With such an event coming to pass, the world governments put even more effort into recruiting and training their people, going as far as to buy, exchange or steal information from other countries, all to increase their own. The people in the top 100 were called out to come forward and help their country and world by giving clear detail of their experiences and the process they went through so far in opening up acupoints.

Most of them tried to hide from the public eye, but those which shared their nicknames even with the most trusted members of their family were eventually singled out by huge corporations and drawn in their factions willing or otherwise.

By the end of the second month since the Minute Collapsing Nirvana, more than 80 people from the top 100 were known to the public, to the point where even the most common of folk was able to place a picture to the name. For those yet to be known, they drew even more curiosity to themselves, making every paparazzi, private investigator, or even huge intel agency search for them relentlessly.

Herman Roy was one of those yet to be accounted for.

“Things got messy real fast… To think that I need to pay attention to my every move in order not to be discovered… damn it!”

In these couple of months, Herman has been very active. Using the revenue earned from selling the two tutorials which only climbed continuously, the pace at which he acquired land or even other real-estate agencies all over the globe was astounding. One of the reasons was, well… the focus of everyone on this cultivation path in front of them. Yes, people still needed money to buy stuff, but as long as they were willing, the government would pay them a real-good salary only to focus on opening their acupoints and casting their Spirit Roots.

Who would still want to work for a fast-food joint, when you could get more than double the salary just by meditating and working out?

Huge amounts of resources and truckloads of money were being poured into this new craze, as every person hired by the government had access to a trainer, a doctor, and a dietary plan tailored for them and them only at the bare minimum. Those with potential would even be guided through the process of opening their acupoints from within their spiritual world, as well as bathe in special solutions that helped the body eliminate the impurity blockage faster.

All in all, one could say that the world changed while remaining the same. Even when given such an opportunity, most would still prefer to follow, rather than lead. Herman wasn’t a follower, but sure as hell wasn’t a leader either. He was somewhere in between the two, or better put, a person that could but didn’t want to socialize.

After two months have passed, there were obvious changes to his body. The previous lanky figure was now well defined, with firm muscles and maybe for the first time in a few years, a bit of tan left from the previous sunny months.

It was now the 1st of October and it was time to review his gains, as well as calculate his remaining time-schedule before the casting of the Spirit Roots.

“System, bring out the interface.”

Personal Information

Attributes

Ultimate

Pill

Name: Herman Roy

Cultivation time: 0 Years

Spiritual realm: Mortal realm

Body realm: Mortal Flesh 0

Ascension number: N/A

Attributes

Life Essence: 7

Attack: 35

Strength: 6

Defense: 30

Vital Energy: 13

Health Points: 195

Dexterity: 7

Evasion: 21

Fortune: 3

Critical Strike: 1

Perception: 150 Points (Locked until ascension to the Immortal World)

Efficiency: 75 Primordial Qi points / 5 minutes

Absorption: 102 points

Refined Qi Absorption: 51 Spiritual Qi point / 5 minutes

Character (Locked until ascension to the Heavenly Realm)

Personality (Locked until ascension to the Immortal World)

“It’s not the best, but it’s not the worst outcome either. Thankfully, I also dropped from the top 10, but due to my Qi door already being refined at 100%, I am somehow still in the top 50. Double their original size is the maximum for an acupoint from what it seems.”

Such results were not without rewards either. For each 5% refined, he would get another 3 Absorption points added to his attribute panel and another 5 points in Perception. As unfortunate as it was, the perception reward would only be given for the first acupoint opened only and not the following ones.

Through daily workout, his body also reached the peak condition of a national athlete and gained much in terms of points. In the first month, he managed to get another 2 points in Strength, Life Essence, and Dexterity, with 4 points in Vitality. The problem was that during the entire second month, he barely got another point in the first three and 2 points in the last.

“It’s truly hard to refine the body without Primordial Qi. Luckily, I will get a nice boon once all my acupoints are opened and my meridian paths can circulate Qi.”

In his last life, once that happened he got an increase of 5 points to Life Essence, Strength, and Dexterity, with another 10 to Vitality after he connected his first meridian path. Not only that, but his Perception also went up by 10 points and his Absorption by 50.

It was needed to mention that in the body there are twelve primary meridians and another eight extraordinary ones. As unfortunate as it was, he didn’t manage to even find the acupoints for the extraordinary ones in his past life, much less open and connect them.

“According to what I’ve read on the forums before, there should be another 54 acupoints that would become visible, once the first twelve meridians have been connected. In about a week or two, I should be able to finish the clearing of these current 360 and then move towards the next objective.”

It was obvious that besides clearing the blockage, he was planning to widen each acupoint to the maximum, just like his Qi Door, before casting his Spiritual Roots. As for the reason, it was quality.

Based on the quantity of Spiritual Qi one was using when casting them, the Spiritual Roots can be separated into different classes, from low to medium, to advanced and finally to superior. In the Immortal World, every inhabitant except for the participants of the 361 worlds will eventually form Superior Spiritual Roots because of the Primordial Qi available to them. It was quite different though, for the participants in the trials, who depended only on the Spiritual Qi and their acupoints to cast their roots.

