Greg gave them fifty stones each to buy what they wanted, and would be spending the rest on techniques he thought might be worth selling on Earth. This meant the Randy and Mike now had 100 stones each to spend on things in town. Randy, however, was too tired due to having just pulled an all night job, and went to his room and went to sleep. When he got up six hours later he ate something, then pulled out all of the books that they had taken from the bandits, having left the bags of relics with Mike.

  He scanned the names of all of them, sorted them by element, then put them into stacks. When he was done, he had six stacks of books. There were three large stacks of Water, Earth, and Wood techniques, and three smaller stacks of Metal, Fire and Other. The Other books were the most interesting. There was a book of Dual Cultivation techniques, the shrinking technique, a few books where Randy wasn’t certain if they were fact, fiction, or legend, and two special books. They were called “The Journal of Iron Scholar Xu Xi Quan”, and “False Roots”, with the second being written by Iron Scholar Xu Xi Quan.

  Once he was finished listing all of the books in a text document and posting it in the app, he finished translating the “Immolating Rain” technique and made six folders in the app’s file sharing section, one each for the five elements and one for ‘other’ books. When he was done he was surprised to find that both Dr. Lee and Dr. Shmidt had requested that he translate the journal and the book the man wrote. They also wanted the books of legends, but were interested in the other two first.

  With no other requests, Randy got to work. The journal had much more text per page than the technique books and didn’t have as pristine handwriting, so several times he had to make translation notes. Eventually, he decided to add the local language versions to the folder as well, as both of them could read the local language and fix the translation themselves.

  Once he was done he decided to do one from each stack at a time, and spent the rest of the day translating books. That night, however, he left after supper and told them he was going to go look around. He made his way back to the same street where several women had propositioned him two days ago, noticed that there were far more women out there offering their services. He ignored many women until he found just the type he was into. Wide hips, firm ass, and massive chest. She was wearing some type of dress, but that wouldn’t matter once she took it off. He spoke with her through the translation app and, after finding out that she was also a cultivator, she invited him to her place in exchange for a single stone. He accepted immediately.

  Something was different about this time. He had expected the fun to last for hours, with both of them moving the entire time, but instead they had only moved for a few seconds before ending up holding onto each other tightly. He had felt some sort of warmth enter him from between his legs, and for some reason he instinctively resisted with his water chi. She seemed to like that and for over an hour they just laid there in each other’s arms, their qi doing all of the movement.

  Eventually she pulled away and he felt better than he ever had after spending time with a woman. “Wow.” She said. “That was different. So raw and instinctual. Was that your first time?”

  “No, of course not.” Randy said defensively. “I’ve been with plenty of women.”

  “No, I mean dual cultivating. You weren’t as formulaic as most men. Most men, and I suppose most women too, though I don’t take them as clients, figure out something that works well in qi combat and stick to doing that. It’s like sword fighters who learn a set of movements, then stick so closely to that set that they are no longer capable of adapting. You, though, were so creative. There were feints and thrusts, and slashes, and other moves that I don’t have a sword term for.” She stood up and started putting her dress back on. “In that case,” she said, “do you mind coming back tomorrow night? I’ll give you another round for free.”

  “Wait, free? I’ve got to be honest. I’ve never had a prostitute offer me free services.”

  She giggled. “Well, that was the most training my Fire Root has gotten in at least a year. I need to meditate on what I learned from this battle, or I’d offer you another round right now. If you want to come here a few more times, though…”

  Randy sighed. “I only have tomorrow in the town. We leave the morning after that. Unfortunately.”

  “Well, then, come by just after sunset and ask for White Summer Fox. Tell them you’re the man with the Water root. I’ll leave instructions with the girls up front that I’m expecting a special client, and they should let you up to my room, but may come and ask me first. Now, if you don’t mind, I’m going to meditate. Who knows. I might go up an entire minor realm just from digesting that battle.” She pulled a cushion over from the corner of the room and sat down, then started meditating. Randy got up, got dressed, and left a spirit stone on the ground beside her before leaving.

  As he left he thought about what a strange experience that had been. It was somehow both the most exciting sex he had ever had, but also the most tame and boring. It was like he had ran a hundred miles, yet was as full of energy as possible, while also being completely relaxed. Then there was the battle. All of the various moves went through his mind, the advances he made, the feints on both sides, the traps, the flanking maneuvers. The time she managed to advance a squadron all of the way to the fort that was his lower sub-node and a fierce battle had resulted which had resulted in heavy losses on both sides. It was somehow like a one on one melee combat, yet also like they were both the generals of vast armies, hers less numerous and powerful, but more skilled.

  He knew he needed to do something with this information. He went into a store that was nearby. There were a wide variety of items here, from weapons, to relics, to techniques, to formations. Randy knew this was basically a pawn shop for cultivators. There was a sign behind the desk offering financing, just beside one that promised the best deal on your collateral items. Randy looked around for a few minutes before finding two weapon techniques which fit him, a water sword technique and a metal spear technique. He realized that they wouldn’t do him much good without a weapon, so he went over to the weapon rack and started looking. They only had one weapon with metal in it, a small throwing knife, and wanted fifty stones for it, so he decided to get a metal weapon from Earth when he got back. Instead he picked up a saber for only five stones and took the three items to the counter. The sword was made from the rib of a level two Vrooshkin, though he wasn’t sure how they altered the shape enough to make it, as it didn’t look that much different than a normal saber.

