Acting Method?

Lü Yuan had been busy for the past half month.

Both of them, of course-

Ancient Cultivator Lü Yuan had been busy settling the scattered refugees brought back to him.

Some were hungry, others sick, and the suffering they had endured over the past days had left their bodies almost unrecognizable.

If he left them alone, it would be no different from leaving them to die.

So, at first, Ancient Cultivator Lü Yuan spent almost all his time maintaining order among the refugees and tending to them.

But even so, as the refugees grew more numerous, Lü Yuan gradually found himself unable to manage them and provide relief at the same time.

His cultivation was not high, and after keeping this up for so long, he was bound to grow tired.

But just then, the wandering young nobleman from that day seemed to notice.

One noon, he came beneath the tree and volunteered his services.

He said with great confidence that, if Lü Yuan did not mind, he could let him try his hand at management.

And the facts proved that this young nobleman, who called himself Han Jiu, was a managerial talent in the truest sense.

At the very least, he was far better than Lü Yuan-

Even the two Lü Yuans put together could not match him.

Whether the refugees gathered at the camp numbered in the hundreds or, later, the thousands,

he kept every aspect, including sanitation, in perfect order, and no one even had a word of complaint.

Ancient Cultivator Lü Yuan believed that, had the war between Han and Qi not reduced a talent like Han Jiu to such a state,

his abilities might have made him a chancellor one day.

In short, having someone capable at his side greatly reduced the things Ancient Cultivator Lü Yuan had to worry about.

Even so, he still put his cultivation aside for the time being. Meanwhile, with school about to start, Punk Lü Yuan had recently been making a final push in his cultivation.

So Ancient Cultivator Lü Yuan simply lent him the Spirit Root around the clock.

That let him experience what life was like for those celestial dragons in Upper City, who could cultivate with a Spirit Root twenty-four hours a day without interruption-

With such treatment and the aid of medicine, even with Punk Lü Yuan's own abysmal aptitude,

he had made a "lightning-fast" breakthrough to the embryonic breathing first layer a week ago.

He had successfully gained strength comparable to a second-grader's while still a prospective first-grader!

Normally, someone with two Spirit Apertures needed at least four months to break through to the embryonic breathing first layer, even with money poured into medicines to help.

Punk Lü Yuan had taken only two weeks. His peers could hardly even catch a whiff of his exhaust.

Punk Lü Yuan: "Mingyang City No. 1 Technical Primary School, I'm afraid it won't be long before I forget you..."

Filled with lofty ambitions, he thought that if things continued like this and Ancient Cultivator Lü Yuan kept spending his time saving people,

it might not be impossible for him to catch up!

But wishes were beautiful, and reality was cruel-

Why?

Because today, Punk Lü Yuan heard Ancient Cultivator Lü Yuan say that, despite having neither a Spirit Root nor any cultivation, he had somehow broken through to the embryonic breathing fifth layer anyway.

Punk Lü Yuan: "?"

Punk Lü Yuan: "What do you mean by that? I'm starting to wonder which of us is the one taking medicine all day and cultivating for at least eighteen hours-"

Punk Lü Yuan: "I entered embryonic breathing on almost the same day you reached the embryonic breathing fourth layer—and that same afternoon, you even casually trained the embryonic breathing section of the fourth-grade artifact-refining Technique Method, [Complete Furnace Operation and Artifact Forging], to perfection."

In the consciousness space, Punk Lü Yuan had his hands around Ancient Cultivator Lü Yuan's neck:

"And now you're telling me that, without a Spirit Root or any cultivation, you automatically leveled up just one week after I reached the embryonic breathing first layer."

"And now, for some reason, you're at the embryonic breathing fifth layer, is that it?"

"I really need to give you some proper training!"

"Are you going to talk or not? Are you?" Punk Lü Yuan shook Ancient Cultivator Lü Yuan back and forth in grief and indignation. "Tell me what Secret Method you got from the Immortal Book! You actually kept it from me and hogged it all for yourself. Do you even have a heart?"

"Are you trying to leave me a whole major realm behind?"

"Stop shaking me..."

Ancient Cultivator Lü Yuan's head was nearly shaken to mush. "I really don't know why I suddenly broke through..."

"Isn't that why I called you over to think it through with me? Because I couldn't figure it out?"

