Motivation

They gasped for breath, sucking in the extremely hot and humid air of the room, permeating with both of their scents. Since last night when they first cultivated properly using the Dual Extremes Infinite Union Art, Ye Ling suddenly was making leaps and bounds of progress in her bed skills in a very short amount of time during their cultivation today. It was as if the bond that was now connecting the two was now awakening something in her. She also had a lot more stamina thanks to his Yang Qi invigorating her during the act.

As they cultivated properly now, there was no residual Yin or Yang Qi after the act for them to cultivate, as they made progress while doing it.

Though of course, she could not compare to him, who cultivated the Golden Yang Dragon Body, the cultivation time definitely had an increase, as well as an increase in intensity.

He poured the energy he received from this session into cultivating Spiritual Qi War Art to increase his reserves of Spiritual Qi and its quality even more. Last night the Heaven Transcending Lotus sucked away most of his Spiritual Qi, so his reserves still left a lot to be desired, even if they now were comparable to a normal Qi Condensation Realm in both quantity and quality of Spiritual Qi stored.

He still had instability in his cultivation base from continuous breakthroughs recently, so he needed time before he could use that energy to increase his cultivation base again.

They kissed for some time in the same position they finished in, him cuddling her close, and feeling her warmth, and her scent filled his lungs as he breathed in with his nose in her hair.

As she also cultivated the Dual Extremes Infinite Union Art her Yin Qi, saliva, and sweat became of very pleasurable flavor, and her scent was bewitching.

She felt warm and content in this loving embrace, as they continued to kiss and whisper sweet nothings to each other.

---

Wu Long woke up the next day to find that there was a small wooden box delivered from the Soaring Feather Trading Company. Inside, he found 30 identical Qi Manipulation Rings neatly placed on silk padding with some slightly harder parts inside the padding so that they do not fall out.

He smiled at this generosity and care, as he took this feeling in, and accepted the gift without being humble.

In the morning training, he found out that not only did Ye Ling's skills with the sword between his legs rise exponentially, but her actual sword skills received an even greater boost in the speed of improvement. He did not notice it yesterday as they skipped training. Theoretically, it was impossible for anyone to improve at such a speed, but to her own confusion, it felt more like she was remembering her sword instead of learning it.

Wu Long also recognized her sword quite clearly now, as it was the same sword that trained him during one of the hardest periods in his life, only in its infancy, and will require much more growth to completely reach the level he remembered it at.

With this rate of improvement, it would only take a year for her to start reaching the level of sword intent, which was an astronomical speed.

Wu Long started pondering if the bond that bound them from dual cultivating the Dual Extremes Infinite Union Art was the key to awakening her.

---

In the afternoon, after he finished helping Hua Ziyan with her technique in which she already made considerable progress, Wu Long went to the small courtyard house Bi Rui and Yu Huan were living in. On the way he was pondering if he should teach Hua Ziyan the Spiritual Qi War Art. He already taught it to Ye Ling at the end of their training today.

But unlike Dual Extremes Infinite Union Art, the Spiritual Qi War Art was not unique or exactly secret, it was quite a popular technique, so he was not as cautious about giving it to someone except his women.

As he reached the small courtyard house, he already saw two familiar figures waiting for him at the gate.

They both knew he was going to leave the capital for a while, but it was not like he would not return. So this was their final lesson in this visit after which they would say their goodbyes.

As he sat across Yu Huan and answered her questions regarding the scroll from before, he was astonished by her speed of learning, height of comprehension, and ingenuity. She thought of questions that were levels above the scroll he gave her before and reached them solely through deduction and extrapolation.

He saw that she was talented the more he taught her and interacted with her before, but she managed to always surprise him slightly even as he raised his expectations of her.

But that was because he was teaching her skewed skills for concocting his two pills, and her thinking was suppressed by her environment for too long and required restoration, so deviation from his expectations was still small. Now that he gave her a piece of knowledge that was intended to raise her general comprehension of alchemy, and she also started to shed the shell her environment forced her to grow, she seemed to bloom.

He was shocked to find a rare alchemy genius in this small and insignificant fractured world, wasting away as a low-level alchemist because her mind is far ahead of her superiors.

He was hoping for a slightly more flexible-minded alchemist at first, thus requesting to meet a relatively young alchemist. But he never expected to find such a precious gem.

The lower level of development in a region is, the more rigid and petty higher-level alchemists of the region become, regarding themselves as the authority, and squeezing any innovative young minds out of the profession since they threaten their position and authority. There were of course exceptions from this trend, but the trend existed nonetheless.

Yu Huan's mind was simply too free and unrestrained, as well as brilliant for them to understand that what she was searching for was not the ravings of an ignorant and whimsical novice, but that she was instinctively grasping at and searching for concepts far above their understanding, thus making it sound like nonsense to them.

Alchemists were a separate branch of cultivation, just like dual cultivators. Their cultivation was fundamentally different in its base principles as they cultivated an alchemy flame within themselves that was the cornerstone of their cultivation. They still conformed to normal cultivation realms, similar to how dual cultivators did. Moreover, this cultivation required quite a rare talent. Thus great alchemists were very rare and precious because they were an extremely infrequent combination of natural talent for alchemy, high comprehension, and an environment that allowed them to bloom.

In truth Wu Long was not an alchemist, he tried learning alchemy a long time ago, and it was a period of long and futile efforts as his natural body cultivation talent and talent for alchemy were simply too low for his practical skills to advance. So he only advanced theoretically, since his comprehension was high while being completely useless in his practical skills, a laughingstock even for himself.

Yu Huan, on the other hand, had the first two conditions, she was just lacking the third which was fairly simpler to resolve.

He had to reevaluate the potential longevity of their partnership to try and extend it as she was a great help if she could properly grow.

He gave her another scroll just in case she finished comprehending this one early, which he was now fairly certain about.

"Thank you... for training me"

Bi Rui said after he oversaw her training.

"You have a good heart for martial arts, just that you had no master, which is a shame, but you will reach great heights if you continue"

He answered her.

"But... even you said that you never reached the pinnacle of the spear"

She said after some hesitation, causing Wu Long to raise his eyebrow a little.

"You want to reach the pinnacle of the spear? I thought you wanted to become captain of the imperial guard?"

There was a light of surprise in Wu Long's eyes now.

"I do... no... I did. But after seeing that spear..."

She said as a light of admiration and yearning shone in her eyes, not able to finish as the emotions overwhelmed her.

Wu Long felt a little moved by that appearance. There was an indescribable charm in it.

This was something he felt in Sui Luxiao, Hua Ziyan, and Yu Huan as well, and it was this ethereal feeling that he could not name or put a finger on that fascinated and intrigued him. It was what moved his heart.

He pondered on this a little, but still could not find a definite answer.

"I cannot guarantee you that you will definitely reach the peak of the spear, but your hard work will not fail you. Keep it up, when I visit the capital next I will see your progress"

He said, implying that he might take their training a bit more seriously than just giving some advice if she shows her determination and dedication.

She nodded, as a hopeful expression appeared in her eyes. He might not have reached the pinnacle with the spear, but he is definitely capable of taking her much higher in her realm of spear than she could achieve on her own.

He said his goodbyes to both of them and left their peaceful courtyard which was now covered in autumn leaves, as a new determination filled the hearts of two beauties.