Chapter 47: An Idealist’s Blade

Chapter 47: An Idealist’s Blade

In a hurry, Paike pulled himself out of his trance while using half of his mind to keep his spiritual soul sealed. He clamped down hard on the tear, cutting off the qi oozing into his dantian and grimacing as the rest dispersed.

At the same instant, he looked up, checking to see if some threat had decided to come and attack him, even if he was on sect grounds while he was meditating. But there was no ancient spirit or some vicious beast, but rather a young boy, at least three years younger than him, but one that he recognized.

Paike rose to his feet, standing nearly a head taller than the Late Ruby cultivator before him. He offered him a small bow, which Li Feng returned.

“Li Feng,” Paike greeted calmly.

“Kong Paike,” Li Feng said in a stiff and formal tone.

“Is there something I can help you with? Why have you sought me out?” Paike asked.

Li Feng offered a slightly deeper bow.

“My apologies for interrupting your meditation. I come here to train most nights, and I have not seen you here before. I was not well aware you were fully recovered from your ordeal.”

Paike had yet to get a read on the top-ranked newly initiated outer sect member. The only thing he knew from the family reports was that Li Feng was a prodigious swordsman, even by the standards of the Li clan. He was a prodigy in their Ethereal Dragonflame arts, which, unlike what it sounded like, did not actually produce flames but rather was integrated into their sword style.

“I wouldn’t say I’m fully recovered,” Paike said demurely, “but rather that what I need is time to meditate and train, to return to my former strength.”

Li Feng nodded. “We always need to train and cultivate. You have surprised me, Kong Paike.”

Paike raised an eyebrow at the smaller boy, and Li Feng continued to explain.

“My family thought you would be a weakling, a disappointment, a vulnerability to the Kong clan. But here you are, middle Ruby before almost anyone else. And I know your family does not let you train for any period before sending you off to the great sects, not after you’ve awakened.”

Paike inclined his head in gratitude.

“Yet you seem to be doing quite well.” Li Feng continued.

“I think spending extra time as a mortal helped me in ways that many cultivators would not understand.”

Li Feng frowned. “That is certainly against common wisdom.”

Paike wasn’t about to spill all his secrets, but he felt that a little bit of insight was warranted for such a polite conversation.

“Many of the arts I learned training as a mortal carry over—strategies, tactics, physical conditioning have acted as a strong base for my cultivation. That and honing of the fundamentals of combat for years.”

Li Feng took a half step back and bowed again.

“I thank you for your insights, Kong Paike. I’ll be sure to meditate on them. Now, if you don’t mind, may I use this arena to train? It will not disturb your meditation.” Li Feng asked with exceeding politeness.

Paike gave a shallow bow. “I will be returning to meditating, so do not worry about me observing.”

With that, the young boy turned on his heel and leaped down to the center, where he drew his sword in a fluid motion, holding it above his head for a full second.

Paike, though, stayed true to his words and just closed his eyes and began shoving qi back into himself. But he couldn’t help but feel the qi be disturbed from the rapid whirlpool that Li Feng was causing. Qi moved around him like a hurricane with speed and fluidity that even water lacked.

It was all Paike could do to not be jealous.

Paike slowly sat back down with his eyes still closed. He released the hold he had on his daintian incision. It was several hours before his dantian felt as if it was bursting at the seams. With clumsy spiritual fingers, he stitched up the slit he had cut as best he could, going over it and over it again with ever finer threads, constantly reinforcing the breach.

When he felt that he could finally release the gash, the pressure of his full qi pressed against it, and he felt as if he were near advancement. He had gathered enough qi to be near the peak of Middle Ruby. However, he wasn’t sure he could expand his dantian again until the wound had healed. Even then, he wasn’t sure how he would go about doing that. If, in order to insert more qi into his body, he needed to rip it open again…

He supposed he could always try to find some higher-level qi, like last time. But that had been a harrowing experience he had no desire to repeat.

Paike took a tiny bit of qi from his dantian and flushed it through his qi channels, keeping them topped off and slowly moving, powering his body. He watched as his physical cultivation drank in the qi. Each thread he used to improve the physical aspect of his cultivation was practically vibrating by the time he had finished cycling all the way through.

And suddenly, he wished he had been back in his own cultivation chamber, because he was also ready to break through to the next minor stage of his physical cultivation. Here, he did not have the facilities to clean himself after the impurities would be forcibly purged from his skin and orifices. He clamped down on his body, stalling the breakthrough, but he knew he could only hold it off for so long. Sometime tomorrow, he would have to break through.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

Once he had determined that as much of his cultivation as possible was stable, he opened his eyes and stood up. He stretched his head from side to side, popping his neck and rolling his shoulders, which were slightly stiff from the hours he’d spent sitting on the cold grass in the middle of the night.

Standing, he noticed that the sky hadn’t yet begun to lighten from the sun. But it couldn’t be more than a few hours before sunrise. He had been cultivating for that long, at least.

Down in the arena, Li Feng still stood—though that wasn’t the right word. Maybe more danced—with his blade, still training.

Paike cleared his throat and coughed, something that Li Feng would never have missed. Li Feng stopped, and Paike tensed his muscles slightly, testing the durability of his suppressed breakthrough, improved physical cultivation from the days he had spent working on it and perfecting it. His qi channels filled, and his dantian stretched taut. The patch was holding, and he could see it healing at a faster rate than it had back when he was an Early Ruby cultivator.