[Slow-paced, without mindless face-slapping or that sort of intensely emotional plot. Proceed with caution if that isn't to your taste.]
Immortal Palace calendar, year 1433223, June, summer.
Inside an Immortal Palace standardized basic cultivation room.
Chen Fan sat cross-legged and let out a deep breath. Looking at the screen of light before him, he could not help being overwhelmed with emotion.
"Seventeen years of effort finally weren't wasted. My cheat has finally arrived."
Chen Fan would have liked to cultivate diligently like an ordinary person, improving and growing stronger step by step. Unfortunately, he simply couldn't!
Yes, Chen Fan had no Spirit Root. He was the born-useless sort.
But-
I'm a transmigrator! I'm someone with a cheat, too! How could I possibly spend my whole life accomplishing nothing like this!
Before him, a screen of light that only Chen Fan could see appeared.
[Congratulations to the host on successfully activating the entry immortal cultivation talent. Starting initialization.] [Initialization in progress: 1%, 10%, 50%, 90%, 100%.] [Initialization complete. Congratulations to the host on successfully activating the entry section.]
With a thought, the screen appeared.
[Host: Chen Fan] [Talent: false Spirit Root (Spiritual Qi affinity: 16%)] [Realm: none] [Cultivation Method: none] [Equipped entries (2): Diligence Can Make Up for Lack of Aptitude (???), Heavenly Dao Rewards Diligence (???)] [Unequipped entries (11): I Am Trash (white), Little White Dragon in the Waves (white), Does Not Eat Cilantro (white), Born Rebellious (purple)...]
This was Chen Fan's entry-drawing panel. Activating the system had prerequisites: he needed a Spirit Root, an innate constitution, or something of that sort.
However, Spirit Roots were a scarce, regulated resource in the Immortal Palace. Apart from innate Spirit Roots, acquiring an acquired Spirit Root was extremely difficult-essentially impossible.
The simplest route was to take the Immortal Palace Comprehensive Higher Education Institution Examination, abbreviated to the Immortal Palace College Entrance Examination.
And outstanding results were mandatory. Yes, the kind where you had to earn a place in the city's top fifty through your own ability before you qualified to receive a Spirit Root. There were other routes, too: one was to participate in interstellar wars and exchange military merits for a Spirit Root, though this was extremely difficult and came with risks, along with a range of lottery-like avenues.
Chen Fan had taken the former route, cutting through thorns and brambles to distinguish himself in the Immortal Palace College Entrance Examination. With the outstanding result of forty-ninth in the city, he had gained admission to Handong University in Jingzhou City, a directly administered city under the Immortal Palace's Xuzhou, thus obtaining the right to have a Spirit Root implanted.
This could truly be called a carp leaping through the Dragon Gate. From then on, the sea was vast enough for fish to leap, and the sky high enough for birds to soar.
"Ding."
Just then, Chen Fan's Micro Message chimed.
Micro Message was one of the Immortal Palace's universal communication tools and had permeated every aspect of life there. From major matters such as payment methods to minor ones like chatting, nothing could do without it.
[Student Chen Fan of Handong University, Jingzhou City, Xuzhou, congratulations on passing the assessment and successfully connecting to the Immortal Palace's low-sequence fire-attribute false Spirit Root, serial number [10086]. A student loan of 20,000 spirit coins has been automatically applied for on your behalf. Your Spirit Root usage rights have been automatically pledged as collateral for 7,000 spirit coins, and your Spirit Root ownership has been pledged as collateral for the remaining 13,000 spirit coins. Please repay the loan principal within ten years of graduation. Thank you!] [Student Chen Fan of Handong University, Jingzhou City, Xuzhou, congratulations on your successful admission. Your admitted major is [Sword Dao Theory and Science]. Please report in September and complete the relevant enrollment procedures. We wish you a pleasant time studying! Thank you!] [Immortal Palace Xuzhou Higher Education Student Public Service Platform Center: congratulations, newly registered higher education student. Your information has been entered into the Immortal Palace education system. We are now issuing the Cultivation Method universally available to higher education students throughout the Immortal Palace: the original 1,898th edition fire-attribute Cultivation Method (abbreviated to Fire Cloud Cultivation Method, with one built-in set of simple combat techniques, Fire Cloud Instruction). It has been sent to your inbox. Please check for it. A simple usage tutorial is included. Happy cultivating!]
Reading these messages, Chen Fan could not help sinking into thought. He hadn't even enrolled yet, and he already owed a loan of twenty thousand spirit coins?
"Sigh."
Chen Fan heaved a long sigh and shook his head helplessly. Fortunately, it was only the principal, with no interest. Otherwise, it would be an even bigger headache ten years later.
Still, he didn't take it too seriously. After all, he was a man with a cheat. A mere twenty-thousand-spirit-coin loan was nothing but a little wind and frost.
At this thought, Chen Fan could not help reflecting.
Cold winds blow through the Valley of Desolation; how could the likes of us be men of the weeds!
At worst, I just won't repay it. I secured that loan through my own ability. Why should I pay it back?
