Consolidation

Surprisingly despite all he'd heard about consolidating the foundation after breaking through to the next realm, it didn't take Shen Lei long at all to gain a full grasp on his new abilities.

A single day, well, a day and a half since the sun was already beginning to set and cast a light orange glow over the horizon and he'd started the morning before.

Standing in front of his bed, Shen Lei clenched and unclenched his hands, marvelling at the power he felt within himself, "The differences between myself today and from yesterday are like night and day." he mused.

Not just his inner power, but his physical power as well. While all cultivators grew more powerful physically the higher the realm they reached, those who cultivated the yang attribute where reinforced to further heights by yang qi.

He had found out at the first time he started cultivating, that the attribute he had the most affinity for, was Yang qi and so had focused on that. He trained and cultivated under the sun that provided yang qi every day and through various means gained enough merit points for enough silver to purchase many an enflamed yang stone at the Black Woods Market place, sold by the Blood Gang Sect stalls, one of the three Sects that ruled over this area of the Great Han Dynasty, the other two being Storm Manor Sect and his own High Heaven Pavilion Sect.

Enflamed yang stones were quite costly, costing five hundred silver each. But, with good reason. They were stones filled with yang qi that cultivators could absorb to enhance their own overall yang qi.

He had hoped absorbing so much yang qi would allow him to break through his bottleneck, but alas, no luck. It was not in vain though, because just because he was at a bottleneck and could not reach the next realm through the year, did not mean his power could not grow. And the more his yang qi grew, the more to did his physical prowess.

It was to the point where even other ninth tempered body disciples did not want to fight him unless forced. And it definitely made hunting in the Black Wind Mountains much easier.

Granted, even hunting could not allow him the amount of silver he needed to purchase more than one enflamed yang stone a month. Those of the first realm from his sect were all warned not to go too deep into the mountains for gathering herbs or hunting lest they court death by running into powerful demonic beasts beyond them.

As such, the most he'd come across here and there were the odd demonic spider while hunting normal animals and gathering herbs.

But, he typically purchases around five enflamed yang stones a month. Something he could only do because of the other methods he'd looked into over the past year.

The Heavenly Alchemic Way. The Heavenly Refining Way. The Heavenly Array Way.

While he was only at the very basic levels. Mere Common Low Grade in each, it was enough for him to refine some basic qi returning pills, each of which that was worth fifty silver each, and easy to do with how common the herbs for them were in the Black Wind Mountains.

"Speaking of which, today is the eighth day of the month isn't it?" Shen Lei stopped observing his hands.

The eighth day of each month was the day the amount of merit points each disciple had earned was tallied up and they would be rewarded them at the treasury.

Shen Lei supposed he should head on over there after he informed the elders of his breakthrough to the second realm.

And while he was there, he could ask Treasurer Meng for some advice. The pervy old man was the one who informed him before of enflamed yang stones and lent him books on alchemy, artefact refining and sealing arrays.

The elders of the sect had lost hope for his supposed heaven defying talent after three months of his bottleneck. The only one who even kept him in their eyes was Elder Su, while the others lost interest or focused on others.

Well, he supposed he could not blame them. Unlike the other world he now had memories of growing up in, this world was not kind. Without strength, you were nothing. Civilians for instance were nothing in the eyes cultivators.

For instance, if Shen Lei came across a village with no cultivators guarding it, he could take it over without effort and force every women that resided in the village to be his bed slave, wife and daughter alike and none could stop him.

It was a dog eat dog world as the saying he now knew went. As such; 'I have to be a fucking dragon and devour all the other hungry dogs.' he snorted.

He would repay kindness with kindness, but that did not mean he was a good person. He had looked into many distasteful ways over the past year that he had considered when desperate to break through his bottleneck.

Dual cultivation for instance, the art of cultivating with another during sex, but they were failed arts nowadays, only known for one partner draining the cultivation of another through forcing them to submit.

Many of the talentless resorted to it and raped the helpless.

That was of course his last resort. While appealing to make beautiful women submit to him and increase cultivation at the same time, it was still quite distasteful.

There was another. Cultivating Monster Qi. By taking a monster core and refining it within himself, he could take the creatures abilities into himself and learn them as martial techniques. Those who cultivated monster qi were known for having much stronger bodies and senses than normal cultivators as well. The only problem was, the high risk, low reward factor.

Especially for himself.

There weren't really any particularly powerful monster beasts even within the Black Wind Mountains. And cultivating a monster beast was kind of a permanent thing, especially the first monster and could influence a lot when it came to a cultivators growth. On top of that, if the cultivator could not subdue the beast in the process and make them submit, there was the chance of a rebound and suffering damage to the cultivation meridians.

The best kind of monster to take in was one of the same element as the user. For Shen Lei, that would be one that was attributed to yang qi. The problem was, yang qi was one of the rarest attributes for a monster beast, and there were definitely none native to the Black Wind Mountains, he knew, for he had researched that fact quite vigorously.

After all, if it was simple, he would have done it already. He cast a glance over at the desk at the side of the room, specifically a small wooden chest atop it. Within there were a few monster cores from the few demonic spiders he'd found and killed

"Well whatever." Shen Lei shook his head and got a move on, leaving his dorm room behind, heading towards the Su compound. He was going to inform Elder Su about his breakthrough to the second realm and then visit the treasury.