Calculating Cultivation

I followed my senior down a steep flight of wooden stairs. He was still dragging the half instantiate demonic cultivator around by the neck. In the basement, there was an enormous cauldron and piles of bones off to one side that appeared human.

In addition, there was a chained starving young boy in a cage who was naked. There were blood splotches and butchering tools located around the room. “A demonic alchemical workshop. Inner Disciple Yuan Zhou, guard this building until I return. Touch nothing, not even that child. Let no one enter under the authority of the Cloudy Moon Sect and member Tian Fang.”

“Yes, senior Tian Fang,” I told him and he quickly departed with the demonic cultivator in hand. I quickly exited the building and could see people gathering. They quickly ducked away as I glared at them in my Cloudy Moon Sect robes.

I patrolled around the building, making sure no one was trying to get in and reversing up my path while keeping an intense look out. Five minutes after senior Tian Fang left, he returned with four other members of the Cloudy Moon sect.

“Junior greets seniors,” I said, and bowed. Then an old woman stepped forward.

“Explain exactly what happened from the beginning and how you encountered the demonic cultivator inner disciple,” she said.

“Yes, senior. I was attending a wedding for my sister Yuan Chuntao yesterday and then left the Yao family compound early in the morning. I came across a man dressed as a beggar in the street and stopped to give him some money, but he cast off his cloak and hat. He talked about how he planned to refine me. He lunged at me and tried to knock me unconscious. I pretended to be unconscious since his strength was greater than mine.”

“Based on his strength, I guessed he was in the late second stage or the early third stage of his cultivation. He then wrapped me up in his discarded cloak and began carrying me. I got an arm free and struck his back. I pushed 100,000 motes into his body, crippling him.”

“After that, I crushed his foot, but could not defeat him fully until Senior Tian Fang showed up. He struck me in the chest once with his leg. Senior Tian Fang easily disabled the demonic cultivator and stopped him from killing himself. I then mentioned he had been taking me somewhere. Using where I had been captured, freed myself, and Senior Tian Fang’s excellent discernment, we located this building and the basement senior,” I explained.

“That would explain why his cultivation was messed up. Sacrificing so much to disable him, that is impressive, and you have my condolences for your hard work being cast aside,” she said.

“It was a fraction of my cultivation senior. Thankfully, it wasn’t any more. I wouldn’t want to annoy Elder Li Fu, senior,” I replied.

“Your name?” she asked.

“Yuan Zhou, senior,” I replied.

“The heaven’s blessed genius. Hmmm, interesting. You will be escorted back to the sect to answer any questions the elders might have,” she said.

“Yes, senior,” I replied. After that, I waited as the sect members began clearing out the building piece by piece. Once the entire building had been cleared out, it was burned down along with the nearby buildings as well. No one complained, and I said nothing. They considered mortals having their homes burned as a small punishment for living next to a demonic cultivator. If any dared to speak up, they would have been killed instantly, along with their entire families.

Once that was done, they loaded me up into a carriage, along with a bundled up demonic cultivator and Tian Fang. We set off and since my senior didn’t speak; I didn’t either. After three days of hard riding, we arrived at the base of the sect.

They forced the demonic cultivator to piss through his clothes. I felt sorry for the poor people who would have to clean the carriage, but Tian Fang clearly wasn’t taking any chances. The demonic cultivator’s fingers were each clamped individually, and his head and neck were in a brace so he couldn’t move. They only gave him some water through his ruined mouth, but that was it.

Once we got back, I followed senior Tian Fang up the steps, who carried the demonic cultivator like a sack of potatoes. I had to push myself to match her pace, but I was used to climbing the stairs after having swept them for so long. At the top of the steps, three elders were waiting, including Elder Li Fu. I bowed and Tian Fang did the same after dumping the demonic cultivator at the feet of the elders.

One of them approached and put a hand on the man’s forehead. “Demonic cultivator, blood compression cultivation. Late second stage.” He removed his hand.

“How brazen to set up an alchemical workshop in Half Moon City. Explain exactly what happened. You first, inner disciple,” the elder said. I quickly recounted my explanation and then they had member Tian Fang do so as well.

The elders moved away slightly to discuss things in private before coming back over.

“Capturing a demonic cultivator alive is no easy feat. While he probably does not know much, we can hopefully track down his master, who is no doubt a member of the Demonic Blood Cultivation sect. We will handle it from here.”

“Member Tian Fang, you showed excellent judgement and defended a junior of the sect. We award you 500 contribution points,” Elder Li Fu said. My eyes went wide at that number. I thought the bounty was much lower. Then I realized that was the public bounty. The bounty made out to the sects was much higher, and capturing a demonic cultivator alive was a tremendous accomplishment. He thanked the elders and took away the demonic cultivator after he was dismissed. The elders turned towards me.

