Chapter 9 – Foundation repairs

As Aki passed his days practicing his weaves, he noticed that he was gradually growing visibly older, at an accelerating pace. The white hairs on his head kept on increasing in number, and his face was beginning to grow more and more wrinkled. He did not however worry. Fundamentally Aki believed that things would always work out well for him in the end. It was part of his "go with the flow" creed. Besides, his progress had been steady so far, and after two weeks of practice he was growing confident enough to try his hand at starting the repairs on his foundation cloth.

It was on a warm summer morning like any other that Aki sat down into a meditating posture in the middle of his courtyard and began steadying his breathing and emptying his mind. The sounds of the nature around him slowly faded away from his perception as he fell deeper into the trance. First the distant sounds of leaves rustling in the wind faded away, soon followed by the chirps of the birds flying about.

Aki had managed to get the hang of the meditation technique, so the process of entering the trance state did not take him long, and soon he could again observe his internal Qi. He started off by studying his fractured foundation cloth again, and this time he could sense the expert work that had gone into weaving it. The patterns were complex and precise, giving the cloth a smooth but firm texture. The exquisite craftsmanship, however, was ruined by the many rips and tears in it. The fractures were not large individually, but there were many of them.

Aki chose a relatively large fracture to study and observed the chaotic Qi roiling inside of it. He carefully reached out with his senses, and gently picked up a strand. It felt to his senses just like any other strand of Qi, and he felt that he could try weaving it into a pattern with the other threads. He of course did not immediately start attempting to repair his foundation cloth; A calm, measured approach should prove the surest. He began to weave the threads into attempted copies of the pattern that his foundation cloth had, and after finishing an attempt, he would unwind the threads and try again.

Actively attempting to weave the pattern did not go that well, so he once again attempted to focus his mind on other things and let his hands act according to their instincts. This did not come to him immediately. It had been a long time since his hands had been used for such a purpose after all. However, he felt faint traces of recognition from his instincts. It was like returning to an activity one had been a master at during childhood, but then not touched since for tens of years.

'Hmm, seems like with steady practice I should become proficient enough to start my repairs. I should maybe hurry up a bit.'

Aki decided to increase the time he had allocated for cultivation practice to ten hours per day, of which he would spend eight hours practicing his foundation repairs, and two hours practicing the techniques he had picked up. Aki diligently practiced weaving internal Qi until the time he had allocated for other techniques arrived.

Aki felt that he wanted a bit of a change from his practice of the [Thread of Fate] technique, so he chose to start practicing the [Karmic Bonds] weave, which should allow him to observe the threads of karma connecting people. Beginning his study of the technique, he noticed that his karmic reincarnation Qi string seemed to resonate particularly well with the technique, giving him further insight into the technique. 'Interesting, I guess reincarnation is also a type of karma thread that connects incarnations to one another.' As a result, he ended up progressing rather rapidly with the technique, getting a basic working version of the technique ready in record time. He could begin to see the threads of karma connecting people, but could not ascertain their nature, or affect them in any way. Satisfied with his progress for the day, Aki set off to his evening leisure activities.

As he continued spending his days attending to his studies, Aki began to grow concerned with a problem. His face was growing more and more old, and he was worried about what other might think once they realised it. Thus, he managed to discreetly acquire a cosmetic cultivation pill by asking Passionate Seeker to get him one for "research purposes".

The pills were generally used by cultivators gaining in their years who wanted to maintain their youthly look. After eating it, Aki noted that the wrinkles that had been forming on his face disappeared overnight, however the white hairs remained. He did not truthfully mind that too much, as it added to his sagely aura. Besides, this was only a stopgap measure. Once he managed to increase his lifespan, his features should return to normal.

Aki had been steadily growing more proficient with weaving his internal Qi for two weeks, and at this point a lot of the lost muscle memory had returned. Aki decided that he was at a good enough level to start the actual repairs on his foundation cloth. He did not strive for perfection, as he did not particularly care about having perfect foundations. As long as it served its purpose well enough, it would do.

The quality of a foundation mainly affected the versatility of a cultivator, not necessarily their power. Depending on how smooth and firm a foundation cloth was, techniques affixed to it would bleed less power, interfering with each other less. Having a higher quality foundation would allow one to affix more techniques to it, as well as have more diverse techniques affixed near each other. Aki was mainly concerned with finishing before he started to experience too may adverse effects from being beyond his allotted lifespan, so he did not care much for quality.

Aki began the long and tedious process of picking up the chaotic threads of Qi and threading them to once more be a part of the cloth they had been torn apart from. It was a bit of a patch-up job, with his foundation cloth beginning to resemble a smooth silk cloth with patches of rougher stitch-work fixing up the bits of damage done to it.

Aki grew more confident and skilled as he continued his weaving, so the quality of his work began to gradually grow. He first repaired the cloth on his limbs, leaving it with the poorest quality work. He left the head, heart and spine cloths for last as he judged that he would want to be especially careful with them.

