Once Li Yun was inside his house, he quickly swept through every part and got a rough idea of his surroundings. The house he was given consisted of a bedroom, a dining room, and a bathroom. Other than the courtyard on the side, there was nothing else.
'Well, it's at least better than the hut I was staying in before,' Li Yun thought as he sat cross-legged in his courtyard.
The courtyard was large—almost the size of a basketball stadium, which was good since it was the only place where disciples trained their techniques in the sect.
'Night is approaching. I'll go to the Martial Library tomorrow,' he thought, seeing the red sky in the distance.
**Knock!**
At that moment, a knock sounded at his courtyard gate.
'Who could it be at this time?'
Li Yun could tell the knock came from the main gate. Getting up, he headed there to open it.
Upon reaching the gate, he opened the door and saw a middle-aged man standing there.
"Outer Disciple Li Yun?" the man asked for confirmation.
Li Yun nodded and showed his badge. The man inspected it for a moment, and upon confirming it was Li Yun, handed him two pouches.
"These are the rewards from the selection assessment," the man said.
Li Yun joyfully took the pouches. After handing them over, the middle-aged man left.
Li Yun closed the door and took the pouches to his bedroom.
'The rewards are here,' he thought, sitting on his bed.
He opened the heavier pouch and saw that it was filled with Qi Gathering Pills. He then opened the other pouch and found two square-shaped pages with a bloody cloud stamp on them, each about the size of his palm.
'These must be used to get techniques from the Martial Library,' Li Yun guessed and stored them in his storage ring.
'Let's cultivate,' he decided.
He walked back to his courtyard and sat cross-legged on the ground. This would be his first time cultivating after breaking through to the 1st level of the Qi Training Realm, and his first official cultivation training.
Taking out a Qi Gathering Pill from the pouch, he swallowed it and began running his Primordial Essence Chaos Codex.
Suddenly, visible mist and fog began to appear around him and slowly entered his body through the pores in his skin. Li Yun absorbed every bit of the fog and mist before opening his eyes in excitement.
"Cultivating with Qi Gathering Pills sure is efficient," he exclaimed.
Qi Gathering Pills were a common human-rank pill used to speed up the gathering of Qi around one's body. They were very effective for people in the Qi Training Realm, where the goal was to increase the amount of Qi inside the body in mist form.
However, these pills lost their effectiveness over time or at higher levels of the Qi Training Realm. The more one used them, the less effective they became. This was a slow process, but noticeable after consuming around 100 pills, at which point their effects diminished, especially if one relied solely on them for cultivation.
But there was a remedy. One had to consolidate their cultivation, take things slowly, and allow the pills to be fully absorbed by doing physical training or other activities. This method prolonged the effectiveness of the pills without causing instability in one's cultivation.
It was a widely known fact in the cultivation world, but many lacked the discipline to follow it since it was a time-consuming process. As a result, people took shortcuts, which led to unstable cultivation and a shaky foundation, limiting their future progress.
'Even though my father and mother aren't with me now, their teachings will always stay with me,' Li Yun thought before taking out another pill and resuming his cultivation.
Once again, mist and fog gathered around him, slowly being absorbed. It was a slow process but steady.
Some time later, he swallowed another pill and continued cultivating.
Hours passed, and the moon hung high in the sky.
All around Li Yun, mist had gathered, and he was bathing in it.
Suddenly, a cracking sound echoed in the courtyard, and all the mist was sucked into his body.
At that moment, Li Yun opened his eyes and exclaimed in joy.
"I broke through to the 2nd level of the Qi Training Realm!"
However, his joy faded when he recalled how he had consumed a hundred Qi Gathering Pills just to break through a minor realm from the 1st level to the 2nd level of the Qi Training Realm.
Even a fool could see that was far too many pills.
Normally, one would need about five Qi Gathering Pills to break through from the 1st to the 2nd level. In some cases, it might take up to ten pills, which was understandable. But needing a hundred pills for such a small breakthrough was unheard of.
Li Yun found the situation baffling. As an alchemist, he knew how these pills worked and how many should be required for a breakthrough, but his situation defied logic.
'There's seriously something wrong with my body. First, almost all of my Qi was sealed, leaving me with only one-tenth of what I had originally. Now, the number of pills I need for a simple breakthrough has increased by ten times what's normal.'
He pondered his situation but couldn't come up with an answer.
'My days in the sect are going to be difficult,' he thought grimly.
Li Yun couldn't help but feel the weight of his situation. The sheer number of pills he'd need just to break through to the higher levels of the Qi Training Realm was daunting.
Worse yet, he didn't possess a bone frame, something that could greatly accelerate cultivation for most disciples. Those with higher quality bone frames could advance with ease, their natural talent pushing them forward.
But for Li Yun, there was no such advantage. He had to rely solely on pills and his cultivation technique. The absence of a bone frame meant his progress would be slower, more arduous, and entirely dependent on external resources. Every step forward in his cultivation would come at a high price, and that realization gnawed at him.