RaizellV

  Four years had passed.

  Feiyin was ten years old, nearly eleven, and the st traces of childhood were beginning to fade from his face. In their pce emerged the sculpted lines of a young man, handsome and composed, his features sharpened by discipline and quiet resolve.

  His body was honed, his meridians tempered, his inner strength soaring beyond conventional understanding.

  He had reached the peak of the Meridian Opening Realm—106 meridians opened.

  And yet, it still wasn’t enough.

  To many, cultivation was a race against time.

  The faster one advanced, the greater their prospects. The more meridians opened, the greater their foundation.

  But few truly understood the intricacies behind each step.

  The first 33 meridians were the foundation, located within the limbs, building energy circution for movement and strength. They were retively accessible to most cultivators.

  Opening them granted 3,300 kg of inner strength, a significant jump that separated true cultivators from commoners.

  The second 33 meridians, nestled in the torso, were far more difficult to open. They were linked to the internal organs and endurance, reinforcing a cultivator’s stamina and control.

  Opening them added another 6,600 kg of strength, pushing Feiyin’s total to 19,600 kg.

  The final 33 primary meridians were the hardest of all, buried deep within the viscera—the organs themselves. They required extreme control and fortitude to awaken.

  But their rewards were unmatched.

  Opening them granted 9,900 kg, bringing his strength to 29,500 kg.

  At this point, most cultivators stopped.

  Reaching 99 meridians was already considered a genius-level feat. Many prodigious talents from great sects stepped into the Qi Condensation Realm as soon as they reached this stage, securing a powerful foundation.

  But the true monsters?

  They went further.

  Beyond the 99, there were seven more—the Final Meridians.

  These were not simply pathways for energy.

  They were enhancers, stabilizers that set a tremendous foundation.

  Each one refined the flow of energy, allowing a cultivator to cycle Qi with fwless efficiency.

  Opening them granted 500 kg of additional inner strength each, bringing Feiyin’s total to 33,000 kg.

  This was the peak of the known Meridian Opening Realm.

  Those who reached this level were the true prodigies of an era.

  And yet—Feiyin was still not done.

  There were 108 meridians in the body.

  But only 106 were ever acknowledged in modern cultivation.

  The st two—the Conception Vessel and the Governing Vessel—were considered legends.

  They were not just pathways.

  They were the foundation of the entire meridian system.

  Opening them meant achieving true harmony within the body, reaching an equilibrium that surpassed even the most gifted geniuses.

  But no one had ever opened them.

  The texts Feiyin had gathered barely mentioned them. The few that did spoke of them in theoretical terms, calling them the Unbroken Cycle, a concept dismissed as fantasy.

  For the past six months, Feiyin had been stuck at the threshold, unable to proceed.

  Each time he guided his inner strength to the locations where these meridians should be, they simply did not respond.

  They weren’t blocked like the others had been.

  They simply didn’t exist.

  And yet—his osciltion sense told him otherwise.

  He had spent months studying his own body, tracing the ebb and flow of his energy, listening to the silent frequencies beneath the surface.

  And he could feel something.

  Something faint, something unformed.

  A bridge between them.

  It wasn’t something he could break through like before.

  It was something he had to awaken.

  He exhaled slowly, sinking deeper into his meditative state.

  What was missing?

  He had followed every principle, every cultivation method known.

  And yet, these st two meridians did not function like the others.

  They were not simply pathways.

  They were resonance points.

  And resonance did not come from force.

  It came from harmony.

  He would need to understand them.

  And once he did—he would complete the Meridian Opening Realm.

  He would achieve perfection.

  Beyond the confines of the sect, the war had continued to rage.

  The Wu Kingdom and the Six Great Sects had fought countless skirmishes, yet the Saint Spirit Sect had never escated the conflict.

  They had not pushed for total victory.

  Instead, they maintained pressure, grinding away at their enemies while keeping themselves hidden and untouchable.

  To Feiyin, that was far more terrifying than outright war.

  If the Saint Spirit Sect truly wanted to conquer the kingdom, why had they not finished it?

  Why maintain a prolonged war of attrition?

  It wasn’t a strategy for winning.

  It was a strategy for wearing down an enemy.

  And Feiyin had the uneasy feeling that the sect was waiting for something.

  Something worse than war itself.

  And even if he did not yet know what it was…

  He knew that he had to be ready.

  Over the past four years, Feiyin and his group had become a force within the menial disciple ranks.

  Now twelve and thirteen, they had each forged their own paths, their power growing alongside his.

  Yue, now twelve, had refined her beastkin instincts to the point where she could fight as if predicting movements before they happened.

  Ren, also twelve, had blended the eccentricities of formation arts and force, developing a combat style that was both brutal and deceptive.

  Shen Mu, now thirteen, had become a master of poisons and concoctions, ensuring that any battle he fought was already won before the first move was made.

  All of them had reached the final meridian, since the prerequisite, perfection in body tempering, has already been reached.

  They trained, they hunted, they fought, and they survived.

  While other menial disciples scraped by, struggling to gather enough contribution points to maintain their pce, Feiyin and his group thrived.

