34 Different Mindsets
Jack returned to his bed, closed his eyes, and started to sort out the new information in his brain.
'Pseudo-philosophical mumbo-jumbo, nonsense, horrible advice…' After twenty minutes he discarded more than 70% of the new memories as useless drivel and focused on the real core of the Air Blast spell.
'Send out strands of spirit energy and make a complex structure, which seems like it has parts of several different sigils in it, out of them in the air. They all have to assemble in the correct order and with the correct amount of spirit energy, or it will fail.' Jack opened his eyes and sighed as he looked down at his hand.
'No wonder the others waved their fingers around when they used their techniques, it's gonna suck making this thing work without their help.' He thought as he slightly focused and connected all of his fingers with a strand of spirit energy, and brought them closer and further apart rhythmically while he thought about how to proceed.
Ten minutes later he stood up and went to Kuang Bindun's house. There he took a few sheets of cheap paper and charcoal and went back home. Kuang Bindun liked to keep extra materials for writing and drawing in his free time.
He sat down at his table and started drawing the picture from his brain on the page. It felt real in his brain like it just happened to him every time he recalled it, but he needed something more tangible.
A few minutes later he clucked his tongue in dissatisfaction, turned the paper over, and started drawing again. Like this, he went through four sheets of coarse paper before he felt satisfied that the thing he drew looked like what his new memories told him his spirit energy had to look like.
With a satisfied smile, Jack got up from his chair and sat down on the middle of the bed, with his back leaning on the wall. He held the paper propped on his left knee with his left hand and started making connections between the fingers of his right hand.
He had to connect all of his fingers with each other, a total of ten connections that had to keep cycling his spirit energy as a part of the same cultivation cycle.
The three connections that he managed to establish collapsed when he failed to keep them stable while he started to connect his pinky and his thumb. He ignored the failure and started from scratch.
An hour later Jack managed to connect all of his fingers and keep the connections in one whole and stable cultivation cycle. He rewarded himself with a slight smile and wiped the sweat from his brow.
While holding the just drawn picture next to his right hand, Jack started focusing on the next step of the spell. He had to make the spirit energy strands rise into the air to form the complex structure while still maintaining the energy flow and intensity.
At first, he tried to will one of the strands to move up a few centimeters, but that only made the flow of energy become unstable and caused the collapse of all of the strands.
Jack frowned and tried it a few dozen more times, this time with just one strand connecting two fingers, but he couldn't make the strand move up without collapsing the flow.
'How do those primitives do this? It can't all just be self-hypnosis and natural talent.' Jack complained as he looked around the room for inspiration.
His gaze stopped on the table, after a second he looked towards the door, and then down at his right index finger. 'How did that strand of energy know to enter the rock? In my delirium, I even aimed to the side a little.' Jack thought as he kept looking from his finger to the table.
After a minute of contemplation, his eyes widened as he murmured "It can't be that simple."
Jack made a connection between his thumb and forefinger, looked up to a spot ten centimeters above the strand of spirit energy, and imagined that the strand's route had to flow through that spot for the cycle to work properly.
A few seconds of twitchy movement later, the strand made a perfect curve between his thumb and forefinger.
Jack cursed, stood up from the bed, and threw the pillow at the wall while thinking 'Those morons! How come they don't kill themselves ten times before lunch?!' He suddenly stopped and looked at his door, gave a self-deprecating smirk, and picked up the pillow from the floor.
As he sat back down on the bed he thought 'Maybe some of those inane ramblings make them more careful? They do bind them to stricter rules, but that might keep them alive for longer also.'
Jack considered the merits of attempting to cultivate in the way the people from this world did for a split second and rejected the idea resolutely.
Once more he slowly connected all of his fingers with spirit energy strands and took a deep breath. He glanced at the picture that he drew for confirmation and made the first strand rise to its proper position.
When he felt satisfied that it looked right, he focused on the second strand and made it connect to the first strand half way up the arc. Next, he had to move two strands at the same time, and then merge them into one strand. He failed this step and everything collapsed.
