Chapter Summaries

Li Xingkong waited for news about new farmland while watching the Cherry Blossom Wind Group respond to its contract blunder. The group suspected internal factional conflict and gave the director responsible five days to find the cause or face severe consequences.

• Li Xingkong asked a classmate at the township government office to check which nearby villages had idle farmland.
• Li Xingkong tended his garden and hoped the Cherry Blossom Wind Group’s refusal to pay would unite the villagers against it.
• The Cherry Blossom Wind Group’s senior management investigated the contract after discovering the massive payment error.
• The group concluded the blunder likely stemmed from escalating factional struggles and gave the responsible director five days to find the cause.

Li Xingkong watched the Cherry Blossom Wind Group’s crisis unfold and decided to focus on cultivating rather than managing people or factions. After a friend sent him information about abandoned villages and farmland, Li Xingkong began choosing a remote place to grow Body Tempering Grass.

• Li Xingkong learned from intercepted records that the Cherry Blossom Wind Group director was about to die, and he expected Dong Yu to fall with him.
• Li Xingkong resisted the urge to confront the group’s personnel in person because his strength could badly injure ordinary people.
• Li Xingkong concluded that he should devote himself to improving his strength rather than learning management or seeking power over others.
• Li Xingkong’s friend sent him a spreadsheet of nearby abandoned villages, including land details and photos.
• Li Xingkong reviewed the listings and looked for a remote, comfortable place to grow Body Tempering Grass.

Li Xingkong expanded his plans to cultivate Body Tempering Grass in abandoned Xiurong Village while learning how the Cherry Blossom Wind Group’s people had fallen into trouble. As he thought the dispute was over, Old Master Liu rushed to stop the departing group because the contract included too much money and he feared they would leave without paying it.

• Li Xingkong chose Xiurong Village for his expanded vegetable garden, leased its abandoned farmland from villagers, and propagated Body Tempering Grass for future planting.
• Li Xingkong learned that the Cherry Blossom Wind Group director had fled, Dong Yu had been arrested as a spy, and Ximen Feng’s graduation prospects had collapsed.
• Reiko and her associates were recalled for investigation, and Li Xingkong mocked them as they left without resolving the land payment.
• Old Master Liu grabbed Li Xingkong and hurried to stop the group, explaining that the contract amount was wrong and they needed to make sure the company paid them.

Li Xingkong assessed his Mid Qi Refining cultivation, reviewing his bone tempering, magic-power pathways, spells, and spiritual-plant breeding. He judged himself capable of competing with the main weapons of land warfare and set a goal of reaching the missile-level second tier.

• Li Xingkong returned to his courtyard and assessed his cultivation progress before beginning a long period of practice.
• Li Xingkong reviewed his body tempering, estimating that he had tempered forty-five bones and could finish within a year if he used more Body Tempering Grass.
• Li Xingkong evaluated his Qi Refining Technique and spells, noting his broad magic-power circuits, growing mastery of the Ingestion Spell, and limited ability to fight other cultivators.
• Li Xingkong reviewed his spiritual-plant breeding and recognized that his cultivation of Body Tempering Grass had begun to bear fruit.
• Li Xingkong ranked his current abilities in Earth Star's third tier, comparable to the main weapons of land warfare, and resolved to reach the missile-level second tier.

Li Xingkong planned to focus his cultivation on improving his range and speed, then met up with his former squad leader Wu Yan to complete the rental paperwork and share a meal. After cultivating through the night, he arrived at Wu Yan’s workplace and greeted him after years apart.

• Li Xingkong decided to keep advancing his cultivation while prioritizing greater range and speed to better match modern firepower.
• Wu Yan told Li Xingkong that he had arranged nearly fifty mu of land and prepared the rental contracts, and they agreed to meet the next day.
• Li Xingkong watered his garden and cultivated until morning, noting that his sessions were growing long enough to last nearly three months.
• Li Xingkong reserved a meal at a well-known township restaurant and went to Wu Yan’s workplace to meet him.
• Wu Yan came out to greet Li Xingkong and remarked that he had become handsome.

