"Now that I have displayed the technique, it's time for you to give it a try." Edward nodded, "Second young master, I'll help you first." Edward then looked to Kaden, "First young master, you should just try to through the forms yourself first. I'll be over in a bit."
Edward clearly wasn't very satisfied with Kaden's behavior today. But Kaden didn't really mind, he wasn't that interested in learning the technique anyway. After all, he had the system's supreme technique now. Still, he would learn the Gold Piercing Fist anyway. It was important to keep up appearances.
As Kaden began to go through the forms, he quickly got a knack for it. The technique put a lot of focus on strength, which meant there was a quite a force behind his attacks.
"Great second young master, very well done. First young master you could learn something from your younger brother, see how—" But Edward's sentence trailed off there. Having turned around, Edward was now staring wide-eyed at Kaden performing the technique. The words that he had wanted to say got stuck in his throat and wouldn't come out.
"In— Incredible!" Edward stammered, "Mastering the technique in mere minutes. I— I've never seen anything like it."
A condescending sneer appeared on Kaden's lips, a both humorous and frightening expression on a four year old.
"That's amazing brother." Zandr was a beam of joy and ran over to his brother, smiling at him like his biggest fan. Much more akin to how the average four year old would act.
"Right." Edward coughed to bring them back on track, "Now that you have both learned the technique to some extent, it's time I teach you how to cultivate."
"Cultivation is important as it forms the very foundation of our strength in the Body Tempering Stage. Using the world's spirit energy, we can guide it into our bodies and use it to nourish our muscles, bones and organs. Of course there are various other methods of strengthening the body, but cultivation is a necessity for everyone. These other methods can only aid and not replace cultivation." Edward said as he sat down and crossed his legs.
In the Body Tempering Stage the focus is on tempering the body and strengthening it before the following stages. After progressing past the Body Tempering Stage, one can no longer rely on cultivation to increase one's physical strength.
"Both of you, sit down and cross your legs like mine." Edward gestured to his legs, "The first step is looking outward and sensing the spirit energy. The energy is all around us, in the air we breathe, the things we touch, it's even flowing through our body."
He then looked each of them in the eye and nodded satisfied, "Close your eyes and breathe deeply. Move your presence outside your body and try to feel the energy. Don't expect to succeed right away. Both of you have good talent but it can still take hours."
Kaden closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Moving his focus outside of his body he tried to sense the energy, but it felt like there was nothing but air around him.
"System will now activate the assist-mode to help host sense spirit energy." The system suddenly said.
"What?" Kaden couldn't hide his surprise, but before he could continue a faint energy started to permeate his surroundings. The feeling was quickly growing stronger, soon it felt like an entire ocean filled the space that was completely empty before.
He had a vague feeling that he could control the energy if he so wished, with nothing more than a thought required. Willing it, a vortex shaped spiral took form in Kaden's mind and he began to draw the energy towards him. The energy soon entered his body and moved around according to his will. Even as he stopped thinking about it the vortex remained, continuously drawing energy inside of his body to nourish it.
At the same time, Edward was observing Kaden with a baffled look, thinking to himself, "This boy, he truly has remarkable talent. It is a pity he's not the first miss' son. What a shame… For the family's sake I must put more effort into guiding the second young master in the future. With the family's full nurturing, hopefully he will be close to the first young master in terms of prowess."
It took an hour for Zandr to sense the energy but Edward was still satisfied. Not everyone could be an extreme prodigy like Kaden.
"Good, now as I'm sure you both have noticed, cultivation is not an active process. The spiral each of you have formed will continue to draw in the energy as you eat, sleep and move about during the day. It will continue to do so as long as you remain in the Body Tempering Stage. If it ever stops drawing in energy, it will be a sign that you have stepped into the Elemental Stage. At that point it will no longer be as easy to increase your strength." While saying these words, Edward made eye contact with Kaden.
…
After returning to his room, Kaden sat down on his bed. Holding his hands out in front of him, he felt an inexplicable strength surging through him. Something he was sure he had never felt before. It was a very alluring feeling.
Having been lost in this feeling for a while, he suddenly remembered something.
"System, weren't you going to teach me that Five Flowing Arms?" Kaden said.
"I can only provide the details of the technique, host will have to practice and learn it yourself." The robotic voice said and a stream of information entered Kaden's mind.
Nodding, Kaden sorted through the information and got up from his bed. He had a little time now before dinner. There was no way he could train this foreign technique in the practice room, so he just stayed in his bedroom.
He practiced according to the details and images the system had sent to his brain. But even though he knew what to do, he wasn't having much success. This continued and after two hours he'd made a little progress, but he still a far cry from being able to use the technique, let alone mastering it. He knew it was going to be a lot harder than learning the Gold Piercing Fist.
His training time was cut short by a knock on the door and an innocent girlish voice calling from the other side, "First young master, dinner is ready."
"Understood, I'm coming." Kaden called back, walked towards his bedroom door and opened it.
A dark haired teenage girl was standing on the other side, dressed like a servant in the family's trademark blue color. Seeing Kaden she smiled and offered her hand.
With a frown Kaden stared back at her and then her outstretched hand. With a scoff he turned on his heels and left her standing there as he walked towards the dining hall.
The young girl was clearly quite flustered, almost forgetting her job as she watched Kaden walk off.
"Ahh! First young master wait for me!" She yelled and hurried to follow behind.