When he opened the cabin door a vast amount of black smoke poured out. It climbed high before dispersing. The second stage felt good. He pulled his robes out of their hiding placed and put them back on.

Above his head were clear blue skies and a bright shining sun. It was the second day and he felt better than he had at the sect. Though they had healed him being there didn’t feel like home. The second he was awake they sent him to work. Even the elder’s words seemed patronizing. Hard work will get you far in this sect. No, it’ll just advance everyone else.

A fish leapt up from the water caught a diving white crane in its mouth and swallowed the bird whole. Ian recognized the red along its gills. It was a cutthroat trout. His stomach groaned. Wasn’t there some fishing equipment in the shed behind the cabin?

After rummaging in the shed he found a pole, some ghost spider silk line, and some chickens roosting on a beam. He snatched the chickens up and snapped their necks on the spot. It didn’t take long to prepare them, heat the wood stove, and begin cooking. He took the chickens eggs and made an omelet before eating it with the chicken. He kept the organs for bait. His stomach grumbled again. Three chickens just weren’t enough.

He took a large pig slopping bucket and filled it with water. Golden and rainbow trout were biting in earnest. Soon his bucket was filled to the brim with fish. After pulling them from the lake he started a fire in front of the lake and began spit roasting them.

The fire raged a cool orange under his control. It was a strange thing being connected to fire. Being fire made him feel ever hungry and frail. As fire his life span was measured by how much he burned and for how long it burned. Ian almost didn’t want to stop the flames from rising and burning the fish.

A sudden shift in qi alerted him to a scrawny dog that looked to be a mix of wolf and shepherd. It growled at him bearing a set of milk teeth. It obviously hadn’t been off the teat for very long. Ian calmly picked up the bucket of fish guts and poured them out for the dog. It looked at him strangely before lapping up the guts.

Ian snorted and picked a fish that looked done off the fire. He was getting used to manipulating the fire and maintaining his human mind. Diving too deeply into the flames wasn’t necessary to keep them from burning the fish.

He took a bite of the fish and felt qi slowly dissolve into the body from the fish. It was like with the chickens only much more pronounced. Ian consumed them until only bones remained. While he contemplated what to do about the bones, he heard wining. She hadn’t left.

“Their sharp what would you do if one got lodged in your throat?” Her large golden eyes continued to plead with him. He cut off the sharper ends before handing them to her. She happily snapped up the bones and he heard the most disturbing crunching sounds.

After licking his hand, she walked up next to his fire and curled up. “Well I always wanted a dog.” She yipped at him. If he didn’t know better, he’d figure it was something sarcastic.

Ian removed his clothes and sat in meditation. To reach the third stage of refinery passive refinery is required. No matter how much qi he refined he’d never reach the next level until he could passively refine it. Passive refinery was an integral part of the refinery realm.

Black smoke poured off his body at a constant rate while he tried to decipher a mystery that should take months to achieve. He had the ability to cut and burn but that was it. With only those two tools how could he hope to, he felt that something was at the edge of his thoughts. Burning was only one aspect of fire. Fire was a grand Dao that could be broken up into many smaller Dao. Even now, he held a slight connection to the Dao of fire within his own cook fire.

What did he experience within the flames? Heat rises, fire is always hungry, and it must consume to exist. Why not slow down the pull of his cultivation and never turn it off? Instead of pulling at a great ocean, he could pull at a tiny stream.

It was an interesting theory. Using cut he severed a tiny stream from the lake. It was like creaking on a nozzle instead of turning it full blast. In moments, he understood the advantage that passive cultivation had over his former strategy. The difference was taking a single bite to drinking a slurry. With a smaller amount consumed digestion was even faster.

It was a failure regardless. He couldn’t do anything but cultivate as he was and his skill with cut wasn’t great enough to divide the ocean of qi any further. Muscle, tendons, skin, and his bones hardened from the effects of the new cultivation strategy. Instead of reaching the third realm, he reached a pseudo third realm. Smoke continued to billow from his body at a constant rate.

Did he dare learn the other two sutras? One was a breathing technique to hasten reaching the Aura foundation realm from the fifth stage. The other was a sutra called Wind Sweeping Falcon’s Palm. Would adding a third tool help or worsen his situation? It took a lot of his mental energy to maintain his cutting and fire cultivation method. If he used a third method, he could spread himself too thin. It wasn’t something he could easily calculate. He’d know when he reached his limit.

Ian was a man in the dark walking towards the edge of a cliff. Once he fell over, he’d lose control of everything. Without control the fire would rage and burn him and his blades of qi would cut from the inside out.

His only avenue to increase his mental power was to train his qi. Training his qi would decrease the amount of mental energy it took to complete a task but there weren’t any exact numbers. That would take test subjects standardized sutras and heavy observation.

