Chương 17: The Five Elements Spiritual Technique

Leo sat cross-legged on his bedroom floor, the yellowed book laid open before him. The pages had gone soft from years of handling, corners rounded smooth, spine cracked in familiar places." The Five Elements Spiritual Technique by Deity Transformation Monarch Everlight" The Five Elements Spiritual Technique was the greatest cultivation method ever developed, and everyone on Earth had a copy of it. The book itself was designed for elementary school students.

Hospitals presented one to each newborn as a matter of tradition, and many parents stamped their baby's first footprints on the inside cover, recording major milestones alongside. Leo traced his fingers over the faded ink impressions on the first page. Two tiny footprints, slightly smudged at the edges where infant feet had squirmed against the paper.

Below them, in his mother's careful handwriting: Leo Chen Born: March 15, 2011 Spiritual Roots: 25 Wood, 15 Fire, 26 Earth, 13 Metal, 21 Water Average across the board. Nothing special. The kind of spiritual roots that would have been considered trash tier if not for Monarch Everlight. Leo owed a lot to the Monarch. Without him, Leo would never have had the chance to begin cultivation. When Leo first transmigrated, almost everything in his room remained identical to what he remembered.

The posters, the furniture, the arrangement of books on his shelf. Aside from the VR Pod, this yellowed volume had been the biggest difference. In his original world, no such book existed. Here, it sat on his nightstand like a treasured heirloom. His mother caught him reading it once, during those early confusing weeks. She smiled with a warmth that made his chest ache.

"You used to make your father read chapters as a bedtime story," she said.

"Every night, the same sections. The Golden Path, the Five Elements meditation, the story of how it was created. You had them memorized before you could write your own name." Leo smiled and nodded, pretending to remember. Now he flipped through the familiar pages, reviewing contents he had studied countless times since arriving in this world. The book detailed the stages of the path to immortality with cheerful illustrations and simple language.

Qi Refining (Lifespan of 120), where cultivators drew spiritual energy into their bodies and refined it within their dantian. Foundation Establishment (Lifespan of 160), where accumulated Qi seeped outward from the dantian, saturating and enhancing the physical body with spiritual power. Cultivators could begin using spiritual medicine and pills to refine their bodies.

Gold Core (Lifespan of 320), where cultivators formed a condensed core of energy at the Zhifu point in the brain, dramatically refining their divine sense and mental capabilities. Nascent Soul (Lifespan of 640), where by consuming the infant transformation pill, the soul itself condensed into a divine infant capable of projecting a domain of influence. And finally Deity Transformation (Lifespan of 1280), where the infant matured and condensed a divine spark, approaching true immortality.

Each stage featured friendly cartoon cultivators demonstrating proper meditation postures. Thought bubbles showed the internal processes at each realm. Helpful arrows indicated the flow of Qi through meridian pathways. The book proclaimed the Five Elements Spiritual Technique as Earth's greatest cultivation method. It earned that title because everyone could use it, and decades of research had proven it the best method for universal adoption.

From the earliest stage of Qi Refining to the peak of Deity Transformation. The pinnacle of cultivation, given as a free gift to everyone. Later sections, intended for older readers, explained the technique's origins. After World Cultivator War 2, all the sects, nations, and scientists came together in unprecedented cooperation.

President Harry Truman, known by his Daoist title Monarch Everlight, ordered the seizure of all sect cultivation techniques and commissioned a massive research initiative to develop the perfect universal method. Nearly every great cultivator of the era contributed to the project. After a decade of research and bloody debate, the Five Elements Spiritual Technique emerged as the mathematically proven most efficient cultivation method for universal adoption.

The proof, simplified for young readers, centered on a fundamental principle of cultivation. A cultivator could only convert spiritual qi from a spiritual vein into personal cultivation based on how well the element of their technique matched their spiritual root. For example, if Leo cultivated an Earth Element Technique, he would utilize only 26% of the spiritual qi drawn from a vein. His Earth spiritual root sat at 26. The remaining 74% would dissipate uselessly into the environment.

