Three Years to Foundation Establishment

After breakfast, Shen Hui went to the western courtyard as instructed to practice calligraphy with Senior Sister Jingming.

Today, Jingming had switched to a commentary on the Taishang Ganying Pian as their teaching material.

She guided Shen Hui in reading and recognizing the phrases within, while also explaining basic cultivation concepts and Daoist anecdotes.

Shen Hui studied earnestly, occasionally asking questions, and Jingming answered with clarity and thoroughness.

When they reached a line in the commentary that read, "A cultivator must not deceive themselves within, nor deceive others without; only when the mind and heart are unobstructed can they resonate with Heaven and Earth," Jingming suddenly paused her explanation, her gaze settling on Shen Hui's face.

"Junior Brother Qingxuan, you've already entered the Dao, haven't you?"

Her voice was not loud, nor was her tone aggressive—just carrying a calm sense of certainty.

The hand holding Shen Hui's brush paused slightly.

He instinctively wanted to deny it, but the words caught in his throat.

After a moment of silence, he finally gave a slight nod.

A flicker of surprise passed through Jingming's eyes.

Though she had suspected as much, seeing this junior brother, who had only joined the sect two days ago, nod in confirmation still stirred a tremor in her heart.

Yet she did not press the matter, instead raising another question.

"Why didn't you say so earlier?"

Jingming looked at him, pausing her movements. "Were you afraid that Junior Brother Qing Shi would hear and feel resentful?"

Shen Hui didn't answer, only smiled.

Seeing this, Jingming continued flipping through the commentary, her tone flat. "If he can't even bear to hear such news, if it breeds resentment or shame, then these twelve years of secluded cultivation in the mountains have all been for naught. He might as well descend the mountain early."

"Senior Sister's words miss the mark."

Shen Hui shook his head with a smile, but his brush never stopped. "...Though we are all cultivators, we are ultimately nothing but mortal bones and flesh. Who among us can be entirely free of comparison?"

As he spoke, he dipped his brush into the inkstone, his tone calm. "Senior Brother Qing Shi is honest and diligent; perhaps he wouldn't think this way. But even if he did, it would only be human nature. After all... why should others easily obtain what one has struggled so hard to gain?"

At this, the surprise in Jingming's eyes deepened, and she took a fresh measure of Shen Hui.

She hadn't expected this newly initiated junior brother to speak such words, and with a brow so serene and composed.

"For you to think this way is truly rare. But since your entry into the Dao comes from your own hard cultivation, you naturally have a clear conscience..."

She paused, softening her tone. "Last night, you must have stayed awake the whole time, meditating and refining your qi. That diligence already surpasses many."

She hesitated. "Even I, unless necessary, wouldn't meditate through the night, for laziness is human nature."

Shen Hui silently admitted a pang of shame.

Staying awake all night was true, and meditating on qi wasn't false, but the word "diligence" hardly fit him.

If three parts of his cultivation could be attributed to his "talent," the remaining ninety-seven parts relied entirely on that inexplicable "interface" cheating.

He hadn't shed many drops of sweat, and his effort... had mostly gone into "adding points" and "eating fruits."

"Senior Sister flatters me."

Shen Hui shook his head, wearing a perfectly measured look of "humility." "This meager progress of mine is hardly worth mentioning. Cultivation is a slow, grinding process; only time reveals the heart."

Jingming looked at Shen Hui, as if trying to discern truth from falsehood in his expression.

But seeing his open demeanor, clear eyes, and not a trace of arrogance or pride in his brow, she couldn't help but admire him inwardly.

"It's excellent that you think this way."

She said solemnly, "On the path of cultivation, nothing is more taboo than a restless heart. How many see others advancing swiftly while they themselves stagnate, only to give up in despair and let inner demons arise. Take this as a warning."

Shen Hui nodded gravely in agreement, but inwardly he couldn't help muttering.

Anxiety? Giving up? Those were emotions he'd worn out in his past life as a beast of burden.

As an old hand who had weathered the beatings of modern society and deeply understood the arts of "lying flat" and "self-reconciliation," his mindset was as steady as an old dog.

Collapse? Impossible, never in this life!

Besides, the master himself had said twenty years was but a snap of the fingers. He'd only been cultivating for a few days!

