrate, she continued taking the pills one by one, each time enduring the agony of transformation, each time healing her body with the fragments of the healing pill.

The process was grueling, and as the hours stretched on, it became harder to keep track of time. The pain was relentless, a constant reminder of the price she was paying for her pursuit of power. But with each pill, more of her meridians transformed, slowly but surely expanding her spiritual root.

By the time she consumed the final, fifteenth pill, the night had long since passed. As the light of dawn began creeping through the entrance of the cave, Rinne opened her eyes, her body trembling with exhaustion.

"Finally, it's over!"

She could feel it—a larger, more complete spiritual root pulsing within her meridians. The transformation was complete.

♠♠♠

However, even though Rinne had successfully acquired a spiritual root, the process came at a great cost.

She leaned against the cold stone wall, her body wracked with tremors from the effort. Her newly formed spiritual root felt unstable, fragile even—like something that could break under the slightest strain. Worse, the pain caused by the transformation still throbbed deeply within her, as if every nerve in her body was alight.

"It feels like surgery without any anesthetic,"

Rinne muttered between labored breaths, her brow drenched in sweat. The ache was relentless, deep and gnawing, spreading from her dantian to every part of her body.

She had already consumed a few of the first-grade healing pills she had prepared, but their effects were negligible. They could heal superficial wounds and soothe minor injuries, but this pain ran much deeper than that. The transformation had scarred her internally, and there was nothing the healing pills could do to ease the discomfort. The feeling was so intense, it was as though someone had carved her open, leaving her with no reprieve.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

'I’ll have to live with this for a while.'

She clenched her fists and exhaled slowly.

This pain wasn’t something that could be fixed in a day. She guessed it might take a month, two months, or maybe even longer. With time, the spiritual root would stabilize, and when it did, the pain would subside. But for now, she had to endure it, her body just needed time to adjust.

But the pain wasn’t the only issue.

As Rinne focused inward, trying to sense the spiritual root with more clarity, she realized how flawed it was. The root felt sluggish and impure. Every time she tried to gather qi, the process felt unnatural, slow—like dragging water through a rusted pipe.

"The Verdant Meridian Pills weren’t refined well enough. This root is... weak!"

Rinne sighed, although she had prepared for this result.

While the pill had succeeded in forming a spiritual root, its quality left much to be desired. The root was riddled with impurities, making it inefficient at absorbing spiritual energy. Cultivation with such a root would be painstakingly slow. She would be far behind others with naturally purer roots, and the gap would only widen if she didn’t do something about it.

Fortunately, this could still be fixed—and she had a clue on how.

Spiritual roots could be nurtured and purified, though it wasn’t an easy task.

Rinne closed her eyes and dove into the memories she had inherited from Roran. One particular set of memories came to the forefront: Roran’s childhood, when his mother had prepared medicinal baths for him. She could see the scene clearly, as if it were her own experience. His mother, a skilled cultivator in her own right, had concocted these baths to strengthen and purify his spiritual root.

The details of the process were vivid in Rinne’s mind. She watched through Roran’s eyes as his mother prepared the herbs, each one carefully selected for its unique properties. The bath itself was a blend of rare medicines, designed to soak into the skin and nourish the root from within.

'Well, he's just a child anyway, it doesn't matter if I've seen it.'

Rinne wasn’t bothered by the scenery of his body, given she had seen such things many times in her past life. She had seen far worse during her years of extracting memories. There had been playboys with far more... distasteful recollections.

But this bath, though potent, presented a new problem.

Many of the ingredients Roran’s mother had used didn’t exist in this realm. They were from somewhere else—likely the "middle world" that Rinne had heard mentioned in various memories from the powerful figures she had once hunted. Most likely, Roran’s mother had cultivated those herbs herself, possibly using the planting space within her ancestral heritage necklace.

The "middle world" was an enigma. It was referenced in the memories of powerful individuals she had encountered in her past life, but details were sparse. From what she had gathered, it was a realm above this one, filled with higher-quality resources, techniques, and knowledge.

And if there was a middle world, there was likely an upper world and a lower world as well. It was becoming increasingly clear that this world she now lived in was the lower one—limited in resources, techniques, and knowledge.

From what she could piece together, Roran’s mother had originated from the middle world.

For reasons unknown, she had entered this lower world and married into the Lareth clan. Her abilities, however, were far beyond what most in this realm could achieve. She had brought with her knowledge and resources that didn’t belong here, including the medicinal bath she had used to nurture Roran’s spiritual root.

