3 Cultivation!

When Renard next opened his eyes, he was saw only darkness around him. He was back in the void. He decided it was best not to panic, certain that the system would appear in a moment to clear his confusion.

*DING*

[You have passed out due to shock. Estimated time remaining: 34 minutes and 16 seconds.]

Renard glanced at the screen and then dismissed the notification. 'That isn't important right now. What did that scan just say? I wonder if there is a notification history?' As he thought this, a prompt appeared in front of his eyes.

[You can bring up the entire notification list by thought. Additionally, you can apply filters to your results. These include key words, time, date and category. Just think the query you would like to sort.]

'Cool! Can you search notifications for Lucy's Scan please?' His thoughts were shameless and oddly polite.

[One result found! Displaying.]

~~ [Scan of 'Lucy' Complete] ~~

~~ [##ERROR##] ~~

~~ Name: Laurence ~~

~~ Gender: Male ~~

~~ Age: 8 ~~

~~ Cultivate Stage: Unknown ~~

~~ Level: Unknown ~~

Renard felt a sense of relief wash over his body. 'I did read it correctly. It did say there was an error. I hope that means this entire result is wrong. Surely it was wrong. How could such a beautiful woman be....' He didn't feel very optimistic.

'No! Its not possible, even if I didn't see under her clothes. There was no chance that she was 8, she had perfectly developed proportions.' Renard at least knew that, the silk-like material that was draped over Lucy's body created a silhouette that he was certain of.

With his confidence restored, he had a thought about another option from the scan. 'Cultivation Stage? Does this mean I can cultivate? SYSTEM, how do I cultivate?'

[To cultivate, you will need a cultivation technique! Once you learn one, you can use the 'Aided Cultivation' protocol.]

'I knew I would have an advantage in this world, haaah.' He let out a breath as the stress released from his body. Renard had finally found out what his goal was, what he wanted to be in this world. He wanted to be the strongest, so he could finally step on everyone underneath his foot.

'Now, how to get a cultivation technique. Maybe the system can provide me one. System give me a cultivation technique please!' However, the response he expected did not arrive. No noise echoed in his ears, nor any text in front of his eyes.

'I guess I will have to find another way. I need to look for a town when I wake up. Maybe there are some readily available techniques I can use. For now I need to wait until I wake up.' He decided to wait in his thoughts, for the timer to count down and to awake.

As the timer was nearing its end, Renard suddenly had a thought. 'If I hadn't let myself get so attached to women, I would've had much a much smoother life, well both my lives.'

Along with this thought, the void that Renard was in started to rumble. Although it was impossible tell, Renard could've sworn that he felt the void getting larger. The countdown timer suddenly dropped from over 10 mins to zero. A suction force appeared directly above Renard as he was forced awake.

A buzzing pain rang through his body, his senses started to clear as he realised the situation that had evolved around him. He was on his back. An itchy feeling was felt over his body. The sounds of hooves crunching through gravel entered his ears, a warm breeze washed across his body and the distinct smell of animal life blasted though his nose.

Renard was laying in the back of a wagon, resting on some chopped wheat. He body felt weak and groggy, yet his vision was clear. There was an wrinkled old man who sat at the front of the wagon. He held on to a set of reigns which were tight towards the front. A straw hat covered his face in a shadow but the clear details of a man who had hard his whole life were defined enough to be seen.

Renard sat himself up, attracting the attention of the old man. A deep, raspy voice entered his ears. "Finally awake. I don't know what you were doing out there, but you were sitting there in a pool of your own bloody vomit. You're lucky that the wild beasts out there didn't catch the scent. Don't bother givin' me an explanation either. The town guard are offering 6 copper for any young adventurers brought back. The new town lord is supposedly trying to raise talents. Don't see how me carrying your sorry a*s back is going to help that." Renard felt quite displeased with this man, but he couldn't criticise, he did supposedly save his life.

"Most people don't bother with the effort. You're just lucky I don't like seeing people die for no good reason. I won't be there to pick you up in the future, try to be a little less reckless. You've got a long life ahead of you, I wish you younger generation would look at your elders, we know how to last."

He continued. "Anyway, you must be someone special. I felt a spiritual disturbance from you a moment ago, spooked my horses. You must do that cultivation that the bigger cities are obsessed with."

Renard was shocked, he blurted out his words. "You know about cultivation?"

"Of course I do. Everyone around town is talking about it nowadays. They know nothing though. I've travelled around this land and seen truly powerful cultivators at work. Its how I noticed the spiritual disturbance coming off you."

"How do I get a cultivation technique?!" Renard jumped towards the old man. Glaring eyes stared at him, immense desire rooted deep within them.

A thought appeared in the old man's mind. 'He must be a genius to make a spiritual disturbance without a cultivation technique. I guess I can help him a little bit.'