Chương 49: Lu Shan

Jianyi sat in Elder Sun's study, still feeling elated from his success in finally opening his dantians and becoming a cultivator for real.

"Welcome to the Qi Gathering Realm. You pushed very hard over the last few days, didn't you?" Elder Sun asked, his brow furrowed.

"I have, teacher, but it was all worth it! And now I can finally add cards to my dantians!"

"Mhh, my young friend, I would recommend that you let things settle down a bit in your pathways and dantians before you add cards."

"But I worked so hard to be prepared for the duel tomorrow!" Jianyi exclaimed, eyes wide. The elder tapped on his chin while thinking.

"Well, you could add the cards now; it is not a major risk. However, let me ask you this: If you had the choice between fighting tomorrow with your own spear or a rare and powerful sword I give you now, what would you choose?" Jianyi squinted at the elder, already sensing where this discussion would lead. That was beyond frustrating—he wanted to finally use his cards! What made it even more infuriating was that the elder was very likely right.

Stumbling into a fight with untested techniques would likely not lead to the result he had imagined while lying in his bed, fantasizing about stomping Lu Shan. Out of frustration, he didn't answer the elder directly. Instead, he murmured that he wouldn't add any cards to his upper dantian yet. Elder Sun chuckled.

"Very well. You also need to remember, without a cultivation technique, you are unlikely to gather sufficient qi to even cast the techniques." Jianyi almost slapped his forehead for that oversight.

"Anyway," the elder continued.

"If I recall correctly, I provided you with affinity cards for Wood and Fire, right?" Jianyi nodded and produced them from his storage ring. The two common jade cards looked beautiful to his eyes.

"So you can add those to your lower dantian in a day or two. Do you know how?" Jianyi leaned forward, shaking his head, eager to learn this important step in a cultivator's life.

"It is very simple but also slow. If you hold a card and reach out with a thread of qi, you can will it to enter your spirit world. It will turn into qi, which enters through one of your meridians. That takes just a few seconds. Then, however, you need to move it into the appropriate dantian: affinity into the lower, qi into the middle, and techniques into the upper. The time it takes depends on the cultivator, but more importantly, on the card's rarity.

An average cultivator should be able to move a common card to their dantian in an hour or two of meditation. That time increases dramatically the rarer the card becomes. For a rare card, you need to calculate at least a day or so." Jianyi nodded along, for a change that sounded relatively easy.

"Do I need to meditate the whole time?" The elder shrugged.

"As a beginner, probably. Later, not so much. You need to start the process, then dedicate a part of your attention to it. So it usually is not recommended to go into a large-scale confrontation while undergoing this integration."

"Very well, I understand…" he hesitated for a moment, not quite sure how to bring up the next topic. He raised his hand with the storage ring.

"Teacher, you remember that you gave me this ring, and in it you included two techniques." He pulled those out, just like the affinity cards before. Edge of the Blade Technique Common 1x Metal Swift Increases damage of a bladed weapon, lasts for five breaths Blockading Barrier Technique Common 1 x Earth Creates an earthen wall, lasts for two breaths"Now, I do remember. I handed you those before I knew about… your affinities, didn't I?" he looked at Jianyi meaningfully.

Jianyi nodded and hesitantly made to hand over the cards to the elder, who waved him off.

"Keep them, but don't add them to your dantian as you clearly cannot use them, correct?" After Jianyi had confirmed, though grimacing while doing so, the elder tapped on his desk, thinking.

"We obviously can't have you be without any techniques, and you did earn them as a reward for your support on that fateful day a few months ago. Let me see…" The elder grabbed another storage device, produced multiple card holders with ten cards each from it, and then selected two.

"Those are a great starting point for a Wood and Fire cultivator." You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author. Jianyi took them and smiled as he read them. Force of the Forest Technique Common 1x Wood Swift Cultivator's strength is enhanced, lasts for five breaths Bolt of Fire Technique Common 1 x Fire Shoots bolt of fire at single target"These are incredible! Thank you, teacher! Once I can use them…"

he got lost in his thoughts, imagining all that he would do while throwing fire at his opponents and smashing them with his bulging muscles. The elder laughed.

"I am glad you like them; may they be the start of a powerful deck." Jianyi nodded, then scrunched up his nose.

"Teacher, not that I am not grateful, but how does one go about building a powerful deck if one isn't rich enough to just buy one?"

"Let me address the last point first, my young student. Gifting a deck to someone is considered a disservice. We can discuss what it takes to ascend to the pinnacle of cultivation at another point, but know that earning your deck is a key component of finding your way for most." That was a surprisingly great relief for Jianyi. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he had feared that rich disciples would just buy powerful decks with which he could never compete.

"On how to get a deck, the most straightforward way is obviously going out and fighting spirit beasts, but to find the right cards that synergize with each other and make you a true powerhouse, it is usually required to trade cards with other cultivators or traders. More relevant for you, maybe, is that one of the reasons for sects is that they collect cards and award them to their disciples.