For the next hour he merged and molded the strands as the picture in his mind, and on the paper, suggested. Sometimes he would rely on the information in his mind to make a connection that he couldn't do from just observing the drawing, and sometimes the drawing would make him realize the right position in which he had to place the strands so that they retained their form.
Little by little he managed to connect nine of the ten strands in the required form that the Air Blast spell required.
As he moved the last spiritual energy strand into position a voice from outside yelled "Tanda, are you here?"
With a snap of his head, Jack looked up towards the door and saw Kuang Bindun slide it open. He had a pleasantly surprised expression on his face as he started saying "Oh, you're back. I'm going to get some food from old Long, do you want someth…"
Jack stopped paying him any attention as he felt something happening above the palm of his hand. He looked down and saw the last strand of spirit energy successfully merging into the complex structure that floated above his hand.
In the split second that it started to shine brightly as it fell apart, Jack turned his palm over and pointed it at the doorway, and the confused Kuang Bindun.
The next moment Jack had to close his eyes shut as all of the air got sucked out of the room towards his palm and then got shot out towards the doorway.
As it did Jack opened his eyes and saw Kuang Bindun's hair fly around his head as he grunted and took a step back, more in surprise than from any air force that Jack generated.
Kuang Bindun rubbed his dried eyes a few with his hands as he said "What happened?" He squinted through one eye at the insides of the house and asked "You alright, Tanda?"
Jack's voice came from the inside as he said "Yeah, I'm fine. Just testing out a new trick."
Kuang Bindun froze for a second before realization showed on his face as he asked "Did Elder Yu give you a technique to use?"
Jack walked out of his house as he answered "Yeah, something like that." He glanced back into his home and saw all of his furniture scattered all over the floor.
With a sigh and a shake of his head, he said "Let's go, I'll keep you company." and followed the pleasantly surprised Kuang Bindun down to the Tranquil Lake Town.
After their group evening meal, where everyone from the unit joined in with their stories and laughter, Jack walked to a moonlit clearing and started to practice the Air Blast spell again.
He got used to staying up late long ago due to the graveyard shifts so he had no problems with spending hours in practice of the spell.
Just as he released his last Air Blast and started to feel his new and improved dantian run dry, he heard a soft noise of cloth brushing against a leaf from behind him and turned around.
To his surprise Du Angliang's handsome face greeted him. With time he managed to make his broken nose work to make him look more rugged.
Du Angliang had a slightly startled expression on his face, which he quickly hid as he saw Jack looking at him.
Jack furrowed his brows lightly and asked "What?"
Du Angliang put on a cold smile and said "We can hear the blasts from the houses. The other worms feel too much fear towards you to come and complain, but I want to sleep. I had a long night."
Jack's face turned serious as he said "They're not worms, they're my friends and colleagues. They know that this is important for me so they gifted me some free time to practice, something you won't ever know anything about."
"Hmpf!" Du Angliang snorted coldly and jeered "I do not need weights around my ankles. Just stop the racket and go to bed, I have to bring you around with me tomorrow and I do not want Elder Yu to think that I have not taught you well enough just because you did not get enough sleep to pay attention."
Jack scoffed as he said, "Don't worry, unlike you I've kept my sleep hours down to a minimum during my whole stay here, and I'm not planning to…"
Suddenly this whole thing seemed ridiculous to Jack as he thought 'What am I doing? Arguing with a child about irrelevant things? For what? Pride? I left that behind me long ago.'
After a confusing moment of silence to Du Angliang, Jack took a deep breath, looked into Du Angliang's eyes, and said "Look, I don't want to argue with you anymore. Tomorrow's your last day, and I'll do everything necessary to learn what you have to teach so that the Elder gives you praise."
He started walking towards the houses as he added "I just finished my practice before you arrived. Let's go to bed."
Du Angliang stood frozen for a few seconds, but then he hurried after Jack and started to walk in step with him. After a dozen seconds, he tentatively said "You have to concentrate the structure of your spell more, and not let so much of your spirit energy leak out if you plan to use it for anything more than for a nice breeze on a warm day."
After that, he sped his steps up and walked into the night in front of Jack.
With brows raised in surprise, Jack watched Du Angliang's disappearing back and thought 'Maybe there's hope for some of the people here.'