  Through relentless effort, calcuted risk, and strategic cultivation, they had amassed a staggering amount of contribution points, enough to secure training resources, combat experience, and valuable knowledge.

  But their success came at a price.

  Their efficiency did not go unnoticed.

  Within the Saint Spirit Sect, strength ruled above all else, and those who climbed too quickly always drew eyes—some filled with greed, others with malice.

  And Feiyin’s group had drawn plenty of both.

  It had started with whispers—low murmurs in the training halls, in the mission areas, in the underground fight rings where menial disciples settled their grudges.

  Then came the attempts.

  A casual challenge to a spar turned into a sudden ambush.

  A hunting trip became a trap set by desperate disciples looking to steal their kills.

  But time and time again, Feiyin and his group prevailed.

  They left broken bodies and crushed egos in their wake, sending a message—they were not prey, they were the hunters.

  The assaults stopped being subtle.

  Larger groups started forming, hoping to overwhelm them with numbers, believing that Feiyin’s group could not fight them all at once.

  They were wrong.

  The first organized assault had ended in carnage.

  Yue had torn through her attackers with primal ferocity, her cws sshing through tendons and joints, leaving them howling in pain.

  Ren had silently broken bones, shifting in and out of his opponents perception, striking unseen until his foes colpsed into screaming heaps.

  Shen Mu had not even fought physically—his poisoned needles and traps had turned their enemies against one another, making them vomit blood before they even reached him.

  And Feiyin—Feiyin had ended the fight in moments.

  A single bde strike.

  No wasted movement. No excess force.

  Just one, perfectly calcuted, death-blow.

  The result?

  Sixteen dead.

  Not a single one of his people harmed.

  After that, the whispers changed.

  “They’re not normal menial disciples.”

  “They’re not to be provoked.”

  Fear became a shield, and their reputation became a weapon.

  Yet, for all the danger, their success allowed them to thrive in ways others could not.

  They spent liberally, not on luxuries, but on themselves.

  Contribution points became their lifeblood, spent on training methods, combat skills, and knowledge that others could barely dream of affording.

  Feiyin himself had spent tens of thousands of points to access advanced training halls, testing his techniques, practicing alchemy and understanding his osciltion sense in ways no other menial disciple could.

  His group followed suit.

  Yue refined her body techniques and bestial side, ensuring she could seamlessly flow between offense and defense, turning every attack into an opportunity.

  Ren dove deep into formations, learning from its philosophy and techniques that allowed him to manipute terrain to his advantage and ambush enemies with precision.

  Shen Mu perfected his poison craft, gathering deadly toxins and learning their applications, blending his medical knowledge into a terrifying dual-threat.

  And Feiyin—Feiyin invested in everything.

  Alchemy, Weapon Arts, Combat Techniques, Cultivation theory, Beast taming, Spiritual arts and Strategy.

  He bought two more advanced alchemy manuals, broadening his understanding of pill refinement and artifact forging, ensuring that when he entered the Saint Alchemy Branch, he would do so as ready as he could be to become a true alchemist, not a mere apprentice.

  He acquired advanced combat manuals, improving his bde techniques, refining the resonance-based strikes that made his attacks deadly beyond their weight css.

  Every point was an investment into their future.

  And among the most abstract, yet essential, of all his pursuits—were the spiritual arts.

  Spiritual arts, especially those categorized under spiritual nurturing techniques, could be found in the vast collections of the Saint Spirit Branch’s knowledge hall. These were visualization-based methods, ancient practices that guided a cultivator to focus their mind on an extraordinary image—be it a legendary beast, a sacred ndscape, or a mythical figure—to stimute and nourish the soul.

  Though subtle in effect compared to direct combat or alchemical prowess, spiritual nurturing was foundational. These techniques served as the first steps toward solidifying the soul, a requirement for anyone nearing the threshold between the Meridian Opening and Qi Condensation realms.

  Before a cultivator could step into the Qi Condensation realm, they had to complete an intermediary step: sensing and awakening their mind’s eye. This inner space was where the soul resided. Awakening it forged the bridge between mind, body, and soul, forming what cultivators called the 'spirit'—a unified entity capable of channeling the world’s ambient essence.

  This spirit would then allow the cultivator to absorb worldly essence and blend it with their own inner strength, forming their personal essence qi—a unique signature, shaped by their body, mind, and nature. Only with this step completed could one open their dantian—the internal wellspring linked to the meridians, where essence qi was gathered and refined.

  A cultivator who had opened more meridians had not only a better energy circution system but also a deeper bond between soul and body, making the formation of the spirit more stable. Likewise, a stronger body meant more inner strength—transting to a rger capacity to absorb and refine essence.

  Spiritual visualization was thus more than mental training—it was a gateway. The stronger the soul, the more easily the spirit could be formed, and the more essence could be guided into the body.

  Feiyin and his companions, knowing this, each purchased spiritual arts suited to their nature. They approached them seriously, experimenting with different visualizations. Feiyin in particur found the process hauntingly familiar. For years, he had dreamt of the Eight—vast, primordial beings who appeared to him in sleep. Those dreams, once a mystery, now seemed to be powerful visualizations in their own right.

  And he realized—he had been unknowingly nurturing his soul all along.