Chapter 0008 – Qi Gathering 2nd Level

Ning Cheng never imagined that when he asked, this fellow, both his attitude and his response, would be so rude. He could only helplessly shake his head and prepare to go down to the Fifth Floor to ask. The Sixth Floor was larger when compared to the Seventh Floor, there were even more students here, you could occasionally see some of the students go in and out of the Cultivation Rooms, it was unlike the Seventh Floor, where there were very few people and the few who were there would hardly come out of the Cultivation Room.

“You!! Stop for a minute.” when Ning Cheng was on the stairway, someone called out to him.

“You called me?” Ning Cheng turned and looked towards a boy who was few years older than him, the boy seemed to have just got out of a Cultivation Room. The boy, when compared to Ning Cheng, had a dark complexion, and was smiling at him, it was clear that his smile did not hide any malice or evil thoughts towards him.

Ning Cheng knew that the cultivation level of any one of the students cultivating here was much higher than him who was just a handyman of sorts. In order to avoid unnecessary trouble, he did not intend to ask this person, he did not want to strike up a conversation with the students. Also in the Cang Qin Province, the ones who could enter the Academy as students, regardless of which one, most of their backgrounds were not ordinary. To Ning Cheng, these students were someone who he could not offend under any circumstances i.e. for Ning Cheng they were untouchable existences.

“I just heard the words you spoke a while ago, you are the one who is responsible for cleaning the Cultivation Rooms, right?” The boy asked directly.

Ning Cheng replied in a hurried manner, “Ah… Yes, today is my first day, I did not know where I could find something to eat, so I came here to ask.”

“You not only do not know where you can go to eat, but you also do not seem to know the rules around here. After today, keep this in mind, the Grand Staircase is not for the helpers to use, if you are caught by other students or the law enforcement people, you would end up losing a layer of skin.”

After listening to the words that were spoken by the boy, Ning Cheng was shocked, he had just come down from the Seventh Floor, moreover by taking the Grand Staircase. But why did Ji Luo Fei not tell him, that as a helper, he could not use the Grand Staircase? If there was such a rule, and if the boy hadn’t warned him, then he was afraid that something ominous would have happened to him

“Thank you for telling me, otherwise it would have been dangerous.” Ning Cheng said with gratitude in his heart.

The boy laughed and said, “It’s nothing, I was also a cleaner of the Cultivation Rooms before, I did the job for seven years, and was able to cultivate till I reached the Qi Gathering 2nd Level, and from then became a formal disciple of the Academy, and now currently I am at the Qi Gathering 4th Level. If you can put the effort, maybe in the future you could be like me. Remember, if you have to go in and out of the Cultivation Tower, you can only do so by going through the side door.”

After saying so, the boy pointed towards a hidden door at the back, “You can find the side door there, each floor has it, after you go in, you can directly exit the tower from the back. In the back of the tower you can find a place to eat, the money for the food will have to be earned by yourself, do not go looking for Elder Mu, otherwise you are as good as dead. I wish you good luck.”

The boy finished, and didn’t even say his name before he descended the staircase.

Ning Cheng knew that the other party did not plan to introduce himself. However, as this boy had pointed out the rules to him, it was equal to saving his small puny life, Ning Cheng, in his heart, was extremely grateful towards the boy.

Eying the Grand Staircase, he seemed to have heard some footsteps, Ning Cheng hurriedly walked towards the small concealed door in the back corner, opened it and entered in a flash.

Behind the small door, was a very dark and narrow staircase, to him it looked like a lifesaving emergency escape passage that was installed on every high rise building back on Earth.

After going all the way down the staircase, Ning Cheng found himself in the back of the Cultivation Tower, at its bottom. The back side of the practice tower was similar to the interior of the tower, but contained only a very few people, there seemed to only be a single curved path. On both sides of the path were some giant trees, and from the shadow like gaps between the trees, many Academy students can be seen coming and going. There were also some students who deliberately sneaked onto this path, and would rush forward on the path in a hurry.