That means you can buy them for contribution points or get them as rewards for your position on the leaderboards, specific missions, or tournaments. The key thing is that you earn them in some way." His thoughts were racing. So far, he had not really given much thought to the leaderboards, meaning the collection of merit points, but if they were the way to get powerful cards, then he needed to increase his efforts—beyond all the other things he had on his plate.

"Thank you very much, teacher. I will work hard to get there."

"You are welcome. Good luck with your duel tomorrow," the elder said with a genuine smile.

"Remember how hard it was to control two threads of qi at the beginning."

As Jianyi made his way from the compound to the lecture hall in the outer sect, he stopped as he stepped out of the paifang of the inner sect. There was something… different. He took a couple of breaths, looked inside himself, and noticed that the number of qi motes entering through his meridians was markedly less than it had been before. Then he remembered.

One of the key benefits of being in the inner sect was that there were large-scale formations in place that helped concentrate qi, making it easier to cultivate and increasing the amount of qi one took in passively. Now that he stood outside the walls of the inner sect, that no longer affected him. It was yet another reason to be grateful to Elder Sun for taking him in.

A short while later, he entered the walls of the outer sect and noticed right away that the concentration of qi rose, but a lot less than it had been in the inner sect. He nodded to himself, acknowledging the difference and that with his dantians now open, his ability to sense qi had apparently gone up as well. As he neared the lecture hall, Miyao joined him. After they exchanged greetings, she opened her mouth to say something, hesitated, then went ahead.

"I have made a few enquiries about Lu Shan…" She hesitated again, looking at him for a reaction on whether she should continue. Jianyi nodded. While he was not interested in rumors and gossip, he acknowledged that any kind of information about somebody who so clearly had it out for him could only be helpful for him to understand and counter him.

"He was tutored by Dai Ruomei for a few years before the family ran out of money." She looked at him as if that should tell him something.

"I am afraid I don't know who that is." She blinked at him for a moment, then realization hit her.

"I am sorry, I forgot that you are not from a noble house. Dai Ruomei is one of the most renowned spear tutors in Shiqiu City. She was raised here in the sect, fought on the frontlines for many years, and then gave up the path of ascension and just takes on students when they are truly talented—and if the parents are willing to pay a lot of money for the education." That made sense to Jianyi. Even in the short duel they had fought four weeks earlier, he had seen how refined Lu Shan's spear technique was.

"About two years ago, they ran out of money, though. His father is from a minor noble house, but was disgraced after he left the frontlines under dubious circumstances. His mother's noble house is impoverished and supposedly didn't want to share what they had left with her and her disgraced husband…" Miyao blushed, noticing that she had veered from relevant information to gossip. Jianyi nodded gratefully anyway.

"Thank you. My mother always said that when negotiating with a customer, it helps to understand them. It might not impact the duel tomorrow directly, but who knows? So thank you for sharing."

"You know we are rooting for you," Miyao said before finding a seat for the next class.

Piercing Fang. He launched his attack right after Cai Fangyin announced the start of the duel. Jianyi had agonized the previous night over the question of how to approach the fight best. He sidestepped Lu Shan's counter and launched into a Blazing Arc. Physically, he felt close to his peak. The fallout from the failed meridian opening was finally behind him.

Based on what he had learned about cultivation over the last few weeks, he would get physically stronger with every realm, even though he was not a body cultivator. However, one would also get stronger between the steps within one realm, and he could not rule out that Lu Shan had already taken one of those steps within the Qi Gathering realm. The attack forced his opponent into an awkward block, which made the boy furious, but in the end didn't lead to anything.

The other boy also had years of tutoring behind him, but Jianyi had not been lazy during all those years, and he believed that the intense training by Minghao and, to a lesser extent, Elder Sun, had helped him catch up. He was forced into an Unyielding Wall, defending against two vicious thrusts from Lu Shan that he barely evaded. But he didn't hesitate to go back on the offensive with a Flowing Current.

The biggest issue, of course, was that he didn't have access to any techniques, but there was nothing to do about that at this point. He overextended and was punished with a painful hit to his chest that fortunately didn't draw any blood.

"That you hid from me for weeks just shows how pathetic you really are. I am surprised that you came out of your hidey hole for this." Lu Shan's taunting was as loud as it was unhinged, playing to the audience—easily twice as many as last time—watching from the sidelines. Jianyi ignored the comment and attacked with another Piercing Fang. Despite having landed the first blow and likely being the superior fighter, Lu Shan got frustrated. The answer had come to Jianyi eventually.

Lu Shan inhaled exaggeratedly, and two cards appeared before him. Aggression. Relentless assault was the answer. The inspiration had been Minghao's gauntlet training, which forced him to continuously move forward while attacking, dodging, or blocking, but the deciding factor had been Elder Sun's comment about managing multiple qi threads. Jianyi's attack pierced Lu Shan's distracted defense. Only at the last second did the boy manage to divert the spear to only hit his side, not his chest.

The cards vanished as he exhaled without having activated a technique. Lu Shan might have access to his cards, but that was different from having mastered the art of using them in the heat of the battle. That was something that took months, maybe years, to master. The young disciple seemed to come to the same conclusion, his face twisting in rage, his focus shifting back to the spear.