Chapter 205: Life 72, Age 16, Martial Disciple 1
After our first training session ended, I carefully watched everyone as they returned to their houses. Upon returning to mine, I took out my journal and started making a map.
I could only match names to the faces of a few of the forty-odd young men and women, so making a full map of who everyone was and where everyone lived would take a bit of time, but it would be invaluable if I ever wanted to interfere with the affinity testing process.
Once this map was as complete as I could make it, I stood and stretched.
That long training session had reminded me of the horrendous shape my body was in at the start of these timelines. Recently, these problems had been masked by early cultivation and several months of good living, but this time, I was forced into an intense workout without any cultivation base to speak of. After only a few hours, I was severely exhausted and was about ready to collapse.
Long ago, I used a Rank 1 Healing Pill purchased from the System to fix most of my acute health problems. The first time I shifted my permanent reset point, I had locked in the effects of this pill, so I didn’t have to worry about any major health problems. However, I was still suffering from the chronic effects of long-term malnutrition.
Reaching into my storage space, I pulled out a small seed pod and used it to concoct a Rank 0 Nutrition Pill. After taking it, I felt a soothing energy flow throughout my body as small aches and pains were washed away.
With my immediate health concerns taken care of, I turned my attention back to refining.
I didn’t like the idea of destroying my cultivation base every week, so I chose to go ahead and cultivate the terrible Low-Yellow Earth Heart Mantra like I was supposed to. While metal qi was considered ideal for a refiner, I didn’t see any reason why earth qi shouldn’t work just as well. After all, while fire qi tended to work best for alchemy, the other types of qi were still usable, and depending on the toxins present, were sometimes superior. I would just need to do my best to limit the amount of impurities I absorbed from cultivating such an awful technique.
After breaking through to Martial Disciple 2 by opening an acupoint in my right fist, I returned to my refining practice.