10 years later
"Hah…*Thump* Hah…*Thump* Hah…*Thump* Hah…*Thump* Hah…*Thump*"
The sounds of shouting and a fist hitting a tree rhythmically sound in the corner of the training field.
A teenager looking to be in his mid-teens is standing in front of a thick ironwood tree in loose pants and punching it in a steady pattern; one fist after the other.
The teenager is of average height with long black hair and incandescent black eyes.
His physique, shown to the max due to his lack of a shirt, is slim but powerful.
His body looks like it could be anything he needed it to be; if he needed strength, he has strength; if he needed speed, he has speed.
However, what was strange with the teenager was the complete lack of energy fluctuations.
While this would normally be expected in such a rural area of the world, every other person training in the field had a fluctuation of qi with every action during their training.
Especially considering the fact that the rural area was the home of the Fan Clan, a clan of martial artists.
The boy was named Fan Zhi, a 15-year-old boy who couldn't cultivate.
Or at least, that was what all the people of the clan said. The only ones who said such things where those who didn't know the truth.
The number of people that knew the truth amounted to a meagre 3; the boy's father, mother and his grandfather who was the clan ruler.
Not even the boy's own siblings knew that he was only temporarily crippled.
Over the past 10 years, Fan Zhi has incessantly trained his body; the constant bullying of the fact he cannot absorb natural qi to refine his body and cultivate serving as an effective incentive.
While he was training intensely, the other people in the training field are happily laughing as they casually trained.
They didn't need to work hard to train their bodies, they relied on the natural qi they absorbed to refine their bodies.
"Hahaha! Hey, brother Fan Zhi, why don't you spar with us? Don't worry, we will go easy on you!"
A teenager at the age of 13 called out to Fan Zhi, mocking him blatantly.
Despite the patriarch's insistence on the importance of treating everyone equally, the youngest generation of the clan had never paid heed to his words and constantly mocked Fan Zhi.
The target of the mocking, Fan Zhi, doesn't even smile as he continues to train.
The boy, getting annoyed at the lack of a response, tries to provoke Fan Zhi to fight as almost half of the other people training on the field join in.
This continues for hours on end, Fan Zhi not even noticing what the people are saying.
To Fan Zhi, he was lost in watching his soul form as he trained; the mystical process surrounding his soul mesmerising him completely.
This was a strange ability that he had gained when his body was recreated, the ability to observe any part of his body, energy systems or soul at whim.
The mystical energy that surrounded his soul had 8 clear attributes, the same 8 attributes that his soul had faint traces of since birth.
Everyone was born with different various degrees of affinity due to various aspects.
Some had an innate affinity to a particular attribute due to their bloodlines; others had affinities to particular attributes due to their parents and birth conditions.
These affinities didn't provide much in the way of strength, mainly enhancing the qi absorption of the attributed-qi of the cultivator.
Depending on the type of affinity, affinities also helped in other ways. Bloodline and physique affinities made the body more resistant to particular attributes.
People could even be born with unique bodies, bloodlines and even some rare genius' were born with an innate soul affinity!
It was even possible for a person to be born with a unique energy system!
If the cultivator had a unique energy system, then they had an easier time refining absorbed qi and controlling the internal flow of it. The rarest and strongest form of affinity is the innate soul affinity.
This affinity is incredibly rare and while it doesn't help in the early realms on, legends within the Fan Clan's ancient books say that this affinity was easily the best one to have once a certain cultivation level was reached.
Fan Zhi knew that the biggest reason that he could receive the inheritance he did was due to the incredibly strong innate soul affinity to the same Dao as the Pearl's creator.
Lost in thought, Fan Zhi was carefully watching the engraving process.
He was hoping to glean some benefits from observing the weird energy that surrounded his soul. The Pearl had long since disappeared from his soul.
The lone wanderer said that he suspected that it was made of the essence of someone who had once had the Divine Elemental Body, the Sacred body that Fan Zhi now owned.
While Fan Zhi was lost in his own body and soul space, the young martial artists around him had encircled him.
Watching him train with mock interest and clear disdain; the group continued to insult Fan Zhi both directly and indirectly as they watched him train.
Despite their desires to hit Fan Zhi for no reason other than that he was weaker than them, the young clan members restrained their urge to do so.
Fan Heng was in charge of overseeing the training of the young clan members and would prevent any violence against unwilling members of the clan.
Despite being the father of Fan Zhi, Fan Heng was perfectly fine with the clan younger generation he was watching over to verbally abuse Fan Zhi.
After all, he knew very well that Fan Zhi was entirely focused on training while the rest of his mind observed his soul so he had no awareness of anything outside of those two things.
Eventually, the young martial artists got bored and went back to conversing amongst each other. Fan Heng, after waiting a few minutes, went over to reprimand the youngsters.
"Hey, you should be cultivating or training. This clan doesn't give you cultivation resources to sit around and discuss the Dao of Conversation does it?! Look at Fan Zhi over there! He is the weakest of all of you, yet he is the most diligent."
One of the youngsters with a confident swagger replied loudly and proudly to Fan Heng.
"Yes that is true, but unlike him, we are not crippled. We don't need to constantly train, we only need to cultivate for 3 hours each night and physically train for 3 hours each day. That is the minimum of the clan for our age group and I have done so already. Does it matter if we do as we like afterwards?"
Fan Heng's expression turned to one of weariness.
Looking weary and irritated, he replies casually.
"It does not matter, does it? Well, what if you guys lose against the younger generation of Fierce Tiger Tribe or the Gale Hawk Village? If I am honest, I would much rather have a so-called cripple like my son than to take the three most talented of you. If I did pick my son, at least I know that if he became able to cultivate then he can far surpass you lot simply because his diligence is enough to make all of you combined eat his dust."
Upon saying so, Fan Heng then resolutely left the group and sat down to cultivate.
The group of youngsters, talking amongst themselves, returns to the training field and begins to train again with only a little effort.
Suddenly, Fan Zhi, the one often called 'Fanatical Cripple' stops his training in the middle of doing so for the first time.
The youngsters immediately attack this point and yell at Fan Heng to reprimand Fan Zhi for his slacking.
Fan Heng, realising that something is up, walks up to Fan Zhi.
Being looked at intently with an unspoken question, Fan Zhi turns around and says three words that fill Fan Heng with incomparable excitement before walking away quickly.
"A decades passed."
As he walks away, the youngsters all begin to chase after him and call for him to get back to training. Fan Heng stops them with his arms, facing them and speaking.
"It is fine; he has my permission to leave. He needs to inform the ruler of his ability to now cultivate. I expect that this will cause great waves and tribulations for our Fan Clan. The people that knew of his circumstances have known this day would come for many years. Either way, to face the coming days we will need strength and unity. SO WHY THE FUCK ARE YOU STANDING THERE COMPLAINING ABOUT A KID AND NOT TRAINING!!!"
After shouting out his decade of pent-up annoyance, Fan Heng felt strangely relieved.
He walked back to his usual spot and sat down.
As he closed his eyes, Fan Heng worried for the future.
After all, it didn't matter how great a person's talent was if they were dead, and genius' were known to perish on the path to power.