Punk Lü Yuan had not gotten the answer he wanted, and he gave a sinister grin. "Still hiding it? You bastard, how dare you disguise yourself as my other half-"

"You innately evil ancient cultivation genius, I'll personally..."

But before he could finish, Ancient Cultivator Lü Yuan pried his hands away with a helpless look.

"Enough with the memes. Our minds are connected here. Wouldn't you know whether anything like that happened?"

"Besides, even if the Immortal Book really did spit out some Secret Method, I wouldn't have time to cultivate it..."

Punk Lü Yuan had known that from the start-

After all, the two of them were originally one being. There was no way they could hide a Secret Method from each other.

So why had he treated Ancient Cultivator Lü Yuan like that?

The answer was jealousy.

But then again, damn it, who wouldn't be jealous?

He could break through without even cultivating. Was that reasonable?

But after venting his anger and gradually calming down, Punk Lü Yuan sat on the bed in the consciousness space, modeled after the bedroom in his rental.

Then he rubbed his chin, and his crafty brain began to work.

Thinking, thinking clearly—that was probably one of his few strengths.

He might not know much about the immortal path, and his talent could not compare to Ancient Cultivator Lü Yuan's.

But he had inherited almost the entire store of knowledge and wildly imaginative train of thought he had accumulated from reading webnovels in his previous life.

And the capitalist culture he had been immersed in during this life had given him even greater breadth and scope in that regard-

So even with his meager cultivation, he might still be able to guess the outlines of many things.

After all, as everyone knew, he, Mingyang City Timely Rain, also went by the name Capitalist Cultivation Little Wu Yong.

Damn it, don't underestimate my crafty brain and its invincible imagination!

"First-" After calming down completely, Punk Lü Yuan entered capitalist cultivation Conan mode.

Facing Ancient Cultivator Lü Yuan, who sat beside the desk, he calmly extended his right index finger.

"Let's establish one thing first, or rather, control the variables."

"Have you encountered anything these past few days, such as eating something strange or coming into contact with anything unusual?"

After thinking it over, Ancient Cultivator Lü Yuan shook his head. "No. I can say with certainty, absolutely not."

Punk Lü Yuan nodded, then asked, "Then what else have you done these past few days besides saving people?"

Ancient Cultivator Lü Yuan shook his head again. "Nothing else-"

"Was there anyone unusual among those mortals?"

"Not a one."

Punk Lü Yuan had a rough idea. "In that case, we've ruled out every other variable we can know about and recognize."

"Let's assume for now that the only remaining variable is the root of the matter-"

"Which is... saving people."

"Then the question is, why would saving people raise your cultivation?"

"We need to work out a reasonable answer to that question, then test it and ultimately find the correct answer."

At that point, Punk Lü Yuan paused to think for a while.

Then, when he raised his head again, he posed a question.

"Using logic, what we can establish now is that saving people raising one's cultivation definitely doesn't apply to all cultivators."

"Otherwise, you probably wouldn't even get a chance to help an old lady across the street."

"And over on your side, after the war, there certainly wouldn't be a situation like the current one, where you have to save people."

Ancient Cultivator Lü Yuan agreed. It was something anyone could understand with a little thought.

Punk Lü Yuan's tone grew increasingly serious.

Because if his conjecture was correct, the two of them might have discovered something extraordinary on their own.

"Then you become the key to the question. Why does saving people raise your cultivation? Is it the Immortal Book, the prophecy, or is it related to the Cultivation Method you practice?"

Punk Lü Yuan rubbed his chin, taking longer and longer to think.

Ancient Cultivator Lü Yuan, unable to keep up with his train of thought, sensibly kept quiet and waited for the brain beside him to provide an answer.

After a long while, Punk Lü Yuan rubbed the spot between his brows. "We have no way of judging the first two or any other unknown factors, so let's only consider the last."

"The Southern Dipper governs life. That's stated at the very beginning of the Cultivation Method, and apart from the Five Luminaries mentioned by the Immortal Book itself, the Southern Dipper is also the only lineage on your side that we know anything about."

"So now we can arrive at a hypothetical conclusion... someone who cultivates a Southern Dipper Cultivation Method and belongs to the Southern Dipper lineage."

"Saving people-saving people in your current circumstances, which involve neither natural disaster nor man-made calamity-can raise your cultivation?"

The moment he said that, Punk Lü Yuan froze. Then he looked at Ancient Cultivator Lü Yuan and spoke that highly recognizable term.

"Acting Method?"