Chương 23: Locking Yang Nourishing Art

Lin Yi didn't decide on the Locking Yang Nourishing Art outright but continued to look over the various longevity methods. There were still countless of them, dozens for each possible attribute. Even poison-longevity arts existed. He likely stayed there for several hours looking through the various arts. Lin Yi saw several more yang-attributed immortal arts. However, many shared similar aspects and differed mostly in their execution and their more complex circulations.

In the end, the Locking Yang Nourishing Art suited him the best. After making his final choice, he had little reason to stay on the third floor and returned to the entry counter and to Senior Sister Zhang. She was still at her original place from a few hours ago and saw him walking towards her. She addressed him with a smile and in a voice that sounded more like it was directed at a younger brother than at a peer.

"Junior Brother Lin, finally back. You really took your time, didn't you?" Lin Yi arrived at the counter and replied to her question.

"Yes, Senior Sister. I wanted to properly inspect the immortal arts and choose the most suitable one. I don't want to regret my decision in the future." She nodded wisely in return.

"That is true. One should rather put some more effort into finding the most fitting cultivation method than get stuck at a bottleneck in the future due to incompatibility."

"Sigh, you know how it is, junior brother. Many disciples want to find the strongest and most overbearing immortal arts directly, or choose them because their names sound grander, regardless of whether they can even master them. Only a few have the breath of mind to analyze their own strength and weaknesses properly to choose a compatible immortal art." What Senior Sister Zhang said was quite common throughout the cultivation world.

New cultivators, whether from humble beginnings or old immortal families and sects, often chose grandiose methods that promised greater strength and faster cultivation. Yes, some cultivators were suited to these arts. These arts had, after all, a reason for their creation, but in reality, the fewest cultivators fell into this category.

Who didn't dream, at least once, of standing at the top of the world, facing countless enemies and returning in triumph, breaking a record by being the youngest cultivator to reach the next realm, or killing across realms? Many, for example, discard the Classic of Qi Refinement at the first possible opportunity. Sometimes it was indeed better to concentrate more in their specialized area, but often no one wants to use a mere common cultivation method.

It was also not a good solution to force a suitable art upon them. Cultivation of the immortal dao was not a simple job or just a hobby. It was the complete devotion of an entire lifestyle. No one would reach higher realms if they didn't take cultivation seriously. And when you force a more balanced, simple, or basic immortal art upon an ambitious junior, you get indecisiveness, procrastination, and a general lack of motivation, with less discipline.

It would be better for those juniors to make their own mistakes and learn from them. Many would realize the truth once they started to fall behind other truly talented geniuses or those with a strong dao heart, but then it was too late. Only the fewest of them had the chance to rise again. Senior Sister Zhang continued.

"And, junior brother? What great immortal did you pick?"

"One of the extraordinary immortal arts, the Locking Yang Nourishing Art." Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere. Lin Yi told her without much hesitation, but regretted it in the next moment. His senior sister put on a mischievous expression as she said her next words in a teasing and giggling voice.

"Oh, oh, little junior brother. I thought you were still too young for these spicy activities. You should focus on your cultivation and not court your fairy senior sisters, giggle giggle." Lin Yi didn't know what to say, and could only stand there awkwardly. While he had a mature mind with half a life's worth of experiences, he was, in the end, in the body of a child.

Many would treat him like a teenager or older, due to his Innate Spirituality, whose capabilities were commonly known, but he was still here and occasionally teased. Though in both lives he never had a good answer for that. After a few seconds of continued silence, mostly from his side, Senior Sister Zhang couldn't hold herself and burst into laughter.

"Hahahaha, just kidding, just kidding. I'm joking, junior brother. You should see your face, hahaha." Lin Yi could only smile wryly as she waved her hand in the air. After some time, she calmed down and came back to the topic.

"Hah, nevertheless, the Locking Yang Nourishing Art is quite a good and balanced art. I myself know one or two martial sisters who cultivate the yin-counterpart." She opened a drawer in the counter and took out a pure oval jade stone, which she placed on a special circle. Lin Yi knew what the stone and circle were and which process she would activate next. The jade stone was a storage container into which information could be inserted.

They were widely used in the cultivation world for all kinds of things, from storing simple messages to containing vast and complex cultivation methods. Senior Sister Zhang used one a few hours ago, for example, to read something. These were not mortal jade, but spiritual jade stones. They could be interacted with through spirituality or its higher evolutions, such as divine sense. The higher the grade and the purity of the spiritual stone, the more information it can store.

But even the simplest low-grade first-tier spiritual stone could store an immense amount of data. Compared to modern technology on Earth, they started with terabytes of storage. It was not even necessary for it to be jade, but it was the material best suited for storing information and was thus used by nearly everyone. Each immortal art or text in the Scripture Pavilion was stored on this kind of spiritual stone and fixedly placed on its respective floor and area.

The storage jade containers on the first floor were open to all and accessible as one wished. From the second floor upwards, it was different. There, the jade stones were restricted by the Scripture Pavilion's formation, and only the introduction was freely accessible. To read them, one needed to undergo the process that Lin Yi and his senior sister were currently undergoing. The circle on the counter was connected to the grand formation of the pavilion, and thus to every immortal art and text.

Lin Yi proactively put his sect plate beside the jade stone onto the circle, and earned himself a smile from Senior Sister Zhang.

"Thank you, junior brother." She nodded and continued controlling the formation. The circle lit up for a few moments as it did its workings. Lin Yi's token for a restricted immortal art was accepted and redeemed by the formation. After this process, the Locking Yang Flourishing Art was copied by the formation from its original storage stone and engraved on the jade stone in the circle. Naturally, additional restrictions and fail-safes were installed to prevent the immortal art from being leaked.

One was, for example, that the spiritual stone would lose its contents after it left the sect-protecting formation. Only after the owner returned to the sect would the content appear again. Senior Sister Zhang picked up both the jade stone with the newly entered immortal art and the sect plate and gave them back to Lin Yi.

"Here you are, junior brother. Everything's done. Do you need anything else?" Lin Yi shook his head. For now, he had everything, but he would likely return in a few days.

"No, thank you, Senior Sister Zhang. The other immortal arts I need, I will pick up the next time." She smirked for a moment and said goodbye to Lin Yi.

"Well then, good luck with the cultivation of your special yang art, hahaha."

"Sigh, thank you. I wish you also a good day, senior sister." After bidding farewell as well, Lin Yi set out on his journey home. He had gotten what he wanted today. The Locking Yang Flourishing Art suited him greatly. It had a simpler Qi circulation than other yang longevity arts, which should help him with his plans for his future cultivation. The ability to anchor one's primordial yang was quite a good function, not just for activities that Senior Sister Zhang implied.

Yes, it could preserve the primordial yang during the union of yin and yang, but Lin Yi didn't have any plans for romance. Cultivating the immortal dao was for him the foremost priority. Distractions would lead him only astray. There was a satirical phrase in the cultivation fan community of his past life. While he found it greatly exaggerated, slightly funny, and also applicable to both genders, there was a sliver of truth to most things: Women will only slow the speed of drawing your sword.

He laughed at the phrase and of its double meaning as he returned to his own courtyard.