The Science of Cultivation [Xianxia]

Reviewing the report, Li Lang observed many things.

Besides the tests he performed, he had asked each participant for some basic information. It consisted of their aptitude and number of spiritual roots. It wasn’t anything classified and with the endorsement from the likes of Sima Xue and Tang Yulian, the young cultivators were all too happy to share.

After all, to demonic cultivators, their aptitude was the least of their worries. Their cultivation relied on willpower and resources.

From those results, Li Lang expected many of them to have grade-one aptitude like him, but he was wrong. Perhaps owing to the culture of the Luminescent Domain, most people aspired to join a demonic organization rather than the Peerless Gate. A vast majority of these people had grade-two aptitude. That meant they had between eighteen and thirty-five spiritual roots.

While employing the Vein Flow Calculation Method, Li Lang noticed some new things.

First, he confirmed spiritual roots were the openings that allowed one to absorb Qi. While he had scanned his subjects while they were cultivating; he identified the number of entry points to be consistent with the number of spiritual roots. It worked well with his theory of these roots being filters for Qi.

Just from this discovery, Li Lang had several new speculations. It had led him to believe it was the reason why Foundation Establishment cultivators with higher aptitude often had higher Qi recovery rates.

He surmised cultivators often didn’t realize this because they had too many spiritual roots. When the roots absorbed Qi in unison, it made the sensation especially difficult to detect. At the same time, there was little incentive to look into this kind of information. Just knowing about it did nothing. At the moment, this was true for Li Lang, too. That was why he was more interested in his other discovery.

While analyzing his test subjects during cultivation had confirmed the function of spiritual roots, he discovered the existence of something else when he analyzed them in the midst of employing various Qi arts.

As Energy Gathering cultivators, their entire bodies were constantly brimming with Qi. It was even spread around every part of their body as they had jammed themselves full of this exotic energy. However, Li Lang observed that when they employed techniques, they also invoked the flow of Qi.

He was able to observe how this flow of Qi moved during the execution of these Qi arts. At first, he thought nothing about it, as he often felt the same thing going on within his own body. However, when observing dozens of other people, he could see the flow of each person was unique despite evoking the same action.

The Qi energy didn’t flow in a straight line from point A to point B. Instead, they detoured around the body, and it differed from person to person. If it moved straight to the destination, it would mean Qi would travel through every inch of the body in the same manner.

In this case, the energy congregated on these ‘highways’ within the body before rushing across the body in these roundabout detours. Li Lang believed these detours were the infamous meridians that were the pathways of least resistance for Qi to travel through.

Each person’s meridians were different. The only way Li Lang had to map them out was to thoroughly test the flow by having the subject exert their Qi in various ways. While it was easy enough to do for himself, the time it would consume to map out others would pose a challenge.

Thankfully, that wasn’t his current goal. He was trying to search for ways to increase the number of one’s spiritual roots. He would leave searching for ways to make meridians more efficient for now, as he was still lacking tools in his arsenal to handle them.

To get an idea of which direction to pursue, he enlisted the help of others. Knowing that Ruby didn’t have any knowledge on the subject, he skipped over it and went straight to a more reliable artifact spirit.

“Blue, do you have any idea on how to increase one’s spiritual roots? Maybe some texts you have in that repository of yours?”

“Apologies, we do not have access to the knowledge vault. Only when someone passes the trials will we be able to fetch something suitable for them on a temporary basis.”

“So you don’t remember anything in there or what you’ve seen before?”

“No, we’re only caretakers. We were made unable to obtain such knowledge. Our previous master said it was a safety measure against possible leaks. We only know what we needed.”

“How about Green or Orange? Maybe they know something?”

Blue wistfully shook her head.

“We are connected. What they know wouldn’t be able to escape my notice for long.”

“I see. Well, thank you for your time.”

Having received no useful info through this lead, Li Lang resolved to pursue another one. When he arrived at the mess hall at the usual appointed time, he signaled for Huang Si’s attention. Li Lang sat between Wei Ping and Sima Xue, while Huang Si was off to one end of the table, so he wouldn’t be able to hear him if he didn’t have him tuned in on his words.

