Chapter 3: Refining Qi Period

  At the age of five, Zhao Di began to receive guidance from an elder of the Jian family along with other children, embarking on their own path of cultivation.

  The person in charge of teaching these children the introductory exercises was a bald, white-bearded old man from the Jian family named Jian Shi. Although he was not young, his cultivation was not particularly high, and his position within the family was also quite ordinary.

  Zhao Di still remembered the scene of his first sight of Jian Shis demonstration of Xian Fa, which had left him so excited that he often dreamed of similar scenes for half a month afterwards.

  The old man muttered a few words of incantation, then raised his right palm and lightly touched the tip of his left index finger to it. Suddenly, a fireball about six or seven centimeters in diameter appeared above his right palm, roughly the size of a fist, eliciting loud gasps from the children.

  The old mans mouth was constantly chanting, his left hand also constantly changing gestures, pointing at the fireball in front of his right hand. The fireball grew bigger and bigger, finally reaching a diameter of about half a foot, roughly the size of a human head. Zhao Di, who was closer to the old man, could feel a wave of scorching heat emanating from the fireball, clearly indicating that its temperature was extremely high. At this moment, the old man spat out a "go" and the fireball quickly flew away at an angle, smashing into the rocky ground three feet away. After a loud explosion, the hard rock surface was actually blasted out of a hole over a foot deep and three feet wide.

  "This old mans fireball actually has such terrifying power!" Zhao Di was shocked in his heart, and he felt that no matter how much experience he had in his past life, it couldnt explain everything that was happening before his eyes. This further filled him with interest in cultivating immortality.

  The old man nodded in satisfaction after demonstrating, and then began to teach the introductory practice of cultivating immortality. As expected, the children who were conquered by the old mans performance listened attentively with extreme seriousness.

  Zhao Di forced himself to remember every word the old man said without missing a single one.

  The path of cultivation can be divided into nine major levels, from low to high: Qi Refining Stage, Foundation Building Stage, Core Formation Stage, Nascent Soul Stage, Spirit Transformation Stage, Void Refining Stage, Union of Body and Spirit Stage, Great Vehicle Stage, and Tribulation Transcendence Stage. Among them, the Qi Refining Stage can be divided into thirteen levels, while the stages after Foundation Building only have three levels: initial, intermediate, and advanced. As for the Tribulation Transcendence Stage, it is said that there is only one level, which is to transcend the heavenly tribulation, and once transcended, one can achieve immortality and live as long as heaven and earth.

  The purpose of a cultivators continuous cultivation is to improve their own spiritual realm. The higher the realm, not only will their magical powers and divine abilities be doubled, but even their lifespan will also increase exponentially. Generally speaking, the lifespan of a Qi-refining stage cultivator is similar to that of an ordinary person. If they die of natural causes, they can usually live to be over 100 years old. However, a Foundation-building stage cultivator can live for more than 200 years. As for the Core-forming and Nascent Soul stages, their lifespan also increases exponentially. Its said that Nascent Soul stage cultivators can live for over 1,000 years, and there are many such cases in the Golden Flame Country, although extremely rare.

  As for this old man, he was at the foundation-building stage and had lived for more than 180 years!

  "Live for over a thousand years, and even share the same fate as heaven and earth!" Upon hearing this, Zhao Di was almost driven mad with excitement, he couldnt wait to start his immortal cultivation journey.

  Jian Shi Lao Tou didnt keep them waiting for too long, after a brief introduction to some notes and basic methods of cultivation, he brought out five different manuals of techniques for these children to choose from.

