The knowledge that Jian Xuan and Krell were still alive didn't stop the feeling of isolation from creeping in. For the first time in a while, Li Yu felt truly small in the vastness of the world. There was a feeling of loneliness that he didn’t expect.

  He flew until the sun began to dip below the horizon, painting the sky in hues of bruised purple and orange. He spotted a secluded mountain range in the distance. It was not a famous cultivation site or a known location of a village. It was just a wild and nameless cluster of peaks covered in dense forests.

  ‘Down there,’ Li Yu instructed.

  Tekton circled and descended. He landed in a small clearing beside a rushing mountain stream. The water was crystal clear and looked to be fed by snowmelt from the higher peaks.

  Li Yu hopped off and stretched his joints which popped. He walked to the edge of the stream and the water looked so inviting.

  ‘Relax a bit here,’ Li Yu told Tekton.

  ‘Fine,’ Tekton grumbled mentally, like an old man asked to watch the grandkids.

  Tekton lumbered off toward the rocks with his many legs moving in a hypnotic wave.

  Li Yu stripped off his traveler's robes and waded into the water. It was freezing. Cold enough to numb the skin of a mortal instantly but to Li Yu’s tempered body, it felt refreshing. It scrubbed away his worries and provided a nice relief.

  He submerged himself completely, holding his breath, letting the roar of the water fill his ears. Under the water his mind drifted. He thought about the path behind him. How he got to where he is now and all the experiences that have built him to the person he is now.

  He thought about the path ahead. The Seven Sins.

  The name floated in his mind like oil on water. The bastards that destroyed the first and second home that he had ever known. A debt that was waiting to be collected. They probably didn’t know he even existed but he was coming for them.

  ‘I haven't forgotten,’ Li Yu thought while surfacing with a splash. He pushed his wet hair back. "I've been distracted. Having fun. But I haven't forgotten."

  He stared at his reflection in the water. The face looking back was young but the eyes were older.

  "I need to be stronger," he whispered. "If I want to protect my peace and happiness... if I want to ensure that no one takes my quiet days away... I need to be the strongest. Only then can I truly rest." Li Yu fist was shaking with determination.

  He washed quickly after that. The cold water sharpened his resolve.

  Night fell over the mountain like a damp blanket. The air grew crisp and cold.

  Li Yu sat cross-legged on a large flat stone near the stream. A small campfire crackled nearby and was casting dancing shadows on the trees.

  He had arranged a collection of items in front of him. There were no labels next to the items, just raw power. Several jade boxes containing ancient, dried herbs that radiated intense heat. A few vials of shimmering liquid. A handful of pills that glowed with a soft pulsing light.

  These were treasures he had accumulated over his travels, battle and looting on this continent. Well, what was left of them. He had been going through them each night. Resources that would make cultivators fight to the death over them were now all within him in one way or another.

  "Time to work," Li Yu murmured.

  He didn't hesitate. He picked up a stalk of a crimson herb and his Koi martial spirit began absorbing it as it normally did.

  This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

  Most cultivators would need days to refine the medicinal energy, carefully guiding it through their meridians to avoid exploding from the potency. They would need to use breathing techniques to break down the impurities.

  Li Yu just had his Koi swallow it. That was his advantage with his Koi. It was efficient. It was terrifying. Li Yu took a pill and repeated the process. Then another. Then he took the shimmering liquid.

  He consumed a massive amount of energy but his body was able to take it. His aura flared, illuminating the clearing in a kaleidoscope of colors. The trees around him shook. The stream hissed as the heat radiating from him boiled the water near the bank.

  The Koi swam joyfully in the ocean of Qi. Li Yu could feel his strength increasing slightly. His muscles grew even denser, his bones harder. His reserves of Qi expanded, pushing against the walls of his vessel.

  But then, it stopped. He had gone through an immense amount of resources since he had come to this continent but had barely made any progress. The issue laid not with the flesh, it was the soul or something else.

  Li Yu frowned as he had once again failed to reach the next level.He felt the ceiling.

  It wasn't that he couldn't hold more Qi. The vessel could take more. But he couldn't ascend. He was stuck at the peak of his current stage. There was a barrier there. Not a wall of energy that could be smashed with brute force but something more abstract. A conceptual ceiling.

  It was like trying to fill a cup that was already full but the water wasn't spilling over; it was just... stopping, disappearing somewhere.

  He pushed the energy against the barrier again. And again. Nothing. The energy just circulated, making him stronger horizontally but not vertically.

  After an hour of attempts, Li Yu exhaled a long plume of white steam and opened his eyes. The glowing aura faded.

  "Stuck," he muttered.

  He looked at his hands. They were trembling slightly from the sheer volume of power he had just ingested.

  "It's not about the resources anymore," Li Yu realized. "I have enough fuel. But I'm missing the spark."

  He didn't know what it was. Was it a deeper understanding of the Dao? Was it a specific mental state? Or was it something unique to his strange, hybrid cultivation path?

  He didn't know. Not a single clue. But strangely, he wasn't panicked.

  Not long ago hitting a bottleneck would have frustrated him. He would have felt the pressure of his enemies being so much stronger than he was and he himself having so much further to go.

  Now?

  "It's fine," Li Yu said to himself. He began leaning back on his hands and looking up at the stars.

  Rushing had caused mistakes in the past. ‘Cultivation was a marathon where you took it one step at a time. It was not a sprint. If the door didn't open today, I will just camp out in front of it until it did.’ Li Yu thought to himself.

  "Tekton," Li Yu called out.

  The centipede lumbered back into the firelight but his mandibles were dusty from eating. He curled up next to the fire. He looked like a very large, very armored hill.

  ‘You are leaking energy, Li Yu,’ Tekton observed Li Yu. Tekton’s mental voice sounding more like a croaky grandfather. ‘It is wasteful. Like leaving the door open in winter.’

  ‘I hit a wall,’ Li Yu explained back while staring into the fire. ‘I can't break through. It feels... different this time.’

  ‘Walls are meant to be eaten,’ Tekton advised sagely. ‘Or tunneled under. Patience. The rock does not yield to the first strike but to the thousandth year of rain.’

  Li Yu laughed at such a notion. If he had to wait that long he might actually go crazy. He could tell that Tekton was trying to cheer him up though and he began scratching the centipede between his antennae.

  "You're very philosophical for someone who just ate a boulder."

  ‘Rocks are good for the mind,’ Tekton replied, resting his head down. ‘It teaches stability. You rush too much, Li Yu. Sleep. The wall will be there tomorrow. Maybe it will be softer then.’

  "You're right," Li Yu sighed. He poked the fire with a stick and was watching the sparks drift up into the darkness. "Sleep first. Worry later. There is always tomorrow. There will always be another chance."

  He lay back on the stone and was pillowing his head on his arms. The mountain was quiet, save for the crackle of the fire and the rush of the stream. He missed the voices of Si Luo and Bai Ruo.

  But for tonight the quiet peace wasn't so bad.

  "Goodnight, Tekton," Li Yu whispered.

  ‘Goodnight, Li Yu. Do not dream of walls. Dream of open tunnels.’

  Under the canopy of a billion stars, the lazy hero closed his eyes, drifting into a dreamless sleep. He was unaware that the gears of the world were turning and that the quiet days he cherished were unfortunately numbered. But he would face that when it came. For now, he rested.