Li Xingkong met with his old class monitor Wu Ting to complete paperwork for contracting land, then joined Wu Ting and Tang Cheng for a meal. He explained that he planned to plant vegetables for an experiment and invited them to visit once he had planted them.

• Li Xingkong met Wu Ting at his workplace, reviewed the land documents, and signed them.
• Wu Ting introduced Li Xingkong to his colleague Tang Cheng, who had chosen to work in the countryside rather than rely on his father's connections.
• Li Xingkong, Wu Ting, and Tang Cheng went to a restaurant, where Wu Ting asked why Li Xingkong was contracting so much land.
• Li Xingkong said he was testing an idea by planting vegetables, and Wu Ting warned him against growing addictive substances.
• Tang Cheng asked to visit Li Xingkong's land, and Li Xingkong agreed to let both men see the crop once it was planted.

Li Xingkong traveled to the abandoned Xiurong Village to inspect the terraced farmland he had leased and begin preparing it for cultivation. He cleared nearly a mu of land by eating the weeds, but still faced a large amount of overgrowth to remove.

• After sharing a meal with Wu Ting and Tang Cheng, Li Xingkong left them sleeping off their drunkenness and returned home to prepare for expanding his vegetable garden.
• Li Xingkong flew over Falling Cloud Mountain and located the remote, roadless Xiurong Village using the documents and his phone.
• He confirmed the village was in ruins and found the terraced mountainside farmland he had leased nearby.
• Li Xingkong began clearing the land, pulling up weeds and thorny wild jujube trees until the pile of vegetation grew enormous.
• Unable to find a place to dispose of the weeds, Li Xingkong used the Ingestion Spell to eat the vegetation from nearly a mu of land.

Li Xingkong experimented with using mana to create sword qi and discovered it could efficiently cut through weeds and turn soil. After clearing fifty mu of land, he continued plowing with sword qi for fun.

• Li Xingkong used Shotgun Spells to turn over a mu of land and wondered how to clear the remaining weeds more efficiently.
• Li Xingkong tried shaping mana into sword qi with a stick and gradually improved the technique by testing it on weeds and a tree.
• Li Xingkong unleashed a sword-drawing strike whose sword qi traveled about eighty meters and cut through weeds and saplings.
• Li Xingkong cleared fifty mu of weeds in less than half an hour with repeated sword qi strikes.
• Li Xingkong decided to use sword qi instead of Shotgun Spells to plow the land.

Li Xingkong cleared a plot of land and decided to dig a cave dwelling nearby as a temporary home before planting. He found a tall, solid-looking loess cliff overlooking the fields and prepared to build there.

• Li Xingkong cleared and leveled the plot using sword qi, then ate the weeds for their nutrients and energy.
• Li Xingkong decided he needed a temporary home before he began planting.
• Li Xingkong chose to dig a cave dwelling because the remote village had few usable building materials and bringing in supplies would be difficult.
• Li Xingkong dismissed concerns about building rules and cave-dwelling safety, believing his strength would let him handle collapses and reinforce the walls.
• Li Xingkong found a nearly ten-meter-high loess cliff above the fields and chose it as the site for his cave dwelling.

Li Xingkong used his Explosive Reactive Armor spell to tunnel into a loess wall and began turning the passage into a cave dwelling. After dust overwhelmed him during his first charge, he prepared a plastic-bag mask and reshaped the spell before charging into the wall again.

• Li Xingkong decided to compact the loess with his Explosive Reactive Armor instead of digging the soil out by hand.
• Li Xingkong charged into the wall with the spell formed as a shield, smashing a deep tunnel but emerging covered in dust.
• Li Xingkong inspected the rough, compacted passage and found its far end had become hard from the impact and heat.
• Li Xingkong covered his head with a plastic bag and curved his shield spell to direct soil to either side.
• Li Xingkong charged into another section of the loess wall, kicking up another cloud of yellow dust.

Li Xingkong finished building a crude cave dwelling in the mountains and began clearing a road back to his village. After returning home, he put down his sword at his mother's request, ready to fetch seeds and start planting.

