Chapter 5: Power Leveling Cultivation Begins in the Shadows(Refurbished)
Elias Vance spent his mornings doing two things, with the robotic precision of a well-oiled machine.
First, he drank tea that tasted suspiciously like regret boiled in ditchwater. It was served communal-style in cracked ceramic bowls, a lukewarm, vaguely earthy liquid that somehow managed to be both bland and offensive. He’d tried to analyze its chemical composition, but his internal processor had simply labeled it: "Nutritional Value: Negligible. Flavor Profile: Existential Dread." He drank it anyway, for the sake of appearances.
Second, he stalked people.
Not in the suspicious-loner, trench-coat-wearing way. More like a highly specialized professional botanist observing particularly dim houseplants, or an astrophysicist studying the chaotic, yet strangely predictable, orbits of minor asteroids. From the corner of the outer sect dining hall, tucked away from the boisterous morning chatter, Elias sat cross-legged with his cracked ceramic bowl of spiritual barley and something that might have been meat (he hadn’t risked a full scan, fearing a data corruption event). He watched the crowd with the same intense focus one might reserve for counting solar flares or debugging a critical system error.
And all the while, his divine sense was busy doing what divine sense had never, ever been used for before: stealing cultivation secrets from every so-called genius, every eager, aspiring cultivator around him.
He wasn’t just watching disciples. He was scanning them. He was meticulously mapping the enzyme activation in their blood when they channeled Qi, tracing the micro-fluctuations in their nerve endings as they circulated spiritual energy. He recorded how their unique spiritual roots—the mystical conduits that allowed them to absorb and manipulate Qi—lit up like neon circuits when they showed off for girls, or subtly flared during moments of intense concentration. He was building a database of human bio-spiritual dynamics.
And more importantly? He was cataloging everything. Every subtle resonance, every flicker of energy, every genetic predisposition he could detect.
To the untrained eye, Shen Yuan—the quiet, seemingly unremarkable outer sect orphan, who kept to himself and almost never spoke—was just meditating. Again. In the corner. Still weird. Probably couldn’t even reach Foundation Establishment, everyone whispered.
But under that placid surface, behind the dull gaze of a mediocre disciple? A metaphysical super computer was silently, ruthlessly slicing its way through the sect’s entire genetic and spiritual blueprint.
Three disciples two tables ahead caught his attention. He mentally zoomed in, his divine sense threads expanding like microscopic antennae.
"Hmm," he internally noted. "Subject Alpha has a robust root in the lower lungs—strong fire affinity. Classic. Efficient, but limited."
He shifted his focus. "Subject Beta’s Qi surges strongest through the spine—lightning, or maybe pure instability. Hard to tell without more data. The fluctuations are too wild."