"This is the first condition, the Innate Cultivation Method!"
The moment his voice fell, Grand Elder suddenly raised his hand and pressed a finger against Mu Bai's dantian.
Mu Bai only felt a force as vast as the sea rush into his body, instantly surging through all his limbs and skeletal bones.
Endure the pain; as your master, I shall impart the Innate Cultivation Method to you!
Excruciating pain washed over him like a tide. Mu Bai clenched his teeth tightly as the veins on his forehead bulged.
He felt as though every inch of his muscle and every single bone was being torn apart and reassembled, a torment far exceeding imagination.
"Now circulate the true qi in your body, following the path of my true yuan."
A profound and abstruse incantation sounded from Grand Elder's mouth. He endured the searing agony and began guiding the true qi within his body along specific meridians.
It was unknown how much time had passed before the pain gradually receded, replaced by an unprecedented sense of comfort.
Mu Bai opened his eyes and discovered that the surface of his skin was covered in a layer of black grime, emitting an unpleasant odor.
"These are the impurities within your body. The Innate Cultivation Method is cleansing your marrow for you." Grand Elder waved his hand, drawing forth a stream of pure spring water from a nearby well to wash Mu Bai clean. "How does it feel?"
Mu Bai moved his body around, pleasantly surprised to find that his vision and hearing had improved by a huge margin. He could even clearly see the textures of tree leaves a hundred meters away.
The circulation of true qi inside his body was smooth, more than a notch stronger than before.
"Many thanks, Master!" Mu Bai bowed sincerely.
Grand Elder nodded. "This cultivation method is called the Star Plucking Art. Starting from tomorrow, you will come here every early morning to practice for three hours, until the marrow cleansing is complete."
"You may arrange the rest of your time as you wish, but you must not neglect your lessons."
"Understood, this disciple will remember it closely." Mu Bai said respectfully.
"Go, come again tomorrow."
Mu Bai respectfully took his leave, walking down the mountain along the path he had come by.
When he reached the halfway point of the mountain, he couldn't help but look back at the thatched cottage on the peak, filled with a myriad of emotions.
Who could have imagined that in the span of a mere two days, he had gone from an outsider to the personal disciple of Grand Elder, with his destiny undergoing a earth-shaking transformation.
The path of martial arts, this can truly be considered just the beginning... Mu Bai clenched his fists, a resolute light flashing in his eyes.
The morning dew had not yet dissipated when Mu Bai already stood before the stone steps of the back mountain Forbidden Land.
This was already his seventeenth consecutive day arriving punctually to report.
Ever since he was taken in as a disciple by Grand Elder, his life had entered a disciplined and fulfilling cultivation rhythm.
"Hoo—"
Mu Bai took a deep breath, feeling the dense spiritual qi within the Forbidden Land.
With these days of cultivation, his perception of spiritual qi had grown increasingly acute, to the point that he could even distinguish the flow of spiritual qi with different attributes in the air.
Taking out his jade token and passing through the entrance of the Forbidden Land, Mu Bai walked familiarly up along the stone steps.
Compared to his nervousness and apprehension the first time, he was now able to face this unfathomable master with composure.
In front of the thatched cottage on the mountain peak, Grand Elder stood with his hands behind his back, gazing at the sea of clouds in the distance.
Hearing the footsteps, he said without turning his head, "You are a quarter of an hour earlier today than yesterday."
Mu Bai bowed respectfully. "This disciple wouldn't dare slack off."
Grand Elder turned around, a trace of satisfaction flashing in his eyes. "How are the first two layers of the Star Picking Art coming along?"
"Reporting to Master, I have initially mastered them." Mu Bai answered truthfully.
"Oh?" Grand Elder raised an eyebrow. "Show me."
Grand Elder found it somewhat hard to believe. One had to know that the first two layers of the Star Picking Art corresponded precisely to martial cultivation methods of the Houtian level.
Mu Bai nodded, stepping back three paces to assume a stance.
He saw his hands form a seal as the true qi in his body circulated according to a specific path, and a pale blue light gradually suffused his entire body.
Following a soft shout from him, his right hand formed a claw shape and grabbed toward the empty air—
"Chi!"
