Wind rustled the warrior robes adoring Fan Zhong’s shoulders as Little White ran around him at dizzying speeds. The air was cool, it carried the smell of water and fish that was persistent throughout the docks of Butont. High in the sky the sun beamed providing a pleasant warmth to the day.

This was not the sweltering heat that he had experienced while trekking through the lands in the northern part of the valley; instead, this warmth was like the gentle caress of a loved one after a long time apart. Laughing at the water wolf’s excitement, Fan Zhong bent down and embraced his company in a full-on hug. This was getting more difficult as Little white was now fully grown as such he was incredibly strong and rather large.

At first, he had tried changing his form of address to drop the little part of Little White’s name. However, the wolf had become morose and refused to respond when he was only called ‘brother White’. As such, it seemed the matter was decided and Fan Zhong continued to refer to him as he always had. Currently, he was standing beside his other teammates as they checked their bags and belongings, making sure nothing had been left on the ship.

Fan Shun was standing to the side with Sir Teng and his helmsman arranging for the merchant to drop off payment for the job at the local Fan clan branch office. Normally these branch offices were run by those in the clan that lacked aptitude in the warrior ways and as such many of the less prolific branch clans had members inside of them. Teams that were on jobs usually rested at branch offices and collected their own payments.

However, Sir Teng was a regular customer of the clan and as such not paying would be a hit to his reputation so no one worried about him not paying. This was happening primarily because Fan Shun’s team had been requested to quickly return to the village as they were still short-handed and needed all able members to take on tasks. So, with a heavy heart, the group was saying their goodbyes to Sir Teng today and setting out immediately without even a day to rest.

Thankfully, they should arrive back in Little Green Bamboo Village at the turn of the new year exactly when Fan Zhong’s exile ended. Fan Zhong also realized that his birthday was approaching as he was born on the tenth day after the new year. His training recently had kept him busy and with so many things happening he hadn’t celebrated his birthday.

With a sigh, he realized this was simply one of the facets of taking on a more mature role within the clan. If they had time and events weren’t happening then of course celebrations could be arranged for his birthday. However, the increase in banditry and crime caused by the high taxes of the Wei clan had put everyone on edge, especially the Fan clan.

During such uncertain times, there was no room for such niceties. Thinking on the subject of age Fan Zhong was now 16 and his little brother was 13! This meant that Fan Jia’s last year at the academy was coming to a close and he would be graduated by the time Fan Zhong arrived home.

Thoughts of his little brother and sister put a smile on Fan Zhong’s face and his spirit suddenly felt lighter than it had for a long time. Suddenly movement caught his eye and he turned to see that Fan Shun and Sir Teng were making their way back over to the rest of his team.

“Sir Teng, it has been an honor for the Fan Clan to serve you throughout this time. Please never hesitate to call upon our services again should the need arise” Fan Shun said to the old merchant while bowing respectively, his tone stoic and professional as always.

“Of course Brother Shun! Come now we’ve faced life and death together no more of this ‘Sir’ business. Those that face the call of our ancestors together with bravery do not need to call each other anything short of brother” Sir Teng said jovially while feigning a mock irritation, his beaming smile and general good nature made the expression somewhat less effective in Fan Zhong’s estimation.

“Yeah old man. Lighten up, you even advanced during this whole ordeal making us carry you the last leg… Respectfully, Senior Shun” Su Fen’s demeanor of indifferent laziness faltered for just a moment and a sly amused smile crossed his face, only to be quickly dismissed as his social mask of an expression once again blanket him.

“Oh ‘old man’ is it now? Junior Fen I seem to recall that someone needs to be present for all of my ceremonies for master realm advancement as a witness. You just love official ceremonies, don’t you junior?” Fan Shun’s tone remained professional however a twinkle of mischief played in his eyes.

“Damn you junior Zhong, I told you, none of this old man business. Apologize to senior Shun immediately” Su Fen said while turning away from the older warrior.

“Wha… Senior Fen?!” Fan Zhong turned to face the other man with the expression of someone who had been wronged.

