The building stabbed into the sky.
Zhang Yu craned his neck. The Xianyun Group headquarters rose like a spear aimed at heaven itself. Near the top, something flickered — a palace silhouette, half-visible through the haze. An immortal pavilion. Corporate architecture.
Beyond it, another tower loomed even higher — the Central Tower, 999 floors, the tallest structure in Songyang. Zhang Yu passed it on his way to school every day. He'd never been inside.
*Xianyun Group. Subsidiary of the Myriad Arts Sect. One of the Ten Great Sects.*
He'd looked them up on the way. In Kunxu, the Ten Great Sects touched everything — food, clothing, shelter, medicine, death. Birth to grave. The Xianyun Group handled technique development, sales, and Immortal Path education. A corporate arm of a sect that already ruled the world.
*Of course cultivation has corporations. Why wouldn't it?*
Inside, the lobby gleamed. He stated his purpose at the front desk. Registration. Contract signing. A brief medical exam. Then they led him to a room that looked exactly like a classroom.
Other students already sat inside. Fifteen chairs total. When the last one filled, a middle-aged man in a suit walked in.
"Hello. I'm your supervising instructor today."
He smiled the way a snake smiles at a mouse.
"You've all signed contracts. But I must remind you — everything discussed here is confidential. If any word leaks, we will find you. No matter where you run."
Nobody doubted it. Xianyun Group. The Myriad Arts Sect behind them. They could flatten a city to find a leaker.
"Today's technique: Experimental Technique #113. Please watch the instructional video."
The video played. A Qi Refining breathing technique — but nothing like the Basic Breathing Method. This one required the practitioner to build a complex mana circuit through the entire body. Routes branched, merged, looped back. The diagram looked like someone tried to paint a landscape on a postage stamp.
*This is like sculpting a flower in a pile of dung.*
The video ended. Every student stared blankly at the screen. The instructor launched into a detailed breakdown. It only got worse. By the time he finished, most of them had forgotten half of what they'd heard.
*Forget spreading the technique — I'm not sure I could reproduce a single step of it.*
The instructor seemed to read the room. "Don't worry. We don't expect you to master this technique. In fact, a beginner working alone could never learn it."
"What we're testing today is the guidance system paired with #113."
They were led to an examination room. Sensor patches went on their hands, feet, chest, back. Mechanical arms swung thin silver needles into position near their bodies.
"The patches monitor your internal mana flow in real time," the instructor explained. "The Primordial Magnetic Needles stimulate acupoints along the correct route, helping you identify and follow the proper path."
*Auto-pathfinding. Great. A GPS for my internal organs.*
The technique was so complex that even tiny errors in timing or position sent mana spilling off-route. The result was instant agony — hot, cold, itchy, aching, all at once. Prolonged failure meant internal injury. The longer you strayed, the worse the damage.
There were three ways out: pay a powerful cultivator to suppress the mana surgically, endure it until the stray energy burned out on its own, or complete the technique and actively reclaim the lost mana yourself.
"Compensation is based on completion percentage," the instructor added. "Full route equals ten thousand yuan. Half route equals five thousand. Begin."
Zhang Yu checked the Feather Book.
**Heavenly Circuit Qi Gathering Method Lv. 0 (0/1)**
*One successful run to learn it? I can do this.*
He closed his eyes. Mana left his dantian and moved toward his spine. A pinprick of sensation guided him — the needle, showing him where to go. He followed. One step at a time.
---
Behind the observation glass, a researcher watched.
The lead researcher had messy hair and eyes that hadn't blinked in too long. Screens around him displayed real-time mana flow maps for each student. Green lines meant correct routing. Red meant deviation.
The maps were bleeding red.
"Primordial Magnetic Needle precision still insufficient," an assistant reported. "Can't meet the accuracy threshold for beginners."
"Should we recruit subjects with higher cultivator's resolve?"
The lead researcher shook his head. "#113 and the needles are designed for beginners. That direction doesn't change. Higher-resolve students have better techniques available. Beginners need passive breathing effects more."
A student lurched in the examination room. He spat a mouthful of blood. The researcher didn't flinch.
"Remove him. Don't let him disturb the others."
But one by one, they started failing. Green faces. Screaming. Unconsciousness. Students carried out like broken parts off an assembly line.
"This batch is terrible," the researcher muttered. "Can't we recruit better students?"
The assistant hesitated. "The previous test subjects were injured too severely. No school wants to work with us anymore."
The researcher's face darkened. "A bunch of poor students. Do you understand what #113 means if it works? The beginner market is enormous. If we succeed, hundreds of deaths are acceptable."
---
Three students remained. Two had low error rates — minimal mana spillage, still holding on.
The third was Zhang Yu.
The researcher studied his screen. Red everywhere. Error after error. Stray mana flooding through his body like poison.
"He should be in agony," the researcher murmured. "How is he still going?"
"Should we stop him?"
"No. Let him try. His failure data along the full route is actually more valuable than a clean run."
---
Inside the examination room, Zhang Yu wanted to quit. Every time he deviated, mana spilled into his tissue. His skin itched like ants nested under it. His guts burned. His legs were ice. His chest felt like a furnace.
But the Ritual's chill pressed against his spine. The countdown ticked in his skull.
*You stupid thing. You want to force me? Come do it yourself.*
He pushed through. Deviation. Correction. Deviation. Correction. One grueling step at a time.
Finally — the last node. The full route.
**Heavenly Circuit Qi Gathering Method Lv. 0 (0/1) → Lv. 1 (0/20)**
He exhaled. Memories flooded in — hundreds, thousands of practice sessions compressed into a single download. He could feel the technique running inside him now, gathering stray mana, building a circuit, pulling the chaos back into order.
He didn't use it yet. Not here. Not in front of them.
The instructor rushed over. "Are you all right?"
"I feel like my organs are on fire and my lower body is frozen and everything itches. Terrible."
"Let me take you to the medical room—"
"No." Zhang Yu waved his hand. "What I mean is — I need more money."
The instructor blinked. Then looked at Zhang Yu's trembling body, his pale face, the sweat rolling off him.
"One thousand more. Sign an additional waiver. Anything that happens to you after this is not our problem."
They negotiated. The final number was three thousand extra.
Zhang Yu walked out of the Xianyun Group with thirteen thousand yuan and a body full of stray mana he pretended he couldn't control.
*They don't need to know I can fix it myself.*
---
*New terms: Heavenly Circuit Qi Gathering Method (周天采气法) — experimental passive breathing technique. Primordial Magnetic Needles (元磁针) — guidance devices for technique practice. Myriad Arts Sect (万法宗) — one of the Ten Great Sects.*