Five visible strands of true qi burst forth from his fingertips, instantly slicing through the trunk of an ancient tree three zhang away.
A sharp glint flashed in Grand Elder's eyes. "Star Picking Hand? You actually managed to master the first two layers?"
Mu Bai finished his technique, fine beads of sweat seeping from his forehead. "This disciple is dull-witted and has only grasped the fur."
"The fur?" Grand Elder rarely revealed a trace of a bitter smile. "The fastest recorded cultivation of the Star Picking Art in the history of the Langya Family took over half a year to master the first two layers, yet you only used seventeen days."
A thought stirred in Mu Bai's heart.
As a webnovel author in his past life, he was thoroughly familiar with all sorts of cultivation tropes. Coupled with the Chaos Dao Physique's super-strong control over true qi circulation, understanding and practicing these cultivation methods was indeed twice the result with half the effort.
"Come, look at this section." Grand Elder retrieved a primitive bamboo slip from his sleeve, pointing to a complex passage of text. "Are you certain you've understood it?"
Mu Bai read carefully, discovering it to be a profound technique concerning true qi reversing its flow to impact acupoints.
If an ordinary person saw it, they would probably be completely baffled, but in his eyes, these texts were as clear and explicit as the novel settings he had read in his past life.
"Master, this section discusses that when executing the Star Picking Hand, one needs to first have the true qi run in reverse upward along the Foot Shaoyin Kidney Meridian. When passing through the Shanzhong acupoint, it splits into three strands to impact the Tianchi, Jiquan, and Qingling acupoints respectively, and finally converges and erupts at the Laogong acupoint." Mu Bai explained fluently. "Doing this can increase the might of the Star Picking Hand by over thirty percent, but at the same time it will place an extra burden on the meridians, so it is not advisable to use it continuously."
Finished speaking, he demonstrated it on the spot. Blue light flourished brightly among the five fingers of his right hand, appearing even more condensed than before.
Grand Elder was silent for a long time, ultimately letting out a soft sigh. "Very good! Extremely good!"
At this moment, Grand Elder finally understood where that complex expression on his master's face had come from when he witnessed him breaking through to Xiantian back then.
Mu Bai rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. "This disciple was merely lucky..."
"There's no need for modesty." Grand Elder waved a hand. "Being exceptionally talented is a fact, but even rarer is your comprehension and diligence. Over this half a month, you have come to cultivate every day regardless of wind or rain; this mindset is the most precious quality on the path of martial arts."
Mu Bai felt a warmth in his heart.
As a bottom-tier writer in his past life, he was accustomed to being ignored and negated. Now, receiving such high praise, his eye sockets unexpectedly grew somewhat hot.
"Since you have already stepped through the threshold of the Star Picking Art, the next thing to consider is the matter of breaking through to Xiantian." Grand Elder's expression turned solemn. "Do you know the difference between Houtian and Xiantian?"
Mu Bai recalled the martial arts settings he had read in his past life. "Houtian is accumulating true qi and strengthening the physical body; Xiantian is transforming true qi into liquid to form a circulation?"
"Mostly correct, but not comprehensive." Grand Elder nodded. "Houtian martial artists rely on the dantian to store true qi, akin to using a bucket to hold water, which always has a limit; whereas Xiantian martial artists form an qi vortex within the dantian, causing the true qi to rotate and condense on its own, akin to digging a well in the ground, inexhaustible and unceasing."
As he spoke, Grand Elder extended a single finger, and a tiny qi vortex abruptly appeared on his fingertip, emitting an astonishing energy fluctuation.
"Forming an qi vortex is the key to breaking through to Xiantian." Grand Elder put away the qi vortex. "The method is to take the Innate Cultivation Method as the foundation, driving the true qi to rotate at high speed within the dantian until a stable qi vortex is formed."
Mu Bai listened with undivided attention, terrified of missing even a single detail.
"This process is extremely dangerous." Grand Elder's tone was heavy. "Enormous pressure is generated when true qi rotates; the slightest carelessness will lead to the rupture of the dantian. In the history of the Langya Family, there were once three geniuses who were reduced to crippled individuals because of this, and one of them was even the family head successor of that era."
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