Xuan stirred from sleep as a firm knock echoed through the room. Blinking groggily, he sat up, rubbing his eyes as the door creaked open to reveal Master Shen's tall silhouette.
"Get up," Shen said, his tone softer than usual. "Your family is here."
The words hit Xuan like a bolt of lightning. For a moment, he froze, staring at Shen as though the man had spoken in another language. Then, the realization sank in.
"My family?" he asked, his voice barely above a whisper.
Shen nodded. "They're waiting outside."
Without another word Xuan bolted from the bed, his exhaustion forgotten as he rushed past Master Shen and into the cool night air. The garden was awash in silver moonlight, and there, standing in the middle of the path, was Mei.
"Mei!" Xuan called out, his heart leaping. He took a step forward, but froze as the moonlight revealed her face.
Her lower jaw was missing, and the side of her head was gone, as if something had taken a monstrous bite out of it. Her lifeless eyes turned to him, and she began to shamble forward, blood dripping from her open wounds.
"No… no!" Xuan stumbled back, his legs trembling. But then, as if sheer willpower forced his fear aside, he clenched his jaw and stepped forward.
"Mei," he whispered to himself, his voice shaking but resolute. "Mei.."
As he slowly walked closer he saw his mother and father appear. His arm wrapped her arms around Mei, while his father openened his arms as if to give him a welcome hug.
"We're here," his father said, his voice trembling with emotion. "Everything will be fine now."
„Dad.." Xuan trembled and then his eyes widened.
A figure stepped out from the shadows behind his parents. It was the headmaster. He send a cold, calculating gaze towards Xuan.
"You've become a problem," the headmaster said, his tone devoid of empathy. "Your talent is dangerous—too dangerous. We can't risk it falling into the wrong hands."
He turned to Master Shen, who had appeared to the right of Xuan. "You know what must be done."
Master Shen hesitated, his eyes flicking to Xuan. There was something in his expression—an apology, perhaps—but it was gone as quickly as it appeared. Without a word, he drew a blade and slashed toward Xuan's family.
"No! Stop!" Xuan screamed, his voice raw and desperate. He lunged forward, his right arm instinctively reaching out to grab Master Shen's wrist—to stop the blade.
But there was nothing. His right arm wasn't there.
The realization struck him like a blow to the chest, and he froze mid-motion, staring at the empty space where his arm used to be. Helpless, he watched the blade arc through the air, his family's terrified faces filling his vision.
"NOOO!"
---
And then he woke up.
His body shot upright, drenched in cold sweat. His breath came in ragged gasps, and his heart thundered in his chest. For a moment, he sat frozen, his mind struggling to separate dream from reality. The quiet hum of the garden outside gradually filtered into his awareness, grounding him.
It was just a nightmare.
---
From that day on, Xuan threw himself into cultivation with unrelenting focus. He allowed himself only brief periods of sleep, no more than a few hours every three days, using cultivation as a replacement for sleep. Even then, he gripped Mei's necklace tightly, as though the touch of it could keep the nightmares at bay.
And is if to reward his madness, the progress he made was significant.
At first, gathering qi and opening a single pathway between his dantian and one of his nodes took two days.
Gradually, as his understanding deepened and his control over the qi improved, his pace quickened. The process became smoother, almost instinctual. By the end of the second week, he could create a new pathway in a day and a half. By the third, it took him just over a day.
Over the course of a month, Xuan created pathways linking his dantian to every major node in his body: heart, arm, legs, and head. He even established connections between the nodes themselves, strengthening his internal qi circulation. Additional pathways described in the manual, ones that didn't link directly to nodes but served to refine specific regions of the body, were opened as well.
By the time the month ended, Xuan had reached the peak of the Spiritual Vein Realm—a feat that, if known to others, would surely cause shock and envy.
The Spiritual Vein Realm wasn't just a stage of cultivation; it was a transformation. Xuan's body had undergone a fundamental change, becoming a network of revitalized pathways, primed to channel qi seamlessly to any part of his body.
Yet, there remained one final step before he could advance beyond this realm.
While the creation of pathways allowed qi to flow efficiently throughout the body, it was only part of the equation. Without the ability to easily release qi from the body, those pathways were of limited use. Martial techniques, which demanded precision and externalized qi manipulation, would be impossible. This was the true threshold of the Spiritual Vein Realm: the process known as the Emanation Ritual.
This step was unique to each cultivation method but shared a common goal: opening the pores of the body to allow qi to flow out freely. It was another transformation for the body, enabling powerful techniques like creating barriers or framing the body in flame energy.
The {Frozen Gale Codex} described its own method for achieving this transformation. It required the practitioner to guide qi in a specific pattern through the body, while bathing the body in a rare substance that could catalyze the process. For Xuan, that substance was Frostdew Essence, a material found only in the chilling depths of the Ebonshade Thicket—a dangerous forest adjacent to the Venomthread Sect.
Xuan's gaze sharpened as he made up his mind.