A heavenly spiritual root with an earth value of 80 would cultivate nearly four times faster, making far more efficient use of the same resources. But Monarch Everlight recognized a crucial truth. If Earth was to truly embark on cultivation for all, every bit of spiritual qi had to count. A trash spiritual root wasting 74% of a precious resource was unacceptable. Likewise, even a heavenly spiritual root wasting 20% represented an intolerable inefficiency when multiplied across billions of cultivators.

The Five Elements Spiritual Technique solved this problem through elegant simplicity. Rather than absorbing Qi of a single element, the technique allowed cultivators to separate unattributed pure Qi into its five elemental components and absorb each one sequentially. The speed of absorption for each element depended on the strength of the corresponding spiritual root.

A cultivator with a heavenly Earth spiritual root would absorb derived Earth Qi rapidly, then spend far more time working through the Fire, Water, Metal, and Wood portions. Total absorption. Zero waste. Perfect efficiency. Of course, a cultivator could simply ignore the elements that didn't match their strongest root. This allowed much faster cultivation in the short term. But every strand of spiritual qi was metered, and every chapter of the book emphasized the importance of utilizing every single bit of it.

The book devoted considerable attention to sleep. For reference, physical exercise, despite appearances, did not actually increase strength. Exercise broke down muscle fibers and depleted energy reserves. The body only rebuilt stronger during rest, particularly during deep sleep cycles. Cultivation followed the same principle. The meridians and dantian expanded their capacity during sleep, when the body could safely stretch and reinforce the pathways that channeled Qi.

Cultivating without adequate rest led to meridian strain, Qi deviation, and potentially permanent damage. The book also covered the critical importance of cultivation timing. Breaking into Foundation Establishment before the body reached maturity, typically around the eighteenth birthday, could cause devastating developmental problems. The Qi saturation process locked the body in its current state upon advancement, preventing proper growth.

Similarly, advancing to Gold Core before brain development completed, usually in the mid-twenties, could cripple divine sense. Several pages featured true stories of geniuses who ruined their immortal potential by advancing too early. A prodigy who reached Foundation Establishment at fourteen remained forever trapped in a child's body with a stunted lifespan. The book also detailed the process of breaking into Qi Refining, which would typically occur at age 15.

If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it. The young practitioner would break into Qi Refining with guidance from someone trustworthy, typically parents, to avoid accidentally damaging fragile meridians during the initial opening process. Then, after cultivating for eight hours daily over three years, a practitioner would reach the peak of Qi Refining shortly after their eighteenth birthday. This timing minimized wasted waiting.

Less idle time meant more opportunity for study, preparation, and simply enjoying youth before the demands of higher cultivation consumed ever-greater portions of life. Finally, the book described 'play cultivation'. Children could request free wisps of Qi from Spirit Veins to practice the Five Elements Spiritual Technique before their meridians opened. The exercise taught the tricky process of separating unattributed spiritual qi into its five elemental components.

It was probably the most popular game every child played, a competitive pastime where kids raced to see who could split Qi wisps fastest or maintain the cleanest elemental separation. When Leo first tried "play cultivation" after transmigrating, he discovered his body possessed excellent muscle memory of the process. Years of childhood practice had ingrained the movements and mental patterns. His fingers knew how to guide Qi separation before his conscious mind fully understood what they were doing.

But that had been play. Practice without true absorption. Now his meridians stood open. Leo closed the book and set it aside. The familiar weight of it grounded him, connecting him to a childhood he had never actually experienced but which his body remembered perfectly. He settled into proper meditation posture, legs crossed, spine straight, hands resting on his knees. The position felt natural. Years of play cultivation had trained his body well.

In modern society, every wisp of spiritual qi was measured out and paid for. Everyone on Earth carried an ID card tied to their personal usage, and personal Qi could not be sold or transferred. If you needed more Qi than your daily allotment permitted, you paid substantially higher taxes and faced cultivation audits by the IRS. Even Qi from theft had to be reported. Every cultivator dreaded tax season, and the government penalized and heavily taxed waste.

