Comparation with Qingyin

Feng Xing wakes up early the next morning. The temperature on top of a peak is always high so he doesn't have any difficulty in waking up at all, the chilling cold is enough. He remembers he still needs to talk to Master Xia today to start cultivate so the moment the slightest hint of sunlight is peeking from the horizon, he is already out the door.

Just like yesterday, it's foggy in the morning but it wasn't as bad as he thought it would be. He walks into the main courtyard while gritting his teeth because of cold, determined to wait outside and see if his stunning master is in the courtyard.

"Master..."

Master Xia is sitting in the courtyard just like yesterday, her skin is moist from morning fog and her eyes bores to the distant horizon without a ripple of emotions. When she heard him calling, she turns her head.

"Who are you?"

Feng Xing stares blankly. "Master, it's me. Did you forget?"

"Who?"

Feng Xing is at a loss how to handle this new problem. Just when he thinks he's basically screwed, someone comes to save him from the kitchen.

"Master, you accepted seventh brother yesterday, that's him." Xuanyuan Yu points.

"Oh. Feng..."

"Xing." Feng Xing supplies.

Xuanyuan Yu puts down a teapot and a teacup to the table in front of Xia Mengzhu, shrugging exasperatedly at Feng Xing as if they'd known each other for a long time. "Master is face blind, so don't take it to heart."

Feng Xing blinks incredulously. "Face blind?" he repeats in disbelief. After seeing his devastatingly beautiful master, Feng Xing couldn't even fathom that his master has any flaw but on the second day here, he's unexpectedly informed of this flaw.

"Yes. Don't worry, she's not completely face blind. Just wait until next year, she'll remember your face by then," Xuanyuan Yu informs cheerfully. "Probably."

Xia Mengzhu takes a quiet sip of her tea and exhales. "What do you need, seventh?" she asks gently. From her experience, with the exception of her eldest disciple, none of her disciple sought for her this early unless they wanted something.

"Master, I want to start to cultivate as soon as possible," Feng Xing says seriously, showing his determination and readiness.

"Junior brother, there are many things to be observed before you start to cultivate," Xuanyuan Yu starts with a serious lecture. "Just the strong desire to cultivate alone is not enough, you need to tamper your temper and be aware of your own limit."

Feng Xing gazes at Xuanyuan Yu anxiously and even he begins to think he is being too impetuous. He hesitantly cupped his hand again to thank the eldest senior brother for his wisdom. "Thank—"

"Sure." Xia Mengzhu puts down her teacup.

Her voice is clear and beautiful like an oriole and even the surrounding is reluctant to let her voice disappear too quickly so, somehow, her voice echoes like a chime of bell.

Sure...sure...

Xuanyuan Yu smiles widely and looks at his master with a 'kind' gaze. Feng Xing purses his lips and lowers his head, pretending to be dumb and avoiding to look at Xuanyuan Yu's fake grin. Feng Xing doesn't know how to react at all but he is sure snickering is out of question.

Xia Mengzhu takes out a booklet. "Here, the most basic about cultivation. This should help you to start gathering qi. Do things step by step. Once you successfully gathered qi, talk to me again."

"Thank you, master!" Feng Xing jumps up, forgetting about Xuanyuan Yu's lecture, and happily grabs the booklet. "Master, do you have any extra instruction?"

"If you don't understand, talk to your senior."

"Yes, master!"

Feng Xing nods and runs off back to his own abode.

Once the excitable youth disappeared from sight, Xuanyuan Yu glanced zealously at the woman he calls master until Xia Mengzhu closes her eyes and furrows her brows.

"He needs to cultivate as soon as possible to be eligible to accompany Qingyin."

Xuanyuan Yu snorts.

.

.

Feng Xing runs all the way back to his abode and shut the door to prevent the cold air outside from making it even colder inside. He opens the booklet and inside is a topic detailing how to introduce qi to body along with the standard Heart Cleansing Mantra to calm the heart and focus the mind.

The first stage of cultivation is Qi Gathering stage. There are nine compulsory levels to this stage, but the booklet detailed there are some people who even got to twelve levels first before perfecting it and could advance to the next stage. There is currently no real proof of advantage and disadvantage of having to cultivate more levels in Qi Gathering stage. Nine levels are the average and basic number to perfect circulation of qi.

To step into Qi Gathering stage, practitioner must introduce qi into his body. Begin by sensing the qi and then lead it into your body, pour it into meridian points and let it flow into sea of qi which is like a storehouse to hold your energy.

The process is hard at the start but instinctive after you start it. This is the basic of basic of cultivation. If practitioner messes it up, then might as well give up.

Feng Xing calms down and put down the booklet while sitting cross-legged. He closes his eyes and starts meditating.

When it comes to introducing qi into the body, one must be in a clear state of mind and in a good environment. Feng Xing is currently on a peak where a Hidden Sect is, naturally he believes the environment is good.

He meditates and tries to feel the presence of qi in the air, sharpening his sense and even imagination as a reincarnator.

After hours of meditating, he still fails to sense any qi. He opens his eyes and frowns thoughtfully and anxiously. He looks out at the small window and he can see the sun is no longer visible in the eastern horizon. So much hours has passed yet he doesn't make any breakthrough.

"Could it be... my talent is that bad?" Feng Xing murmurs to himself, worried.

He picks up the booklet again and reads it. The booklet has a note that it takes three days on average to introduce qi into body and refining it to break into Qi Gathering stage first level. But before that, he should at least be able to sense qi. He couldn't even sense qi, how could he even attempt to refine it?

While Feng Xing is thinking what to do to fix this, a knock sounded from the door. He gets up and opens the door to see Cai Qingxin's beaming face.