“In my previous life, I had low-grade roots and that held me back quite a bit when compared with the others. Even children had a much better absorption rate than myself back then. As for the reason… I only realized recently after my Qi Door was doubled in width. What irony fate shows one sometimes…”

With a sigh and a wry smile, he looked one more time at his Absorption column, where nothing changed and it was the same number of 102. For the Qi Absorption though, it transformed into Refined Qi Absorption. Simply put, after an acupoint has been refined to the maximum, it would filter the Qi it absorbs, making it more pure and concentrated.

So, even if the amount Herman was passively or actively absorbing was the same as before, its quality was much higher.

It was easily proven by the speed with which he could now mine through the blockage.

“At this pace, with another two acupuncture sessions, I should be able to clear them all in one go.”

Due to the ridiculous amount of pain, even he could only withstand it once per week now that the regeneration speed with which injuries heal was that of a normal body. So, while the plan suffered some minor adjustments, the goal remained the same: do your best and pull ahead of everyone else!

Another change, when compared with the original timeline, was that, after the first month, where the Examiner Jing visited a total of four times, in September, he visited only once and that was at the end of the month.

There were no more prizes given out, however his presence served as a reminder for everyone to keep working hard. After all, who didn’t want to be able to step on air and soar through the skies without the help of a plane? Besides, that old fart mentioned that he would only be able to show himself on the date of the examination next time.

It made sense for a cultivator that just broke through the Ascension realm to want to further cultivate to stabilize his foundation. With the 'interruptions' that occurred, he probably didn’t get the chance to do so in these past two months, making it a wonder how he didn’t vent out on this small world just like Purple Snake did back then.

Two weeks passed in the blink of an eye and it was now the 15th of October 12:05 PM. In the same small city, somewhere in Europe, Herman was preparing for his final meditation session before opening up all 361 of his main acupoints.

“All that’s left is to actively absorb Qi and use resonance. I’ve been saving up like crazy in the past two weeks and I finally have sufficient for my breakthrough. It’s time to make this greedy system cry tears of blood!”

After fully refining his Qi Door, his passive absorption was at 102 points of Refined Spiritual Qi per every 5 minutes. That meant over 29.000 points daily. Of course, a huge portion of that, plus the entire amount gathered through active absorption were consumed on resonance daily. The maximum he was able to spare was 5.000 points. Now, on this final day, he had a reserve of 65.000 saved, plus the 29.000 gathered without using resonance yesterday, bringing him close to almost 100.000 Refined Spiritual Qi points.

He didn’t rush, but calmed his mind first through some physical exercises and only then entered meditation. What welcomed him was his spiritual world, much different compared to when he first entered it. The silhouette sitting cross-legged was still incorporeal and barely discernable, however, the entire sphere of darkness had small countless rays of light penetrating it.

The clearest and the biggest one was obviously from the Qi Door, yet all other acupoints were also casting pale lights in the spiritual world, a sign of an imminent breakthrough. To increase his chances even further, he went ahead and used up his dose of daily active absorption, going over the 100.000 Refined Spirit Qi points available to him.

After taking a deep breath, his clear voice reverberated through the empty spiritual world with uncharacteristic confidence.

“System, begin Qi Resonance, and focus on all the markers I’ve set. For the amount of Qi to use… all of it!”

Through the Qi markers he left on different acupoints, he was able to determine the clearing percentage and ensure that he won’t break any of them earlier than planned.

Now, with the system’s help, a small wind was passing through his spiritual world. Eventually, this wind turned into a full-blown typhoon, smashing through 360 different acupoints consecutively. It was impossible to break through all of them at the same time, but Herman hoped that the system would count it as ‘the number of acupoints broken through in the same meditation session’.

If that wasn’t the case… well there was nothing much he could do about it honestly. That's when problems began to appear!

“F*ck! Is it supposed to hurt this much!?”

Almost as if to answer his question, cracking sounds could be heard all around him. The pain only intensified from that point onward, forcing Herman to look around him scared straight. A chilling sight greeted him...

“The spiritual world is cracking!? What!? Why???”

With a broken body, one could still find hope for recovery through rest and herbs. If one’s spiritual world would collapse though, it would be akin to turning one into a retard. All mental faculties would be dropped to the level of a 4-year-old, barely allowing him to talk.

Scared to the point of tears, Herman focused on the Qi passively trickling in from the Qi Door, the only acupoint that wasn’t assaulted by the resonance and tried to use it to mend the cracks that appeared in his world. With the amount he had available though, it wasn’t anywhere close to enough, making it seem that he was trying to hold together two trains wagons using duct tape.

What followed after, was a push and pull session, where cracks would appear and Herman would try to mend them, session ongoing for over four hours until the second beam of light appeared in his spiritual world. The Yunmen or the Cloud Gate acupoint was cleared open, leaving behind crumbs of impurities and only a meager 3% left to unblock. The forceful resonance was quite exaggerated in strength though and the Cloud Gate suffered much damage in the process, however, it wasn’t something that a bit of Spiritual Qi couldn’t fix.

