Chapter 14
Adam sat cross-legged inside his new quarters.
The room was built into the side of a mountain, high above the rest of the sect. It was quiet, with only the sound of wind brushing against the stone walls. His room had the basics: a bed, a table, a mat for meditation, and a small shelf with a few books.
It was simple, but it was his.
He looked out the window. Clouds drifted below, hiding the rest of the sect from view. The night was cold, but the silence was welcome.
After everything that happened at the coliseum, this place felt distant—like the world had paused, if only for a moment.
“I am separated from Xiaoyan, Xiaomei and red. I wonder if they have reached the sect by now.”
Adam stood up and walked to the shelf. His fingers hovered over the spines before stopping at one.
Cultivation Path to Immortality – Vol. 2
He pulled it out without a word and turned back toward the table.
He wanted to know more about the dantians.
“All three dantian. Just how bad can it be”
Skimming through the book until he reached the page he desired
Choosing Your Dantian Setup (aka: How Many Buckets You Wanna Fill?) UPDATED
Archivist Elric’s Guide to Not Exploding Your Spiritual Organs
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So you’ve made it to Qi Condensation. Congrats. You’ve tempered your bones, suffered through organ grinding, and survived long enough to feel ambient Qi swirl around you like you just opened a spiritual bank account. Now what?
Let’s talk dantians—your Qi storage tanks. You’ve got three of them:
Upper Dantian (Mind): Deals with arts of the arcane—arrays, talismans, spells, illusions.
Middle Dantian (Heart): Used for healing, beast taming, and things that need “emotional resonance” (gross).
Lower Dantian (Body): Your classic power keg—weapon arts, martial techniques, punch-stuff-until-it-stops-moving styles.
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Option 1: Single Dantian Specialization
Pros: Easy to fill. Easy to focus. Less likely to end in spontaneous internal combustion.
Cons: Limited flexibility. You’re a one-trick cultivator. That trick might be cool, but still—one trick.
Recommended for those with only one element or if you're lazy (no shame in that).
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Option 2: Dual Dantian Cultivation
Pros: Versatility. You can cast spells and punch people.
Cons: Twice the resources. Twice the time. Twice the sleepless nights wondering why you did this.
Best for those with compatible elements or a little extra talent. Or if you like stress.
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Option 3: Triple Dantian Cultivation (aka “Why Would You Do This?”)
Pros: Peak potential. Master of all trades. Probably terrifying to look at when you fight.
Cons: You will cry. A lot. Resource drain is monstrous. And don’t even think about doing this if your elemental affinities hate each other.
Only attempt this if:
If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
You have a high-grade synchronization with multiple elements.
You like having no friends because you're always cultivating.
You enjoy battling internal imbalances every night like a very sweaty spiritual therapist.
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Important Note: Elements and Dantians
Each dantian must be filled individually, and with care. Qi condensation is not just stuffing a sack with energy—you need to mold your Qi in alignment with your elemental nature.
Examples:
A cultivator with two elements must assign each one to a specific dantian.
A cultivator with opposing elements (e.g., fire and water) must either:
Keep them in separate dantians and never let them touch.
Or, if you’re feeling ambitious (read: insane), learn a balancing technique that fuses them safely inside one dantian.
This fusion approach allows you to access dual-element techniques, but... good luck finding the method. Most of those were lost, burned, or eaten by sentient scrolls.
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Final Words of Wisdom
You cannot switch your dantian choice later. Once you begin filling one with Qi of a certain nature, you’re stuck. Don't be that guy who dumps fire Qi into his Heart dantian and then wonders why all his healing spells explode.
So before you start—meditate, ask your spirit guide, toss a coin, scream at the sky—whatever helps you decide. Just don't rush it.
– Archivist Elric, who filled all three and now regrets nothing but everything
—
Turning to the next page to see if there is anything else he has to understand
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Element Classification
(For when the cosmos decides what kind of nonsense you'll be dealing with.)
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Common Elements – Earth, Water, Wind, Fire, Ice, Wood
Found everywhere. Easy to cultivate. Plenty of manuals, pills, and lectures from dusty elders who’ve been spouting the same stuff for centuries. If you mess up here, frankly, that’s on you.
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Uncommon Elements – Light, Darkness, Lightning, Metal
A bit trickier to find, both in nature and manuals. Expect to pay extra for cultivation resources and, if you're lucky, survive the occasional accidental electrocution or spontaneous blinding. Fun!
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Rare Elements – Life, Death, Gravity, Space, Time
Now here’s where things get interesting. And by "interesting," I mean terrifying.
Rare elements are less “cultivation path” and more “unwinnable gamble.” Cultivators synchronized with these are often regarded as walking disasters—blessed by the heavens, cursed by the world.
Life cultivators risk constant breakdowns of their own body trying to heal others.
Death cultivators tend to rot things just by breathing on them. Romantic relationships are… complicated.
Gravity makes movement absurdly powerful—until you accidentally fold yourself like a paper crane.
Space users can blink through walls… or into a mountain.
Time cultivators are either prophets or corpses depending on how well they understand causality.