Immortal cultivation was all about fate; you couldn't force it.

Turning his head to look at the bright daylight outside the window, his smile grew more relaxed.

What was the point of seeking immortality? Wasn't it just for freedom and ease?

He felt things were fine as they were.

No loans or rent chasing him, no bosses or clients demanding proposals.

A roof over his head, food in his belly—as long as he didn't suddenly drop dead, even if he only lived a few decades, it wouldn't be a loss.

Shen Hui turned to Jingming, his eyes bright. "Don't worry, Senior Sister. I take things lightly. Even if my life doesn't reach a hundred years, it's fine."

His words carried no grand ambitions or bitter grievances, only a relief of having survived a calamity, and a calm of "take things as they come."

He wasn't about to set immortality as his goal from the start—he was already tired.

Jingming initially frowned slightly, as if she thought him a bit too "unambitious," but his words inexplicably touched something within her.

She recalled the hardships she endured before entering the sect, the monotonous and bitter days of cultivation—what she had sought from the very beginning was nothing more than a measure of peace and transcendence.

After a long moment, she let out a soft sigh.

"As long as you can see it clearly, that's fine."

She said only this in the end, then fell silent, picking up the commentary again. "Continue practicing your calligraphy. Finish annotating this passage today."

Shen Hui smiled and replied with a "good," picking up his brush once more, focusing his mind on the words on the paper.

At the exact hour of Si, the calligraphy practice was complete.

After bidding farewell to Second Senior Sister Jingming, Shen Hui returned to his humble little room and, as usual, sat cross-legged in meditation.

Three hours later, he checked the parchment interface.

[Cultivation]: Ten (Distributable)

[Realm]: Qi Induction (0/10000)

Sure enough, with the breakthrough in realm, the daily cap on cultivation points gained from meditation had also increased, rising from the previous five or six points to the current ten.

"At this rate, even relying solely on hard training, I can get ten points a day. That's three thousand six hundred fifty points a year. Ten thousand points would take... about two years and seven months."

Less than three years!

If he could supplement it with "external aids" like spirit fruits, this time could be shortened even further.

"Less than three years... and I'll reach Foundation Establishment?"

Shen Hui withdrew from his meditative state, silently calculating in his mind.

According to what the senior brothers and sisters had said that morning, the eldest senior brother had been stuck in the late Qi Refining stage for over fifty years of bitter cultivation.

Second Senior Sister, with her extraordinary talent, had only touched the threshold of Foundation Establishment after twenty years, and Fifth Senior Brother, after twelve years, had barely entered the realm...

Compared to that, his own speed could hardly be described as merely "gifted."

What did this mean?

"It means I'm awesome!"

Shen Hui grinned, suppressing the surging excitement within him, and continued sitting in meditation to refine his qi.

After another hour or so, the [Cultivation] points steadily stopped at "Ten," with no further increase.

"It seems I've hit today's training limit."

He stood up, stretched his slightly stiff muscles and bones, and pushed open the door.

It was still early, so he decided to take a proper stroll around Clear Wind Temple.

In the two days since his arrival, aside from his quarters, the dining hall, Chengxin Studio, and Senior Sister Jingming's place in the West Courtyard, he hadn't set foot anywhere else.

The deep autumn afternoon sunlight carried a warmth, spilling over the silent courtyard.

He first went to the slightly larger courtyard he had passed by the other day.

The peach tree in the yard remained gnarled and sturdy, but the stone table and stools beneath it were thick with dust.

By now, the tree's leaves had long since fallen, leaving only bare, twisted branches.

More striking were the large patches of charred black marks on the trunk, as if it had been fiercely struck by lightning and fire, exuding an air of decay and death.

He stepped closer for a better look. The scorch marks went deep into the wood, rough to the touch.

He raised a hand to sense it, but aside from a faint hint of withering brought by years of erosion, there was nothing unusual.

Perhaps it was just an ordinary natural disaster?

Shen Hui casually brushed the dust off one of the stone stools under the tree, sat down, and spaced out for a while.

Sunlight filtered through the bare branches, casting a dappled pattern of light and shadow across his gray Daoist robe.

No phone signal, no human voices or traffic sounds—only the mountain wind passing through his ears and the occasional chirping of birds.