“It seems that I might’ve underestimated the potency of Refined Spiritual Qi. If I am to use only refined Qi to cast my Spiritual Roots, they would likely be at least advanced in quality. Urgh… it still hurts like a truck hitting you in the face though…”

With face alternating between white and blue, Herman held on and used the last vestiges of his consciousness to move like a robot and try to fix the cracks that appeared in the huge sphere surrounding him. One after another, acupoints were being cleared and the pressure created by the Qi Resonance was subsiding.

After what felt like a century, there was no more movement in his spiritual world and the void of darkness disappeared as well. In its place there now stood an endless blue sky with Herman in the middle of it, surrounded by many glimmering stars from the spots where the previously blocked acupoints were.

Unable to hold on anymore, he exited meditation and found himself gasping for air on the balcony. Leaving aside the trail of blood flowing at the corner of his mouth due to overtaxing his spiritual world, a smell comparable to the top 10 worst smells in the world combined, assailed his nostrils. He almost passed out as a result…

“If not for insight because of my previous life, I might’ve needed to burn both my clothes and the mattress to get rid of this smell…”

[The hell!? Can you smell that honey? What in the world is that horrifying smell? Did someone die next door?](?)

[Jesus Christ! That doesn’t smell like a single person died! It smells like an entire country did! Oh, Lord! I think I’m gonna throw up…](?)

Hearing neighbors complain about the smell coming from him, Herman ignored them and fully undressed on the balcony while doing his best to wipe the impurities expunged from his body on the clothes. Then walked in the kitchen, grabbed five garbage bags that he put one in the other, and the clothes inside, tied the end, and left it on the balcony until he finished taking a shower and manages to clean the rest. He would probably have to use strong products to get rid of the smell on the balcony and the kitchen…

The shower with almost boiling water lasted for over an hour. He used up all of his shampoo and shower gel in trying to get rid of that horrifying smell, but he could still sense it in his nostrils. It needs to be mentioned that due to his previous self’s laziness, he had those two in XL bottles, yet it was barely sufficient to prevent people from thinking that he was a walking corpse. The cleaning of the floor where he walked on and the spot on the balcony where he entered meditation took another long hour and only after returning from downstairs after throwing the garbage that was smelly even through five layers, did he realized that he was famished.

“With a smell like that, who in the world would even think of food…”

By the time he finished eating and managed to climb in bed, he purposefully ignored the blinking notifications in his system’s interface and stood back upon it in an attempt to meditate. This time, he managed to stay in his spiritual world only for about twenty minutes, able to only inspect the changes and evaluate the damage.

According to this inspection, it was very likely that he would be able to take action again here, only tomorrow after a new cycle began. The cracks were pretty terrible, but fixing them was still somewhat manageable. With Qi trickling in through the newly opened acupoints, even if they were damaged, just the passing Refined Spiritual Qi would help heal them up in a week or so.

“Now then, for the main event. System, I hoped you saved-up on tears, or you might die from dehydration!”

Opening up the interface and bringing the notifications up, he was stunned.

Achievement: Opened up to the world

Details: You have successfully opened all your main acupoints, bringing you one step higher on the cultivation path.

Reward: Number of acupoints opened, multiplied with itself in Spirit Jades (360 x 360 = 129.600)

Achievement: Beat them to the punch

Details: You are the first among those in your world to open up all 361 main acupoints.

Reward: 20.000 Wood essence, 10.000 Iron essence, and 20.000 Food rations.

Achievement: Main contender

Details: You are the second among all 361 worlds to open up all your main acupoints.

Reward: +100 Perception (Locked until Ascension to the Immortal World), 7.500 Spirit Stones, 15.000 Wood essence and 7.500 Iron essence

Notification: Due to damage incurred to your spiritual world, your body has been damaged.

-2 points penalty to Vitality.

A surprised look could be seen on Herman’s face. There was another person that already opened up all 361 acupoints this early? And he/she/it did such a thing before him? It seemed almost impossible as even in his case, he did so because of previous knowledge after being reincarnated. However, there was another person who managed to do the same thing as him, this easily?

“It seems that I won’t be able to bridge the gap between myself and those killer-whales this easily… Well, at least the system wasn’t stingy and properly gave me the rewards I was due. Urgh… my attribute panel looks so messed up…”

Due to opening up so many acupoints, there were now two types of Qi being absorbed in his body: the normal Spiritual Qi and the refined version brought in by the Qi Door, the first acupoint he opened.

To make matters even more complicated, the system decided to kick him while he was down.

Notice: Your body is unable to convert the Spiritual Qi into its refined version due to most of your acupoints not being fully opened.

Notice: Your body is unable to convert the Refined Spiritual Qi into its superior version, due to most of your acupoints not being fully refined.

“Say what now!?”