HPDBC Chapter 295: Foundation Establishment
Chapter 295: Foundation Establishment
Standing at the very top of Ganzhu Ridge, Liu Xiaolou looked out at the surrounding mountains. Misty rain blurred everything in the distance, and weather like this was perfect for secluded cultivation.Liu Xiaolou took out the Sect Leader’s Formation Disk and sent it gliding into a crack in the rock. It immediately began to bore downward. At some point, he heard a sharp click.
To this day, he never figured out whether that sound was something real rising out of the rock crevice or just an echo inside his mind.
Right after that click, a gentle, refreshing spiritual energy began to flow out from the gap.
Liu Xiaolou sat in the small makeshift shelter by the crevice, letting the energy wrap around him. Though not dense, it was continuous and endless.
He sat like that for three days until he felt empty within and connected to everything around him. His senses drifted into a hazy state where he and the world seemed to merge. Only then did he take out the precious Foundation Establishment Pill and swallow it.
A sharp, spicy heat rushed into his belly and settled in his Qi Sea.
It slammed around inside the qi sea, darting left and right as it tried to break through the small primordial pool that contained it. When it failed, it only grew more agitated and pushed even harder to break free.
As it kept ramming around, the searing energy began to mix with the true qi stored in his Qi Sea. Little by little, the two blended together. After being swept into the spicy current, the true qi took on a sharp, blade-like quality, becoming keen and "piercing."
That newly “sharpened” true qi kept battering around his Qi Sea for who knows how long. Then, all at once, it burst into a nearby acupoint and shot out through his twelve meridians, rampaging wildly through every one of them.
From that moment, Liu Xiaolou just froze. He was stuck in this awful, inescapable pain, like someone was taking a knife and chisel to his meridians
The agony was too much. He couldn't hang on any longer. A panic took over him, and he fought desperately to pull out.
Only one thought filled his mind: he must have taken the wrong pill. This wasn't the Foundation Establishment Pill at all. Or maybe it was, and his body just couldn't handle it.
But it was already too late. He had completely lost control of that sharp, cutting true qi. All he could do was grit his teeth and endure it.
Sweat burst from every pore and turned into a fine mist that rose off his skin until he was wrapped in a cloud of vapor.
Just when he thought the pain would kill him, midnight had only just passed.
In that instant, it was as if some force took control of all the “sharpened” true qi, funneling it straight into his gallbladder. It spread out, filling the Foot Lesser Yang Meridian completely. Then, the meridian seemed to break free from its usual spot, carrying all 44 acupoints with it, spinning wildly back and forth inside his body.
Liu Xiaolou felt the pain ease a little, but nowhere near enough.
When the Ox hour (1-3 AM) passed, the sharpened true qi broke away from the Foot Lesser Yang Meridian and plunged into his liver. It expanded again and dragged the Foot Faint Yin Meridian out with it. All 14 of its acupoints joined the chaos, circling inside him in front and behind without pause.
The pain eased a little more.
By the Tiger hour (3-5 AM), the sharpened true qi rushed into his lungs and pulled the Hand Greater Yin Meridian free, sending its eleven acupoints spinning.
Then came the Rabbit hour (5-7 AM), and the Hand Yang Bright Meridian.
The Dragon hour (7-9 AM), brought the Foot Yang Bright Meridian.
One after another it went, until the Boar hour when even the Hand Lesser Yang Meridian was drawn out.
By now, all twelve meridians unblocked during the Qi Refinement stage had detached from their original locations, swirling around.
After hurting all day, that feeling like someone was chiseling through his meridians finally went away.
In the beginning, the rotation of the twelve meridians was completely chaotic and without any pattern. After three days, they started linking together in a set order, following the circadian rhythm of meridian circulation. Starting with the Foot Lesser Yang Meridian and ending with the Hand Lesser Yang Meridian... or maybe it’s the Hand Lesser Yang Meridian that came first.
