Chapter 10 : Chapter 10
Chapter 10. A Breakthrough in the Tai Chi Exercise!
Another three days passed in the blink of an eye.
After the disturbance in the dormitory died down, some people still muttered behind their backs whenever they saw them, but when they noticed that neither of the two reacted much, they soon found it boring, and their voices gradually faded away.
As for any other changes, Chen Sanli had grown distant. He no longer shared gossip or scraps of news with them. Most likely, he had made some breakthrough himself and no longer felt the group was worth cultivating.
Not long after that,
Li Shan finally succeeded in finding the knack of Qi and blood, and loudly vented all the frustration he had been holding in before.
Only Xu Yuan remained as quiet as ever, with no changes inside his body.
Time moved into November, the thirty-third day since the servants had begun martial training.
At the hour of Si,
as usual, Feng Xiao gave everyone instruction once, then turned to leave.
At that moment, one of the servants suddenly spoke up and asked,
“Instructor Feng, I’ve already found the knack of Qi and blood. After tempering it further, I’ve also started feeling a swelling sensation in the Ren Meridian. May I ask how I’m supposed to break through this final bottleneck and make it circulate completely?”
The instant those words fell, everyone present was shocked.
This man had actually reached the point of breaking through the bottleneck so quickly?
Most of them were still stuck on the very first step, trying to sense Qi and blood at all.
“Who is this guy? How can he be this monstrous?”
“He’s Wang Huan from our dormitory. His progress has always been the fastest.”
“Ah, people really can’t be compared. I still haven’t even found my Qi and blood.”
...
“The final step already?”
Feng Xiao looked surprised as well. Even in the front courtyard, that speed would count as fast.
He quickly walked over and placed his fingers on the man’s pulse gate to check for himself. Delight appeared on his face. “Very good. Your Qi and blood really have reached saturation. You’ve done well!”
He gave Wang Huan an approving look, then turned to the others and explained calmly, “Once the first two steps are completed, what comes next is the most important step of all: washing through the blocked meridian and knocking open the bottleneck!”
“The so-called bottleneck is neither wholly real nor wholly unreal. It is the obstacle that appears when you have reached a certain level in something, yet can no longer advance any further.”
“The size of that bottleneck differs from person to person. Some have a deep enough foundation that they may grasp the key in a single instant and break through the barrier. Others, no matter how hard they strive, remain stuck at that point their entire lives without making the slightest progress.”
A trace of melancholy inevitably appeared on Feng Xiao’s face. He himself had been stuck in the Two-Meridian Realm for a long time. No matter how well he had tempered his Qi and blood, if he could not cross that bottleneck, everything else was meaningless.
At that point, he shook his head slightly, driving away those gloomy thoughts, then asked Wang Huan,
“Now that you’ve reached this step and your Qi and blood has been tempered to fullness, have you sensed a faint obstruction in the Ren Meridian, something like the joint inside a bamboo stalk?”
Wang Huan carefully felt for it, then hurriedly nodded.
“That means you’ve encountered the bottleneck.”
Feng Xiao gave a slight nod and continued, “At this stage, you either rely on talent and repeat the process over and over, gradually wearing down that bamboo joint, or you use certain miraculous pills and medicines to assist in the breakthrough.”
There were miraculous medicines too?
Hearing that, everyone’s eyes lit up.
Feng Xiao shot them an annoyed glance. “Don’t entertain any fantasies. Even I can’t easily get my hands on those things, much less a bunch of servants like you.”
Then he said to Wang Huan, “You’ve been training for thirty-three days now, though if you subtract the time spent on chores, that should really be cut in half. Even so, your aptitude is still quite good.”
“At your current pace, given another seven or eight days, you may well be able to break through.”
Wang Huan’s eyes shone brightly. On the one hand, he felt his chances were steady. On the other, he was a little unconvinced. “Instructor Feng, does the final step really take that long?”
Feng Xiao smiled. “Long? This is the most critical step. Most people can’t even touch the bottleneck at all. The fact that you already have a chance to break through is fortunate enough, so don’t aim too high.”
“As for the rest of you, don’t be impatient. Just keep tempering yourselves slowly.”
Suddenly, another servant asked, “Instructor Feng, you always say aptitude is important, but how exactly is aptitude classified?”
Feng Xiao gave him a glance and said flatly, “Judging by the time you’ve used so far, those who complete both sensing and tempering Qi and blood within twenty-five days are top-grade. Within thirty-five days counts as upper-middle. Within forty-five days counts as lower-middle.”
With that, he said no more.
Someone’s heart sank, and he hurriedly asked, “Then what about after that?”
“After that?”
Feng Xiao let out a cold laugh. “This final step is no simple matter. The poorer your aptitude, the harder it is to cross. If you’ve spent a great deal of time and still haven’t even seen the bottleneck, what breakthrough is there left to speak of?”
“You’d be better off saving your strength early and doing your work properly once you’re assigned to another courtyard!”
Hearing that, most of the servants who had not even sensed Qi and blood yet wore expressions full of disappointment.
Sure enough, the path of martial training was not an easy one.
Seeing the low spirits in the courtyard, Instructor Feng had not originally intended to say anything. After all, they were only teaching the servants martial arts in order to sift out the hidden gems.
But considering that whether they broke through or not was, in the end, tied to his own performance, he thought it over and still offered a word of comfort.
“All right, there’s no need to be too discouraged. There’s still a fair amount of time left. Train your stance honestly. If you work harder, you still have a chance.”
After saying that, he left the servants to continue training on their own. He called Wang Huan aside, encouraged him a few more times not to slack off, and then strode away.
As soon as Feng Xiao left, the servants present immediately crowded around Wang Huan. Even a few of the maids put on ingratiating expressions, their cheeks flushed and their alluring eyes fixed on him.
This was the one personally acknowledged by Instructor Feng as having the best talent in the entire courtyard.
Xu Yuan watched coldly from the side. Though he did not think much of this behavior, he could understand it.
Some servants and maids who already felt hopeless about their own futures were clearly clutching at straws, hoping to promise him some kind of benefit in exchange for a few pointers.
But Wang Huan was already on the verge of stepping through. Why would he throw away a watermelon just to pick up sesame seeds?
In the end, the hammer has to be hard enough itself.
Xu Yuan drew a deep breath and, together with Li Shan and Sun Rong, continued training.
Stimulated by Wang Huan’s example, both Li Shan and Sun Rong trained as though they had been injected with chicken blood, practicing in silence and refusing to rest even for a moment.
Most of the others were the same, each of them training with all their strength, filling the entire courtyard with an even more anxious atmosphere.
...
[Name: Xu Yuan]
[Skills: Tai Chi Exercise (Minor Mastery 99%) Stone Platform Stance (Beginner 28%)]
[Aptitude: 3 (average talent)]
When the moon shone through a veil of light clouds and silver radiance spilled gently down,
Xu Yuan came to his usual corner and began practicing his Tai Chi Exercise.
In his eyes, the cultivation of the exercises had already clearly reached a bottleneck.
But this simplified version of the exercise, even at the point of breakthrough, was nowhere near as difficult or complicated as the stance training.
Xu Yuan focused with complete concentration. His hands moved like turning discs, relaxing and tightening in rhythm, every motion open and graceful, light and natural.
Hoo!
Suddenly, Xu Yuan’s body trembled slightly.
That familiar warm current surged forth once again, flowing from top to bottom and spreading through all four limbs and every bone in his body, giving him an indescribable sense of comfort and freshness, as though he were being remade from the inside out.