Sir Teng’s laughter rang out and the banter between all of them continued with even Zi Bao joining in for a bit. Alas, all good things come to an end and eventually, they parted ways. After this, the Fan clan warriors made haste for their home only stopping at a few stores to restock traveling supplies before walking for most of the day.

That night they set up camp in clearing a few minutes off the well-trodden road between Butont and Little Green Bamboo Village. Stars dotted the night sky like immortal gems gleaming on a canvas of the blackest cloth and thankfully the weather held. During the next morning, everyone rose and the group continued ever forward as they had almost a month of travel left to go.

While they traveled Fan Shun had them keep an even pace and they would stop to make camp at midday for a meal before setting out again. After the first day, they were able to gauge their speed and distance using Fan Shun and Su Fen’s knowledge of landmarks on their road. With this, the older warriors determined the party was making good time and each day time could be spared for training

As such, they stopped three hours earlier every following day and commenced training with three of them while one person was assigned to cook. Much to Fan Shun and Zi Bao’s chagrin, only their seniors were able to relax and prepare their daily meals. Meanwhile, they had to suffer under the viper-like blows of Su Fen or the monstrous strength of the newly advanced Fan Shun.

Speaking of their leader’s increased strength, Fan Zhong was very curious to learn more about the master realm. Earlier during his training Fan Cheng had spoken about the master realms broadly. However, the topic was never covered in depth. Unfortunately, Fan Shun could tell the young warrior little about specifics as he was waiting to return to the clan to receive a cycling technique and advice from the elders.

Although his knowledge was lacking in the details of what a master realm martial artist could do he was more knowledgeable than Fan Zhong and so he told him of the broad strokes. The master realms were separated into master, grandmaster, and supreme grandmaster respectively. When one reached this level they could actively force their mental energy from their sea of consciousness, a space that existed in the soul instead of in the physical world, through their dead dantian and into the physical world.

Qi is attracted to mental energy even more so than other dense concentrations of qi and when the two meet the mental energy would be slowly consumed to produce more qi. Mental energy could also guide and control qi in this way, pulling it into the body to strengthen or be used in techniques or to cultivate. This made qi dangerous however as qi that was not naturally part of the body would become violent and cause injury if not guided by mental energy. As such if a martial artist lacked enough mental energy to control the qi they brought in it could cause them to explode from within!

Many sages and immortals in the legends had thought of how to work around this problem to empower their descendants. Indeed they invented various methods to help with it such as techniques to saturate a strong treasure or talisman with mental energy that could be stored for and built up over time to allow one to control a life-saving treasure in an emergency. However, one truth that remained was that in the world of martial arts mental energy and qi were intrinsically intertwined and so it was a great boon that humans first tempered their mental energy in the graded realms before being able to draw in external qi!

What was more terrifying than this was the way that masters progressed as they still had to bring their mind, body, and technique into harmony just like lower realm martial artists. However, after doing this they then needed to pull in qi that would push them beyond their limit, and then only two outcomes could occur. The first was that the harmony of body, mind, and technique were insufficient, and as such the rampaging qi would simply burst forth and turn them into bloody meat paste.

When successful they would take a step toward awakening their dantian and bringing them forward on the path to becoming an immortal. This description was obviously vague as how the energy was channeled for each of the three breakthroughs was different and the results were different, not to mention immortal realms simply being a legend, but it described the general process one must go through to advance as a master. In other words, their progress was on the edge of life and death, to advance one had to firmly believe in their training and path!

Fan Zhong was shocked upon learning this, no wonder so many master realm experts took so long to advance. With a single wrong move or rushed step there would be no difference between progress and committing suicide. Determined to continue learning, he pressed Fan Shun for more details.

After this, the older warrior described to him the process of cultivating martial arts with qi. First one had to have a cycling technique to move the energy throughout the body. There were as many cycling techniques as there were stars in the heavens however the most used ones fell under three types. Firstly there were those techniques commonly referred to as loop method cycling techniques.