• Li Xingkong shaped compressed-soil bricks and a grass door to complete his temporary cave dwelling.
• After inspecting the shelter, Li Xingkong decided to bring seeds back and plant them there.
• Li Xingkong chose the road around Falling Cloud Mountain and used sword qi to clear weeds for Wu Ting and Tang Cheng's planned visit.
• Li Xingkong reached his village after walking more than ten kilometers and entered his home carrying his sword.
• Li Xingkong's mother told him to put the stick away for firewood, and he obediently set it down.

Li Xingkong settled into his mountain home, planted Body Tempering Grass, and found that seclusion helped his cultivation progress faster than it had at home. After a month, he had tempered fourteen more bones, bringing his total to fifty-nine, while his cultivation remained broadly classified within its first realm.

• Li Xingkong finished furnishing his new house and accepted that he could not yet make a storage artifact because his knowledge and cultivation were insufficient.
• He collected Body Tempering Grass seeds from his old garden and estimated that they could plant about two mu of his land.
• Li Xingkong discovered an irrigation faucet and channel, then flooded the plots he planned to plant first.
• He settled into a quiet routine of cultivation, spell practice, and browsing the internet, visiting home less often as mountain seclusion improved his focus.
• After a month, Li Xingkong had tempered fourteen bones, bringing his total to fifty-nine, and considered the need for finer cultivation stages later.

Wu Ting and Tang Cheng secretly visited Li Xingkong’s mountain farm to check that he was staying on the right path. They spotted him tending his crops and prepared to approach him.

• Wu Ting and Tang Cheng drove toward Xiurong Village without telling Li Xingkong, then parked and climbed Falling Cloud Mountain when they could not find the village road.
• The two spotted Xiurong Village from the mountainside and decided to sneak toward Li Xingkong’s fields to surprise him.
• Wu Ting and Tang Cheng watched the fields through binoculars and saw only leafy vegetables at first.
• Tang Cheng and Wu Ting spotted Li Xingkong emerging from the cliff and inspecting his vegetable plots like a farmer.
• Wu Ting stopped Tang Cheng from calling out as Li Xingkong moved.

Li Xingkong demonstrated a precise sword-qi technique and revealed his cultivation to Wu Ting and Tang Cheng after they found him in the mountains. He carried them down from the mountainside, and Tang Cheng kept the wooden stick Li Xingkong had used as his first sword.

• Wu Ting and Tang Cheng watched Li Xingkong clear a semicircle of weeds with a sword-qi arc shaped using geometry.
• Li Xingkong noticed them on the mountaintop, then recognized them as his friends and approached them.
• Wu Ting and Tang Cheng confirmed that Li Xingkong was cultivating, and he explained that he had only just started.
• Tang Cheng picked up Li Xingkong's discarded stick, calling it a future immortal artifact, before joining him for the descent.
• Li Xingkong carried both friends through a high leap and used the Wind Riding Spell to set them gently on the ground.
• Wu Ting asked Li Xingkong to teach him cultivation.

Li Xingkong agreed to teach Wu Ting and Tang Cheng cultivation, starting them on the Hibernating Dragon Technique, which used dreams to study knowledge coherently. He transferred the technique’s extensive materials to Wu Ting’s USB drive, leaving the two with a long course of study ahead.

• Li Xingkong offered to teach Wu Ting and Tang Cheng after demonstrating his ability to soar, warning them that learning would be painful.
• Li Xingkong chose the Hibernating Dragon Technique as their starting point because they lacked the Spiritual Qi needed for Qi Refining and had little time to learn theory.
• Tang Cheng and Wu Ting asked about the technique, and Li Xingkong explained how its dreams could present coherent knowledge unlike ordinary lucid dreams.
• Li Xingkong said the technique had taken him about three years to learn, but Wu Ting and Tang Cheng decided to pursue it despite the time commitment.
• Tang Cheng asked Li Xingkong to pass on the technique, and Li Xingkong asked whether either of them had brought a USB drive.
• Wu Ting supplied a twelve-gigabyte USB drive, and Li Xingkong filled it with the technique’s instructions and visualization materials.