Wind Sweeping Falcon’s Palm was a mix of movement and striking technique. It was a fusion that channeled wind to a user’s qi pathways to greatly increase striking power by increasing the pressure of qi through the body. That’s what he surmised from reading the text. It spoke of the mystical aspect of swirling typhoons witnessed by qi experts. The sutra propositioned the power of heaven and the unknowable power of storms. Such power was too great for a human vessel, so the sutra contained only a fragment of wind qi. By observing the wind qi with his sixth sense he could mimic the flow with his own qi.

Once he memorized the flow of wind qi the rest was unnecessary. He wasn’t after a wind-based palm strike. Ian raised a hand and directed the wind. The smoke that surrounded him gathered in swirling streams of wind before dispersing. He’d stopped with only his toes hanging off the cliff.

After blending the three different Dao into his own cultivation method he began to feel a development in the background of his mind. His cultivation didn’t rely upon the heavens or the earth. It called no higher powers or begged the world for help.

Ian had mechanized his cultivation; machinery was slowly being built from the qi within his body. A solid boiler, funnels, and tubes were taking shape. His skin, muscles, tendons, sinews, and bone were changing qi pushed into his body and foul smoke poured out.

After the day fell to night Ian stood up. The fire had died out and the wolf dog rose with him. He sliced off a reed and placed it in his mouth. Instead of the vapors pouring out of his pores a small stream poured from the end of the reed. With every breath he released a small puff from the reed. By the time the moon hung overhead he was well on his way to the 3rd stage of refinery. His cultivation had taken on the form of a factory, but the equipment formed of qi needed time to congeal.

“I’m in a delicate spot. Will you protect me girl?” She winked at him and lead the way back to the cabin.

A trace of fire qi sparked the wood stove back to life quickly warming the cabin. He stuffed some overly charred fish into his mouth before giving the rest to the dog. She happily ate the treat before curling up beside him. Ian reached out and rubbed the dogs head. Her pointed ears twitched but she didn’t protest to his petting.

“You need a name.” She gave a sarcastic yip then grumbled and laid down.

“I can’t just call you dog; you need a name. How about More Changchang?” She whimpered and placed her paws over her nose. “Ok you don’t like that one.” Ian dug deep for any name he could think of. “More Mei sounds beautiful.” She turned to him and glared. Ian raised his hands in surrender and thought about it. “More Meifeng,” the wolf dog turned its head and wagged her tail.

“More Meifeng it is then. Well let’s catch a lot of fish in the morning. I don’t know about you but I’m starving.” He figured seven days was plenty to at least find the bear. Normal bears had strong pelts and took a lot of punishment to bring down. He had a good axe but that wouldn’t be enough. He hoped that the name fire fur bear just meant the bear had red fur.

She had no name and no pack. Yet this mortal cultivator dared to treat her like a common dog. He was obviously courting death. This place was the territory of the great bear Da Chao. Every demon worth their salt knew that the heavens were closed off. This was the time of demons. She was born a demon and knew that this human should be her enemy. Instead of treating her with fear or scorn he shared his fish with her. Then when she asked for the bones he refused to eat, he cut the edges off for her.

He was in a delicate situation. She could feel the newly formed framework of his cultivation. It was clear as day. Any demon could sense this moment of weakness if she hadn’t marked the area with her scent. She could attack him and devour the qi within his body. He’d make a fine meal. Then he gave her a name. It was a gift she didn’t expect. Some demons gained their names by terrorizing human towns and villages.

It said that if a demon slays a mortal that shows them kindness then they will suffer heavenly tribulation. With no heavens that threat didn’t exist, but she found herself conflicted. She wanted to eat more tasty fish. There would never be a better time to strike the human down than now. He slept and his cultivation was in a fragile state.

With her belly full of fish, she wasn’t quite as tempted. A sudden presence alerted her of the approach of a dark spirit. It quickly passed through the cabin walls to hover over her benefactor.

“I’ve found you More Ian. In your weakened state you’ll be unable to resist me.” She changed into her human form and approached the dark shade.

“You killed me, and my mortal remains still cling to your axe. No formation can hide you from my wrath now. I’ll swallow your soul.” Before the retched shade could make good on its declaration, she raised her hand and produced of whip made of moonlight. With a flick of her wrist the sliver whip split the shade in two. She opened her mouth and sucked in a deep breath. Qi poured out of the shade and down her gullet.

With the emergence of shades Da Gao would soon open a stable portal to the hells and flood the mountain with shades and fiends. Soon sorcerers from across the southern continent would journey here to cultivate. It would be no place for a human mortal cultivator. The promise of fish still stood, and she returned to her wolf form and curled up next to him vigilant for another shade.