'That’s irrelevant to me.'

She didn’t care much for the politics or mysteries of other realms. What mattered now was that the medicinal bath could work, even if she had to modify it using local materials.

While the original materials were out of her reach, Rinne wasn’t without options.

Roran’s memories provided her with the details of each ingredient and the effects they had. With her knowledge, she could find local materials that could serve as substitutions. It wouldn’t be an exact match, but she believed she could substitute the ingredients and achieve something similar.

But before that, she had to solve a certain pressing issue.

♠♠♠

Rinne sat cross-legged, her body trembling slightly from the constant pain radiating from her newly formed spiritual root.

She took a deep breath, trying to focus on the tasks ahead, but the sharp ache was a relentless reminder of the consequences of her transformation. While enduring the pain, she methodically began to note the tasks that she needed to complete and plan for the immediate future.

"First things first, I need to refine the Marrow Cleansing Pill."

The first and most urgent task: refining the Marrow Cleansing Pill. The harmful substances left behind by the Verdant Meridian Pills had begun to spread through her meridians, tainting her blood. The toxins needed to be purged before they caused any long-term damage. She would have to prepare the pill and use it to expel the dangerous residues from her body. This was her top priority.

Once she managed that, the next step would be to prepare for the medicinal bath to nurture her spiritual root.

According to Roran’s memories, the bath was essential in raising the purity of the spiritual root—a process his mother had started when he was just a toddler. He had taken the bath for eight years, and by now, his root purity had risen to an impressive 90%. Rinne knew she couldn't afford to aim so high.

"I'm already seven years old, and I’ve only got less than three years until I turn ten."

The bath was only effective for the first ten years of life, so her window of opportunity was limited. Her goal was modest compared to Roran's—a purity of 70%, the standard of many wealthy scions in this realm. If she could achieve that, she'd be content.

Gathering the herbs and materials for both the Marrow Cleansing Pill and the medicinal bath shouldn’t pose too much of a problem. Once she joined a sect, such resources would be easier to obtain.

However, the thought of how costly the medicinal bath would be weighed on her. The bath needed to be taken regularly, and each session would require rare ingredients. The expense would drain her wealth rapidly.

"I’ll need to work hard and earn enough spiritual stones,"

She thought, already bracing herself for the future. She knew that the path of cultivation was never easy, and her circumstances were far from ideal. She had come into this world with no family support, no powerful background, and now, a fragile and unstable spiritual root.

Another issue gnawed at her—the instability of her spiritual root.

It couldn’t be used for cultivation until it stabilized, and that could take anywhere from a month to a year. If the worst-case scenario played out, and it took a full year to stabilize, it would create a massive problem for her. The annual assessment in any sect was a crucial event. Without a stabilized root, her cultivation would be minimal at best.

Rinne sighed deeply, her brow furrowing as she thought about the consequences. If she failed the assessment, she’d be relegated to a handyman position in the sect. That would make everything harder, especially completing her ultimate goals. The danger of not having a spiritual root was gone, but now she had to worry about advancing her cultivation.

"I can’t afford to be a mere handyman! I'll need to compensate for my weak cultivation with body refining techniques."

She muttered to herself, frustration seeping into her voice. If her spiritual root remained unstable for too long, body refinement could be the key to passing the assessment.

Rinne couldn’t help but sigh again, a sense of weariness washing over her. At the age of seven, she already felt the weight of the world pressing down on her.

"While other children are out playing, here I am, enduring all this pain and planning my next steps."

Her lament was quiet, but it echoed in her mind.

She spent the rest of the trial holed up in the cave, trying to get used to the constant pain.

It was as if her body was fighting itself, a battle she had no choice but to endure. During moments of reprieve, she made sure to wash her ragged clothes, scrubbing out the blood that had soaked through from her transformation. The last thing she needed was for others to notice something wrong with her when the trial ended.

'It would be best if no one realized what I've been through,'

For now, her best strategy was to keep a low profile, just as she always had. The more inconspicuous she appeared, the less attention she'd draw. That was the safest way to survive.

Finally, the one-week time limit passed. Rinne was sitting in the cave, her thoughts wandering when she felt a sudden warmth emanating from the wooden token she had been given at the start of the trial. She glanced down at it just in time to see it glow, the light pulsing for a brief moment before her surroundings blurred.

In the blink of an eye, she found herself sitting on the platform, along with other participants.