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Archivist Elric’s Final Note:
If you’re thinking, “Cool, I want a rare element!”—no. Stop. Reconsider. Hug a rock. Rare elements make you powerful, yes—but only after surviving years of psychological torment, weird side effects, and at least one incident where you accidentally distort reality and have to apologize to your village.
And if you’re one of the “lucky” few born with multiple rare elements?
Good luck. Also, please stay far away from my office.
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Elemental Synchronization: How in Tune Are You with the Thing That Might Explode You?
Ah, synchronization. That lovely little number that decides whether you and your chosen element(s) are soulmates or sworn enemies. Every cultivator has a synchronization grade—basically, how naturally your body, mind, and soul can handle a given element.
We measure this in percentages, because apparently "just vibes" wasn’t scientific enough.
Grade 0 (0–9%) – You and the element actively hate each other. Using it is like trying to ride a wild boar blindfolded.
Grade 1–8 (10–89%) – The higher the percentage, the smoother the cultivation. Fewer explosions. Less screaming.
Grade 9 (90% and up) – You are the element. Like, spiritually. And physically.
Now hold on.
Before you start praying to get Grade 9 in every element—don’t. I mean it. Especially if you have multiple elements.
Grade 9 means your connection is so strong, the element begins to bleed into your thoughts, feelings, and sometimes your dreams. One is fine. Two is risky. Opposing elements?
You're basically asking a volcano and an iceberg to share an apartment and not kill each other.
Unless… you’ve achieved internal harmony.
What’s that? Well, if you manage to balance your elements inside a single dantian—especially those that hate each other—you gain stability like no other.
Your emotions don’t swing based on elemental influence.
You can cultivate multiple elements without side effects.
And best of all, they’ll keep each other in check—a perfect natural counterweight.
But make no mistake: balancing multiple Grade 9 elements is like juggling flaming swords while reciting poetry
—
“Well, aren't I absolutely fucked”
Adam leaned back in the chair, the book still open, his eyes staring past the pages.
Light. Metal. Death.
Grade 9 for all three.
He closed the book slowly, setting it aside. A thin layer of dust clung to his fingers—like the world reminding him how long it had been since someone tried something this stupid.
Three dantians.
Two uncommon and one rare elements.
All already filled.
He hadn’t even chosen a path. The path had chosen him.
Light in the middle dantian—emotions, resonance, the heart. Fitting, in a way. That foreign being's mark had sunk itself deep, making his core glow like it owed the universe something.
Metal in the lower dantian—strength, durability, brutal clarity. The Titan’s presence still clung to his arm, cold and sharp and utterly silent.
And Death in the upper dantian—illusion, curse, the arcane end of all things. Zayk’s last “gift.” A joke disguised as a blessing.
He should’ve exploded.
He still might.
Adam rubbed his temples and stared at the floor. The book hadn’t lied. Triple dantian cultivation was insane with normal elements. With rare ones? This was suicide wrapped in spiritual theory.
He exhaled through his nose.
“internal harmony,” he muttered.
Light and Death were on opposite sides of the spectrum. One gave; the other took. Metal, at least, didn’t care. It just was—unbending and absolute.
If he didn’t stabilize them, they’d tear him apart from the inside.
If he did… he'd become something else.
No manuals. No elders. No friendly warnings. Just a vague footnote in an old book and three unstable storms inside his body.
Adam stood up and walked toward the window again. Clouds drifted below, unaware of the absurdity crouched just above them.
“Alright,” he said quietly. “Let’s see the world make sense of this.”
Adam turned back from the window, the book still open on the table behind him.
If the sect was worth anything, it had to have a library. A proper one. With more than half-sarcastic guides and cryptic footnotes.
There had to be something about internal harmony. Or at least rare element management without spontaneous Qi combustion.
He grabbed his outer robe and stepped toward the door.
As his foot crossed the threshold, a voice echoed in his mind—calm, authoritative, and unfamiliar.
“Disciple Adam. You are now officially recorded as a disciple under Grand Elder Guo.”
“Your elements are registered as Light and Metal. Grade 6.”
“Make sure you wear your sect uniform. Red robes. You represent the crimson Peak now.”
The voice faded just as quickly as it arrived.
Adam blinked.
“Light and Metal. Grade 6?”
He glanced down at his cursed arm and exhaled, half a scoff.
“Right. Public record. No need to startle the sect elders into heart attacks just yet.”
He stepped back inside, pulled the red robes from a folded pile on the shelf, and changed quickly. The fabric was coarse and stiff—new—but not uncomfortable. Simple design, with the sect’s crest stitched in black over the left side of the chest.
He adjusted the fit and stepped out again, shutting the door behind him.
The wind greeted him like before, but this time, it felt less like silence and more like the start of something.
He began the descent down the mountain.The flicker of torchlight lined the winding path downward, and in the distance,
crimson-robed figures moved like red ants between towering halls.
He had questions. Hopefully, the library had answers. If not—well, he’d just make some up himself.
And maybe, if the universe was feeling generous, a guide to not dying from being too rare for your own good.
