Chapter 4: Systematic Ascendance (Refurbished)
Elias Vance woke with the morning mist, not because an alarm clock blared, but because his body simply decided it was time. After a perfect six hours of sleep, his internal Qi energy hit its morning peak, and his eyes snapped open, sharp and ready.
He was alone in his small, dusty meditation room. Good. He liked the quiet. While other young disciples in the nearby dorms were just groaning and stretching under their rough blankets, Elias was already running a quick check of himself.
Heartbeat: Perfect.
Qi energy: Full, 91% capacity.
Mind-scan power: Super clear, no static.
Memory bank: Loaded with thousands of books, all neatly filed away.
He got dressed quickly in his plain, grey robes. They felt rough, a reminder that he was just a low-ranking disciple here. But he didn’t care about rank. He only cared about data. He slipped out of his room while most people were still asleep, heading straight for the sect library.
He wasn’t going there to borrow books or read.
He was going to copy them.
Elias didn’t need paper, ink, or brushes. He had his special mind-scan power (what they called ’divine sense’ here, but way better). And his brain now worked like a super-fast computer hard drive. Every tiny brain cell could grab and store information – a word, a picture, a sound – like a tiny switch turning on or off.
One quick look. One mental scan. One moment of powerful focus.
And boom. Everything was stored. Thousands of old scrolls. Hundreds of jade slips (like stone tablets with ancient writings). Dozens of rare, forgotten cultivation books.