Chapter 6 - First Steps

As Aiden arrives back to his room after breakfast Du Jun is gone. Thinking that he probably locked himself to start to cultivate, Aiden does not spend time worrying about it and starts his preparations.

Taking the first step on the road of one's cultivation requires you to open up your dantian. This process can be done in multiple ways but the goal is very simple. To enter the Qi Gathering Realm you need to absorb just a minuscule amount of Qi and guide it to your dantian. As the Qi gathering organ, the dantian will reflexively absorb any Qi it receives and the only thing that separates a mortal from a cultivator is that small amount of Qi in the right place.

Not that there is much difference between a mortal and someone who just entered the Qi Gathering Realm.

Breathing techniques achieve this minuscule amount of Qi by circulating the air in one's lungs in a way that gathers up Qi. When this Qi spreads from the lungs out in the rest of the body it will inevitably end up in the dantian. The only thing that is needed is an environment with sufficient Qi which is as far from a problem as it could be for anyone in the Heavenly Court.

With the environment being this favorable for cultivation there is no need to prepare for something as simple as entering the Qi Gathering Realm. That is if you go the vanilla milkshake route, Aiden does not plan to practice a breathing technique but the Space Wind Mantra.

Mantras are different in that they rely on speaking a series of words with specific intent forced into them. Someone who practices a mantra will have a multiplicative increase in speed of gathering Qi for every continuous moment they cultivate without breaking the mantra.

That can be compared to someone who practices a breathing technique which would give a linear speed of Qi gathering as they cultivate.

This might sound good and all but mantras do have a pretty severe downside which is that as soon as the focused intent of the mantra is broken all built-up speed in gathering Qi will dissipate and has to be built up again from nothing.

In other words, breathing techniques give a slow and steady pace of gathering Qi while mantras start slow but have an exponential increase in speed the longer one can stay focused.

Well aware of this need for absolute focus required when one cultivates a mantra is why Aiden is preparing. Yesterday when they got back he asked Cui Zhong to gather some materials for him and just now when he returned to his room there was a package on his bed.

Opening the package he sees a small bag of tea, a bottle of pills, and three clear crystals the size of a grape. There is also a little note explaining what everything is since Aiden only explained his need but gave no specific instructions. Cui Zhong however, seems to have done a great job.

First, he takes out the tea, it is a blend that should produce a calming effect. He asked for something to help put him in a meditative state. Taking down a tea kettle he starts to heat some water and set it aside as he goes through the rest of the items.

The bottle is full of Sword Edge Focus Pills, these are basically amphetamine but sword cultivators seem to like popping them as they endlessly train.

Last and probably least he asked for a way to increase the Qi density in his cultivation chamber. Crushing these Qi crystals will release all the Qi stored in them into the surrounding. This is just a precaution so that he will have the best possible environment to breakthrough through.

Moving everything to the cultivation chamber and picking up a small hammer on the way, Aiden sits down and starts brewing the tea. Tian Yan was given a rudimentary introduction to tea ceremonies but this tea only requires Aiden to follow the written instructions on the note so he avoids anything fancy.

When the tea is done he puts the finished cup in front of himself and arranges everything else around him so he has easy access to it.

Taking a final deep breath before starting, he then brings the cup of tea up to his lips.

A warmth invades his body but from that warmth, a cool tingling feeling spreads and infuses his entire body. The tingling feeling gradually subsides leaving a nothingness behind.

Grabbing the hammer to his side he smashes the first of the Qi crystals. He feels no noticeable change from this since he still has not acquired the ability to feel Qi but has a hard time mustering even an ounce of worry over this with his body's current calm state.

Last he picks up one of the nicely marketed amphetamine pills and swallows it.

Everything suddenly becomes very clear and the words of the Space Wind Mantra are the only thing he focuses on.

“Universally”

The word rings out from Aiden backed by a firm image in his mind of the universe as he sees it, stars, planets, and galaxies. He does not have a perfect map of it but pushes the idea of the laws of physics he knows are keeping this infinitely big thing together.

“Manifest”

The concept of it all being real is behind this word.

“Space”

Everything that separates anything in this creation as its own unique entity is firmly placed as an idea in his mind.

“All”

An infinite idea, including everything that is, has come before and that will come after.

“Grasping”

Reaching out and touching.

“Wind”

An idea of seaming chaos with perfect logic. This concept spreads out and touches everything in existence but its medium is the space in-between.

“Universally, Manifest, Space, All, Grasping, Wind”

“Universally, Manifest, Space, All, Grasping, Wind”

“Universally, Manifest, Space, All, Grasping…”

It is at this moment Aiden’s concentration breaks as a stray thought breaks his concentration. “Does wind move in space? Does it not utilize temperature fluctuations in gases?”

And with that, he is back in the small room with the smell of tea in his nostrils.

Taking a deep breath to gather himself Aiden takes stock of his current state. The effect of the Sword Edge Focus Pill is wearing off so he should take a new one before his second attempt if he wants to be in an optimal state. The tea’s effect is still clear, the nothingness is still occupying his body and the extra Qi from the smashed crystal should not dissipate for an entire day so he is good there too.

Popping another pill he takes another deep breath and again immerses himself in the concepts behind the words of the mantra.

