It had been seven weeks since Xiao Yun found himself in this bizarre world. He finally had a goal and for the past two of those weeks he had been relentlessly pursuing that goal. From the perspective of Xiao Clan members and servants alike however, a peculiar sort of activity had taken root. For two weeks straight, the clan’s most infamous member had been seen entering the long-neglected library pagoda at sunrise and emerging only when the purple-colored moon hung high and cold in the sky.
This was a phenomenon so bizarre it had become the primary source of gossip among the few remaining clan servants.
“Did you see him today?” whispered a young maid named Chunhua to the old groundskeeper, Uncle Wei, as they swept fallen leaves near the pagoda’s entrance. “His eyes have dark circles, and he smells of old bamboo and ink, not… well, not of cheap perfume and wine.”
Uncle Wei grunted, his stooped back aching with the rhythm of his work. “The sun rises in the west, and Young Master Yun seeks knowledge. Mark my words, the world must be ending. Seven years, Chunhua. Seven years he’s been a stain on the Xiao name, stuck in the third circle of Qi Gathering realm like a fly in amber. Now he reads? He’s probably in there looking for illustrated scrolls of a different kind, if you catch my meaning.”
Chunhua giggled, but her eyes held a flicker of something else. Pity, perhaps. The old Xiao Yun was a disaster, a walking cautionary tale. But this new version was quiet, withdrawn and had a look in his eyes that was less lecherous and more focused…and haunted.
The younger clan members reacted with a mixture of suspicion and schadenfreude. Xiao Chen, who had long envied his cousin’s title of ‘Young Master’ (and the monthly allowance that came with it), muttered to his friends that this was obviously some scheme: “Mark my words, he’s only pretending so the elders stop scolding him. Then he’ll go back to buying wine by the barrel soon enough. You can’t turn a wolf from its nature.” He scoffed contemptuously.
“Did you hear?” one disciple whispered between spear drills. “Young Master Xiao Yun hasn’t been drunk in nearly two weeks. The heavens must be preparing for a rain of swords.” Which elicited some laughter from nearby disciples. Xiao Yun had been spending his time inside his room for a month after he’d transmigrated; he hadn’t drunk any alcohol then. People didn’t see him around and they assumed that he was being a degenerate somewhere, but for the past two weeks his visits to the Library Pagoda had been a more obvious occurrence which drew their attention.
…Inside the pagoda, the subject of their gossip was oblivious. Jack or Xiao Yun, as he now had to force himself to think, ran a grimy finger down a line of text on a brittle scroll.
To any other cultivator this place was a testament to failure. To Jack, the former office drone from a world of spreadsheets and quarterly reports, it was a goldmine. It was data. And data he knew was power when properly utilized.
For the first four days he ignored the cultivation manuals entirely. That was like a middle schooler trying to read advanced quantum physics. Instead, he devoured the basics. He read The Geography of the True Yang Prefecture, A Chronicle of the Noble Clans, and An Unofficial History of the Five Great Sects. He learned about Fallen Star City’s strategic importance, its proximity to the Black Bamboo Pass, a known haven for bandits, vagrant cultivators and demonic beasts. He learned of his own Xiao Clan’s slow decline after his great-great-grandfather, an early-stage Nascent Soul Realm expert, had perished in a border skirmish almost a century ago, or that’s what the records showed anyway.
Xiao Yun’s methodical, office drone/fantasy nerd mind began to construct a framework, a mental map of his reality. He cross-referenced texts, identifying inconsistencies, rumors and hard facts. He was building a threat assessment report in his head. While looking through the records, he learned that Xiao clan used to have six shops selling various pills, artefacts, spiritual herbs and other cultivation related items around the Fallen Star City, now their only remaining shop wasn’t doing very well. Its meager income was barely enough to sustain the cultivation of the clan’s younger generation and day-to-day expenses.
On the fifth day, he turned to the cultivation texts. He wasn’t looking for a heaven-defying technique. He was looking for a diagnosis. Why was Xiao Yun, heir of a once-great clan, so pathetic? Laziness and indulgence couldn’t be the whole story. It felt too simple.
He poured over esoteric manuals on meridians, Qi flow and body constitutions. The language was archaic and filled with metaphors of rivers, stars and dragons, but Jack’s analytical mind cut through the poetry. He compared the descriptions to his own experiences when he tried to cultivate. The manuals spoke of Qi gathering like a whirlpool, a powerful vortex in the dantian. For him it was more like a leaky drain. He could draw Qi in with some difficulty, but it would dissipate, leaving behind a frustratingly small residue.