This cycling technique forms a constant stream of mental energy between consciousness and dantian. While keeping this loop closed the martial artist simultaneously expends small amounts of mental energy to generate qi around the portion of the loop that resides in their dantian. Once there is a thin amount of qi surrounding the loop the martial artist will keep adding mental energy into the system widening it and strengthening the amount of mental energy generated.

At the same time, they will slowly raise the amount of mental energy expended to generate enough qi to keep the growing loop fully enriched. This is a careful balance but allows the loop cultivator to be flexible. If they need to fight or do something that requires them to spend less concentration on cultivating their martial arts they can reduce the size of the loop. Conversely in closed-door cultivation, the loop cultivator can widen their loop of mental energy to speed up qi accumulation and speed of cultivation advancement.

This all amounts to the loop method being incredibly flexible while excelling at teaching the cultivator to have precise control over their energy. Notably, Loop Method cultivators have trouble generating sudden spontaneous bursts of qi and power. As such they prefer longer drawn-out engagements that let them take advantage of their control and flexibility in energy expenditure.

Doing this allows them to slowly gain an advantage over opponents, many compare this to the slow erosion of a rock from an endless immortal river. With this description, many have the misconception that only water-based cycling techniques can use the loop method. This was untrue however as the methods themselves could be used with any elemental qi combination.

Next Fan Shun described the techniques that fell under the burst method, this cycling method is the most straightforward and thus is quite popular. In this method the martial artist forcibly uses mental energy to quickly generate enough qi until they can barely control it (though each burst is unique to the martial artist/sect), leaving barely enough mental energy to control what they have gathered. Then they proceed to release the qi into techniques to strengthen the body and techniques they are cultivating to the limit of what their remaining mental energy can control.

Afterward, the martial artist will rest and meditate on what they have gained while cycling their remaining mental energy in and out of their dantian in large waves. Doing this allows the mental energy to sit in their dantian to saturate in their remaining qi as much as possible before cycling it back to their consciousness. During this time the qi saturated mental energy strengthens the consciousness producing a large amount of mental energy.

This back and forth is repeated until the burst user has fully refilled their reserves of mental energy and is ready to once again generate qi and start from the beginning. This puts a great strain on their body and minds from trying to cycle while leaving so little energy in their consciousness. Thus these martial artists need long periods of rest between sessions and need a closed-door environment to do so as well as setting aside time to recover.

As such, burst martial artists have great cultivation speed, power, and qi generation but their energy control and mental energy regeneration suffer. However, burst cycle techniques can generate incredible amounts of spontaneous power being known to frequently activate ultimate techniques and decimate entire groups of opponents before they have time to react. As such they prefer quick engagements that last a few dozen exchanges at most.

Any more than that and most burst cultivators will need to use external pills and resources to replenish their depleted energy reserves. Last but not least burst users are fearsome closed-door martial artists. They cultivate their martial arts faster than almost anyone else provided they have ample resources prepared to supplement repeated burst sessions as well as plentiful amounts of time to stay in seclusion.

At this point, Fan Shun reminded Fan Zhong that while one could advance quickly in closed-door cultivation it cut you off from outside ideas that could provide enlightenment onto your path. As such even though it was tempting for a burst method martial artist to stay in a cave for a hundred years he could similarly find that he lacked inspiration and take ten times the effort to make the same advancement that someone who saw the world made in a single year. Continuing, the older man described the last cycling method he knew about.

This was the whirlpool method of cycling. The Whirlpool Method is unique as it was rumored to be made by immortals for their mortal kin whom they wished to raise to higher realms quickly. However, while developing the technique these immortals never considered the need to fight during mortal cultivation stages, as they would defend their kin and allow them to safely raise their strength. Although whirlpool methods have evolved for more practical mortal use over the years many mortal and rogue martial artists still view whirlpool methods with disdain.

They consider their users' rich noble kids or those with big backers that were born with silver spoons in their mouths. This method uses the fact that mental energy can be used to form spirit seals and runes. To abuse this fact the martial artists will make a spiral of mental energy in their dantian which starts at the top and spirals downwards.