After seven days, the path of rotation finally grew clearer. It began in the lower abdomen, moved out through the perineum, passed the inguinal region, rose to Guanyuan acupoint, reached the throat, circled the lips, connected to the wings of the nose, and ended at the eye sockets.
By the ninth day, the route shifted again. This time it started in the lower abdomen and went downward, traveled along the lower back, rose up the spine, entered the skull through Fengfu acupoint at the base of the neck, passed Baihui acupoint at the crown of the head, and flowed downward from there.
The twelve meridians flowed up and down in an endless loop. In Liu Xiaolou’s perception, the upward and downward movements even seemed to overlap or happen at the same time, which felt incredibly mysterious.
At that point, Liu Xiaolou knew he had completed the first step of forming his Qi Sea... he had opened the Conception and Governing Vessels.
Once the Conception and Governing Vessels opened, the spiritual energy that his body could no longer absorb suddenly surged back in. It gathered along those two channels and transformed into true qi.
The true qi pooled at the Qi Sea acupoint. As more of it formed, the new true qi pushed out what had been there before, took its place, then was pushed out in turn by freshly transformed true qi. The displaced true qi flowed along the Conception and Governing Vessels.
During this cycle, he absorbed spiritual energy faster and faster, and the amount turning into true qi grew by the moment. Before he realized it, the energy around him could no longer fully meet his needs. It just wasn’t enough to satisfy the increasingly “hungry” Qi Sea.
He pulled out a spirit stone and held it in his palm, drawing in its energy along with the energy from the spirit spring. That finally eased the hunger, but only for a while. Each spirit stone lasted barely half a month before it was completely drained. And the hunger always came back.
His ability to absorb spiritual energy grew incredibly fast, but the formation of his Qi Sea barely moved forward. Still, the process had gone smoothly so far, so Liu Xiaolou didn’t stop. He simply kept at it.
As long as he didn’t break the cycle, it didn’t matter if it took a long time. Time was something he had plenty of.
Spring gave way to summer, summer to autumn, and the weather on Wulong Mountain was slowly starting to cool."
One day, as the first autumn rain of the year finally drizzled down over Qianzhu Ridge, a single chilly drop landed right on Liu Xiaolou’s head.
After lying dormant for so long, the Conception and Governing Vessels suddenly surged to life. Like rivers swept up in a fierce gale, they churned with turbulent currents.
The currents slammed back and forth, raising wave after wave under thunder and lightning, as if the entire river were about to flip over completely.
At a certain moment, all that churning reached its peak, then spun into a rapid vortex. It twisted like a massive dragon, coiling at incredible speed with one end whipping toward his Qi Sea.
No one knew how long it spiraled. Eventually, the great dragon tore open a crack in the Qi Sea and plunged straight inside.
The dark, silent Qi Sea acupoint stayed still for a heartbeat. Then it bursted open, expanding in a single breath until it filled an entire world.
Liu Xiaolou sat cross-legged within that vast inner world. Clouds of rising mist surrounded him, and every wisp of that vapor was true qi he had refined himself.
When he looked up, a sky full of glittering stars hung overhead. Each star was an acupoint he had painstakingly opened on his cultivation path.
The moment he fully understood what he was seeing, his spiritual sense shot out of that inner world within the Qi Sea and returned to Qianzhu Ridge.
The autumn rain kept falling, soaking the mountains. Liu Xiaolou held out a finger and caught a single drop. Somehow, in that single bit of water, he felt a thousand kinds of force and ten thousand subtle shifts.
Seeing the world clearly in the tiniest details. This was the feeling you gain after reaching the Foundation Establishment stage. When you completed your first real connection with Heaven and Earth.
It’s this connection that let Foundation Establishment cultivators control flying swords.
At the light tap of Liu Xiaolou’s paired fingers, the Three-Mystery Sword arced through the air. Its turn carried a kind of smoothness that was impossible to describe.
More nimble than a flick of his own fingers!