Zalea tightened her grip on the doorknob.

“I should go check on him… Who knows… He might really be the one… ”

After saying this, Zalea loosened her grip on the doorknob and went outside. But before any townsfolk could see her, her body disappeared like the wind… And when not even several breaths passed, Zalea had already crossed tens of metres to arrive at Kyril’s shack.

But with regards to Zalea’s sudden arrival, Kyril took no notice of it. His face still retained the usual calmness hardly seen by children of his age.

When Zalea arrived at Kyril’s shack, the foul smell that came from the black ooze attacked Zalea’s nose.

“Impurity cleansing? Who’s cleansing their bodies of impurities here? Moreover, there’s such a large amount of it too…” Zalea said.

Despite the foul smell of the black ooze, Zalea was not too disgusted by it and only wafted her hand in front of her nose to dispel the smell. Rather, she appeared to be quite used to it, as if she had dealt with the smell hundred of times already.

“Is there someone other than Kyril here?” Zalea asked herself. Immediately, she moved to the source of the foul smell which brought her to the back of Kyril’s shack.

Zalea’s eyes landed on Kyril’s ooze covered body, causing her to be momentarily startled. This was because contrary to her expectations, other than Kyril, there was no one else around. The foul smell she smelt earlier did not come from anyone else, but from Kyril!

Zalea did not care about what the black ooze on Kyril’s body was, but what it meant for it to be coming out from Kyril’s body!

“Kyril is actually undergoing impurity cleansing! Has the heavens finally took pity on him?” Zalea became thoroughly shocked within her heart when she saw this.

What did impurity cleansing mean? It was the process of purifying the body! The dirt and waste that accumulated in Kyril’s body was being thrown out to leave only the ‘good’ material!

Such a process was an indication of achieving a breakthrough and ascending through into another realm!

“Has Kyril finally escaped the chains of being a cripple? Looking at him now, there’s clearly a huge increase in his strength… He should be in the Normal Realm, Third Stage right now! Although he is just in the lowest realm of cultivation, to jump three stages from being a cripple… And he even seems to have received some enlightenment! This is quite extraordinary…”

The shocked eyes of Zalea only held for a few minutes before being replaced with happiness for Kyril, yet at the same time concern.

“With this, Kyril has stepped into the world of Practitioner’s. But whether or not he gets far depends entirely on him. However with his attitude, he should definitely get far… ay… if only I could do the same…“ Zalea sighed to herself before her body disappeared once again into the surroundings.

The process of comprehending information gained from enlightenment was a difficult one. Those who received enlightenment could not afford to be distracted from anything otherwise they might risk losing valuable insight. Thus, although Zalea disappeared, she did not actually leave. She simply blended her presence with the environment and spread her senses to detect for anything that might distract Kyril.

…

Just like this, ten full days had gone by and Kyril began to show signs of awakening from his cultivation. During this time, Zalea had been keeping watch over him from a distance ensuring that there were no distractions approaching him. And when Kyril awoke from his cultivation, only then did Zalea relax a bit.

“Normal Realm, Sixth Stage… He actually jumped six stages… Amongst all the people I’ve seen, never have I seen person jump Six Stages of a realm from just one case of enlightenment…” thought Zalea as she watched Kyril finally start moving.

As Kyril got up, only then did he notice the black ooze all over his body.

“What is this?” Kyril muttered to himself, but then he suddenly remembered one of the books he read from the library. “Could this be impurity cleansing!?” Kyril involuntarily shouted out. He scraped his finger along his arm, and looked at the black ooze on the tip of his finger with eyes like an eagle that was looking for it's prey on the ground.

Rubbing his fingers together in circles and then taking small sample to nose to smell it, Kyril inspected every bit of it.

After doing this for more than five minutes, Kyril was sure that this black ooze were indeed impurities that came from his body.

“Hahaha! This means I can cultivate! I can really cultivate! Hahaha!” Kyril laughed. His mouth spread open and he threw his arms in the air as he started jumping up and down in the same spot.