Li Xingkong offered Wu Ting and Tang Cheng a shortcut to cultivation by empowering them with a Qi Refining method instead of making them study the extensive theory first. Both agreed to undergo the untested procedure, and Li Xingkong began with Tang Cheng in his cave dwelling.

• Wu Ting and Tang Cheng learned that the Hibernating Dragon Technique contained more than ten gigabytes of material and worried about how long it would take to study.
• After consulting the system, Li Xingkong learned he could build a Qi Refining method inside them, letting them use basic magic power without understanding or advancing the method.
• Li Xingkong explained the limits of empowerment, and Tang Cheng volunteered to go first while Wu Ting watched.
• Both men agreed to the procedure, and Li Xingkong had Tang Cheng lie down on the kang before beginning the unfamiliar process.

Li Xingkong examined Tang Cheng and modified his body with a simplified Qi Refining Method, creating a Qi Sea and a basic Mana Circuit. Tang Cheng endured intermittent pain during the process and was left able to absorb solar energy and potentially cast spells if given Spell Seeds.

• Li Xingkong used the Restoration Technique to confirm that Tang Cheng was healthy before beginning the modification.
• Li Xingkong constructed a Qi Sea in Tang Cheng's body, and Tang Cheng felt an internal itch while it was being formed.
• Li Xingkong built a simple Mana Circuit connecting Tang Cheng's Qi Sea to his hand, causing Tang Cheng occasional bursts of pain.
• Li Xingkong finished the simplified Qi Refining Method after a little over half an hour, and Tang Cheng climbed off the kang covered in sweat.

Li Xingkong completed Wu Ting and Tang Cheng’s modifications, allowing them to absorb mana from sunlight, and offered them two spell seeds. After they accepted both, he began inscribing them and reflected on how similar the process was to a spell in an old story.

• Li Xingkong finished observing Wu Ting and Tang Cheng after their modifications and confirmed that neither had suffered any abnormal effects.
• Wu Ting and Tang Cheng felt mana entering their bodies through their palms when they stepped into the sunlight.
• Li Xingkong explained that they could recover energy by basking in the sun but had limited mana and few spells available.
• Wu Ting and Tang Cheng chose to receive both the Rejuvenation Technique and Explosive Counter Spell spell seeds.
• Li Xingkong began inscribing the two spell seeds for them and thought of the Wall-Passing Technique from “The Taoist of Mount Lao.”

Li Xingkong inscribed the Rejuvenation Technique and a protective spell on Wu Ting and Tang Cheng, explaining how spells were triggered and why controlling magical power required a disciplined mind. Tang Cheng successfully tested the healing spell, and Wu Ting prepared to try the Explosive Counter Spell.

• Li Xingkong explained that inscribed spells needed a hand gesture and incantation as safeguards against accidental casting.
• Li Xingkong finished inscribing the spells and warned Wu Ting and Tang Cheng that they each had enough magical power for only one attempt.
• Tang Cheng cast the Rejuvenation Technique on Wu Ting, healing a small strip of his skin before the spell ran out.
• Tang Cheng's spell drained his strength, so Li Xingkong gave him two energy bars.
• Wu Ting, having felt the healing effect, prepared to test the Explosive Counter Spell using the incantation Li Xingkong supplied.

Li Xingkong showed Wu Ting and Tang Cheng his cultivation spells and explained how he had developed Body Tempering Grass from lettuce. He agreed to let Tang Cheng arrange a future approach to the Divine Land's authorities, while saying that after succeeding in cultivation, he would overhaul the Solar System.

• Wu Ting used Li Xingkong's instructions to form a small mana shield modeled on tank armor, then rested with energy bars.
• Li Xingkong explained that he cultivated on the land to grow Body Tempering Grass, and Tang Cheng and Wu Ting discovered its leaves were too strong for them to tear.
• Li Xingkong said he had considered working with the state but worried officials would disrupt his cultivation, and Tang Cheng offered to arrange contact without unwanted interruptions.
• Wu Ting asked what Li Xingkong planned to do after succeeding in cultivation, and Li Xingkong said he would overhaul the Solar System.