Then the martial artists use the most basic 3 rune spirit gathering formation to attract extra qi into the forming whirlpool. Since mental energy can be expended to form qi in the first place the cultivator will make a thin counter spiral on the outside of the original vortex with a small gap while converting that small spiral into qi. The resulting counter spiral will form a flow that all the qi being drawn into the spiral will follow

This will form an inner spiral that draws the qi down to the bottom and an outer spiral that draws it up along the outside of the whirlpool in a counter-rotation. Since qi strengthens mental energy all the mental energy forming the simple spirit gathering formation will become extremely saturated. As such this will amplify the original formation causing the suction force to be much greater and attract more qi progressively in a snowballing effect.

At this point, the martial artist only needs to control the amount of mental energy in the whirlpool such that it does not start generating too much qi for them to handle. In addition, they must also send back enough super saturated mental energy to recover what is expended to generate the skeleton of the outer spiral. This is because the structure does need a small constant input of generated qi to maintain itself.

However, the advantages here are incredible amounts of qi generation and cultivation speed. Alas, the downside is that although the spiral guiding the energy flow means minimal direct control is needed since the martial artist is not directly controlling the qi they can only widely disperse it from the out spiral. This is effective for cultivating martial arts as they can even strengthen their whole body.

However, for fighting they usually have a hard time gathering all of their qi into one place for concentrated techniques. Once one selected one of these cycling techniques they had to choose one of two methods to progress themselves. The first was to expend the qi with techniques, this would allow the martial artist to understand the more profound truths of a technique and improve it while strengthening their body marginally.

For the other method, it was to disperse the qi into the martial artist’s body and hold it there as long as possible while using external means to stimulate the body in certain ways. Although the second method took longer it could allow one’s body to exceed those of a similar stage. However, without technique comprehension in an actual battle, they may not be as powerful but when qi reserves ran low they would be more powerful. Developing technique understanding still strengthened the body; it merely didn’t focus it, otherwise, a martial artist would destroy themselves with the shockwave of their own techniques.

Although these things had been taught to Fan Zhong during his years growing up, his memories of the topic combined with the explanations by Fan Shun illuminated many details and gave him a much clearer picture of master realm advancement. By the time he had been able to extract all of the info out of the older warrior the group’s return trip had finished and Fan Zhong once again found himself outside the gates of Little Green Bamboo Village.

Thinking back on the trip it had been refreshing as no bandits had harassed them and Fan Shun had given small bits of this information over their training session and time spent walking. With their mission reported as a success to the town guards, the party returned to their homes, everyone was allowed a week to rest and gather themselves. Returning home, Fan Zhong was surprised to find a messenger waiting for him with an update regarding his assignment.

Fan Shun’s advancement had caused a hitch with his assignment as a squad leader and he needed to spend time consolidating his gains as well as being advised by the elders. As such Fan Zhong would be assigned to a squad with Su Fen leading it along with Zi Bao and Fan Yong. Since all of the more senior warriors and observers were busy attending to duties this small squad would be his team for now.

With the squad being small and lacking experience he was assured the clan would only assign them to safer assignments. Nodding his approval Fan Zhong walked into the Fan Clan's main family compound and went to his courtyard. It was late in the afternoon and the sky was darkening at this point so he decided to sit in his meditation hut.

All around the moon's light and cool night air silhouette the legendary beast carved into the pillars of the hut casting the shadows of these heavenly terrors upon him. Breathing in deeply, Fan Zhong smelt the crisp smell of the bamboo forest along with the familiar refreshing waters from the banks of the Flowing Grass river. Without any thought he retrieved his lute and played, his songs spoke of beautiful landscapes and towering mountains.

Of the heartache, the warriors' path brought, of the glory brothers in arms roused in each other. In the melodies and sweeping notes his longing for a home that seemed so far away yet close and a place that was named part of home but felt so new and alien. For Fan Zhong there was no score that he played off; there were only his feelings and Little White softly howled his own notes while pressed against his side.

