1 Below Average Beginnings

Early in the morning a long snaking line stood in front of a rectangular window of a two storey building. A young man with an ordinary face sat on a table facing the window. He wore a dark green robe with black borders and the words treasure hall written on the chest. Further back one could see a stern faced middle aged man wearing a robe written with the same words but of grey colour sitting cross legged with eyes closed and head down. At the window the first in line young man in green robes handed a three finger wide and a finger long token to the man which he placed on a foot wide pattern on the right side of the table. The pattern was filled with concentric circles and simple geometric shapes interspersed with some tadpole like characters. It had an empty circular space at the center just right to fit the token. The moment the token was put into the circular space the pattern glowed with a green light for a breath following which the treasure hall personnel returned the token along with two palm size bottles filled with green and pink liquids and a bottle with thirty grey pills within and the young man left with his items. The next person in the line then handed his token.

Every now and then the pattern would flash with a red light and the token holder leaves despondent with only the liquid bottles and without the pills.

After waiting close to half an hour it was finally Zhang Wuji's turn. He gave his token took his items and walked south for around twenty minutes reaching a small building. Beyond the building one could see a four meter tall stone wall and a six meter tall and four meter wide unadorned simple metal gate. Young men and women wearing green and yellow robes could be seen around the wide open gate. Extending from above the walls a faint yellow coloured light shield could be seen. It is the product of a formation that covers the whole sect like an upside down bowl to make sure that entry and exit is only through the gates and purifies and fills the air within with spiritual energy.

The entrance to the building faces the road that leads directly to the deeper parts of the sect from the gate. It is the first building one would see after entering through the gates apart from the guard structures. Zhang Wuji entered the building showed his token to the yellow robed girl at the reception desk waited for a few minutes and left with a big box and walked towards his room.

After reaching his room Zhang Wuji put the box down on his bed and sat beside it. He looked at the three meter long and two meter wide room which had nothing except a table a chair a bed and his bag of belongings under the bed and sighed.

'It's been three days. I'm afraid this is real. I'm screwed.'

It's indeed been three days since he came to this world. In the beginning he thought it was a dream. Although dreams aren't usually this realistic but he thought that maybe he was having a lucid dream that he had only heard about. Or maybe all dreams are realistic but the realistic feeling fades away when you wake up. But after experiencing the dream for the three days it was becoming difficult to continue believing that this is a dream. Especially after enthusiastically trying a hand at cultivating for the past few days.

Yes it is a world of cultivation, cultivating for immortality like the ones he read in novels. And that conclusion terrified him. Although he often fantasized about being in a world of cultivation and doing all kinds of amazing feats but fantasizing is just that. He knew how difficult and torturous it would be for someone from modern day earth to live in such a world. Especially for someone like him. His life on earth started off good. His parents weren't rich but they had more than enough to live a life of comfort. He lived in a free democratic country where he had the freedom to do whatever he wanted. Convenience to get whatever he wanted at his doorstep. Although there was crime, that only happened in movies and the news far away from him. He breezed through much of his schooling and got arrogant at how easy it was for him compared to majority of those around him. There sure were geniuses but again only in the movies and news. From arrogance began his fall. He got complacent and lazy. He spent all his time reading novels and fantasizing thinking he could study later. But unfortunately that time never came. He then failed repeatedly and developed an inferiority complex which later evolved to cowardice. He lived a below average life with a below average job.

Cultivation needs diligence. He doesn't have it. Cultivation needs a strong will. He doesn't have it. Cultivation needs patience. He doesn't have it. Cultivation needs courage and he did not have that either.

In trying to cultivate in the past three days he found that cultivation also needs a high tolerance to pain and also that he has a very low tolerance to it. Living here is going to be hell for him. Starting now he has to live in constant fear. Fear that while walking on the road he would fail to move aside fast enough and come in the way of some young master's carriage. Fear that in a restaurant a young master would find that his face doesn't go well with whatever he is eating. Fear that some young lady would see him looking at her and gouge out his eyes or maybe some young master would take him as a rival and have him killed. Fear that someone will find out that he is not a native to this world and experiment on him and torture him. They were random cliche filler chapters he once found annoying that now have become his nightmare. There are beast attacks, two random strong cultivators fighting in the vicinity, a dragon sneezing, a strong being getting annoyed for no reason at all and a whole bunch of reasons that could lead to his doom. Without a cheat, a golden finger he is as good as dead. In the past three days there were no Ding!s in his head nor was there some amazing object that he encountered. He could only hope that there is some condition that has yet to be satisfied before his system is activated or he would get the cheat level item in the following days.

His present circumstances weren't something to rejoice over either. The body he was now inhabiting is one with average talent. The previous owner Zhang Wuji also happened to have a low tolerance to pain and therefore his cultivation speed is lower than average cultivators making him overall a below average cultivator. Although he did get Zhang Wuji's memories he did not feel his soul power which should, going by the knowledge he gained from reading novels, show in mental capabilities grow at all. He still takes a similar amount of time to do calculations and memorize stuff.

Now onto Zhang Wuji's identity.

