That was…a lot of information to get at once. It was interesting to say the least, and thinking of all the possible benefits was hard to wrap my head around.

"Why hasn't anyone told me about this before? Surely I would have heard this from somewhere by now?" If I had known about this before, it would have helped out so many times since I came to Dou Can.

"Like I said, only those with constitutions and physiques, like you, Jia, Bing Bing, and I that attune the body toward their particular element allow this level of synchronization with elemental qi. If a normal body cultivator tried to do this, they wouldn't feel any special effect different from normal.

Remember, Astra, your unique physique came with a crippled spirit root. For all of its benefits, your life would barely have been extended due to your body's condition being much improved from that of a mortal's. You've been given an incredible gift, a gift that has led to me receiving a similar gift in turn."

I could feel the seriousness in his words and reflected on how lucky I had gotten with finding the inheritance and it fixing the defect from the Elemental Unity Physique. Then, I latched onto something he had said.

"Lady Bing has a special constitution?" I asked, this being the first I'd heard of it. Elder Hazeon blinked at me a few times before a look off realization crossed his face.

"Ah, yes…You were quite inconsolable at the time so that's understandable.

Bing Bing has what is known as the Primordial Ice Coffin Body. This constitution has extremely high affinity with both water and wind qi as you would expect. Alas, she always dreamed of traveling down the path of spirit cultivation and was well beyond changing to body cultivation by the time she realized the boon she barely missed out on.

One of the main reasons Bing Bing accepted your friend, Jia, as a disciple was because of my personal request, but once she met your friend she recognized that Jia too was blessed with the Primordial Ice Coffin Body. She needed no more convincing, and from my understanding she has been training your friend in the correct use of her own body cultivation, though…" he replied, trailing off at the end. It didn't look like he was going to continue, and I felt a flash of anger strike out from within me.

"What?!" I shouted, the mere implication that something was wrong with Jia making my heart beat furiously. Elder Hazeon looked shocked for a moment, then narrowed his eyes, staring at me for a few moments before sighing.

"The Primordial Ice Coffin Body has certain…side effects while its owner is in the core formation realm or the body cultivation equivalent. I'm certain Bing Bing has it all well in hand. She wanted to explain it to you herself when you go visit, so please understand that your friend is perfectly safe, you should focus more on your own training. Speaking of, were you curious about anything else related to what I explained about body cultivation, or are you ready to begin?"

I felt my anger flare up at his words but then it petered out as he spoke. As long as she was safe, it was fine…I guess. I would have to interrogate Lady Bing when I went to visit Jia as soon as that stupid blizzard was gone, but it didn't really make my anxiety over something being wrong with Jia go away. I tried to focus on the matters at hand instead, hoping to get my mind off of it with action.

"I have one last question; If my body is so attuned that I can get these benefits, then why don't I already feel them when I flood my body with all the elements of qi? Shouldn't the wind qi in my eyes or the metal qi in my bones still provide a benefit even if it's only one sixth the amount of qi I could give to that part of my body?"

Elder Hazeon nodded sagely.

"That is a good question!

In spirit cultivation you know very well that the elements are always in balanced opposition. While you are able to channel all of the elements of qi within yourself at once during standard body cultivation, this principle is still the same.

As I said, metal and wood qi are in opposition. When the metal qi enters your bones, the wood qi following alongside it counteracts its effects leaving you with traditional body cultivation. Ironically, if you had only a five or three branch spirit root you would have noticed this truth much sooner as one of your pairs would have been broken, and the effects of the remaining half of the pair would have been much more apparent."

That…made a lot of sense actually. I don't know why I thought the elements wouldn't be in conflict just because it was body cultivation.

"I think I'm out of questions, then. Alice, do you have any questions for Elder Hazeon?" I asked, looking over to the girl who had been entirely silent the entire lesson.

She shook her head slightly, surprising me.

"No. It is good that this information will lead to your rapid growth, Head Researcher Astra. Me surpassing you in cultivation ability would hinder the progress of Project Eden." She responded.

That made a lot of sense, though what would happen if I didn't progress further? Would I somehow lose my position as Head Researcher? That was a weird thought, though I assumed Rin would be able to keep the project going if that happened, not that I'd let it. I needed to be stronger, and Elder Hazeon's teachings were the first step toward that lofty goal.

If this method of body cultivation was as powerful as Elder Hazeon said it was, then it'd be no time until I was laying Alice out on the ground.

***

If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

My back hit the rough dirt of the training ground, the wind getting knocked out of me, as Alice followed immediately after, pinning my arm again in the same motion as before. I tried to push more fire qi into my heart and earth qi into my muscles but I lost the thread of concentration I had been holding for the complicated task of directing my qi to the various parts of my body. The strength empowering my limbs dissipated and found myself immediately immobilized, glad that Alice also adjusted her strength to not break my arm as my power left me.

After she let go of me, upon Elder Hazeon's sharp clap, I again slammed the ground with my fist. It was so frustrating. I genuinely felt stronger despite how inexperienced I was with the method. I was barely able to focus enough to keep the cultivation technique up while sparring without spirit cultivation. I could tell if I tried to use any of my techniques, or even just re-summon Shimmer, I would lose complete control over my qi flows.

Elder Hazeon's shadow rudely covered the sun again as he stood over me and smiled.

