"Can you swim?"
Super Little He asked.
Qin Shi nodded. He'd grown up in the countryside, with a reservoir less than a kilometer from his home.
Every summer vacation, after school, he'd go fishing and shrimping underwater with his friends. He'd had the time of his life.
Thinking of that, he walked straight out from the sandy shallows, heading deeper toward the sea's horizon.
But before he'd gone two steps, he immediately ran back.
"So cold! Like the kind of cold where you freeze solid at ten below!"
Qin Shi felt a shiver that came from deep in his soul. He nearly started trembling.
"Your Mental Strength is too weak to support you as you explore the Netherworld. You should find a boat first."
Super Little He seemed to have expected this.
"Next time, you can give me that warning a little earlier."
Qin Shi frowned, as if faced with a very serious problem.
"How am I supposed to get a boat?"
Super Little He explained:
"In the Netherworld, anything external can be manifested through Mental Strength. Knives, swords, guns, cannons, even boats.
"As long as your mind is strong enough, you could even make a cruise ship."
Qin Shi fell into thought, then asked uncertainly:
"So because my Mental Strength isn't strong enough, I can't leave the island. And if I want to leave the island, I have to increase my Mental Strength?"
It was the classic conundrum of "a recent college graduate needs four years of work experience to get hired"!
The ultimate vicious cycle of "how can you run Karazhan if you haven't graduated from Karazhan"!
And now he'd run into it himself!
"Can't you cultivate? You're the Chosen Saint Son of the Four Pillars, your Mental Strength is over thirty, and you've already made a start