“Inner disciple Yuan Zhou. You truly must be favored by the heavens themselves to have assisted in the capture of a demon cultivator alive. I will give you a choice, either 1,000 sect contribution points, or a minor favor.”

“This disciple thanks Elder Li Fu. I would ask for the minor favor of being allowed to leave the sect for periods of 90 days to hunt beasts to improve my cultivation.”

“Hmm, well, you defeated a demonic cultivator on your own and helped track down his location. Very well, I will inform the administrative hall that you will be allowed to leave the sect for 90-day periods under my authority. Also, go to the healing hall. The sect will cover your care. Good work Inner Disciple Yuan Zhou. You have brought great honor to the Cloudy Moon Sect,” Elder Li Fu said.

I bowed and thanked him, and the elders left. I made my way over to the healing hall to get my bruised ribs checked out. An older woman, who was a sect member, looked at me and shook her head. She gave me a pill, which I swallowed.

“That is a Healing Pill, quite expensive, rare, and hard to make. Normally one costs 100 sect points,” she said.

“Thank you, senior,” I replied.

“Well, Elder Li Fu must like you, since he allowed it as part of the sect expenses. Now, don’t take another healing pill for one year. If you take any other pills in the next year, consult with a healer or alchemist to make sure there are no bad interactions. After a year, there should be nothing to worry about. Your cultivation won’t be impacted unless you take something.”

“Yes, senior. Thank you, senior.” She just shook her head and shooed me out of the healing hall. Well, I had earned some sect credit with Elder Li Fu and got my time extension without hassle. Now I just had to cultivate back all those motes I had lost.

My side was already feeling better. It had been a rough couple of days, but I had managed thankfully. I was not due back for another four days, so I had time off. I took that time to walk about the sect, breathe in the fresh air and enjoy the great views from the plateau the Cloudy Moon Sect resided on.

After my four days were up, I confirmed that I now had 90 days of leave from the sect per year. That was nice that Elder Li Fu followed through on my behalf. I reported back to Fan and took up my jobs again. Time to get back to earning those sect contribution points and collecting all the motes I needed.

I had been so close as well, but if I had entered the Foundation Establishment stage, then that trick wouldn’t have worked. Trying to refine me, I was going to refine those demonic cultivators into favors and contribution points, no matter what. I would drag their entire sect in one member at a time to get sect points and favors.

It might be risky, but after getting a taste of fighting, I found I wasn’t that averse to it. The power to crush my foes and enemies was exhilarating. Getting paid for it was even better. The big problem was that demonic cultivators didn’t wear signs and advertise themselves.

But after I was done with the beasts at the third stage, I might look for demonic cultivators during the fourth stage to really rake in those benefits. I also looked up the rewards the Imperial Sect offered for demonic cultivators.

The earlier numbers were just for reporting them and were paid out to non-sect members. The Cloudy Moon Sect would get the equivalent of 2,000 rank 1 spirit stones, which was the value of half the century required tribute for a stage two demonic cultivator. A stage one would only pay 1,000 rank 1 spirit stones.

A stage three demonic cultivator would pay out 5,000 rank 1 spirit stones. A stage four demonic cultivator paid out 10,000 rank 1 spirit stones. The elders clearly got a lot out of that capture, and I wanted to cry at being scammed.

Well, it wasn’t a huge scam. Getting 90 days of leave as a disciple required a lot of sect contribution points. The number was unclear, but they valued a minor favor from an elder at 1,000 sect contribution points. Since if something happened, they would have to bear the headache of dealing with the fallout.

Even elders needed contribution points and resources. Giving me increased leave but pocketing 1,500 rank 1 spirit stones was quite a good trade for Elder Li Fu. He got materials for whatever he wanted to use them for and possibly more leads to other demonic cultivators.

But I was just a lowly inner sect disciple, so they had all the power and authority to do what they wanted, and I had gotten what I wanted. So, while they benefited from doing almost nothing, that was one benefit of managing the sect day to day.

I knew what Elder Li Fu was up to and could only shake my head in exasperation while applauding the wily old cultivator. He had probably seen something similar many times before and grabbed up a huge chunk of the benefits himself. One did not make it to the rank of elder by being stupid and letting opportunities slip through one’s fingers.

Time slowly passed as I gathered up motes again and I was forced to send a letter to Zheng Ting adjusting the date I would depart the sect. It wasn’t something I wanted to do, but even going full tilt to get my mote count back up it would take time.