"You're improving quickly, Astra! You were able to last almost a full ten seconds that time. At this rate, you'll be able to use this in real fights in half a year which is probably twice as fast as I learned. What's giving you such a drive to improve so quickly?" He asked. I didn't school my expression and the narrowing of my eyes toward Alice's stupid placid face must have clued him in on exactly what had spurred my growth. He gave a hearty chuckle.

"I see. Yes, I believe that would be quite the motivation, but I never pegged you for someone so competitive, though I'm not upset at this development. You have a long road ahead of you, and that competitiveness will keep pushing you upward to higher heights."

I pulled myself away from looking at my new mortal enemy to huff at Elder Hazeon.

"It doesn't feel like I'm improving. Each time I try to keep it up while actually moving and in combat, it becomes too difficult. It's like all the qi is fighting against each other when I try to move. Is it always this hard?" I asked, though the confused look on Elder Hazeon's face stopped any further complaints I had.

"There shouldn't be any disarray with the qi. How are you channeling your qi?" He asked, furrowing his brow.

I frowned at him.

"What do you mean? I'm flooding the individual parts of my body with their respective qi like you said?" I told him, confused as to why he was confused. He had just told me what to do before we started sparring.

"All at once?" He asked, an eyebrow raised. I nodded.

"Yes, just like you told me!" I told him, unsure of what the problem was. It was just too hard to do them all at once like that. It'd make more sense if-

"I didn't tell you to channel them all at once. I told you you could have them all channeled at once. Little Fu was correct, you have trouble listening to instruction properly." He said sighing somewhat as he did. I flushed.

"Hey! You gave a super long speech right before it! You can't expect me to be able to remember all of that and then also remember what you said next!" I protested and he rolled his eyes.

"Don't act like such a child, though I suppose you are still quite young. I would still expect someone of your cultivation realm to be more mature."

I thought that was a little unfair, I was still really young. I was only…

I frowned. How old was I now? I was sixteen when this all started and then so much happened. I thought back and tried to estimate it based on how long I had been on Dou Can. I frowned deeper. I couldn't really estimate that well either, but I was definitely over 17, and considering the light amount of time difference from traveling from Setria 9, that should be fairly close.

There weren't seasons on Setria 9, so I didn't know for sure what season on Dou Can my birthday would be in, but I think it would have been a few months ago when converted? I would have to check when I had a chance, even though thinking of my birthday still made my heart ache. I supposed that made me somewhere around 18 now? That was still plenty young! And I told Elder Hazeon as much.

"That's…much younger than I thought actually…perhaps a dash of petulance is appropriate for someone so young. You're still well into the core formation realm, though. Do try to act a bit more your realm, please?"

I nodded. I could at least try to listen a bit more closely, this was important.

"Good. Now to get back to the topic at hand. You need to channel your qi in a specific order at first until you get used to the process. It starts with the heart, then the blood and sensory organs, then the viscera. Following those you have the muscles, then the cartilage, tendons, and ligaments. Finally you finish with the bones.

Try channeling in that order and you should see a major difference. The fact you've improved this much while trying to use all six elements of qi at once is quite hard to believe."

I took my place back in the starting position and took a deep breath.

I started with my heart, flooding it with fire qi from the Divine Flame.

Thump. Thump. Thump.

It thundered within my chest; a deep, primordial power spreading through my entire body. I was taken aback by the sheer difference I felt in the application of my body cultivation and quickly moved on to the next step before I lost my concentration.

I pushed wind qi through my blood and sensory organs, feeling it following the rapidly pumping blood through my veins and to my extremities. As the qi flowed into my eyes and ears, the nearby sounds of the sect grew louder in my ears, and the harsh rays of the sun nearly blinded me.

I listened closely and could hear people talking from much farther away than before and the roaring of the cascading waterfall drowned out most other sounds. I brought my hands over my ears to stop the onslaught of sounds, and squinted my eyes to try and stop the oppressive amount of light now filtering in through my closed eyelids.

In addition to the pain I was feeling from my eyes and ears, the slight breeze I felt passing through the sect felt like a whirling gust had touched down nearby. The various scents of the waterfall, nearby trees and other vegetation, and Alice and I's sweat were clear and distinguishable through my smell and taste.

Despite the pain, I pushed through, hoping that it would subside over time. Luckily it didn't that last much longer as I channeled water qi through my various organs. The soothing waters flowing through me and dampened the harshness of my elevated senses.

Next, sturdy earth qi flowed into my muscles and I felt all my muscles relax at once, causing me to flop roughly to the ground. A mumbled "Oops…" from Elder Hazeon was all I needed to know to be mad at the decrepit old man.

I flexed my new innate control over my muscles and managed to get them under control and stand up in time for my wood qi to flow into my cartilage, tendons, and ligaments. I tested my new flexibility and found I was easily able to bend over well past any realistic human norm I was used to. I raised a leg up well over my head and it wasn't even a struggle.

Finally, I pushed metal qi into my bones and felt them strengthen and give a more solid foundation to my footing. My entire body felt more grounded and balanced. I focused as best I could on keeping the individual flows of qi channeling into my body parts and after what felt like hours I finally stabilized them all.

When I did, I felt something within me click, and all of the individual flows of qi became much easier to control at once. I stood from the sitting position I fell into while I finished the channeling process and readied myself across from Alice. I felt an unbelievable amount of strength, fluidity, surety, and foundational strength in myself in the moment, and readied myself for another round with the seafoam green haired menace. This time, she was going down.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.