Slowly but surely, the damage began to be fixed. It had taken him a week to repair his limbs, but his efficiency increased the more he worked, making the next steps progressively faster. Repairing the head cloth took him 5 days, while he completed the heart and spine cloths in only two days.

Aki did not spend all his time on foundation repairs, as he also wanted to make preparations for his eventual chain of hunger breakthrough attempt. At long last, after weeks of hard work, Aki wove the last thread of chaotic Qi into place onto his heart cloth. Finally finished, he collapsed onto the ground in a rather undignified manner and sighed with relief.

'Finally! I was almost starting to get so bored of this stuff. Doing such precise work for hours at a time is way too exhausting! How can cultivators spend years making the whole cloth? I only had to make small repairs, and even that was pretty tough. I know some people find knitting to be a relaxing activity that can be done while watching TV, so maybe it's something like that for them?'

Aki had made rather rapid progress. Sure, the fractures in his cloth had not been too big, but it was still a notable task for a newcomer to the art. Even considering the latent abilities his body possessed, he had made good time. Perhaps his approach of leaving plentiful time to relax and recover had actually paid off? Well, the task was now finished, leaving the final step. It was time to stitch the fractured pieces of his foundation cloth back together using his karmic reincarnation Qi string.

'However, I'll leave that for tomorrow. No point in hurrying pointlessly at this point. It's time for some nice afternoon tea!'

Indeed, even at this point Aki did not hurry, choosing to maintain his chosen path.

Aki woke up the next day energised and excited. He almost started cheerfully skipping towards his courtyard but remembered to return to his sagely state before anyone could witness his disgraceful conduct. After a hurried breakfast, he sat down to prepare for his work.

He first observed his repaired foundation while humming with the satisfaction of a job well done, then began to extend his sights towards his karmic reincarnation Qi string. It felt like pure condensed energy, pulsing with power to the tune of his heartbeat. As he grabbed hold of it, he noted that its length felt difficult to define. It was almost as if its length was just a matter of perception, being at the same time an endless string and a single point of power.

Aki grabbed hold onto one end of the string, leaving the other inside his dantian. As he the dragged the end out of his dantian, the discordant pieces of cloth reacted instantly. The connections they had once shared began to be revealed, almost as if the pieces hungered to once more be united into the whole they had used to be. Aki could see the spots through which the string had been threaded through.

Aki did not actually need to do much at this stage. As soon as he brought the end of the string out, it started threading into place almost by itself. It stretched longer and longer, threading through the connecting pieces of cloth while Aki gently guided it along. On and on it went, until it had travelled through all of his foundation cloth.

Aki brought the end back into the dantian, then also took hold of the one that had been left there and began to gently but firmly pull at both of them. The stitching he had done began to tighten, pulling the various pieces of cloth together into one piece once again. He did not have to struggle as he pulled, as the pieces of cloth were merely returning to their rightful places.

There was a certain sense of harmony to it, and once everything had been connected back together, Aki tied the two ends of the string together, finishing the process. Aki felt his spiritual body pulse with power and his spiritual sense expand. He had reached the second realm of the spiritual realm.

Aki opened his eyes and stood up. He began to observe the changes he felt. He no longer needed to enter the trance-state to observe his internal energies and could now also send his spiritual sense outside of his body. Using it, he could sense the auras of Qi all around him. He could sense the crystal-clear water Qi deeply infused with the small pond in his courtyard, and the weak auras of the birds fluttering above.

Aki observed his surroundings with satisfaction and began to study the changes done to his weaving ability. 'I should now be able to affix weaves directly to my foundation cloth, which should allow me much greater mastery over them.'

Aki formed the weave for his [Thread of Fate] technique and began to attach it to the heart section of his foundation cloth. The weave slowly fused onto the cloth, and Aki could feel his karma Qi beginning to flow into it. He could now feel the imperfections in his weave a lot better.

'Hmm, if I want this technique to be any good, I will have to improve the quality of the weave a lot. It feels like it would be a lot easier to modify it now that it is attached to my foundation cloth. It's like I now have a worktable I can place the weave on while tweaking it, instead of trying to fix it on the go as it floats about in the wind.'

Aki tried calling the technique from his foundation, and it felt like he was creating a copy of the weave within him, rather than making a completely new one from scratch. 'That certainly felt a lot easier than before.' As it was an internal technique, he could now also activate it inside his foundation, allowing him to use it discreetly.

As Aki pushed out with his spiritual sense, he started to feel a vague pressure pushing at him. He felt that he could try to push against the pressure, but that would start an irreversible process. 'Chain of hunger, huh? I guess it's time for the final step.'

His determination reinforced; Aki did not get to work. Rather, he decided to inform Passionate Seeker that his preparations should be made for tomorrow. He deserved a little rest after that, didn't he? Aki decided to laze around for the rest of the day.