Suddenly the water wolf’s head snapped to the door and he rose to bark. From the shadow of his courtyard doorway stepped Fan Jingyi wearing a smile. She said nothing, only looked at her brother. her gaze spoke of sadness, of worry. Fan Zhong understood, both her and Fan Jia were even younger than him and the world was taking their family here and there, robbing them of time spent with loved ones.

Silently the young girl, his sister, walked up to him and sat down in his lap while pressing her head to his chest. She was so small yet so strong, in this moment however small sobs and tears flowed down her face. Tears of sadness, tears of relief and joy, all of this and more was conveyed without words.

Little White consoled Fan Jingyi, pressing his snout into her neck and allowing the small girl to hug him tightly. Eventually, the water wolf curled up beside her on Fan Zhong’s lap, keeping Fan Jingyi warm like a white blanket. A genuine smile crossed the young warrior's lips and he played his lute, played it until his heart felt emptied and cleansed.

Like this, the three spent the night and fell asleep in the courtyard. In the morning Fan Jingyi woke up and stretched to yawn, pushing a tiny palm into Fan Zhong’s cheek. He gave her an amused stare before pushing her off.

With no surprise the young observer caught herself and turned the motion into a summersault, landing on her feet and sticking her tongue out at her older brother.

“Pay up older brother, the senior sisters at the soft moonlight hall say when an ugly guy shares a bed with a pretty fairy they pay extra.” Fan Jingyi said teasingly.

“Jin... Jingyi, who exactly are you talking to? Who taught you these things?” Fan Zhong’s face reddened and he stammered.

What kind of devilish thoughts were those crazy hostesses putting in his little sister's mind?

“Hehehehe, just kidding elder brother.” Fan Jingyi said, giving the most proper and balanced bow he had ever seen “This junior thanks elder brother for the music and senior Little White for the blanket. Now, my mother’s tutors will have my neck if I’m any later. Stop being such a stranger and visit me more often elder brother!”

Saying these words the little girl did a series of acrobatic jumps and giggled as she vaulted over the wall of his courtyard. Fan Zhong simply shook his head and prepared to start his morning training routine. At this time life settled into a rhythm for him as he reported to his squad at the main family mission hall every day to see if they had a mission.

Most of the time, the answer was no as their squad was only assigned tasks the elders thought suitable for them. As such Fan Zhong spent the rest of his time catching up on socializing as he felt that martial arts had consumed much of his life. A lot of this free time was spent composing and practicing calligraphy or conversing with Fan Yong.

He even visited Zi Bao a few times. The other young warrior was far more respectful now however he usually only met with Fan Zhong to spar and trade pointers. Occasionally though, he was convinced to come to a concert or a venture to the Soft Moonlight Hall with Fan Yong.

On that note, with Wang Qiang missing Fan Zhong needed someone else to help foot the bill for these ventures and as they each got paid 100 spirit stones a month for being active warriors Zi Bao was just the man! Normally Fan Zhong’s allowance was only 300 spirit stones and most normal meals or services only cost two to three, as such an additional 100 was a great boon to his funds. Knowing that Zi Bao didn’t get such an allowance Fan Yong and Fan Zhong agreed that if he paid his own five spirit stone entrance fee they would pay for drinks and anything else.

During this time of peaceful living the squad was assigned to three jobs they took part in. The first was a bodyguard job to escort a mining caravan from Clear Sky village to Butont. While they were traveling a wild spirit boar attacked them however the four clan warriors easily took it down and Su Fen even showed his excellent cooking skills. Surprisingly the older warrior was bantering with the squad now that they were away from seniors and he could be laxer, all in all, this job took them around two months.

Some three months later they were assigned to the Three Winds Change Sect which was hosting a minor auction of natural treasures and talismans. Noting travel time and the time spent at the auction Fan Zhong and company spent another two months completing this assignment. Thankfully, no one tried to rob the auction house except for an old man with tattered robes and a sharpened spoon.