“Universally, Manifest, Space, All, Grasping, Wind”

“Universally, Manifest…”

“Does manifest imply a form of creation?” Thinking this over he decides that it does not, it just implies revealing something so it still works with the mantras concepts.

Taking another sip of the tea he skips taking a new pill this time to conserve his resources.

Thinking “third times the charm” Aiden starts another attempt.

-

Three days later Aiden has run out of all the resources he procured for this breakthrough attempt. The Sword Edge Focus Pil was the first to run out and did so during the first day. After that, he used what was left of the tea sparingly and the feeling of nothingness had not left him until earlier this morning.

At this point, it was late afternoon and he was pretty certain that the extra Qi from the Qi crystal he smashed this morning was gone.

Accepting the fact that his window of success has passed, Aiden leaves the cultivation chamber and goes to his room.

He has not slept more than a few hours combined during these three days and he is starving.

Luckily, Du Jun is in the room, scarfing down food when Aiden enters.

“Give me some of that.” Aiden grunts as he sits down at the table opposite Du Jun.

“Brother Tian, are you finally done breaking into the Qi Gathering Realm?” Du Jun asks as he starts to transfer plates filed with delicacies over to Aiden’s side of the table.

Aiden grimaces.

“No, I might have bitten off more than I can chew. All my supplementary resources are used up at this point and I do not think I could last without food for another night." Aiden says with a mouth full of chicken breast.

“That is bad, it only took me half a day to enter the Qi Gathering Realm so it should not take Brother Tian three full days.” Du Jun says while pouring a cup of tea for Aiden.

Aiden almost chokes on a steamed carrot as he hears this and stays quiet after.

Finishing the food on the table Aiden is still hungry but he puts that aside for now. He asks Du Jun to order the kitchen to prepare more food for when he comes back and then heads off to the library.

The next day Aiden enters the Qi Gathering Realm using the Wind Dragons Breath.

-

Aiden is very happy with the Wind Dragons Breath. The fact that he can not move a hundred meters with one step or cut holes in reality, is not bothering him at all.

It has been a month since Aiden and Du Jun entered the Qi Gathering Realm and they have both spent most of their time cultivating and getting used to sensing the Qi in the environment.

Sensing Qi is not hard and as long as you have Qi in your dantian you do it on reflex. The struggle is more towards learning how to ignore the endless presence of Qi in your surroundings but still notice when the Qi is gathering towards another person utilizing it for an attack.

Aiden has been diligent this month and has now gathered enough Qi in his dantian to open his first meridian. The fact that Du Jun already did so a week ago is not bothering him at all.

Sitting in a lotus position in his cultivation chamber he circles the Qi in his body.

He feels kinda bad for whoever had to clean the place after his three-day retreat failed. It had been a mess and the smell was repugnant. Only cultivators of the Core Formation realm have complete control of their body’s waste.

Gathering the Qi towards his lung meridian Aiden lets it circle there slowly corroding the impurities blocking the passage.

The Lung Meridian is a go-to option for your first meridian to open. With it open, the Qi gathered through your breath increases and makes clearing the rest of the meridians a faster process. The other go-to option is the heart meridian and it is considered the more ambitious one since with your Heart Meridian open you can start to spread Qi in your body to enhance it. The earlier this process starts the stronger your body will become but Aiden chose the Lung Meridian since he will gain an additional benefit from it.

The greatest benefit of the Wind Dragons Breath is the special attribute that allows the practitioner to store Qi in his lungs. To get access to this attribute Aiden has to open his Lung Meridian and the sooner he does so the more time it will have to strengthen in the Qi Gathering Realm. He will just open his Heart Meridian next.

As the Qi swirls around his Lung Meridian for half an hour and slowly depletes itself, Aiden can feel a loosening effect on his breathing. Every breath pulls in more Qi and the amount of Qi he is losing while grinding down the blockage in the meridian is slowing down thanks to supplementation from his increased breathing.

With a final push, he feels the blockage in his Lung Meridian crack and washes away with the Qi flowing through without any impediment.

Pulling deeply on the Qi-rich environment around, he fills up his lungs with Qi saturated air and guides it to his Lung Meridian. Most of the Qi is guided from there to his dantian but a fraction starts to gather in his lungs.

Taking another hour to replenish some of his Qi, Aiden reflects on his cultivation path forward. There are twelve prime meridians, these are easy to access and he expects he will open all of them within two years. After that, he needs to start attacking his eight hidden meridians. These require more effort to open since they are individual to each cultivator and are harder to estimate a time frame for. There are a lot of cultivators that just open their twelve primary meridians and then call it a day, that is all that is required to reach the Foundation Establishing Realm.

With a smile, Aiden gets up and leaves the cultivation chamber.

His room is empty when he gets back but there is a letter stacked up to be seen on the table. The letter is addressed to Tian Yan and curious Aiden picks it up and starts to read.

I most sincerely invite you and little friend Du to attend a small gathering of the pre-teen children of the court I am arranging in two days, on the autumnal equinox. There will be some light exchange of pointers and I think this is a perfect opportunity for me to give you some advice that helped me while I was in the Qi Gathering Realm.

Your Brother, Tian Feng