Chapter 8Chen Zhen felt a swelling, painful feeling in his dantian. Hearing Shanggu Julong"s words made him begin to hyper ventilate and panic. Chen Zhen never paid attention to how much energy he took in because the wisp of dragon lightening would always circulate the energy for him. Now for some reason he didn"t understand it wasn"t moving the energy for him anymore.
As Shanggu Julong saw how scared Chen Zhen was he knew he had to intervene before things got out of hand.
"I already explained to you that this world is full of spiritual energy that far exceeds anything you have ever experienced before in your life, yet you still took it for granted. If you couldn"t drink more then a handful of water from the stream outside, why would you think that you could eat as much food as you wanted? When you were running laps around the clearing you observed how much energy just breathing the air brought you. Yet you failed to discern that the food would also contain abundant heaven and earth energy? You cannot fumble around and a.s.sume I will be there to fix your every mistake. Your life is at stake at every turn in this world. If you aren"t absolutely careful at all times you could pick a fruit from a tree and die from too much energy because you picked a spiritual fruit that is beyond you level of control. Or you could die from the spirit or demon beast that has been guarding that same fruit for countless years waiting for it to mature. This is not your world! The sooner you come to understand this the safer you will be. Now sit down on the floor." Shanggu Julong pretended to be upset there at the end, but he felt it was the only to get Chen Zhen to start to take things more seriously
Chen Zhen knew he had made a huge mistake. He was so hungry and the food was so good that everything he had learned so far just went right out his mind. With his life on the line and seeing how he had angered Shanggu Julong, Chen Zhen now felt that if he made it past this safely he would strive to be more independent. Just because he was under Shanggu Julong"s tutelage that didn"t mean he was always safe. He had to treat everything as if it would kill him at any moment. That was the only way Chen Zhen felt he could guarantee his own safety. As Chen Zhen sat on the floor he crossed his legs and inclined his head to look at Shanggu Julong. Chen Zhen was no longer panicked or hyper ventilating, he was now fully focused on what Shanggu Julong had to say.
As Shanggu Julong saw the sudden change in Chen Zhen he was immediately surprised, he had to steel his face to prevent it from showing. The more he observed Chen Zhen the more he felt he was actually worthy of being his disciple. Shanggu Julong at first agreed to teach Chen Zhen out of guilt. The reason he attacked the airplane that Chen Zhen was in was because he had mistook it for a avian beast. When he sensed all the life forms inside of it and he thought some Demon beast had attacked a small village and eaten all of its inhabitants. It wasn"t until Shanggu Julong had flown around Chen Zhen"s world and read the minds of many of its people that he learned of his terrible mistake. Shanggu Julong stayed on Chen Zhen"s Earth as long as he could to learn as much as he could from this strange and exotic planet. A lot of the scientific knowledge from Chen Zhen"s world help him to understand his martial Dao better. As Shanggu Julong had been meditating on some of the things he learned he actually felt he was getting close to a breakthrough. As Shanggu Julong was finally returning to his world he felt a wisp of his spiritual energy entering his world ahead of him. When he saw that not only was Chen Zhen still alive but he was adapting and resisting the pressure from Shanggu Feng and Lou Tian, he made the decision that if he managed to survive this ordeal with his meager strength then he would do whatever he could to help him.
Now that Shanggu Julong saw the courage and resolution in Chen Zhen"s character, he felt Chen Zhen was much stronger mentally then he first gave him credit for. "Maybe Chen Zhen isn"t the ant we mistook him for.", Shanggu Julong thought to himself.
"The wisp of my dragon lightening that has been helping you all this time has been removed by me.", Shanggu Julong said as he started to instruct Chen Zhen, "If you had been paying attention to it you would have known by now the correct pathway to use to circulate the energy stored in your dantian to help strengthen your body. Use that you have learned to move the energy in your body around. Judging by the way your dantian is swelling you only have about and hour or two left so you better hurry up and remember." With that Shanggu Julong got up and left the shack.