Leo drew a slow breath, inserted his ID card, and started his daily allotment. Through the wall, he sensed the house's connection to the neighborhood spiritual vein. A thin trickle of Qi, carefully metered, flowed into the residence's cultivation formation. His daily allotment. Enough for eight hours of advancement cultivation, precisely calculated based on his spiritual roots and current realm.

Spiritual Qi entered through the connection point in the living room, traveled through the house's internal formation channels, and arrived at the secondary node in his bedroom. It emerged as a soft silver luminescence that existed more in his perception than in physical reality. He extended his hands, palms up, fingers spread. The Qi pooled in the space between his palms. A small sphere of undifferentiated potential, waiting to be shaped.

This was the critical step, the technique that Monarch Everlight had refined through a decade of research. The separation. Leo's fingers began to move. The motions came from muscle memory, ingrained through countless hours of childhood play. His right index finger traced a spiral pattern through the Qi sphere, and a thread of green energy separated from the mass. Wood Qi. It pulled away like honey stretching from a spoon, maintaining connection to the main sphere while becoming distinctly itself.

His left thumb pressed against an invisible pressure point in the air, and a strand of red emerged. Fire Qi. Warm and eager, flickering at the edges. Both hands worked in concert, fingers dancing through patterns that had no names but felt as natural as breathing. Yellow for Earth. White for Metal. Blue for Water. Five threads extending from the central sphere, each vibrating with its distinct elemental nature. In play cultivation, this was where the exercise ended.

You separated the Qi, held the separation as long as possible, then released it back into the air. But now Leo's meridians stood open. Now the separated Qi had somewhere to go. He drew the Wood thread toward himself first. The green energy flowed through his open meridians, following pathways carved during his breakthrough. It felt like drinking cool water after a long run. Refreshing. Natural. The Wood Qi settled into his dantian, merging with the tiny pool of refined energy already present.

Leo let out a slow breath. So this was real cultivation. He had tried a few times after he transmigrated, splitting wisps, but now the Qi actually stayed. He could feel it settle inside him, warm and alive, like a second heartbeat he had only just learned to hear. His Wood spiritual root sat at 25. The absorption proceeded at a steady pace, neither fast nor slow. Each wisp of Wood Qi integrated smoothly, without waste, without loss. When the Wood thread emptied, Leo drew in the Fire. His Fire root was only 15.

The red Qi flowed more slowly, requiring more time and attention to properly absorb. He could feel his body working harder to process the energy, his meridians straining slightly against the elemental mismatch. But it absorbed. Every wisp. Every strand. No waste. Earth followed. His strongest element at 26, and the yellow Qi flowed eagerly, almost rushing to join the pool in his dantian. Then Metal at 13, the slowest and most tedious absorption.

Finally Water at 21, a comfortable middle pace that felt like settling into a warm bath. One complete cycle of the Five Elements Spiritual Technique. Leo checked his internal state. The pool of refined Qi in his dantian had grown measurably. A tiny increase, but real. Tangible progress on the long road toward the peak of Qi Refining. He allowed himself a small grin. Tiny or otherwise, that pool of Qi belonged to him. Every wisp accounted for, every element absorbed.

Monarch Everlight's gift to the average and the unremarkable. He reached for the next portion of his daily allotment and began separating again. After what seemed like only a few moments, the flow stopped. Eight hours had passed. Cultivation flew by in a breeze.

Leo didn't bother going back to school to finish his finals. Now that his talent was proven and he had great immortal destiny, he didn't need mortal studies as a backup option. In fact, half of the incoming students, especially the rich ones, deferred their enrollment to second year directly. The reality was, Leo did not have any time. Each day, Leo needed to spend 8 hours for sleep, 8 hours for cultivation, and 8 hours for lifebonding with his new sword.

