I felt a strange sense of grief, as a tangle of thoughts and emotions carried over to me from Labby. ‘I’m alright’ the thought read, yet it sounded almost like an apology.

For a few moments, I sat silently, thinking if I should try to find Labby. I could still sense her vaguely, despite whatever it was that was blocking my bond to her. I had sensed her moving towards the Inner sect on her own, and my concern had begun to rise.

It wouldn’t be a stretch of imagination if Labby had smelled the pills or herbs on some strong cultivator and had decided to give chase in hopes of snagging a bite. But, something about the message made me think otherwise.

I took a deep breath, and turned to look at Sheldon, sleeping calmly nearby in my chamber.

“Can you keep an eye out for her? If she doesn’t want me to come find her, then I’ll respect her choice, but I can’t help but feel a bit concerned.”

Sheldon opened his eyes, regarding me silently for a moment. With a light chirp, the little turtle got up. A tide of water rose beneath him, as he carried himself out of the window.

I took a sigh of relief. With Sheldon around, I’d have little concern even if some arrogant cultivator came and noticed Labby somewhere she shouldn’t be.

I returned my attention to my notes, going back to my plans for the upcoming days. I needed to contact Yan Yun in regards to the prize and details of the spirit herb hunt and how to participate. I’d also need to find a method to reach out to Zhang and Su Lin, and how their journey to Taizhou was going.

Not to mention, practicing the Earth pill that the Old Man had told me about, writing about and exploring Gu itself, and then the Gu-Drugnade. The modified version of my drugnade, and likely the most powerful weapon I could acquire as things stood right about now.

I had held some qualms over producing black powder from the fear of introducing conflict and war similar to back home here. Humanity being allowed that much power was inherently wrong.

Yet, I’d been naive and foolish, forgetting just how strong cultivators were in this world. There were twelve entire realms of cultivation. Twelve realms, and each successive realm larger than before.

Just Sheldon’s strength was enough to level a small mountain if the turtle wished, and each progressive day I cultivated, I could feel my dantian growing stronger and brighter, with strength bolstering me.

The cultivation method I’d developed with Yan Yun alternatingly cycled both Qi and Gu within my body, cycling between the two. The Gu would damage briefly, and the Qi would heal. The cycle would continue eternally, and each cycle of injury and healing would leave my body sore and my spirit wavering from exhaustion.

I looked down at my arms, flexing the muscles. I wasn’t buff, even though I should’ve been with the inhuman cultivation strength I possessed. Yet, my muscles were starting to firm up, and gain density.

I suspected even my bone density had gone up from the repeated cycle of injury and healing. Which is why I really wanted a good weighing scale to properly measure the results of this new cultivation method.

I didn’t want to become a muscle-addled idiot, but I wasn’t going to complain about being physically more able from this new method. As they said, don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.

I returned my thoughts to my notes, and thought through the many things I needed to do. A lot of this would need work, but from order of priority to ease of doing, and my own excitement, I put the Gu-Drugnade on top.

A grin came upon my features as I rubbed my hands in anticipation. Who could remain calm when the prospect of exploding things spectacularly came up in front of them?

I tore a piece of parchment and wrote a simple letter addressed to Liuxiang. He was the only one who knew about formations who I could ask, and they were going to play an important role in my drugnades.

“Nyan?” I called out to the cat, who ignored me and continued to groom itself.

“I’ll give you a pill if you deliver this letter for me,” I said and the cat’s ears flicked as he looked up at me, but then, returned to his grooming without further reaction.

Was a cat trying to negotiate with me?

“Two pills if you do it quickly, but no more. I’ll just send it myself otherwise,” I said, holding out the rolled up sheet of parchment.

The little orange cat looked up at me for a few moments, before letting out a meow as he got up from his place and hobbled over. I smiled, shaking my head as I tied the scroll around Nyan’s neck with a thin thread.

“Off you go then,” I said, patting the little bugger as he leapt to my desk before leaping out of my chamber.

I smiled, before taking a look around my room, feeling odd to see it empty of any animals. I’d gotten used to always having Labby around, and now Sheldon. Nyan would hang out in my chamber more often than not as well, so it felt a bit lonely yet at the same time freeing to be alone after a long time.

Gu rustled within my second core, as I heard a whisper in my head.

“You want me to cultivate? Once more?” I called out loud, receiving an affirmation from Lu Jie from my spirit as the Gu pointed towards the spirit herb garden anchored to my core.

My eyes widened in surprise, before I nodded as realization dawned on me. That was indeed something I needed to test out as well.

“I guess you win then. It’ll be a while before Liuxiang arrives anyway,” I said, walking over to my spirit herbs.

I gently touched the spirit grass growing through the floor mat and boards with roots intertwining through them and down into the earth. A network of Qi was layered within the herbs, one I could tug and draw on to help bolster my cultivation.

Or at least, I could before. But was that true anymore? Gu was anathema to Qi afterall, and the spirit plants injected with them burst apart and turned to ash.

“Only one way to find out,” I said, taking a seat and crossing my legs.

I sat in silence, breathing steadily. My two cores spun leisurely around each other at the centre of my abdomen. Slowly, I tugged onto the spirit herbs, pulling their Qi into me.

The essence within them shook, as I cycled in two cycles, circulating both Qi and Gu within their respective cores. The herbs around me shuddered, responding to my pull as I felt the network of Qi spread all around me.

Then, the next moment, I pulled on the Gu, trying to draw upon the essence of the world to form the energies of death.

The anchor shuddered, the network of Qi recoiling from the Gu as my cultivation ground to a halt. I frowned, pulling more at the Gu, as I circulated the energy, letting it spread through my pathway briefly.

