The Foundational realm. It was said to be the stage a cultivator truly becomes more than a mortal, adding a hundred years of lifespan.

Mei performed cycles with her qi over and over again, trying to condense the qi into her dantian. 

With the sect master's notes, she didn't have much difficulty reaching the 9th level of Qi Gathering. But to reach the Foundation stage, she had to compress and purify her qi, something proving especially difficult because of the limited amount of meridians she could use safely.

To make matters worse, her unusable meridians acted as holes for the qi to leak out. Because of that, she had to use a qi barrier art to halt their flow, which was what the notes adviced. Worse, if she pressed too hard and broke the barrier, the qi would go into the damaged meridians, filling her body with pain.

It was most unsatisfying. While getting to the 9th stage of Qi Gathering was tedious, at least she could feel herself progress. This, however, she likened to trying to break a brick wall with nothing but bare hands. It felt like she was barely making any progress, and it hurt if she hit too hard.

As she grumbled internally to herself about how unfair it was, she heard enthusiastic talking.

"Wow! I'm so excited to go to the auction!"

Two strange-looking men were smiling fakely while doing their best to look excited. One was skinny and had a rather big nose and narrow eyes, while the other was somewhat handsome but obese.

"I know, right?" the fat man.

He jumped up and down.

Mei looked around and saw some cultivators turn to snicker at them, before resuming whatever they were doing.

The two strange cultivators continued to talk in mock excitement about the auction. Eventually, the skinny one cleared his throat loudly a few times.

"Ahem... AHEM!" he switched to whispering. "I heard one of the Xing clan's top chosen, Bai Xue, a heavenly beauty, really wants to get the Heavenly Black Lotus!"

"Wow, I didn't know! Good thing you told me! If someone buys the Heavenly Black Lotus, I would really fear for his life!" fatty said. "And I heard the Zhao Tang, another one of Xing clan's chosen really wants to get... the Violet Jade Snakegrass!"

Mei was confused. What the heck were these two weirdos up to? They continued to list a few other items that some random disciples in the Xing clan wanted, emphasising them very clearly. What even was the Xing clan?

Suddenly, it hit her. This must be the Xing clan's very roundabout way of getting people to lay off items they want! But why not just announce their identity in the auction? Wouldn't doing this make them lose face instead?

As she pondered, she heard a man's yell.

"Scoundrels! Stop right there!"

In the distance, 5 guards charged over.

"Run!" the skinny one said.

The two weirdos ran off in a hurry.

As the guards ran past her, one of them must have seen her confused face.

"You! Are you new here?" he stopped.

"Uh, yes?" she said.

"Don't worry about the Xing clan. If you happen to want one of those items, go for it! The auctioneers will keep your identity secret and help you escape." he finished, resuming his run.

What.

Mei decided not to worry about it and went back to cultivating.

1 cycle, 2 cycles... 50 cycles...

Suddenly, she was snapped out of it by a few rowdy children. They laughed and played, hitting each other with wooden weapons of sorts. As their auras were around the 4ths level of qi gathering, it didn't hurt them much.

Urgh. Why did she have to be constantly disturbed when she finally decided to cultivate properly?

"Senior sister!" one of them, a young boy said. "Are you a Vermeemillion Pooonix disciple?"

"Yes."

"So cool!" his eyes shone. "Can you show me your cool fire magic?"

"No."

"What?" he pouted. "Why?"

She decided not to answer.

After trying to get her to answer for a few minutes, he seemed to get mad.

"Pfft! You must be a fake!" he shouted. "All the other disciples showed me their cool magic! Fake!"

Joining him, the other children started shouting that she was a fake too. Mei gritted her teeth. What a headache! She didn't think other cultivators would take them seriously, but it was making her rather nervous when they turned to look... because she was really a fake.

It wasn't like she could just bluff him with some flames either. The fire aspect of her meridians was too damaged.

"Feng Shen, can you do fire magic?" she asked with soulsense.

"I am a wind spirit beast. What do you think?"

"Grrr..."

As she was about to shout at them to leave her alone in anger, suddenly, a crazy thought came to mind. The core ring! Back in the sect, she tried to use it a few times. It was surprisingly easy to form a connection to and had a strange familiar to it.

Perhaps her stage was too low to control it, but while it was easy to activate, it would sever the connection to her for a few hours after every use.

Mei thought about it for a moment and figured it was probably fine to use it right now. The city seemed fairly safe. She raised her hand and willed it to release fire. 

A huge pillar of flame rose into the air, warming the very air up.

The boy watched in awe, while some of the nearby cultivators gave her cautionary glances.

"So cool! Do it again!"

"No." Mei said, but inwardly, she felt rather pleased.

As the kids pestered her, a middle-aged woman ran over from a nearby seat and shooed the kids away.

"Senior, I apologise on behalf of the kids. Please excuse me for not teaching them well," she said nervously.

Senior? Mei realised the lady must have thought she was at the Core stage. How annoying, she must have seen what was going on, but didn't bother until she mistook her for a Core cultivator.

Then, she realised something, making her eyes light up. She could pretend to be a powerful cultivator! Though... she couldn't think of a situation that would be good for off the top of her head.

Just as she was about to continue cultivating, she saw Wang Wei and Senior Foodie in the distance. Behind them, a man in servant clothing followed, somehow looking both nervous and very excited at the same time.