A hundred thousand motes were no joke. For some cultivators, that was their entire cultivation. My second year in the sect came and went. Gen was making progress with his cultivation into the second stage, and Wen Xue was chugging along. Wu Changying didn’t show up or greet us during the annual celebration, but she was not a sociable person.

Halfway through the year, at the age of 20.5, I finally finished collecting the motes I needed to finish my cultivation. A total of 1,788,606 motes‌. It was monstrous and a number that would crush anyone else. Even with pills and taking in 100 motes a day, that would be 17,886 pills or 49 years of taking pills daily and 894,300 tael. Almost the value of a rank 4 spirit stone.

It was a mind-boggling heaven crushing number of motes. I took six days off from work. I spent the first two days off from work double and triple checking my cultivation. Confirming the placement of each and every mote. Everything was perfect. It was a masterpiece of cultivation. Cultivators would weep at such a sight. In envy or fear was the real question.

I took a deep breath and focused on the first mote in my small left toe to align it for the construction of the first channel. I had grasped motes before and moved them about, but aligning a mote was completely different and the first one was the hardest by a large degree.

The pain I felt was something beyond the physical and made it incredibly hard to concentrate. I had moved the other motes nearby away and formed a barrier of motes I held in place. It was hard, and I felt my control waiver several times.

After 12 hours, I collapsed on my bed, panting. I had done it. I had entered the second stage officially and aligned my first mote. Then, I moved the other motes back into their positions and slept, completely exhausted.

The next day, after some food, I cultivated in earnest. I moved a second mote into place, then had ten motes form a shell around it to reduce the effects on the other motes. It was incredibly mentally taxing but the effects didn’t ripple out to the rest of my motes as I felt the barrier motes want to slip free of my mental grasp.

I had enough experience to hold them in place. The second mote took 4 hours to align and place the connection to the first mote. The third took 4 and a half hours since I was getting tired. I had dinner and rested a bit and the fourth took 3 hours and 50 minutes to align and continue the channel deeper inside of me, past the first three motes. At 4 hours per mote, if I did 3 per day, it would take me 596,202 days to finish. That was 1,633 years.

The biggest issue was having to hold the motes in place to use as a barrier while I aligned a mote. On the fifth day of my break, I didn’t hold any motes in place and aligned a mote as quickly as possible. They went bouncing around in my body, messing up my careful placement.

I didn’t mind. I had every single mote placement memorized and had placed them in their spots multiple times over the years. This time, it only took me an hour and a half to align the motes again. At 12 hours a day, that would put me at 8 aligned mote per day. That meant 613 years to cultivate through the second stage.

I needed to align 100 motes per day at a minimum. That would mean 49 years of constant cultivation to clear the second stage. If I pushed myself and cultivated 16 hours, I had to do a mote every 9.5 minutes. I focused and tried to align two motes at once, but they both vibrated wildly, and I had to stop.

Next, I tried aligning a mote in my hand and one in my foot. It hurt a lot, but they were far enough apart not to interfere with each other, but I felt ill afterwards. The two motes had taken 50 minutes together, and I had been really pushing myself. That was 25 minutes per mote. Still too slow. I moved my motes back into their places and fell asleep.

The sixth day, I did six motes at once, one each in my limbs, one in my torso, and one in my head. It was incredibly hard, but I would not give up after talking such a big game about my cultivation. I refused. I was Yuan Zhou, the number one cultivator in existence, who walked the path of defiance!

I was originally from Earth but died to a truck and was reborn as the son of the merchant Yuan Chen. Because of being aware since birth, I had the heaven’s blessed ability to see Qi motes and had gone all out in my cultivation. I looked at that picture my sister had drawn of us and our parents. My mother, Yuan Wen, the biggest drama queen to ever live.

My master Yi Rong, who had put his hopes and dreams onto my shoulders. I couldn’t fail. I had to succeed, no matter what. If I was going to die, then let me die. But I would succeed in this path. I didn’t put my mind to something to just give up halfway. That wasn’t who I was.

The motes locked into place, and I quickly built the linkages in my left toe before the motes settled. It had taken 36 minutes to do 6 motes. I had gotten my time down to 6 minutes per mote. If I cultivated for 16 hours per day, that would put me at 160 motes per day.

It would take 31 years to clear the second stage with my cultivation plan. Well, time to keep working. I couldn’t afford to slack off and focused while gritting my teeth. As I pushed the motes into position, I forced myself up and to move about. I was slow and barely aware of what I was doing, but I did six motes while slowly walking around my room. I had to pause briefly as I put the linkages between motes in place.