He could save a lot of time by doing his 8 hours of cultivation in the Azure Profound Continent game world, combining his sleep and cultivation time. But this would slow down his divine sense training since as he wouldn't be maximizing his Qi refining death cooldown of 15 hours. Right now the biggest bottleneck to Leo's plans was divine sense. His goal was to reach 9999 Si, the limit of Qi Refinement cultivation, before entering Foundation Establishment ahead of freshman year.

Upon advancing major realms, a cultivator's divine sense would increase dramatically. Most people didn't bother with divine sense cultivation because each realm guaranteed a minimum. Upon entering Qi Refining, your divine sense reached a minimum of 100, and upon entering Foundation Establishment, it jumped directly to 1000. However, some people still pursued it. One group was young masters.

With their family's resources, they entered Qi Refining early at age seven and spent the years waiting for their bodies to develop by grinding their divine sense. By eighteen, they would have 400 to 600 divine sense, increasing to 1400 to 1800 after Foundation Establishment. Another group was formation masters. If you wanted any hope of achieving high-end Gold Core divine sense, taking advantage of the divine sense increase at each realm was a necessary step.

Training divine sense grew increasingly expensive the more you had, so every talented formation master took their time grinding out the limit of 9999 at Qi Refining. This took 40 to 80 years depending on how much money they could burn. The most popular training technique was the "Full Breath Recovery Technique." If you emptied your divine sense completely, then used the Full Breath Recovery Technique to restore it from zero, the recovery process would also strengthen your divine sense.

The downside was that the technique relied on drawing from a spiritual vein to recover, requiring cultivators to pay the corresponding spirit vein fees. Formation masters training the Full Breath Recovery Technique offset the cost by spending their divine sense drawing formations. Unfortunately, the massive number of formation masters at all levels grinding away at divine sense training flooded the market with formations. Formation engraving typically commanded only a 10% margin over the dollar value of Si used.

If you made a mistake or worked inefficiently, you lost money drawing formations for sale. Even though Leo had a free source of spiritual qi to recover his divine sense, the Full Breath Recovery Technique a pretty slow so Leo just didn't bother. The good news was that if Leo wanted to make money, he could use the free Qi of Azure Profound Continent and then draw formations at 100% pure profit. In fact, the other three members of the group were already doing exactly that.

They had finished refining their lifebound flying swords and discovered something unexpected. Lifebound equipment, stored in a cultivator's dantian, could travel between the game world and the real world. More importantly, formations drawn on them transferred too. Lifebonding came with serious drawbacks. A cultivator could only lifebond materials matching the grade of their divine sense, so the group could only lifebond T2 Foundation Establishment materials.

In addition the bonding process itself took six months of eight hours daily before the treasure became usable. And once lifebound, no one else could ever use the treasure again. Since Leo's Si of 2000 had reached Foundation Establishment grade, he could begin lifebonding a flying sword. In fact, his had arrived just yesterday: the La Ferrari Eclipse. The very same model Leo first saw when he transmigrated, on display in a Costco. Leo held the sword for the first time and felt its weight in three directions.

The physical weight, surprisingly light for what it was. The spiritual weight of the forbidden Tier 4 Nascent Soul formations that elevated the treasure to the combat strength of a Late Stage Gold Core cultivator. And then the other weight. The one measured in his parents' twelve-hour shifts and weekend locums and every dollar they'd poured into his training since that first cup of Tier 3 tea. The La Ferrari Eclipse cost 1. 2 million dollars, but his parents wrote the check without hesitation.

Leo felt a tightness in his throat. His parents would never say "I love you" or "I'm proud of you." That wasn't how they worked. They showed it through action, through sacrifice, through taking a cultivation loan for 1. 2 million dollars and simply telling him to work harder. Thus eight hours of sleep, eight hours of cultivation, eight hours of lifebonding. He would spend the next six months locked in his room in closed door cultivation.

The only interruption would be whenever he climbed into the VR pod to 'train' with the Divine Sense Press. Upon hearing about Leo's La Ferrari, the other three members of the group turned green with envy and started drawing formations en masse to earn money, finally working hard for the first time in many, many years.