The spirit herbs shuddered, their Qi mingling with the Gu and destroying one another as I felt the air around me begin to heat, unseen fire licking at my clothes.

Something was wrong. I could sense the flow of Qi. It moves from the sky, in the air around me, into the spirit herbs, before submerging into the plants as they send little motes and threads of Qi towards me.

Yet the Gu refused to do the same, the anchor refusing to work with the energy and breaking apart the moment I tried to gather it from the herbs the same way I did with the Qi.

I sat silently for a few moments, occasionally retrying my method to see if it happened to work again with no avail. My frustration began to increase as the Gu refused to cooperate when a realization struck me.

Perhaps I was drawing from the wrong source?

I shifted my attention downwards, towards the earth beneath me. I closed my eyes, cutting off my sense for Qi, and shifting over to my sense for Gu.

Slowly, I cycled the Gu, drawing not from the air around me, but from the soil beneath me. There was death within the earth, it accepted all, and was the resting ground for all life forms. If the air was what let us breathe, then the earth was our last embrace for death.

I felt the cycle snap into place, as the spirit herbs around me rustled, as if something had just mended their paths. Qi flowed from the spirit herbs, within the first core, filling it I cultivated, and the Gu filled my second core, flowing from the roots of these same herbs. Of the many dead creatures, and worms that remained beneath the ground, unseen, yet still nurturing life.

The trickle of Qi and Gu began to rise, turning into a tempestuous storm. Where before, I’d only been drawing on only one half of the cycle, now I drew upon both, and the energies of the world filled my being to the brim.

Gu pulsated within my pathways, followed by Qi immediately. It was a fluctuating cycle of Gu and Qi, like the periodic rhythm of a sine wave that flowed through my pathways.

I felt a presence touch my spirit, rising from the earth itself. A vast presence, greater than any before. I’d seen this before, back with Sheldon, when I’d been cultivating with just Qi. It was the cycle of the earth, the cycle of the land and the sky, of all that came in between.

The earth had seemed impossibly vast to me, its spirit so large that my senses couldn’t even begin to comprehend its breadth. But now, with my new sight, I saw the other half, the half of death.

The divide of the Yin and Yang. Of the Sky above and the Earth below, and the world that came between them, the creatures that lived encompassed by both. It was the forces that ran this world, the forces tied to its very creation.

I felt Lu Jie’s spirit rising, his will mingling with my own as we dived deeper within the swirling tides of Qi and Gu. Something shifted, the Eternal Sky and the Vast Earth. They turned, shifted, as a pair of eyes gazed upon our twin souls.

Words filled our mind, as the Qi and Gu spoke as one, showing us a glimpse at what had lay beyond.

In the before, there was neither sky nor earth. The world was chaos, endless and seamless. But after endless eons of chaos, came an axe. It split the chaos in twain, forming the Yang of the Sky and the Yin of the Earth.

Thus the world came to be.

Our children bowed to both heaven and earth. To the two that governed the cycle of the world. Yet, there came an interruption, a dispute among our two children upon who was worthy.

A familiar story, to both Lu Jie and I. The formation of the world. Yet, there was more. The half that we’d not heard before.

The two split apart, diverging in separate paths. One who would gaze upon the sky, chasing the heavens that lied beyond it. The other, eternally burrowed within the embrace of the earth, waiting to rise and seize the land beneath.

The split between Qi and Gu. The cultivation of humans and demons.

The cycle, it lies broken, the world split in two halves.

Two eyes, larger than mountains, turned towards me.

You are not enough. There must be more, for the cycle to be repaired.

My soul shuddered at the words. At the cycle we witnessed. I felt my spirit tremble, unable to grasp the information being sent to it. This was but the mere surface, a glimpse at the realities of this world. Yet, even just that was enough.

I felt my body being reinforced and broken down and reinforced and further broken down again. Sweat covered my body as I felt something slimy starting to coat my clothes. Gu and Qi continued to work in tandem as my cores started to fill up to the brim and I felt a tension develop in them.

If I cultivated anymore, my spirit would rupture.

Observe the world, learn, and grow. And then perhaps, one day, we would be as one, once more.

I opened my eyes, sweat pouring through every inch of my body.

Unable to sustain myself I collapsed onto the floor and almost gagged, as I noticed the stench coming from my clothes. Dark gunk covered them all, smelling like the worst kind of sewage water you could find.

“What… was that?” I asked, my voice a shaking shudder. No replies came, and I knew none would come even if I spoke any more.

With effort I pulled up but found my legs shivering and shaking, as if I’d just climbed a mountain twice over.

I pushed against my legs, and walked over, changing out of my clothes as I threw away the old ones. A brief look later, I burned the robes.

I doubted I was ever going to be wearing those again.

Quickly, wiping my body with some water I settled into newer clothes and took a seat, lightly circulating my Qi.

It had been a mere few minutes of cultivation, yet my spirit felt like it had been filled to the brim, ready to pop. I’d need a day or more to process whatever progress both of my cores had made, but whatever it had been, had been enough to leave me haggard.

I stared in a daze at my room, at the vision I’d seen. It was like my mind had been fed with a mountain of information, yet I was nowhere near capable enough to understand any of it.

I closed my eyes, feeling at the thing that remained in my spirit. The seed that stood at the heart of my two cores, the little blossom that centered my two halves.

“A broken cycle…” I muttered out loud, as I walked over to my pool of water with the lunar lotus, looking at my face.

A lot had been said, and much that I could not understand yet. Yet, a strange sense of completion and joy filled my heart as I found myself smiling.

I finally knew what my cultivation was.