Chen Zhen was stunned….! "That"s it… I"m just supposed to remember something that you knew I wasn"t paying attention to? How am I supposed to do that, you must want me to die?"
Chen Zhen didn"t know what to do or where even to begin. He tried to move the energy in his body but it kept causing him more and more pain. Chen Zhen was trying to stay calm but the increasing pain in his dantian was like a clock counting down to his death. Chen Zhen started to take in deep slow breaths to try and clear his mind to help him think better. It was then that he remembered that clone of himself that he left in his sea of consciousness. When he thought of the clone he was instantly taken right back inside his sea of consciousness.
[I know how to help you], Chen Zhen heard the clone say.
"What do I need to do?", Chen Zhen asked.
The Clone walked up to Chen Zhen and placed his finger on Chen Zhen"s glabella. A bright light flashed and Chen Zhen was brought back to when he was running laps. He could see himself but he could also see inside of himself. Chen Zhen could see exactly were the wisp of dragon lightening was going inside of his body. When Chen Zhen looked down at himself he could see inside of himself again. As Chen Zhen was running beside himself in his memory he was having difficulty moving the energy and running at the same time.
"I WISH THIS MEMORY WOULD JUST STOP MOVING!", Chen Zhen shouted in his head. To his delight and surprise it actually did. Chen Zhen thought and sudden he zoomed in on just the wisp of energy. It was like controlling a video except the video was in 3D. This made tings extremely simple for Chen Zhen. Soon he was circulating the energy properly and he could feel the swelling in his dantian reducing. Chen Zhen felt this was very comfortable to him so he began to circulate his energy faster. As he was doing this he felt that something wasn"t right. It wasn"t that he was doing it wrong, but that it just wasn"t what was for him. Now that he was paying attention to what he was doing he remembered this feeling was always there.
[I can fix this for you.], the clone told Chen Zhen.
"Really, how?" Chen Zhen asked
[Change the circulation pathway so that it feeds me too. Then I will have the energy need to figure out the right pathways to better suit you], the clone responded.
As the clone said this a new circulation pathway opened up. As Chen Zhen tried this new method he instantly felt mind becoming clearer. He felt his memories becoming easier to recall. He was amazed by how much his mind was expanding.
From Shanggu Julong"s point of view it was the most amazing thing he had ever seen. Even though Chen Zhen thought it took him m awhile, to the outside world it happened almost instantly. As far as Shanggu Julong knew Chen Zhen sat down and just started cultivating. He had never seen anyone take to cultivating so smoothly and swiftly. Chen Zhen was like a fish in water.
"Have I discovered a cultivation genius?", Shanggu Julong asked in bewilderment….
Now that Chen Zhen knew how to cultivate he quickly used up the energy he had stored in his dantian. He opened his eyes and looked at he steaming food that was still on the table.
[We need more energy. You go eat and I will cultivate for us.] The clone suggested to Chen Zhen.
"You can do that?"
[Yes that is very easy for me]
"Great this is going to be so much easier. I"ll eat and you cultivate. Twice the reward for half the work!", Chen Zhen thought excitedly.
As he sat back down to eat Shanggu Julong got very angry with him, thinking that Chen Zhen wasn"t taking his warning seriously. But he was soon dumbfounded when he noticed that as soon as the energy entered into his body it would be swiftly circulated around his body. Chen Zhen was actually cultivating while he eat! Even though this wasn"t a major achievement because any cultivator that had been cultivating for a year or more could easily accomplish the same thing. The reason Shanggu Julong was so astonished was because Chen Zhen had never cultivated before today. This was unprecedented, this was beyond genius status! He had to think of an entirely new training regiment for Chen Zhen now. Even for an Immortal cultivator like himself, training Chen Zhen was going to be exciting.
As Shanggu Julong got lost in his revelry about how to torture, I mean train Chen Zhen in the future. Chen Zhen was noticing a new bloated feeling in his dantian. But this time it wasn"t painful like before, it was actually quite pleasant.
[I think we are about to level up...]