Su Fen had felt so bad for the man he had spent money out of his own pocket to buy him some clothes and a good meal before introducing him to a branch clan office to see if they could find him work to do. Other than that though the squad mostly stood around looking menacingly at any of the attendees who were getting greedy or tried to swipe something. Their final mission had come two months later and it had been to accompany a gathering expedition into the southern forests of the valley.

This was organized by a set of gatherers who roamed the valley in search of natural treasures. In all this had taken two weeks for the group to finish and the most dangerous thing they had encountered was a large spirit bird that had nested near a patch of particularly old natural treasure bamboo. The gatherers had insisted that it was 50kg of 27% natural earth treasure bamboo and offered them each 50 spirit stones of the profit to slay the bird.

An hour and several deep claw marks on each of their faces later the spirit bird was firmly resting in Little White’s jaws and the water wolf was enjoying the meal. Thus the missions of their small squad had dried up. After this Fan Zhong spent the rest of the year focusing on his daily routine.

While training he started reviewing his composition on the Fan clan style and every time he would change a note slightly here or a timing there. Each time he looked at the calligraphy he would note slight imperfections within the line work, places where he pressed too hard or too lightly. Each passing day started to blur into one another and Fan Zhong felt each of his techniques improving.

Origin palms held the loose structure of shifting palms while receiving palms took all that the others couldn’t stand. Momentum of shifting earth was the cement that held the structure together while Observing the Roaming Earth watched for faults in the construction. The melodies and notes played in his head as he practiced, he could view them in detail or as a whole. Each strike, a beautifully placed individual note of his melody and also the exact thing needed to complete the entire ensemble.

Atop it all, the music and the majestic palace he envisioned, was the character for ‘Fan’ written in glorious characters. Every accent, brush stroke, depth of ink, and stylistic choice was perfect to represent the technique it spoke of as well as being the only piece that could complete the whole symbol. That character pressed outward with a song, the song Fan Zhong composed. A song that suppressed the heavens and earth, one that spoke of shifting sands and firm mountains, of the absoluteness of moving and the avalanche of focused momentum.

In that moment Fan Zhong realized he SAW more, his senses told him more, and his mind was taking it all in. As his mind faded to darkness amid the ancestral training grounds overlooking Little Green Bamboo village, Fan Zhong smiled. He realized that on the day of his 17th birthday he had achieved the second-grade martial artist realm.

Waking up he was greeted by the smiling, yet troubled, expression of his elder brother.

“Truly a genius that upturns heaven and earth junior brother. Becoming a carp that jumps the floodgate to become a dragon in only three short years? Truly impressive” Fan Cheng said with as much cheer as he could muster.

“Gr… Greetings elder brother, apologies for my lack of manners however, my body seems to be rebelling at the moment,” Fan Zhong said, gritting his teeth as he tried to move and a flood of sensations filled his mind like staring into the sun.

“Hahahahah,” Fan Cheng’s full belly laugh was genuine this time and for a moment the trace of worry and doubt disappeared from his face, alas the moment passed and the signs returned a second later “you’ll get used to it. Allow me to congratulate you junior brother on your advancement to the second-grade realm”

“And?” Fan Zhong sighed, slowly clenching and unclenching his hand to get used to the feeling

“And what junior brother?” Fan Cheng’s eyes looked away from his little brother trying to conceal the look in them

“And what's the bad news? Elder brother, respectfully, you’re far too honest to lie. What has happened? You're keeping me in suspense now” Fan Zhong said with earnest worry in his voice.

With a heavy sigh Fan Cheng spoke

“The Wei have made their move, war is about to ravage the valley junior brother. Currently, father has called for a military mustering of the whole clan. I’m here with your deployment orders.” Fan Cheng said with a grimace, clearly unhappy to deploy his little brother into such a conflict

“What a nice birthday present father has for me,” Fan Zhong said while laughing.

Inwardly his guts twisted, this could only signal the beginning of a storm.