I could do it. It was hard, painfully hard. The mental exhaustion was immense. The pain was eye-watering. But I could function barely while cultivating. But I would not give up. In fact, I was going to speed up, if anything.

I did 12 motes this time, 2 in each section of my body. I felt like I was going to rip apart. The other motes inside of me were going crazy, bouncing all over the place. Oh gods, the pain. I felt like my head and guts were going to explode out of me.

Just standing was excruciating. I could barely breathe as I forced the motes to align with my astral soul. The pain kept hitting me in waves. Keeping my mental grip on the 12 motes was a struggle. It finally ended, and it had taken me 40 minutes. I made the connections I needed with the motes before I collapsed on my bed drenched in sweat. That was a mote every 3.4 minutes.

I wanted to keep going, but that would not happen. I felt ill, tired, and sore. Trying to find some way to recover, I made my way to the bathroom and got into the bath. Water came through a large sect wide formation and plumbing to move it about. It would drain out into the gardens.

Once I was in the warm bath water, I did another round of cultivation with 12 motes once again. The pain was immense. It took an hour this time, which meant 5 minutes per mote. It wasn’t getting any better. My teeth ached.

I needed to check if something was wrong. Teeth weren’t supposed to ache like this. I got changed and made my way to the healing hall.

“What seems to be the problem?” the older woman I had talked to before when I was injured asked me.

“Every time I cultivate, there is a lot of pain. Tremendous pain. My teeth have started to hurt even,” I replied.

“Sit. Did you enter a new stage?” she asked.

“Yes, Foundation Establishment four days ago,” I said. She leaned in close and held one of my eyes open with her hand while she looked at it.

“The first mote is the hardest. But after that it just requires time,” she said.

“I… I am aligning multiple motes at once,” I replied sheepishly.

“Idiot! That is how you blow yourself apart. Doing two motes at the same time is a lot, even if you do them in different parts of your body. When motes are aligned with your astral soul, they vibrate. It is fine with one mote, but with two motes, the vibrations impact each other and your astral soul. You are lucky to be alive.”

“It… Well, I was doing over two.”

“How many?” she asked.

“Twelve.” She took a step back and stared at me in shock.

“Twelve! That is madness. How are your body and soul still functioning? You should be blown apart!” she asked. “Don’t answer that. This… Wait here,” she said and left. A few minutes later, a younger looking woman was brought in, and she was an elder.

“Junior greets-“

“Don’t worry about that here. I am the chief healer of the Cloudy Moon Sect, Elder Healer Meihui. Do I have your permission to scan you with my energy?” she asked.

“Yes, elder healer,” I replied. She put a head on my hand and another on my chest. Her face grew pinched, and I felt weird. After a minute, she let go.

“You are Yuan Zhou,” she said.

“Yes, elder healer,” I replied.

“Foolishness!” She lightly smacked me on my head. “What you have done, and the number of motes you have taken in, is something unheard of. I thought Li Fu was playing a prank on me. No one could be this idiotic, stupid, foolish, brain dead, and a blight to all intelligent life!” I kept my mouth shut. The older looking woman who was a sect member and had first looked at me appeared shocked.

“Your astral soul is on the verge of collapse. Your body has only held together since you have so many motes. That is the only reason why your astral hasn’t since it is extra tough, ‌but if you keep doing what you are doing, you will rip it apart. Also, your physical body is under great strain with all those motes inside of you. Let me guess. No one told you about the medical risks of your cultivation plan?”

“No, elder healer,” I replied.

“Foolishness! It is too late to cast aside the motes you have. They are trapped inside of you. You can cultivate, of course, but you are crippled.”

“What?!” I asked in surprise.

“Only lightly, but even then, the number of channels you will have is dangerous. You will tear yourself apart from the strain, most likely.” She held up her hand as I opened up my mouth. “Don’t speak. Your foolishness sickens me.”

I closed my mouth and Elder Healer Meihui continued. “You are not to cultivate for three days. I mean it. No cultivation. That should stabilize things hopefully. The damage isn’t permanent, but it is close. Anymore and your astral soul will rip. Come back here in three days.”

“Yes, elder healer,” I said, and she snorted.

“Long term. I don’t even know, since no one has ever been this idiotic. How many motes? I know it is over a million.”

“1,788,606, elder healer,” I said.

“Foolishness!” she shouted. I sat there quietly with my head bowed. “Three days, I mean it. Long term, I know you won’t stop cultivating. And with all those motes, you will want to rush forward. If this was the damage done with a couple cycles of twelve motes, then you should be okay at six. But you will need regular checkups.”