Ning Cheng also walked along this path, after about half an hour later, he saw a narrow door, it was like the door of a small stone house. There was a middle aged man in front the stone door, but this man didn’t seem to care about the students who passed in and out of the tower through the narrow door. Seeing his appearance, it was evident that he was just a gatekeeper.

Ning Cheng, after emerging from the small door, was immediately shocked, as in front of him, was a market that had everything, and was really noisy.

There were a variety of shops, restaurants and street vendors. But it was obvious that the level of these were much lower when compared to the shops on the big streets of the Cang Qin Province’s capital city, the Cang Le City. But this place was very busy, and had so many people wandering around, Ning Cheng suspected that even Ji Luo Fei did not know about this place, at least he could not recall any previous memories of this place.

A huge sign was erected in the most conspicuous place, the sign showed the various directions in which the various shops and stores were located through the use of arrows.

The first building was unexpectedly not for business, similarly it was also not the kind that sold medicines, but rather was a place with the name “Fighting Pot”. The name “Fighting Pot”, when Ning Cheng heard it for the first time, raised his sense of curiosity. Simply following the directions of the arrows from before, ten minutes later, he appeared in front of a huge circular building.

Ning Cheng stopped, as he saw that they were two people that stopped at the entrance of the circular building, it was obvious that if he wanted to enter the building then he had to pay some fees. Ning Cheng only had a few silver coins on him, which were supposed to his future living expenses, he just didn’t want to waste this money on something unknown like the “Fighting Pot”.

Just as Ning Cheng wanted to turn away from the circular building, his ears twitched and he stopped. From the next building a few people were coming out, it was their talks and remarks that attracted him.

“Looking at that person going all out against that brute really does not have any meaning, it really did not feel good that we lost today’s silver coins, not only we didn’t get to see any wonderful things, but also ended up losing money.”

“The last battle between Gu Fei and that ugly Ji can definitely be called splendid, little did I expect that Gu Fei wouldn’t even be an opponent for the ugly Ji”

“Ji Luo Fei may be ugly, but she knows the importance of cultivation. She defeated Gu Fei and got the Qi Gathering Stone too. A Qi Gathering Stone, ah, it really makes me envious. But it seems that even her injuries were not light, once his elder brother Gu Yuming comes back, I guess she will have to spit out what she took. Even if Gu Yuming does not come back, Ge Fei is not of the forgiving type.”

“She is not necessarily ugly, she only has disfigured face, otherwise can you find someone who has a better figure than her in the entire Academy? Even Jian Su Jie, is not as ……”

“Don’t talk anymore, do you not want to live, daring to say such things about Senior Apprentice Sister Jian”

……

As the few people went away, blue veins popped on Ning Cheng’s fists as he clutched at them tightly. Ning Cheng did not go inside the “Fighting Pot”, but he could already imagine that inside there, were many bloody fights that went on, it was similar to the underground boxing scene back on Earth. He did not think that not only did Ji Luo Fei obtain the Qi Gathering Stone from such a hard to get place, but it even left some serious side effects for her.

That Gu Fei and his brother Gu Yuming, listening to those people, it seemed that they were not willing to let off Ji Luo Fei.

Ning Cheng did not have the mood to continue strolling casually, he just bought some arbitrary dry rations and hurried back to the Seventh Floor of the Cultivation Tower. He wanted to speed up the pace of his cultivation, and reach the Qi Gathering 4th Level as soon as possible. In this place, only if you had strength, would you have dignity.

As usual, there were very few amount of students cultivating on the Seventh Floor of the Cultivation Tower. Ning Cheng, after cleaning up several of the Cultivation Rooms, directly entered and locked himself in his small stone room and began his cultivation of Qi.

The students inside the Cultivation Rooms, once they went inside and closed the door of the Cultivation Room, the Qi inside the room would increase exponentially. But Ning Cheng did not have such a treatment in his small stone room when he was cultivating behind closed doors.