"Qingyin, what's wrong?" Feng Xing smiles at the girl.

"Second sister asks me to pass it to you." Cai Qingyin extends her hands and the basket in her grip. "They're all clothes for you! She made them in a day to be a meeting gift."

Feng Xing recalls the reserved beauty in the cave with fluorescent light from yesterday. "She didn't have to," he remarks, flattered as he accepts the basket filled with neatly folded new clothes.

"She wants to. Second sister is the gentlest, she cares a lot for others but she doesn't talk much." Cai Qingyin patted her hands to get rid of imaginary dust. "I also forgot that you might be not used to the temperature here, second sister gave you thicker clothes and I got you some charcoals from the kitchen." She put a dusty pouch by the door.

Feng Xing hastily thanks her, inwardly feeling warm and well-taken care of.

"Are you busy? Have you eaten?" Cai Qingyin blinks inquisitively. "Don't forget to eat, or else you'll get sick. You're also not used with the peak's temperature, if you starve, you'll get sick even easier."

Feng Xing chuckled sheepishly. "I'm reckless, sorry to make you worry."

Feng Xing accepts Cai Qingyin's invitation to eat together and he temporarily puts aside the matter of cultivation. They both sit on the courtyard in their own individual bamboo chair, eating steamed buns.

Feng Xing scans the courtyard and finds they had added one more chair with his arrival, making the chairs scattered around the courtyard to be eight. This makes it very intimate somehow in Feng Xing's eyes. Even though no one else is present in the yard with him and Cai Qingyin, Feng Xing feel their presence just through the empty chairs, always reminding Feng Xing that there are owners to these chairs.

He wonders if that is the reason the chairs are put out exactly the same number of the people within the sect, so it can build an environment where everyone will remember each other. Feng Xing feels like there are many more reasons why it's done like this, but his current level and intelligence have yet matched the wisdom of this arrangement.

"Qingyin, I have a question." He straightens up and pats off the crumbs from the steamed buns he just ate while Cai Qingyin feeds her leftover to the fish on the pond.

The girl turns around curiously. "What is it?"

"How long did you need to introduce qi into your body?"

The girl jumps a little but Feng Xing is too distracted by his own thought that he doesn't notice.

"I've meditated since early this morning but I can't make any progress, so I need a comparison." Master Xia told him to ask any of his senior if he has any question. Cai Qingyin is his senior too, so he finds no problem in asking her at all.

"Um, ah, erm..." Cai Qingyin trails off intellectually. "Comparison is root of envy, why bother asking this?" she remarks loudly, if anyone is to listen closer to her tone, they can easily sense her nervousness. Fortunately, Feng Xing is too focused on her words rather than tone.

Feng Xing smiles warmly. "Qingyin, do you think I will get discouraged if I hear about your achievement?" his eyes soften, touched. "You don't have to worry. I have a strong heart and conviction. I really just need your experience as pure educational landmark. I swear, my dao heart is not so fragile." After all, he needs to uphold the standard of this sect.

"H-how could that be?" Cai Qingyin stammers. "I'm not that impressive, Feng Xing. Don't overestimate me!" she clenches her hands into fists, flushing anxiously.

'So humble...' Feng Xing nods subconsciously in approval. "Please, just tell me," He insists.

Cai Qingyin deeply regrets her decision to linger around after eating with Feng Xing. "It's t-two..." she stammers.

"Two days? That's not so bad." A bit average, but everyone has their own path and pace.

Cai Qingyin looks up in bafflement. "No!"

Feng Xing stiffens. "Two hours?!" he immediately guests.

Cai Qingyin stares at Feng Xing with wide confused eyes. Inwardly, she is at a loss on how Feng Xing arrives into that conclusion. "Th-that's too much of a stretch!"

Feng Xing becomes even more shocked and slaps his forehead. "Two minutes, right! I was rude, senior sister!" he stands up and bows. "I shouldn't have assumed." Spending time with Cai Qingyin made Feng Xing feel she is a peer, after all they are the same age and Feng Xing is even older by a couple month. He forgot Cai Qingyin was previously the youngest junior sister of this hidden sect, her talent couldn't be measured by average.

Seeing Feng Xing nods in determination with whatever he's thinking in his mind, Cai Qingyin feels like they are from two different world. She couldn't understand Feng Xing's train of thoughts at all.

Before she could even attempt to correct Feng Xing's view due to her copious amount of guilt, Feng Xing salutes her first.

"Qingyin, I will go back to meditate again. Thank you for today."

The handsome youth turns and walks away with newfound determination, leaving behind the beautiful young girl alone in the courtyard.

The girl bites her nail and furrows her brows. "It took me two weeks..." she murmurs but her conversational partner is no longer within earshot.

But if she said this to Feng Xing, will he be disappointed by her sect's low standard?

Cai Qingyin had read the basic knowledge about cultivation too and she knows she took too long to be considered average.

She purses her lips in dilemma. She wants Feng Xing to stay, but if he knows that this sect is not even registered and has no weight whatsoever in the outside world, would he be willing to stay?

She recalls what her master told her yesterday.

"Qingyin, whatever your seventh junior say or expect, just nod and try to make it reality for him."

Cai Qingyin sits down on the edge of the koi pond, exasperated. "But how to make things a reality when it's already way in the past and decided?!" she whispers desperately.

A loud splash from the koi pond distracts her and she saw a ripple spreading from the middle of the pond with one of the fish swimming on circle then diving deep back out of sight. A second fish appears and also swims in circle, prolonging the ripple effect on the water.

Cai Qingyin stares in silence, her eyes downcast. "This can't keep on... I must do better." She clenches her hands.