“Also, you will need medicine to ensure your astral soul heals during all of this. If you wish to cultivate at a high intensity, then you will need time in the Astral Stabilization chamber. The formation will make sure the fraying is reduced. We use it for injured members as they attempt to rebuild their cultivation.”

“It won’t be cheap either. Whoever paid for you to get all those motes will have to pay for this as well. I would recommend a treatment session once a month for half a day. It might be a bit more or less as I monitor you going forward.”

“How much elder healer?” I asked.

“Half a day would cost 100 sect contribution points.” I wanted to die at that amount. “Or you could fund the 100 spirit stones needed to run it.” I really wanted to cry now.

“Should I get a session now?” I asked.

“Yes. And we charge healing prices at cost. But proper healing is expensive. Who is your master? I plan to yell at them for a bit,” she said.

“Master Yi Rong passed about a decade ago,” I said.

“Then I shall curse his grave for allowing this to happen and Li Fu will hear a piece of my mind. Give me your badge.” I handed it over. She deducted 100 points from it without even asking me and then gave it back. “Come!” I followed her out of the treatment room.

She led me to a door and into an underground chamber with a bench. “Sit there, focus on your breathing and the edge of your astral soul.”

“Yes, elder healer,” I said, and she left, slamming the stone door closed behind her. The chamber glowed a light blue, and I felt the constant pain diminish.

I sat there into the night, and then the chamber finally stopped glowing. Surprisingly, I was feeling much better. I had taken this time to move my motes back into their proper positions. The door to the chamber slid open and Elder Healer Meihui was back.

“Come,” she said more calmly than before. They brought me back to the treatment room. Elder Li Fu was there as well. She had me sit and checked my body once again.

“The fraying was corrected. His astral soul is quite resilient, but cultivating that many motes at once is impossible,” she said to Elder Li Fu. No doctor patient confidentiality around here when you were a disciple.

“I see, but you say he could handle six?” Elder Li Fu asked.

“Possibly, with checkups and time in the Astral Stabilization chamber. Even then, it will be risky for him. The only other option would be an Astral Recovery Pill, but those would be even more expensive. Or if someone is hiding it, an Astral Soul Stabilizer,” she said.

“No, neither of those. Disciple Yuan Zhou is walking the path of defiance. New and uncharted territory,” Elder Li Fu said while looking at me. “Well, he might come up with something. An Astral Recovery Pill would cost 5,000 sect points and would have to be specifically requested. It would last about a year, isn’t that right?” Elder Li Fu asked Elder Healer Meihui.

“Yes, it would. But it would only do so much. For 6 motes, a cultivating session constantly, even such a pill would struggle. To do 12 is impossible long term and would only worsen his condition,” she answered.

Elder Li Fu nodded at this. “As for the Astral Soul Stabilizer, it would be an astral device that is implanted into your soul. I can see your curiosity. The issue with such a thing is that it is immensely valuable. To put a price on it, even if someone had one, they would not easily part with one, it would be 500,000 sect contribution points at a minimum.” That was insane.

“I see you understand. It also requires a rare material to be made, an astral shard. Remnants of lost things in the astral plane, where your soul resides. Only an elder has the qualifications to make such a trip with their physical body and risk retrieving something like that. Even for a child, no elder would undertake such a risk lightly.”

“Then if they retrieved it, well, it would need to be made into an Astral Soul Stabilizer and implanted into you. That would require knowledge. Only one elder and the Sect Leader are qualified to make astral equipment. That is why such a thing would be quite expensive.”

“There is one other option,” Elder Healer Meihui said.

“Oh, what would it be?” Elder Li Fu asked.

“He could go himself,” she replied. “He would probably die, but you claim he is a genius blessed by the heavens themselves. The hardest part of the Astral Soul Stabilizer is getting an astral shard. The rest isn’t that much.”

“You just don’t want to deal with this,” Elder Li Fu said.

“I also am curious to see what will happen in the third and fourth stage. If he dies, it was not meant to be. He chose this path. We might as well toss him to the wolves and either see him progress or not waste our time or resources,” she said.

“He could make it to the third stage with just normal methods,” Elder Li Fu said.

“But that would be it. There would be no time for anything else. Almost one point eight million motes. He will be stuck at the second stage trying to get to the third stage and then die.”

“The astral plane is something even I would not take lightly, and you want to toss him in?” Elder Li Fu asked again.

“That is my official recommendation after thinking about the situation. I would even be willing to pay for the entry cost.” Elder Li Fu’s eyebrows went up at that.

“Truly? Well, we should probably explain this option to Yuan Zhou before he dies of curiosity.” Well, ‌my second stage of cultivation would not be as simple or easy as I thought.