  After paying the seven stones for the items he set off for the inn. As they catered to cultivators, many of whom used martial arts or weapons as part of their cultivation, Randy went behind the building to where they had set up a training field. There he read the Sword manual and started going through the movements. Sometimes he would remember moves from earlier, when White Summer Fox had countered his techniques or his techniques had been more effective than expected, and he had gotten through her defenses. By the time the sun started to come up he was circulating qi through his muscles just to keep going, feeling the last of the knowledge from the battle sink into his mind.

  When the seventeenth and final form of the style was complete he paused to breathe, then sheathed his sword and went to his room. As he passed the front counter he asked that a bath be drawn for him, then went upstairs to get a change of clothes.

  Once he was done bathing he thanked the servant girl, then dried off, got dressed, and returned to the training field. He was certain that she had seen him naked, and even caught her watching him dry off, but he ignored her. After last night he knew that normal women wouldn’t be enough for him any more.

  At the field he pulled up the Early Cultivators Guide and read part four again. If these were the standard techniques which all cultivators needed to learn, he would do so. Maybe he would learn something new he could use tonight when he returned to visit her.

  The first technique he needed to manage was the body enhancement. He already did this to some degree, as he had qi sight and the various sensory enhancements. But it mentioned other things that could be done with it, like running qi through your lungs to improve your breathing, through your muscles to make yourself stronger, or through your skin to resist damage. It would be hard to test the last one without a sparing partner, so he would have to wait and see if one of the other men wanted to spar later. For now, though, he started the movements of the sword technique again.

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  Within a few minutes he was starting to run out of breath, so he started sending qi to his lungs. They quickly improved how much oxygen they were pulling from the air and how much CO2 they were exhaling, and thirty seconds later he could breathe properly again. He continued the forms for another hour before he saw Dr. Clement walk out onto the field carrying a case. He opened it up and pulled out two metal staff segments and a spear head, and assembled them.

  “Hey doc,” Randy said, noticing this. “You don’t happen to have a metal root, do you?”

  “I don’t really know. Haven’t tested myself yet. Why do you ask?”

  Randy sheathed his sword and pulled the metal spear technique from his bag. “I bought this at a pawn shop. I figured if you had a metal root, even a really weak one, you might be able to use this. I won’t be able to use it until I get back to Earth, so, if you want to read it…” He offered the book to Dr. Clement.

  Dr. Clement took it and looked it over. “Thanks, I’ll go test myself, then, if I have that root maybe I’ll learn it. It’s an ideal fit if I do.” The doctor disassembled his spear and started to go inside to find what he needed to test himself, when Randy remembered that he was going to ask the doctor a question.

  “Hey. Strange question. You don’t happen to know a pregnancy test technique, do you?”

  “What brought that up? Forget to do your meditation and hook up with someone?”

  “No, I did find a woman, but I remembered the meditation, as did she. She was a cultivator so I decided to see what that whole ‘dual cultivation’ thing was about. In fact, I’m meeting her tonight. You can tag along if you want to check out her coworkers.”

  The Doctor shook his head. “I’m married. Might download the manual you found once the PDF is done so my wife and I can try it, but I’m not going to cheat on her just to see what it’s like.”

  “Ah, right. Makes sense. So about the test?” asked Randy.

  “Oh, yeah, the test. No, I don’t have it, as I’m not a medical doctor. I’m sure I can learn it when I get back, but I won’t be able to use it on anyone here until then. So, why did you ask?”

  I told him the story about the bandits and what they had done to the women, and then about the teenage girl. He whistled. “That’s kind of messed up. I knew this world was harsh, but…”

  “Yeah, you’d think the city would have done something about the bandits, as close as they are to the city, but I guess they don’t have the funds to do it.”

  “Maybe”, said Clement. “I’m sure the girl will find a person that has a similar technique and have them test her, though. Besides, she’s not really your problem any more. You saved her, and she’s not related or anything, so I don’t see why you should get involved with the situation.”

  “I know, it’s not my problem, but still…” Randy sighed and went back to practicing his forms.

  Once he was certain he had learned the lung enhancement, he tried the muscle route. He landed several blows on the training dummies, first without any enhancement, then with it. The first swing buried his sword into the log chest of the dummy and it sunk in about 10 centimeters. The Spirit wood they use here seemed to be stronger than the wood on Earth, but due to its cost he had never even seen spirit wood on Earth and so couldn’t have tested the effects. He then sent qi through his muscles, and the swung again. The sword went completely through the dummy and embedded itself into one of the pavement stones underneath. He was about to put metal qi into it and try again when he realized that might cause significant damage. He would have to try and find a level three bandit to try it on.