  These five books look very ancient, with covers that are neither silk nor paper, and at first glance, they seem to be extraordinary objects. The covers have the titles "Jin Jin Jue", "Chang Chun Jue", "Zhu Lang Jue", "Lie Yan Jue" and "Tu Shi Jue" respectively, corresponding to the five spiritual root attributes of gold, wood, water, fire and earth, all of which are basic techniques for cultivating the Five Elements. As long as one has the corresponding spiritual roots, they can cultivate them. For example, a cultivator with the three spiritual roots of wood, fire, and earth can cultivate any one of "Chang Chun Jue", "Lie Yan Jue" or "Tu Shi Jue". In theory, a cultivator with multiple spiritual roots can also cultivate multiple techniques at the same time, but in reality, no cultivator does this. Its because quality is more important than quantity when it comes to cultivation. The realm of cultivation depends on the highest level one has reached in a particular technique. For example, if someone cultivates "Chang Chun Jue" to the 13th layer, they are at the 13th layer of the Refining Qi stage, and advancing another layer would make them a Foundation Establishment stage cultivator. Even if this three-spiritual-root cultivator spends a lot of time and effort cultivating all three techniques to the 12th layer, their cultivation level is still only at the 12th layer of the Refining Qi stage, regardless of the size of their spiritual energy or the power of the techniques they can display.

  Of course, the characteristics of different attribute methods are not exactly the same. Generally speaking, fire-attribute methods have the strongest attack power, while water-attribute methods are slightly easier to cultivate, and wood-attribute methods pay more attention to their own adjustment. The cultivators who cultivate this method often live longer than the cultivators of the same level. Metal attribute and earth attribute methods also have their own characteristics.

  Since each child already knows their spiritual root attribute, they are free to choose for themselves.

  Zhao Di was a Five Spirits Root, and all five spirits roots were present. These five methods could also be cultivated. After hearing Jian Shi introduce the characteristics of various attribute techniques, he chose to cultivate the fastest "Chu Lang Jue" without hesitation. After all, his spiritual root attributes were not good in the first place, so choosing an easy one might not make cultivation too slow. As for the water attribute technique being the weakest, he didnt put it in his heart either.

  But the rest of the children were different, and almost all those with fire spiritual roots chose "Blazing Fist Technique", I dont know if they were attracted by Jian Shis performance.

  After everyone had chosen their spells, several ordinary people from the Jian family handed out paper and pens to each of the children. Once all the children had paper and pen in hand, Old Man Jian Shi made a series of strange gestures with his hands, then pointed at each of the five spellbooks in turn, causing them to emit colorful glows that formed into five spheres of light about two feet in diameter, enveloping the books within. Then, characters made of light flew out from the spheres and hovered above them. These dazzling five-colored spheres of light attracted even more attention from some of the children than the fireball spell had earlier.

  "These are the first five layers of the Five Elements incantation, quickly copy them down, and the light spheres will disappear after half an hour." Old Jians voice was not loud, but it made the children who were mesmerized by the colorful light spheres feel like they had been struck on the head, and they all trembled with fear, hastily picking up their brushes to record.

  Zhao Di copied quickly, not thinking about the meaning at all, anyway there was plenty of time later. After finishing the first five layers of Gongfa in "Zhu Lang Jue", he felt that there was still a lot of time left, so he also recorded the first five layers of Kou Jue in "Chang Chun Jue" with the fewest words.

  Less than half a time, all the children had finished copying, and Lao Tou collected the five books, threw down a sentence "Work hard to cultivate, after cultivating the first layer, go to Ru Zi Ge to find me" and left.

  Hearing the old man say so, Zhao Di still thought that the first layer was easy to cultivate. Who knew it wasnt like that at all!

  He carefully memorized the first layers mantra and began to guide the heavenly spiritual energy into his body, controlling it to circulate along the corresponding routes, finally entering the dantian and condensing into his own spiritual power, completing a small cycle. The result was easily achieved, but the amount of spiritual energy gathered each time was pitifully small, even inferior to those who started later. Although he spent almost every waking moment absorbing spiritual energy, becoming more proficient with each passing day, and shortening the time it took to complete a cycle, it still took nearly a year to accumulate enough spiritual energy in his dantian and successfully control it to impact several important acupoints in his body, achieving the first layers cultivation perfection and entering the second layer of the Qi Refining stage.

  To know that there are several five or six-year-old children who can complete the first level of cultivation in two or three months, and the rest mostly take about half a year.

  He had worked so hard to cultivate himself, but he couldnt even compare to these five or six year old children, Zhao Di was speechless about his own inferior spiritual roots.