“Do any of you guys know anything about what spiritual roots are?”

“Spiritual roots?” Huang Si parroted. “That’s just a more detailed measure of aptitude, isn’t it?”

Li Lang shook his head and looked at the next likely candidate to know something. The woman in blue robes shook her head.

“I don’t know anything either. My Eternal Wave Sect doesn’t focus on these scholarly questions. Perhaps Nightmoon Valley may know more. As guardian of the domain, they also dabble in everything as they take on the role of record keepers as well.”

All attention was drawn to Sima Xue. She gave Li Lang an incredulous look.

“You didn’t think to ask me first? Do I appear that unreliable to you?”

“You unreliable? Of course not. But scholarly, on the other hand…”

“Li Lang!” she spoke with thorns in her voice. “I’ll have you know that I happen to have discussed this topic with my master before, you know?”

Li Lang urged her to continue with his gaze, but she revealed a mischievous smirk instead.

“What should I do? I’m not that scholarly, so maybe it’s not my place to speak.”

“Five tofu puddings.”

“And your secret to inscribing a three-rune talisman.”

Li Lang barely hesitated before nodding. The three-rune talisman wasn’t anything worth keeping a secret. It wasn’t an advancement in brushweaving technique, but something from a different era. Out in the real world, there wouldn’t be the same restriction on materials. The main benefit of Li Lang’s methods would be the cheaper production cost of low-end Earth-grade talismans.

With them being in the craftsmanship era where mass production was absent, it didn’t hurt that much for others to rediscover the methods for three-rune talismans.

Li Lang assented, nodding his head.

“Good, good, good,” Sima Xue clapped. “To answer your question, no, there’s no way to increase one’s spiritual roots. I had asked this question to my master a few years ago. He said that spiritual roots were closely tied to one’s meridians, an innate part of the body. It would be impossible for even Heaven Link realm experts to overhaul someone’s network of meridians. It’s too sophisticated, a work surpassing human means, he said.“

While I won’t blindly believe in the words of others, what they say about the difficulty of the task is probably true. These people have lived alongside Qi for generations. It would be arrogant of me to think I could find a way to increase something as important as aptitude when it involves such intangible matters that I was new to.

This was way out of my field of expertise, and would consume too much of my research time to pursue…

The results weren’t what Li Lang had hoped, but he had to live with it. Research wasn’t always fruitful, it was a lesson many researchers had to learn. At least he had confirmed the existence and role of spiritual roots. It may prove to be useful in his future endeavors.

When these seemingly small discoveries were stacked up over time, it would surely lead to something much larger in time.

For now, Li Lang planned to focus on the next matter. There were many things waiting for him to discover.

He had wanted to produce a talisman printer of some sort, but he was stalled due to the lack of Qi battery. That wouldn’t change while he was in the pocket realm, so he moved on to something more relevant to the trials.

With the Gliding Coil Spear Art he had earned, he now had a way to inject his poison into his enemies. However, his poison had proven to be only marginally useful. It slowed its victims, but they recovered in a few minutes at most. It didn’t bestow the overwhelming advantage in combat, as he had hoped.

That was why he had set his sights on poisons next. He had heard rumors of experts who rely on poisons as their main weapon. That should mean there were ways to brew more effective poisons.

It just so happens he was in a pocket realm with a rich repository of knowledge. He aimed to tap into that library to expedite his research.

Once again, he reached out to his new acquaintance.

“Blue, you said you guys can’t pull out techniques from your cultivation vault or whatever, unless one passed their trial, right?”

“That is correct.”

“Does that mean you have control of what the reward is when they pass?”

“...Only to some degree. It’ll still have to be something the challenger has displayed during the trial.”

“Perfect. I’ll have to trouble you then.”

Even Blue, who was more pragmatic, could only sigh at the repeated requests from their master candidate. She had been a supporter of Li Lang amongst the three artifact spirits. It was because she knew it to be necessary, but she was starting to have her doubts.