  The next technique was basically qi blast, which he was already proficient in, so he practiced sending a few under-powered blasts comparable to a Gathering level attack of the Water or Metal element at the targets. They were damaged but still mostly intact. Apparently the spirit wood they were made with was fairly tough. After that he turned off his barrier bracelet, not knowing how it would interact with the other barrier, and made one of Water followed by one of Metal. Dr. Clement came outside and threw a few qi blasts at the barriers just to test them, though the blasts were all using neutral qi.

  “I take it you did the test?” Randy asked.

  “Yeah, the four scientists all did it. I only have a petty Earth, Lee and Shmidt don’t have one, and Talmidge had a Fire and Wood root. So none of us can use the book to it’s potential, but a proper spear technique is still a proper spear technique.”

  “Still, you should probably get a stone tipped spear and an Earth type spear technique. If nothing else, I felt that my Water root made learning the forms of the Water sword technique easier. There are several technique merchants in town.”

  Clement nodded. “I’ll think about it. Normally I’d assume that a stone spear would be inferior to this metal one, but with the presence of qi it might be even stronger.” Some materials gained strange properties once they were exposed to high levels of qi. While there weren’t many natural materials that did that on Earth, there was a whole class of metal alloys that changed their structure once they were bathed in liquid qi, including one that became a qi superconductor, but was too expensive for anything short of Nascent level items, at around a million per gram. It was quite likely that the various types of elemental qi also had materials which were changed in their presence.

  Now that he was certain that he could properly use the barriers, he moved onto the next technique, movement. Though it sounded more like flight to him. The problem with that was that the book said it required a Heavenly root, and his was only Average. Still, it was similar enough to the Levitation, Flight, and Improved Flight techniques he already knew, so he was certain he already had that power’s effect covered.

  Next came attacks. These wouldn’t be that difficult to do. He pulled out his combat knife and floated it above his palm then added some Metal qi and threw it at the target. The knife embedded itself into the wood up to the hilt and Randy went to pull it out of the dummy’s head. Because it was only a petty root he was barely able to adjust the trajectory and enhance the damage. He threw it a few more times from various distances and found that the further he got from the target, the less control he had of the knife and the less power it had on impact, barely sticking into the target at ten meters. He would need to practice more with his metal root.

  After that he pulled some water out of a nearby barrel. He wasn’t sure if it was there for use in training, to cool off the trainee after practice, or to drink, but he grabbed around half a liter of it and threw bolts of water at the target, where they harmlessly splashed against its surface. While he had plenty of accuracy at this range, the power was lacking due to the nature of the material. He opened up the ice technique he had translated earlier and read the section on ice creation. After a few minutes of practice, learned to freeze the water. He would probably need a different technique if he wanted to make something knife like, like ice shards, but at least they were solid now. The small chunks of ice flew at the target and knocked wood off occasionally, but Randy was satisfied that he had learned the lesson here, and just needed a new technique and more practice to make the most of it.

  Last was dual cultivation. While he would get plenty of practice with the sexual kind tonight, he hadn’t yet learned how to do the other kind. “Hey Doc.” he said to Clement, who was executing a series of spins with his spear, leaving shallow cuts on his dummy. “I think I have a way for you to improve your spiritual root.”

  The doctor unleashed a flurry of stabs, then stopped and breathed. “Are you going to suggest dual cultivation again?” he asked.

  “Well, technically.” said Randy, “But it isn’t the sexual kind this time.”

  “You are referring to the techniques listed in the Early Cultivator’s Guide, yes?”

  “Yeah. That one is basically a better version of Suppression Training, though we can do that too, if you want. Each should have their own benefit. External should teach you more about fighting with techniques, and internal should develop your the strength of your qi and improve your root.”

  The Doctor nodded and walked over. “So, how do we do this?”

  “Just give me your arm.” Randy said, and the doctor lifted his arm, only to find it grabbed in the style of a medieval handshake, grasping his forearm just before the elbow. Randy released just a tiny bit of Water qi from his arm, and it started to go into Clement, who resisted with his own Earth qi. “Water is overcome by Earth.” he said. “So this is basically easy mode. Once you are ready, though, we’ll switch to Earth versus Metal, with Earth feeding Metal, so you are making me stronger. That will be hard mode.”

  They sat down at a bench and sat there for several hours. After an hour or so, at which point Randy had greatly increased the force he was using and Clement had managed to push him out, they switched elements, and it took Clement another two hours to resist enough that he could push Randy out. So, Randy doubled the amount of qi he was using and Clement had to redouble his efforts as well.

  Some time in the afternoon Randy could tell that Clement was starting to flag mentally, so he called an end to their fight. At some point they had both improved their petty roots to lower roots, so the training had been useful.

  “Well, I guess that’s enough training for today.” Randy said, standing up. “I’m going to go get something to eat, then meditate on all of my training so I can get the most of it, then maybe meditate to advance before taking a shower. Now that I think about it, I should be able to advance twelve times as fast in this world due to the background level.”

  “You just now figured that out?” asked Clement. “I’ve been meditating every chance I got since coming here. I’ve probably gotten several months of advancement so far.”

  “Yeah,” responded Randy, “I realized my vest was filling me up a lot faster, but didn’t think about it.” With that, he left, having so much to do before his big date tonight.