Bottleneck

After being scolded by Antonietta, Guihu Luixing and the headmaster ate their dinner in silence.

Soon they were done and moved somewhere else, where they could talk, while Antonietta would clean the table and wash the dishes.

They went to the headmaster's home office. There, they each took a seat, then resumed the conversation.

"Father, why did mother react like that during dinner? While I agree the dinner table is hardly the place to discuss about tombs, I think her reaction was exaggerated."

The headmaster only sighed and explained "Your mother has some bad memories related to tombs. When she was younger, she lost quite a few family members in a trap disguised as a Tomb. If you want to know more you can ask her, it's not up for me to tell. Just know it's a delicate topic for your mom."

Guihu Luixing nodded.

"Back to the topic." said the headmaster "Tombs usually are discovered when either the mechanism that kept it hidden malfunctioned due the passage of time, or it deliberately showed itself, usually many, many years later the expert passed away."

"Why would they hide their tombs for so long if they want someone to find it?" asked Guihu Luixing.

"Mainly for three reasons." his father said while lifting three fingers. "First, in order to avoid their enemies from getting their secrets. Every expert has enemies, and nobody eants their enemies to ransack their tombs and profit from their deaths."

It was an easy to understand reason.

"Second," he continued "To protect their inheritors. If soon after a expert dies, a young kid shows up using the techniques everyone had seen the expert using, they can obviously make the connection. The inheritor would be quickly captured by the expert's enemies, and the scenario they wanted to avoid in the first reason happens."

It made sense.

"Lastly, because most experts don't want to give up in life. In many cases, the tomb is where they did their do-or-die breakthrough. If they didn't manage to breakthrough they would die, if they did, they would live. So the tomb is a backup in case they fail." concluded the headmaster.

"I see." the boy nodded "And I assume trap tombs also do that because they want to mimic tombs to the best of their abilities, untill it's too late."

"That's right. But Trap Tombs aren't so easy to execute. Tombs usually becomes rich in resources over time and might hold ancient secrets of great experts, after all. Every time one shows up, the surrounding organizations usually send teams to investigate it. The people mobilised depends on the report of these specialised teams. If they think it might be a trap, we just send people tp crush the place, otherwise we send our disciples. Tombs are a great place to train after all."

After that they talked fpr some more time before the headmaster sent Guihu Luixing to bed, it was getting late

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The next morning.

The usual routine repeated itself. Dark Moon arrived just after the first morning bell rang.

This time, however her fur was a bit dirty, which was unusual, as Dark Moon cared a lot about her appearance.

He wouldn't ask though. He knew she was working hard recently, so he wouldn't intrude her privacy. If she wanted him to know, she would tell him.

Guihu Luixing went to his cultivation mat and sat in the lotus position, as usual. When he did so, both Dark Moon and Serana went to their "positions" in order to hear the chant.

One could say they were waiting for this moment since last day.

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After a few hours, Guihu Luixing was reaching the end of his endurance. The pain was very real and he was frowning very hard.

The pain wasn't the only cause for his frown, however. Guihu Luixing also noticed that while he was still improving, his rate of improvement greatly fell.

He felt as if he was reaching a limit that he had inside himself and was not able to surpass it no matter how he tried. It wasn't as if he was close to a breakthrough thought, he could feel he was still far from reaching that point. That made him even more confused.

Suddenly he felt this situation was familiar. Searching his memories, he found why. When he had just broken through to Qi Interaction Realm, he also felt his progress slow down. It seemed he had reached a bottleneck!

Guihu Luixing had a complicated expression on his face. He started cultivating for less than a month, and he already was on his second bottleneck.

*Toc toc toc*

His musings were interrupted by a soft knock in the door.

"Sweetie, are you busy?" asked Antonietta with a soft voice.

"No, mother. Come in." he answered.

Antonietta just opened the door a bit and inserted her head through the gap.

"A classmate of yours is outside. He wants to talk to you." she said before leaving.

'A classmate? That must be Hector. I didn't really interact with anyone else.' Guihu Luixing suddenly realised he might have no friends.

Now a bit sad, he went to the front door, leaving Dark Moon and Serana, who were still meditating, behind.

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On the front door, Hector was uncharacteristically behaving meekly.

"Hector, why are you here?" asked Guihu Luixing.

"Ahhh, Brother Guihu!" said Hector " I cam- Ahem. The pur-purpose of my visit today is to invite you to be my sparring partner once again."

"Huh?" Guihu Luixing was caught by surprise. He had never seen Hector acting so timid and polite. "Did something happen? Why are you talking like this?"

Hector became even more stiff with anxiety. "I-I mean, this is the headmaster's house, you know! The man who runs the sect in the sectmaster's place!"

Guihu Luixing rolled his eyes "I know, I live here."

"To you, it might just be your old man, but to everyone else, he the headmaster, you know?! THE bigshot in the sect!" exclaimed the taller kid.

"Whatever. You came for a spar right?" asked Guihu Luixing "I successfully broke through to the Qi Gathering Realm. Have you broken through? If you're still at the Qi Interaction Realm I wont spar against you."

"Hehe!" Hector let ou a cheeky laugh "I broke through yesterday, without many complications! After a night's rest, I am back to my peak state. Even better, in fact!"

Guihu Luixing didn't really expect to Hector have managed to catch up with him. If that was true, than he had no reason to refuse the offer. It might be just what he needed in order to loosen the bottleneck.

"Okay." nodded Guihu Luixing "There's a training field nearby. Let's go there."

The two then left, going towards the nearby training field.

Meanwhile, on the front window of the headmaster's house, Antonietta was watching the interaction between Hector and Guihu Luixing.

She was moved by what she saw. "My baby has friends! He won't spend all his life alone!"

Being his mother, Antonietta naturally knew Guihu Luixing's naturally cold and distant personality towards strangers. As a mom, she obviously worried that her child won't fit in.

The Ghost Fox Valley Sect is known for having many members with weird behaviour or low social skills. Guihu Luixing was a natural genius, a condition that naturally causes envy on others, and his personality also didn't help much.