Cultivation

"Take off my clothes?" Xu Yuan asked subconsciously. Ran Qingmo's expression remained completely placid as she spoke softly: "I am heavily injured, and my control over my qi has deteriorated considerably. If you keep your clothes on, I might hurt you." Hearing the woman's explanation, Xu Yuan cast aside all pretense and directly stripped off the luxurious robe he wore. Taking off his clothes for the first time, aided by the faint glow of the luminous pearl on the stone wall, Xu Yuan only now realized just how gaunt his current body truly was. Standing over 1.8 meters tall, he likely weighed less than 110 jin, so skinny that his ribs were clearly visible. Years of debauchery had thoroughly hollowed out this body. Xu Yuan drew back his gaze, looked calmly at Ran Qingmo, and asked, "Underwear—do I need to take that off too?" "..." Ran Qingmo looked up, her cool, aloof gaze resting quietly on him. *Alright, evidently not.* Xu Yuan sat cross-legged across from Ran Qingmo. Just as he was about to speak— "Lie down," she instructed softly. Xu Yuan adjusted his posture in silence and lay flat before her. Ran Qingmo lifted a slender, jade-like finger, a faint blue light blooming at her fingertip. "My qi will enter your body." Xu Yuan glanced sideways at it. "Won't something go wrong?" He remembered Ran Qingmo saying that if her qi entered his body, it would directly tear open his narrow entryway. "..." Ran Qingmo was growing accustomed to this "Origin Realm qi master" asking her such idiotic questions about cultivation. Pausing, she shook her head and explained, "The qi will only remain on the surface. It will not enter your meridians." Xu Yuan nodded, signaling for her to continue. Inside the dim cave abode, the woman's slender finger twitched slightly. The dab of blue light at her fingertip instantly shattered into hundreds, thousands of specks of light that drifted like fireflies, gently settling across the surface of Xu Yuan's body. They felt somewhat chilly to the touch. In the next moment, like clay oxen sinking into the sea, those specks of light plunged straight through his skin and into his body. In an instant, Xu Yuan's own body appeared in his vision like a living cross-section diagram. Those specks of light linked into a cohesive network, laying out distinct channels and acupoints vividly before his eyes. Soon, Xu Yuan felt his body gradually sink into a state of numbness as the points of light entered. Yet beneath the numbness came wave after wave of tingling pleasure. Her qi was cool and icy, remarkably pleasant. "Ah..." Ran Qingmo's eyes flicked over. Xu Yuan shut his mouth. Ran Qingmo withdrew her gaze and said coolly, "First, I will teach you to recognize acupoints." "Acupoints?" "Acupoints are crucial nodes along the meridians," she explained. "Oh, alright." Xu Yuan nodded. "This next part might hurt a little." As she spoke, Ran Qingmo extended a slender finger and tapped lightly on Xu Yuan's neck. Her fingertip was not warm; rather, it was somewhat cold. "This is the Huiyuan acupoint." As the words left her lips and her fingertip touched him, a sharp pang instantly pierced through the pleasant tingling from earlier. The pain on the right side of his neck made Xu Yuan's body shudder uncontrollably. Still, this level of pain was barely tolerable. Ran Qingmo's finger did not stop, tapping down upon Xu Yuan's supine body at an unhurried pace of once every five seconds. With every tap, Ran Qingmo named the corresponding acupoint, accompanied by a prick of sharp pain beneath the skin where her finger landed. Time crept quietly by. Half an hour later, the hundreds of acupoints across the human body had all been tapped. Ran Qingmo slowly withdrew her hand. Looking at Xu Yuan, she asked in a clear voice, "Did you memorize all of them?" Xu Yuan opened his eyes. He met her gaze for a second, parted his lips, and said, "Huh?" *Did she really think he could memorize them all on the first try?* "..." Ran Qingmo fell silent. Saying nothing more, Ran Qingmo silently extended her finger once again and resumed tapping. "This is the Huiyuan acupoint." "..." "..." Xu Yuan had no idea how much time passed, nor how many times the acupoint lesson repeated—perhaps an entire morning, or an entire afternoon. Ran Qingmo withdrew her hand once more and looked at the man lying flat before her. "This time, did you memorize them?" Xu Yuan closed his eyes to carefully sense the lingering traces left behind by the qi Ran Qingmo had sent into him, then nodded slightly. "Pretty much." "Pretty much?" "About seventy to eighty percent." "..." Ran Qingmo looked at him strangely, her eyes brimming with utter incomprehension. *So stupid.* She could not understand how this man before her could be so dense. "..." Xu Yuan roughly deciphered the meaning behind the living block of ice's gaze and parted his lips to explain. In his past life, revered by others as an academic god, he considered his speed in memorizing these acupoints to be remarkably fast. Yet in the end, Xu Yuan swallowed the words back down. Compared to her, perhaps his past-life "academic god" status truly amounted to nothing more than ordinary. He recalled that at this point in the storyline, the woman in black before him seemed to be only seventeen years old. And at seventeen, her cultivation had already reached the realm of Grandmaster, merely a single step away from reaching the Origin Realm. The disparity between human beings was truly wider than the gap between humans and dogs. Ran Qingmo said nothing more. Silently raising her finger, she said, "We continue." "Right." Xu Yuan nodded and focused his concentration once more. Time crept quietly by once again. Unable to see the sky from inside the cave abode, there was no way to tell how much time had elapsed. When another round came to an end, Xu Yuan felt as though his entire body had practically turned into the deep-blue color of Ran Qingmo's Source Qi. Ran Qingmo spoke up as well: "If we continue any further, your body will be harmed." "..." Xu Yuan slowly opened his eyes. After a brief hesitation, he agreed with Ran Qingmo's suggestion. Although Ran Qingmo's qi was gentle, it was an external force after all, and keeping it inside his body for prolonged periods would inevitably take a toll. At this very moment, he was already experiencing faint waves of nausea and dizziness. Moreover, the prolonged mental concentration had brought upon his body an unprecedented exhaustion. A person's willpower was indeed important, but physical limitations were what they were—no amount of willpower could alter them. With the day's lesson over, Ran Qingmo did not rest, continuing to sit cross-legged to regulate her breathing and heal her wounds. Xu Yuan, on the other hand, climbed onto the only jade bed in the cave abode. The moment his head touched the pillow, his consciousness sank into deep slumber. In his dreams, images of her teaching him to identify acupoints continued to play out... Ran Qingmo seemed to require no rest. Whenever Xu Yuan was awake, she taught him the fundamentals of cultivation. Whenever Xu Yuan rested, she sat quietly in a corner, regulating her breath to heal her injuries. There was no food in the cave abode, but the pool of water seemed to have been formed by some kind of heavenly treasure; a single mouthful provided Xu Yuan with enough energy for an entire day. Life here seemed suspended outside of time, and the days drifted by one after another. Through those days unmarked by day or night, Xu Yuan gradually mastered that obscure, arcane cultivation knowledge.