Zalea who was watching this also felt glad for Kyril, but also could not help but snicker at Kyril’s current actions. The sight of him jumping up and down like a child was a complete contradiction of his normal calm attitude. But it was understandable. Zalea knew how much Kyril had suffered from not being able to cultivate, and now that he was able to, it was akin to the feeling of one receiving everything they ever wanted.

As Kyril slowly calmed down from his excitement, he focused his mind on his body and started feeling the changes that had happened to him. Gradually, he felt surges of energy and vitality erupt from within his body. It was as if Kyril’s body was a volcano filled with fiery lava that wanted to shoot up and explode into the air!

Immersing himself into this feeling, Kyril did not need to look at a reflection of his body. He could already feel that his body had become a lot stronger and more flexible!

Right now, Kyril felt like his body had the strength of a tiger with the flexibility and ferociousness of a coiling dragon!

“With this, I’m one more step closer to my goal!”

Kyril took off all his clothes and grabbed a few leaves from a tree beside him. “I need to test out my strength whenever I get back to the Grassy Mountains. Who knows? I might even be able to defeat two or even three black wolves with just my bare hands!”

Kyril was truly elated. From today onwards, his life would be drastically different!

“After this I should go to the library to learn a bit more about cultivation. Now that I can cultivate, those books about cultivation are no longer just storybooks to satisfy my curiosity, but books that are useful in helping me achieve my goal! I would also need to go and pick up some more herbs to exchange it for more coins. Meager foods like yellow grass and earth nuts just won’t be able to provide the right nutrients to supply healthy growth for a Practitioner. After all, you are what you eat!” Kyril said to himself as he planned his next course of action.

With leaves in both hands, Kyril rubbed all over his body in an effort to remove the black ooze from his body.

“If only there was a source of water nearby and a disposable cloth to wash my body…” Kyril said to himself. But what could he do? If he went to the Grassy Mountains to look for a river, he would have to go through the Town. Doing this would just attract unnecessary trouble, furthermore, he did not want to expose the fact that he could cultivate. This was a hidden surprise which could be his life saver!

“I should keep the townsfolk thinking that I am still a cripple. That way I would not attract unnecessary trouble from people who are overly curious about how I recovered. It is, after all, related to the fact that I have lived two lives! Although I don’t know if it’s true or not, I should have been able to cultivate since being reborn into this world because aside from being reborn, what else could have made major changes to my body? I just didn’t try it under the assumption that I was still a cripple due to being in the body of the previous Kyril who was crippled ever since he could remember…” Kyril thought.

“Wait! Wait! Take this and wipe yourself!”

Suddenly a figure flashed from above the trees and arrived in front of Kyril holding a pail of water on one hand and a small piece of cloth on the other.

“Zalea?” Kyril looked at the figure in front of him. “Why are you here?” Kyril continued, seemingly unaware of the situation.

“Ahh…” But instead of answering Kyril, Zalea’s eyes stared, with a face that changed several times, straight at Kyril’s bare upper body which had just been purified before her gaze lowered down to his equally naked legs…

Looking at Zalea’s weird facial expressions and following her gaze, Kyril was struck with the sudden realisation of the situation he was in. Currently, Kyril’s hands were wrapped around his shoulders trying to remove the black ooze. Thus, there was nothing hiding his ‘little brother’ down below…

“Ah uh… Here… I brought this pail of water and piece of cloth for you…”

However, before this Zalea could hand over the pail of water, her shaking hand had dropped the pail onto the ground spilling all the water.

“S-sorry!” Zalea quickly said. Her shaking figure was like a flustered young girl. “I-I’ll go get another pail of water!” Zalea said with a reddening face. Her face at this moment looked much like a tomato!

Although Kyril had, quite literally, his everything seen, he did not mind it too much. He was an old man in reality, what did it matter if his ‘little brother’ was seen? Not only that, he was also just a mere twelve year old child! How could Kyril be bothered with it? But what made him quite confused was Zalea’s reaction!

“What was with that reaction?” Kyril involuntarily let out as Zalea disappeared from view.

An old hunched back woman who looked older than he did in his previous life was acting like a teenage girl! What is this? To this Kyril truly did not know whether to laugh or cry!

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