It was on the evening of the Fourteenth Day, his eyes burning from the strain, that he found it. Tucked away in a rotting chest in the pagoda’s highest, most neglected level, was a thin volume bound in what looked like preserved animal hide. Its title was simple: Anomalous Meridians and Obscure Constitutions.
It was a medical text, not a cultivation manual, written by a reclusive physician from centuries past. Most cultivators would have dismissed it as useless theory. Jack read it with the focus of a man defusing a bomb.
And there on a page yellowed with age towards the end of the book, he saw it. A description of a rare condition the author called the "Misty Veil Constitution."
‘The subject possesses meridians that are preternaturally porous. While their capacity to draw in worldly Qi is average, the Qi itself lacks cohesion. It dissipates like morning mist under the sun before it can be properly refined and stored in the dantian. Sufferers often feel perpetually lethargic, their progress stalling in the early to middle stages of the Qi Gathering realm. This condition is often exacerbated by excessive indulgence in wine and carnal pleasures, which further agitate the Qi and widen the ‘pores’ of the meridians.’
This must have been it. It wasn't just laziness or debauchery. The original Xiao Yun had been born with a handicap, a fundamental flaw in his spiritual meridians. The wastrel lifestyle had likely been a consequence of his inability, a way to cope with the despair of being unable to advance no matter how hard he tried in his youth. Which only helped to worsen his situation.
Hoping to find a solution, he read on. Unfortunately, the text didn’t offer a concrete solution like a specific treasured herb or a rare pill he needed to consume. It mentioned an obscure cultivation technique that could solve his problem and possibly let him cultivate normally, but to his great frustration, the name of the text was not mentioned. The medical record simply moved on to other obscure constitutions.
Xiao Yun let out a deep breath. “Well, it’s not like I expected to find a solution this easily.”
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He kept on reading. As he gathered more information from various books, the overall picture became a bit clearer. Xiao clan was once amongst the top cultivation clans, having his great-great-grandfather, an early-stage Nascent Soul Realm expert, who was capable of levelling a small mountain with a single move. To put it into perspective, the current city lord of the Fallen Star City, Feng Xianxu was a middle stage Nascent Soul Realm expert, who was the uncontested overlord of the area and only answered to the Great Ming Imperial Family. Even the Elders of the five great sects had to show a degree of respect to him, and the Xiao clan once possessed a figure nearly as illustrious as Feng Xianxu, but now they had been reduced to such a pathetic state.
The current strongest person within the clan was the first elder, Elder Xiao Chong, who was in the early Golden Core realm. It wouldn’t have been too bad, considering the other noble families within the city had early to middle Golden Core stage masters as their heavy hitters, however, elder Xiao Chong had barely made it into the Golden Core stage with the help of various pills and treasures. He had almost failed to breakthrough due to an old internal injury and barely managed to withstand the lighting tribulation.
Compared to those of similar cultivation stage, his power was pathetically low, he was barely holding the Xiao clan together, if not for him the other clans might have already torn the Xiao clan apart and picked the flesh off the carcass. But his strength clearly wasn’t enough, as the Xiao family kept losing their assets one by one to the other clans, reducing them to barely holding onto a single small pill shop that made just enough profit to feed everyone. Their burdens didn’t end there, as according to the old ledgers, the clan owed a large sum of money to countless people.
Around half of their debt was owed to a powerful merchant union, the Emerald Moon Pavilion. Most of the remaining debt was shared between the Hu and the Ling clans, rival noble clans who had been using the debt as leverage to slowly take away Xiao clan’s assets and their sources of income, like their shops within the merchant district and an old spirit stone mine outside the City.
Now the clan was barely able to sustain its existence with profits from their last remaining shop, which sold low quality spiritual pills and herbs.
‘The situation is grim indeed.’ Thought Xiao Yun. ‘If I know anything about these cliché “power is everything” settings, some arrogant dipshit with more power than sense might get offended at a random thing and drag the Xiao family to its final doom. Or some scheming rival house or someone with a century old grudge might decide to bury the Xiao Clan for good.’
For a brief moment, Xiao Yun considered just abandoning the clan and going off by himself to start over. Away from all the drama and old enmities and debts. But he put that thought aside. He recently had an encounter with a demonic cultivator, it was also likely that he had tipped her off. Although the current Xiao Clan was shadow of it’s former self, it still provided a degree of protection. At least the clan had guards and it’s five foundation building stage elders to ensure some safety, not to mention the First Elder. Who knew what kind of dangers awaited a cripple like Xiao Yun. He wasn’t some lucky son of heaven who would not only survive falling off a cliff but also find a powerful treasure at the bottom of the said cliff. He had to use his brains if he was going to survive. Since he couldn’t increase his own strength, he had to resort to other methods.