It was precisely because of this that time felt so extraordinarily long here.

After sitting for a while, he stood up and wandered over to the front of the Three Pure Ones Hall.

The two heavy hall doors were left slightly ajar, revealing a deep, narrow gap.

He craned his neck to peer inside.

The silhouettes of the towering divine statues loomed indistinct and imposing in the shadows. A thin layer of dust covered the incense altar, with only a single eternal flame burning faintly.

Shen Hui hesitated at the doorway for two seconds, then finally straightened his Daoist robe and pushed the door open to step inside.

Standing in the hall, looking up at the three statues with their peeling paint, he felt little of the reverent awe one might expect—more curiosity than anything else.

Mimicking what he remembered from movies and TV shows, he pressed his palms together and raised them to his chest, then suddenly felt something was off.

That was a Buddhist gesture.

So he switched to cupping his left hand over his right, forming an awkward "Zi-Wu Seal," shook it vaguely, and considered it a Daoist fist-and-palm salute.

"Ahem."

Shen Hui cleared his throat and began muttering softly toward the statue:

"Ancestor above, your disciple Shen Hui has just arrived."

He paused for a moment, as if searching for words:

"Your disciple has no grand ambitions, nor does he wish to cause you any trouble. I only ask for the most basic peace and smooth sailing... Mm, and if I could be free and carefree, that would be best."

At this point, his voice dropped lower, taking on a tone of negotiation:

"If you esteemed ancestors are in a good mood and let a little something slip through your fingers... well, say, picking up an immortal artifact while walking, cultivation advancing by leaps and bounds, and occasionally a modest stroke of luck—that would be even better."

After speaking, he glanced at the empty incense burner on the altar and the solitary eternal flame, then looked around but found no incense or candles anywhere.

"Uh... there are no incense offerings for now, but I'll make up for it later. Don't take offense, don't take offense."

Having said that, he seemed to find it a bit amusing himself, shook his head, turned, and left the main hall.

Passing through the moon gate that connected to the courtyard, he arrived at the eastern yard.

As soon as he entered, he saw Fourth Senior Sister Jinghui and Third Senior Brother Qingyi huddled by the wall near a few chipped clay pots, speaking in low voices.

Jinghui was crouched on the ground, carefully poking at a plant with her finger—its leaves were wilted, curled at the edges, and yellowed.

Qingyi stood beside her, holding a book and leaning in to observe, his brows slightly furrowed.

Shen Hui was curious and, after a moment's hesitation, approached them.

"Senior Sister, Senior Brother, what are you doing?" he asked softly.

Jinghui looked up at the sound, and upon seeing Shen Hui, her face immediately broke into a smile: "Junior Brother Qingxuan, my senior brother and I are tending to these 'Spirit Nourishing Grasses,' but unfortunately, they're not growing well."

Qingyi straightened up and smiled warmly: "Junior Brother has finally decided to come out for a walk."

Shen Hui chuckled and scratched his head.

Qingyi explained, "These are Spirit Nourishing Grasses that Master obtained from Ten Thousand Springs Valley. Though not particularly precious, if they can survive, the spiritual energy in their leaves is much purer than those wild fruits in the back mountain, which is quite beneficial for cultivation."

He then sighed, somewhat helplessly: "But they're a bit delicate. My junior sister and I are trying to figure out why these few are always so sickly."

Shen Hui crouched down and, imitating Jinghui, looked closely.

The soil in the clay pots seemed fairly moist, but the plant leaves lacked vitality, with scorched, curled edges and unclear veins.

"Is it lack of water? Too much sun? Or... the wrong soil?" Shen Hui guessed based on his limited experience with keeping plants—and killing them.

"The water is taken daily from the back mountain spring, and the soil is specially gathered 'moist earth' from near the hot springs there," Qingyi shook his head. "The surrounding environment is also set according to the classics—half-shade is best, so it should be ideal. But... perhaps these seedlings themselves are too poor in quality? Or maybe when we tend to them, our minds aren't focused and calm enough, affecting them?"

Jinghui rested her chin on her hand in frustration: "I even talk to them nicely every day..."

Shen Hui couldn't help but laugh to himself, thinking that if sweet talk worked, there'd be no need for spiritual springs or moist earth.