The Earthly Capital, the meditation room.
The meditation room, which originally looked full of classical charm, has now completely changed. The whole room is dusty and gray. Upon closer inspection, there is a layer of dust on the walls and on the floor, as if no one has been here for a year.
In the center of the room, a figure sat quietly on a futon. The figure remained seated, seemingly motionless for a long time. Only the various scattered parts floating slowly around him proved that he was indeed alive.
As the parts rapidly coalesced, a square piece of jade appeared in front of him and slowly fell down.
He reached out a hand and took the jade stone in his palm.
"The 334th one, finally finished."
The one sitting here in seclusion is naturally Li Xingkong. Ever since the matter on the moon came to an end, Li Xingkong has come to the cultivation room in the Earthly Capital to begin his seclusion to refine the Earth Vein.
Seclusion is a very long process, especially for Li Xingkong this time, as time is tight and the task is heavy, so he can't worry about anything else during his seclusion.
This perfectly good cultivation room was occupied by him for a whole year during his seclusion. After he went into seclusion, the entire cultivation room was sealed off, so naturally no one else could enter. With no one cleaning it for a year, you can imagine the state of the environment inside the cultivation room.
After carefully examining the last Earth Vein in his hand and confirming that it was correct, Li Xingkong tossed it behind him. The Earth Vein landed precisely in a small hill behind him. Upon closer inspection, the small hill was composed of numerous ley Earth Vein piled together.
Having abandoned the Earth Vein, Li Xingkong's eyes seemed to regain some of their luster. He shook his arm, then slowly stood up.
Constructing the Earth Vein is indeed hard work. All operations can only be controlled by the Divine Sense. The body itself is useless in this microscopic world operation; one can only sit cross-legged, like meditating.
But meditation relaxes the body and allows the mind to rest, while during his refining process, his mind is in a very busy state.
This busy period lasted for a year, which would be unbearable for an ordinary person. Even Li Xingkong, in the later stages of refining, had become quite numb. Many times, he was still refining, but he was no longer in the right state of mind, relying entirely on the feel he had developed through repeated practice to carry out the refining.
Fortunately, this monotonous repetition isn't entirely without its advantages.
In addition to producing a sufficient number of Earth Vein, this prolonged and intense use of Divine Sense also greatly promoted the development of one's own Divine Sense.
Li Xingkong's Divine Sense Seed doubled in size during the year of intensive use, and his Divine Sense also became stronger.
The Divine Sense, which was originally unable to leave the body, can now detach itself several inches away. For Li Xingkong, this can be considered a skill gained through arduous cultivation.
But at this moment, he had no interest in figuring out how strong his Divine Sense had become. This year of seclusion had been far too long; all he wanted to do was get out and explore.
Although the previous retreat lasted a long time, I was in a state of cultivation. For a cultivator, it felt like only a moment had passed, and I did not feel the passage of time very clearly.
Although this period of seclusion lasted only a year, he felt the passage of time every moment, and this year truly passed.
In comparison, this year felt to him like he had been in prison for a year.
After getting up and stretching for a while, Li Xingkong looked around. The cultivation room was indeed quite shabby, having been neglected for many days.
It seems that, for now, without the support of an array, it's pointless to decorate this secluded cultivation room in any way. After all, a seclusion lasts for many years, so even the most elaborate decorations and Jidu gather dust.
With a gentle wave of his hand, a faint Magic Power emanated from him, sweeping away all the dust in the surrounding area. The cultivation room, which had been sealed off for a year, was restored to its former appearance, looking like a living place.
Due to his busy schedule, Li Xingkong didn't have much time to rest during this period of seclusion. He was completely unaware of the outside world during this time. After emerging from seclusion, Li Xingkong immediately planned to contact Old Tang to see what new things had happened in and around the Divine Land over the past year.
It was quite unusual that the message sent to Old Tang wasn't replied to immediately. After all, based on Li Xingkong's understanding of him, even if Old Tang was busy, there should be someone specifically responsible for receiving Li Xingkong's messages. It was indeed strange that no one received the message that he had come out of seclusion.
However, Li Xingkong didn't pay much attention. After all, everyone has unexpected moments, and who knows if some special circumstances have occurred? While waiting for Old Tang's reply, Li Xingkong activated his magic and connected to the internet, preparing to see what new changes had taken place in the world situation during his year of seclusion.
After reconnecting to the internet, which he hadn't logged into for a long time—a year without going online— Li Xingkong felt as if he had taken a trip to Reach. All sorts of new internet memes were flying around, and it took him a while to understand what these people were talking about.
Li Xingkong was most concerned about the Rosy Clouds Ascension Plan, which he had prepared to start implementing before going into seclusion. After all, according to the plan, if it was proceeding smoothly, the nationwide promotion of meditation should already be underway. Logically, people should be able to sense the existence of Spiritual Qi soon, and there should be plenty of related topics online.
However, when Li Xingkong tried searching with keywords such as "quiet exercise" and "meditation," the news results were mostly negative comments. They either criticized that this should not be included in the compulsory education stage for students, or said that this could not be quantified and was a failed course.
Furthermore, the sheer amount of support Divine Land provides for this course has overshadowed the main course status of Yingyu, leading to increased dissatisfaction among many.
After all, many people rely on the English language course to improve their grades; without it, their scores would be significantly lower. At the same time, many well-known public intellectuals are touting the importance of English in the international arena, and this trend is being heavily criticized.
The Divine Land government has remained silent on these comments, essentially saying, "Let them make their own noise; the lesson will have to be taught."
As for the meditation course in most schools, the teachers were basically from the military regions of several cities that had already developed Spiritual Qi. Judging from the number of teachers and their allocation, the first phase of the Rosy Clouds Ascension Plan was at least a success.
However, the second phase of the course promotion did not gain the upper hand in terms of public opinion, which Li Xingkong. Logically speaking, there shouldn't have been any problems in this part. Could it be that some other situation had caused a delay?