Once Ning Cheng started gathering Qi, in his mind, once again appeared a new flow which he immediately started using. Because he had not only mastered the Concealing Technique before but even had improved it, Ning Cheng did not even hesitate for half a heartbeat and directly went ahead and abandoned the thin leather book that was the Ning Clan’s Cultivation Manual and started directly practicing cultivation according to the modified Cultivation Method that had appeared in his mind.

The Qi from the outside, had no effect on Ning Cheng, as he began to cultivate, at the same time, from his Dantian, just like before, it provided a much purer and strong Qi from its source. Ning Cheng let this Qi wash all over him and allowed it to flow through all of his Meridians throughout his body.

Ning Cheng, because of his previous experience did not panic, he discovered that the Cultivation Method that his mind has mysteriously created was much more effective than the Cultivation Method from the thin leather book of the Ning Clan. Even the Qi flowing in the Meridians was much more smooth and was flowing ten times faster than what was described in book.

When Ning Cheng woke up again, he was already at the Qi Gathering 2nd Level, and his body oozed a large amount of filth again.

Feeling more powerful than when he was at the Qi Gathering 1st Level, Ning Cheng knew, that he had without any doubt advanced to the Qi Gathering 2nd Level. Forgetting about the time, he actually cultivated for two days and nights in a row.

In addition to feeling hungry, he only felt a drum like fluctuation in the air. Ning Cheng did not dare to continue cultivating, he knew that he had committed a major offence, as he did not clean the Cultivation Rooms for two days.

Fortunately, he knew that very few people cultivated on the Seventh Floor’s Cultivation Rooms, he reaffirmed in his heart that Elder Mu would not really come to find him. Because of this belief, Ning Cheng did not immediately go out to clean the Cultivation Rooms, but instead continued to cultivate a new spell, Dust Removal Technique. So that after every time he cultivates, he could easily remove the filth on his body, without going downstairs to search for water to clean himself.

On the early morning of the third day, Ning Cheng successfully used the Dust Removal Technique on himself, and then went out to clean the Cultivation Rooms.

Sure enough, there were not many people cultivating in the Cultivation Rooms on the Seventh Floor. Even if he did not come to clean the rooms for three days, there were still a few Cultivation Rooms that were still empty.

……

The next day, Ning Cheng not only hid himself in the Seventh Floor of the Cultivation Tower, but also made use of the opportunity to clean the Cultivation Room to cultivate all kinds of techniques. The only regret was that, when he cultivated the various techniques in the Cultivation Room, he did not have the support of the mystic atmosphere that was present in the rooms.

Time flew by, and in a blink of an eye, almost ten days flew by. In this period, Ji Luo Fei had not come to visit Ning Cheng. Ning Cheng also rarely got out, his entire heart and mind were focussed on cultivation.

However, when he advanced to the Qi Gathering 3rd Level, he was somewhat startled. After cultivating to the Qi Gathering 3rd Level, he could no longer sense the mysterious source in his body which had helped him till now. Ning Cheng was very clear, that if he did not have the support from the mysterious source, then even if he cultivated for a lifetime, he would never be promoted from the Qi Gathering 3rd Level to the Qi Gathering 4th Level.

A few days later, Ning Cheng had been cultivating repeatedly, but he was unable to get to the situation where the mysterious source in his body would provide him with the thick and pure Qi. As a result, his cultivation stagnated, he could only successfully cultivate a few simple techniques. After he successfully advanced to the Qi Gathering 3rd Level, under the guidance of the modified Cultivation Method, he was able to master the Fireball Technique and even improved it into the Flame Edge Technique.

Even then, Ning Cheng was anxious to the extreme, he knew that if he did not have the support of the mysterious source in his body, then he would only be stuck at the Qi Gathering 3rd Level for the rest of his life.

Ning Cheng decided to go look for Ji Luo Fei, since he could not progress any further in his cultivation, he did not want to stay inside this small stone room. He had just tidied up a bit and had not opened the door, when he heard a “boom” sound as the door of the small stone room was directly kicked open by a foot.

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