The Path of Magnetic Field Cultivation

Chen Qingxuan did not deny it. He nodded and said, "I do have that intention."

Elder Jin Mang stroked his snow-white beard and pondered for a long while before saying, "Zhou Qing has only one spiritual root. Would choosing him as Senior Apprentice be inappropriate?"

Chen Qingxuan said, "Has Elder forgotten what happened to Mu Zhuosha?"

A mournful look appeared on Jin Mang's face. "How could I forget? Zhuo Sha was raised under the eyes of several of us elders. Having fallen into her present state, neither human nor ghost, how could we not be heartsick?"

"But we cannot therefore veer toward the opposite extreme. Zhuo Sha's dao heart was flawed, so you choose someone with a flawless dao heart but abysmal spiritual root talent as Senior Apprentice."

"Each generation's Senior Apprentice concerns the sect's reputation. When they attend the Immortal Dao Assembly in the future, the Senior Apprentices of other Golden Core Sects will have over a dozen, even dozens, of spiritual roots and reach the perfection of Qi Refinement within ten years. Yet the Senior Apprentice of our Azure Cloud Sect will possess only a single spiritual root, still wandering around the first or second level of Qi Refinement after cultivating for ten years."

"Where will Azure Cloud Sect's face go?"

"Putting that aside, if the other disciples see their Senior Apprentice progressing so slowly in cultivation and develop slackness of heart, what then?"

Chen Qingxuan said, "Elder has considered this thoroughly. It is only that this child's comprehension and temperament are both outstanding. It would be a great pity to simply let him drift."

Elder Jin Mang smiled. "Clever people can often infer one thing from another. Since his comprehension is exceptional, his ability to understand other matters will not be poor either. The Scripture Pavilion lacks a perceptive person to organize its texts, while artifact refining, pill refining, talismans, and formations in the Esoteric Division have relatively low requirements for cultivation."

"We might as well see how he develops in the future. Once his cultivation reaches its limit and can no longer advance, we can transfer him to the Scripture Pavilion or the Esoteric Division. His talent will not have been wasted."

Chen Qingxuan smiled. "We shall do as Elder says."

When he had first recruited Zhou Qing, he had already intended to place him somewhere that required little cultivation but much comprehension, so that such talent would not go to waste. Elder Jin Mang's arrangement suited his wishes perfectly.

Chen Qingxuan added, "In Elder's opinion, who is suited to serve as this generation's Senior Apprentice?"

Elder Jin Mang said, "I think Wei Kuang is very suitable. His grandfather entered Azure Cloud Sect in the same year as you, and later died fighting for the sect. We must not treat his descendants unfairly."

Chen Qingxuan nodded. "Wei Kuang is indeed very good."

After returning to his small courtyard, Zhou Qing could not wait to activate the restrictions to prevent anyone from barging in. Then he began studying in his room the cultivation method Chen Qingxuan had taught him.

Chen Qingxuan's explanation of cultivation had been exceedingly precise.

He had said that Qi Refinement was like taming a wild beast.

Spiritual qi was a natural thing between heaven and earth, not something created solely for humankind. To transform this natural thing into one's own qi, how could one avoid a struggle?

The process of that struggle was the process of circulating qi.

Cultivators used their minds to guide qi through a cycle within their bodies. Once it passed through twelve vital apertures, the natural spiritual qi became imbued with the cultivator's own life aura.

With each completed cycle, the spiritual qi became one degree more imbued with the cultivator's life aura, and one degree more tamed.

If one cultivated Azure Cloud Sect's Floating Clouds Obscure the Sun, then after fifty-four cycles, the qi would truly belong to the person.

Circulating qi was exceedingly dangerous, because natural spiritual qi was extremely violent before it was tamed. If it was made to move through the body while one's dao heart was unstable and unable to restrain the spiritual qi, it could violently crash against the vital apertures. At best, this would cause grave injury; at worst, death and the dissipation of one's dao.

Therefore, those newly entering the Immortal Dao had to cultivate under the protection of their masters and elders.

These were all points Chen Qingxuan had especially emphasized, and Zhou Qing already knew them by heart.

He now had only one question—the most basic question of all: how could he make spiritual qi enter his body?

This should have been the question least in need of asking, yet for Zhou Qing, it was the greatest problem.

He had no spiritual roots, and thus no channels through which spiritual qi could enter or leave.

Since spiritual qi could not enter his body, everything about circulating qi was nothing but empty talk.

Zhou Qing blinked and stared at the pitch-black night outside, momentarily at a loss.

Did that mean Azure Cloud Sect's cultivation method was completely useless to him?

More pessimistically, did having no spiritual roots mean he could never cultivate? Was the cultivation method he had imagined, one that bypassed spiritual roots, nothing more than a castle in the air?

Could it be that he truly would miss cultivation by a hair's breadth?

A deep unwillingness filled Zhou Qing's heart.

He had clearly done everything he could to squeeze through the gates of immortality and obtained a cultivation method, yet the great doors of the Immortal Dao remained shut tight before him. No matter how hard he racked his brains, he could not push them open even a crack.

With his magnetic field ability, he could still live a splendid life even in the mortal world.

But what use was splendor? Could it grant him immortality?

Compared to immortality, every pleasure seemed dim and colorless.

Not to mention that cultivation offered not only immortality, but also divine powers capable of plucking stars and seizing the moon, overturning rivers and seas.

No. He could not give up so easily.

Cultivation was itself a rugged and perilous road, one that required an unyielding resilience to make it through. If he wanted to give up the moment he encountered a difficult problem, then even if he possessed dozens of spiritual roots, he would not travel far on this path.

There had to be some way...

The Cultivation World had existed for millions of years. If there truly were a cultivation method that required no spiritual roots, someone would surely have thought of it long ago.

Did he think himself smarter than everyone who had lived in the Cultivation World over millions of years?

No. He had one advantage over them: his magnetic field ability.

Zhou Qing's entire body jolted. If there really was a method that did not require spiritual roots, then the only place it could lie was in his magnetic field.

He immediately opened his magnetic field.

The magnetic field was like another sense of his, sometimes even like another pair of invisible hands.

That was because it could not only help him perceive things, but also help him grasp them.

He could now clearly sense the spiritual qi around him. He could use the tiny hands of his magnetic field to touch it, envelop it, and perform operations upon it that other cultivators could not even imagine.

But he had no way to make it enter his meridians...

Wait!

Why not?

Zhou Qing suddenly froze.

Other cultivators needed spiritual roots because they had no magnetic field ability. They could not directly influence spiritual qi and could only use their spiritual roots to sense and draw spiritual qi of matching attributes into their bodies.

But since he could capture spiritual qi with his magnetic field, why could he not simply force spiritual qi straight into his meridians?

It was like entering someone's house. Going in through the door was naturally the proper path, but if there was truly no door, what was wrong with breaking through the wall and squeezing inside by force?

Zhou Qing's spirits immediately rose, and he was about to give it a try.

Chen Qingxuan's warning suddenly rang out in his mind.

Zhou Qing paused, then decided not to heed Chen Qingxuan's admonition.

He could not possibly test this method of forcing spiritual qi into his body with his magnetic field in front of Chen Qingxuan. Otherwise, his secret would be completely exposed.

Even if the experiment succeeded, he would probably immediately fall under the sect's control. By then, whether it would bring fortune or disaster would no longer be for him to decide.