Of course, spirit coins were hard currency in the Immortal Palace, something everyone had to carry for daily expenses.
By the three hundred thousandth year of the Immortal Palace, Spirit Stone veins had largely been mined dry, and Spiritual Qi was growing ever thinner.
Thus, the important figures of that time had a flash of inspiration and created spirit coins to replace Spirit Stones, circulating them among ordinary people below for everyday use.
Spirit Stones could also be traded on the market, but apart from a tiny minority who weren't particularly bright, no one did so. As a resource that could be used directly for cultivation, Spirit Stones were more valuable.
Generally speaking, one low-grade Spirit Stone was worth ten spirit coins, while a mid-grade one started at a hundred at the very least. As for the even more formidable high-grade Spirit Stones, or even supreme-grade Spirit Stones, those were treasures one could only encounter by chance. They were usually absorbed internally and never circulated on the market.
After digesting the messages before him, Chen Fan began considering his next steps. The Immortal Palace offered quite a few welfare policies for students who had just passed the college entrance examination.
These included false Spirit Root implantation, the distribution of Cultivation Methods, and, most importantly, two months of free access to public cultivation rooms.
"Classes start in September, which means I have at least two months left to cultivate. I'd better make the most of my time. With Diligence Can Make Up for Lack of Aptitude and Heavenly Dao Rewards Diligence, I have to reach the Qi Refining Stage before classes begin."
Chen Fan silently made up his mind, opened the Micro Message app, and checked the tutorial for the Fire Cloud Cultivation Method.
The Fire Cloud Cultivation Method was a fire-attribute Cultivation Method taught directly through video.
The Fire Cloud Cultivation Method had nine layers in total, with different annotations accompanying the video for each layer.
With an excited heart and trembling hands, Chen Fan tapped the video.
The next second, the image lit up as a voice rang out. At the very top of the video, gilded ancient characters slowly unfurled across the screen of light, and a clear Dao resonance spread forth:
Li fire shone bright, fire clouds rose. Draw yang into the organs, refine fire to open the meridians. Dantian essence harbored flame, the hundred meridians returned to peace...
"Good morning, students. I'll be responsible for teaching you the Fire Cloud Cultivation Method. First, let me introduce myself. I'm Li Mubai, a postgraduate instructor from the Immortal Palace's Jing Prefecture Academy, with Nascent Soul Realm cultivation. You can click the link in the bottom-right corner to enter my personal Douke livestream. I go live at irregular times every day to share cultivation insights.
"All right, the lesson officially begins now. The Fire Cloud Cultivation Method is a fire-attribute Cultivation Method. What you just saw on the screen was its general instruction. Fire belongs to Li yang; its nature is fierce and easily agitated. When cultivating this method, your first priority is to guard your heart. With a steady heart, the flame is stable; with a chaotic heart, the fire burns you!"
"The method has nine layers in total. Advance in sequence, building layer upon layer. A fire foundation ten thousand feet tall begins with its first layer."
"At the first layer of fire cloud, draw fire into the body, nourish the meridians, and cleanse the mortal flesh."
"Cultivation core: absorb the free-floating fire-attribute Spiritual Qi of heaven and earth, sink it into the Dantian, gather a faint fire essence, and open the seventy-two superficial meridians throughout the body."
"Key prohibition: beginners must never be greedy for more. Fire is violent by nature. Absorbing too much can easily scorch the meridians, damage your foundation, and leave you struggling to advance for the rest of your life."
Beside the video, densely packed golden annotations popped up in sync, breaking everything down thoroughly, word by word and sentence by sentence.
From the angle of Spiritual Qi absorption and its circulation route to breathing rhythm and seated posture, even heart rate and the advantages and disadvantages of different cultivation hours were clearly marked.
Not only that, the video also included slow-motion demonstrations of Spiritual Qi circulation and comparative footage of incorrect cultivation. Every common beginner's mistake was listed and corrected one by one.
"At the second layer of fire cloud, condense fire into threads, stabilize the Dantian, and give birth to the first fire breath."
"At the third layer of fire cloud, fire threads form strands and penetrate outward through the skin, allowing you to ward off cold and frost."
Li Mubai spoke at an unhurried pace, breaking down the core wondrous uses and keys to breakthroughs of the nine-layer method, layer by layer.
"Upon reaching the sixth layer, you can condense fire clouds to protect your body. Ordinary Law Artifacts will struggle to penetrate them."
"Upon reaching perfection in the ninth layer, your mastery reaches the point where the furnace fire burns pure blue. Fire essence tempers the body, both the flesh and Spiritual Qi undergo a transformation, and you can transition directly into supreme fire-attribute arts!"
Just as Chen Fan devoted himself fully to following the video's cultivation instructions and attempted to draw in fire to cultivate-
The entry panel in his mind suddenly flickered with a faint light!
[New cultivation activity detected from the host!] [Detected: host cultivating diligently from zero foundation, devotedly studying an orthodox Cultivation Method!] [Entries in use...]