Zhang Wuji is the only son of the Zhang family head. Zhang family lords over Eagle Mountain city a few hundreds of kilometres from the White Serenity sect where they send their talented young ones to study cultivation. Zhang Wuji could enter the sect only because his father is the family head otherwise with his third grade spirit root it would've been impossible for him with his low tolerance to enter the sect. There are three ways to enter the sect. One is the normal way through selection which is open to all who manage to arrive on the selection day. Second is the money way. One has to pay one hundred gold as fees to enter the sect. Even then one has to have atleast a third grade spirit root. By the way to understand how costly it is let's have a comparison. Ten silver which is equal to a thousand copper coins is enough to feed a family of four three times a day for a month. And a hundred silver coins equal a gold coin in value. The third way is through recommendation and only the elders and above have the power to recommend.

The selection process is very straight forward. Your spirit root grade is below three you fail. Older than twenty and still in body refinement realm you fail. Older than fifteen and below sixth level of body refinement you fail. Spirit root fourth grade or above you pass. For third graders they need to go through a will power and comprehension test. Depending on the results they either pass or fail. Fifth graders and those fourth graders with good results in the following two tests are considered as talents and are greatly nurtured. Those above fifth grade spirit root are fought for by the elders and above members of the sect to have as their personal disciples.

Zhang Wuji is a second class outer disciple of the White Serenity sect. There is not much difference between second and third class disciples. Only that second class disciples are rich and pay a monthly fees to the sect and are exempted from doing the compulsory work that third class disciples are required to do. On the other hand first class disciples are real talents with atleast a fourth grade spirit root and good comprehension ability and will power. They need not work need not pay fees and enjoy more benifits than the others. They are given special courtyards to live in unlike the single room within a big rectangular building that Zhang Wuji is currently living in. They are given opportunities to learn from the alchemists, tool refiners and formation masters of the sect for free. Everything that is sold in the sect they could buy with a ten percent discount. Unlike the grey failed pills given to others they are provided with low quality complete white pills. Even their pink and green liquids are of a higher concentration.

The Zhang family sends their most talented members to the White Serenity sect every year to participate in the selection along with those with status enough to move money in case they lack in the talent area. That being the case Zhang Wuji should have had a relatively easy life with senior members of his family looking after him in the sect but that is far from the truth. His father named him Wuji in hopes that he wouldn't be limited by any bounds but he shackled himself with his cowardly and timid nature. His timid nature made it such that despite all the resources his father sends him every month he had only reached body refining level four after four long years in the sect. An average cultivator given the same resources could've easily reached level six or even level seven. This branded him as trash and hence unworthy to inherit the head position. What followed were family politics and the senior family members in the sect boycotting him favouring his second uncle's son Zhang Chen. Atleast he isn't bullied by them.

Temporarily done with lamenting his fate Zhang Wuji opened the box which had two smaller boxes within labelled nourishing and healing respectively. They contain the herbs that his father sends monthly for his cultivation.

'Alright let's cultivate for a while. That's the only thing I can count on for now.'

'Cultivation in this world follows most xianxia novels. Starting with body refinement followed by qi condensation, foundation building, core formation and nascent soul realms. White Serenity sect's sect master is a core formation realm cultivator. The sect doesn't have a nascent soul realm cultivator. In fact according to the previous owner's memories there is only one nascent soul realm cultivator in the Frost Swallow country and he is the ancestor of the Yi family that rules over the country. I'm sure there are more cultivation realms and greater countries out there but this fellow doesn't know it. If I were to ever reach nascent soul realm these things will pop out and I'll forever be in danger.' Zhang Wuji rolled his eyes and grunted in frustration.

Body refinement strengthens the body with spiritual energy of heaven and earth. It involves three steps one exercise two nourish and three heal. Exercise involves normal body movement along with some breathing techniques. Body movement is similar to normal mortal exercise. Depending on the manual it could be something like stationary poses or some dynamic movements or even beating oneself up. The important part is really the corresponding breathing technique. The main point of body refinement is strengthening with spiritual energy but you haven't yet reached the realm of qi condensation and therefore you won't even be able to sense the flow of spiritual energy around you. That's where breathing techniques come. They guide the spiritual energy to enter your body and circulate in a manner such that it nurtures the body. This is what makes a body refinement manual beyond mortal and precious. Mortal exercise can at most take you to the third level of body refinement and it would take a long period of time for that. Even with breathing techniques it is still time taking and that's where nourishment comes where you use different medicinal ingredients to nourish the body and thus speed up the cultivation. The body truly grows in the period of rest where it heals and that's where the heal part comes which further shortens rest time with again medicinal ingredients. Therefore the nourish and heal steps of body refinement are very very costly for an average beginner in cultivation.

The manual comes with a chant which helps in increasing the efficiency of absorption of the medicinal ingredients. The chant is made up of a bunch of sounds which vibrate your upper body at a certain frequency. Each chant needs to be clubbed together with trembling of some muscles. The coordination and everything is a big hassle but thankfully the previous owner of this body has been doing the same for four years and the body comes with muscle memory so he did not need to go through the trouble of learning it. It took the previous occupant several months to get it right of course mainly because of his low tolerance to pain but still it takes a couple of months for an average cultivator.

'Enough thinking let's cultivate.'