The moon is already up in the sky, illuminating the night's darkness.
In Zhang Clan's village, one can hear the peaceful rustling of the blowing winds when it hits the tree leaves.
In a dimly lit room in the Zhang Clan's academy sat a youth at the age of 15. The room is so dark but the youth never paid attention to it because he seemed to be focusing on one thing.
'Just a little bit more and I will finally be able to break these walls of my soul vessel and I can finally break through to the early stage of Tier 1.' The youth thought while holding a spirit stone and channeling the spirit essence of the spirit stone to his soul vessel.
The walls in the youth's soul vessel are already cracked and are about to fall apart completely but it still tries to put one last attempt.
More and more spiritual essence has been attacking the cracked walls. The spiritual essence keeps on attacking one spot of the wall until soon, the walls can be heard cracking and the youth can see it falling apart.
'Finally, I have succeeded, it took me exactly two weeks to be able to reach this. Without the Wine Caterpillar Spirit then I'm afraid it will take me a long amount of time.' Xi Yun, the youth that is breaking the walls of his soul vessel thought to himself.
'The walls on my soul vessel have changed it looks like the sturdier version of the first one! This just proves that I have already reached the early stage of Tier 1. Spirit Cultivator's tiers start from Tier 1 until Tier 9 which is the highest achievable by humans. These tiers are then divided into four stages, the early, middle, upper, and peak stage.' He thought while examining his soul vessel.
His soul vessel is storing spiritual essence at a slow rate naturally, signifying his fifth-class talent.
'The spiritual essence in my recovery is way too slow, I need to do something to increase my talent or it will be a huge hurdle to me like what happened back then.' He thought to himself and then he lay down on his bed.
'The past few days I have been cultivating nonstop and I haven't gotten proper rest. The instructor is annoying me day by day making it harder for me to rest peacefully but I don't care about it.' He thought while closing his eyes, sleeping to his heart's content.
...
"Xi Yun is the first one to reach the early stage of Tier 1? No! I won't believe it!"
"Yeah, Xi Yun must be showing off. This past few days he has done nothing but slack off so how can he be the first one to reach the early stage of Tier 1?"
"It looks like something have gotten to his brain when he defeated all of us back then, we are weak at first so he dared to bully us but now that we learned how to fight he avoided matches and made so many excuses to escape. There is no way that the first one to break through is a coward right?"
The youth's in the academy's class discussed among themselves while observing Xi Yun in his signature black clothing at the front of the academy head.
"Are you truly sure that you have reached the early stage of Tier 1 student Xi Yun?" The academy head said in disbelief.
Even Xun Peng who has the first-class talent hasn't broken through yet so how can Xi Yun do it?
"Academy head, you don't have to doubt me. Just check my soul vessel and you will be able to tell easily." Xi Yun said to the doubtful elder in front of him.
"Besides, I wouldn't dare to lie in front of the elder of the clan" Xi Yun said with a smile on his face which made the academy head frown.
'You dare not to lie? How can I trust your words when you yourself is a natural liar.' The academy head thought while taking Xi Yun's palm and injecting his spirit essence to him.
Xi Yun felt a foreign spiritual essence invading his body but he didn't resist it. It soon entered his soul vessel before disappearing completely.
'Strange, he really broke through to the early stage of Tier 1 without any help of spirit. This is impossible with his talent, there must be some tricks here. The world is huge so something must have helped him but I need to know what it is first' The academy head thought after inspecting Xi Yun's soul vessel.
Aside from his spiritual essence, there is nothing in there, there isn't any spirit that is in his soul vessel either.
The academy head doubts that Xi Yun has a secret but without any clues, his doubts won't go anywhere.
"Student Xi Yun has indeed broken through the early stage of Tier 1." The academy head said with disbelief in his tone.
"As the first one to break through the early stage of Tier 1, the academy will award you 100 spirit stones to show that we encourage people like you who are very diligent in cultivating," The academy head said but even he himself wanted to swallow what he said, Xi Yun has done nothing but slack off in the academy after all.
Soon the academy head gave him a bag full of spirit stones.
"You will also be allowed to pick your first spirit in the academy's treasury later. Don't try to use many spirits, only use one for now since you still have to familiarize yourself with spirits" The academy head added.
"This is your reward go back to your seat now." The academy head said, still in disbelief.
"What? Xi Yun actually broke through the early stage of Tier 1? "
"You have to be kidding me! There is no way that just happened!"
"The academy head must be wrong! Even Xun Peng hasn't reached the early stage of Tier 1 with his talent so how can it be?"
The youths said in bewilderment that they even gathered the courage to doubt the authenticity of the words of the academy head.
Hearing the disparaging remarks of his student, the academy head stared at each one of them before shouting, "You dare to doubt my words? Do you think I am blind or something?" The academy head shouted overpowering the voices of the youths in the class.
"You think I am a liar? If you think so stand up and I will personally teach you why I am not one." The academy head added in an angry tone which made the students quiet.
"A.. Academy head we don't doubt your words it's just that we are in disbelief due to what we heard. So we asked you pardon us!" One of the youths said.
"Right we are at the wrong academy head! Please punish us however you like!"
"We wouldn't dare to doubt the academy head's words in the future anymore"
Soon the others followed suit as well and during this time, Xi Yun is already back at his seat and he is counting the spirit stones in the bag that the academy head gave to him.
Naturally, the academy head saw it which made his mood even more worse.
'This guy thinks that I will fool him and not give him the right amount just like what I had said.' The academy head thought with a grave expression on his face.
'Just continue today's lesson and be done with it' The academy head thought and continuing for today's lesson whereas Xi Yun has already completely counted the number of spirit stones in the bag.
After counting all the spirit stones, Xi Yun organized them in the bag again and he soon rests again and he fell asleep very quickly.
No one paid attention to his behavior since it already became the norm to them but the students are still in shock so they can't help but take glances at him.
'I am not the first one to break through the early stage of Tier 1? How can this be? With my talent, I should be the first one on everything' One youth thought to himself.
'I have the legendary red grade talent so there is no way for me to lose at all' Xun Peng thought, his confidence took a big drop after his loss to Xi Yun not only in the fight but in cultivation speed as well.
He also notices the glances of his classmates at him, as the person with the legendary red grade talent how can he lose when it came to cultivation speed.
This made his classmates doubt Xun Peng's talent, and whether he is also diligent at cultivating.
After all, with his talent, it is already given that he will be the first one to reach the early stage of Tier 1 but that is not the case at all.
'No way the even with my talent I am still a loser? Am I not gonna change at all?' Xun Peng thought and then he shuddered at the idea of him returning to his pathetic past self.
He already lives in glory now, people are respecting him and thinking of him as the hope of the clan but if he still loses to Xi Yun who only has a fifth class talent then doesn't that makes him the shame of the clan?