If you can't increase your own metrics, a voice in his head, sounding suspiciously like his old boss, preached, you increase the metrics of your team. You become a force multiplier.
He couldn't be the sword, but perhaps he could be the ultimate whetstone. He couldn't be the warrior, but he could be the strategist, the master tactician who moved the pieces on the board. His own crippled meridians were a fixed variable, an unchangeable reality for the time being. But the strength of those around him? That was a variable he could manipulate. Not like he had much else to do here.
But how? He couldn't just walk out and declare his intentions. "Hello, everyone, the resident degenerate is now a master strategist! Please line up for your power-ups!" He'd be laughed out of the estate.
He needed a candidate. Someone loyal, overlooked, and with untapped potential. Someone whose success would be so unexpected that it would be attributed to a miracle, not to him. He needed leverage, a proof of concept.
His mind began sorting through the personnel files of his memory. The clan elders? Too old fashioned and set in their ways. The main branch disciples? Too much scrutiny, too much pride. He needed someone from the fringes, someone desperate enough to listen to the clan's official failure.
His thoughts snagged on a name. Xiao Lian. A distant relative from a branch family, who once held immense potential and the hopes of the Xiao family’s younger generation. She was now in her mid-thirties and still stuck in the ninth circle of the Qi gathering stage. Although her current strength was nothing to scoff at when compared to ordinary people, her peers from other noble families had already broken into the Foundation Establishment stage more than half a decade ago. She had once been the blazing sun of the Xiao family’s younger generation. A prodigy who reached the ninth circle of Qi Gathering at mere twenty years of age, comparable to the top disciples of five major sects. The clan had pinned all their hopes on her, even bankrupting a portion of their treasury to acquire a Foundation Building Pill for her breakthrough. But to their disappointment, Xiao Lian had encountered a heart demon during her break through, causing her to fail not only in establishing her foundation, but also receiving internal injuries, making her strength fall back to the eight circle Qi Gathering realm.
For context, Qi Gathering or Qi Condensation realm had nine stages. From Foundation Establishment realm onward, each realm was divided into early, middle and late stages. Xiao Lian was stuck at the peak of Qi Condensation realm, forever separating her from stepping onto the true path of immortality. Qi Condensation realm cultivators were basically enhanced mortals, they could imbue their blows with their Qi the amplify their power many times and they could use basic spells and talismans. They were even strong enough to break ordinary iron weapons with their bare hands, but that meant little in front of a Foundation Establishment Realm cultivator. After one reached Foundation Establishment they would be able to make full use of spiritual weapons, which were made with special materials and had unique properties. They gained an ability similar to telekinesis, called the spiritual sense. They could use their spiritual sense to control artifacts and spiritual weapons to fly and do many more things.
Doing things like “Taking someone’s head from a thousand li away” actually became possible for them, though the saying exaggerated the distance quite a bit. Additionally, they could wrap their body in Qi using their spiritual sense as a control mechanism. Somone at the peak of Qi Condensation Stage can pick up a very fine ordinary iron sword and keep hacking at someone at the Foundation Building stage while they stood still, and the only thing they would accomplish would be to mildly inconvenience that person, like a fly trying to take down a rhino. Such was the uncrossable chasm between major cultivation realms.
Her failure breakthrough had shattered more than Xiao Lian’s spirit; it had broken the clan's faith in her. She became a ghost, a pariah. The hope of a generation was now a thirty-something woman stuck at the peak of the mortal coil, forever denied entry into the true world of cultivators. Xiao Yun remembered seeing her a few times, and he got a beating by managing to annoy her with his idiocy almost every time. A severe woman with a presence as sharp as a blade and a vertical scar that cut from her eyebrow to her cheek, a memento from a reckless beast hunt. She was fierce, proud and utterly alone.
Perfect. An undervalued asset with immense, untapped potential and he had some ideas as to how he might be able to help her.
Ever since Xiao Yun had heard of the term “Heart Demon” from cultivation novels back on earth, he had his own theories about the true nature of that particular obstacle, but since cultivation didn’t actually exist on earth, he couldn’t confirm that theory. But here, he had the chance and if his theory was true it could help him solve a couple of problems.
He spent three additional days in the library looking for any mention of heart demons and cross-referencing the past of those cultivators who encountered them during their breakthroughs. The descriptions were vague, dates wrong and the information incomplete, but he had a better understanding of the subject, which helped improve his reasoning. It was time to look for the test subject.
