Inside the cultivation room, Li Mingfu reread Thousand Thread Qi Weaving Art from the beginning.
This time, he studied every line carefully.
Every diagram.
Every warning.
Every detail.
Only after he fully understood the instructions did he begin.
The first line of the technique was simple but strange.
"Qi is not water to be poured, but silk to be spun."
Li Mingfu closed his eyes.
Following the instructions, he drew Qi into his dantian.
The energy slowly gathered like a warm sphere in his abdomen.
Then came the next step.
Compress it.
He tightened the Qi until it stabilized.
Once the sphere became dense and steady.
He split it; the Qi is divided into two thin threads.
The threads wavered violently.
Li Mingfu focused his mind and stabilized them.
Slowly, he guided the threads into his meridians according to the manual.
Each thread followed a different route.
No overlapping.
No tangling.
No loss of cohesion.
If even one thread collapsed, the entire weave would destabilize.
Li Mingfu immediately understood why this manual had been abandoned.
Normal cultivators sensed Qi like a flowing stream.
They simply guided it through their meridians.
But dividing that stream?
That was far harder.
The diagrams inside the manual were confusing.
Hundreds of intersecting routes.
Thread splits at strange junctions.
Multiple circulation paths run at the same time.
It was like trying to write calligraphy, with ten brushes at once.
Li Mingfu sighed.
"Most people would give up before even weaving ten threads."
He shook his head.
"This really does look like a puppet technique."
Still, his Heaven-Defying Luck had chosen it.
So he continued.
Li Mingfu slowed his breathing and sank deeper into meditation.
Qi gathered again in his dantian.
Following the method, he split it into two threads.
The threads trembled violently at first.
But he stabilized them.
Slowly and carefully, he guided them through the meridian routes shown in the manual.
Pain appeared immediately.
His meridians burned.
Li Mingfu stopped.
He gathered Qi and made them into two threads.
And started cultivation again.
When he finally completed one full circulation, his entire body was drenched in sweat.
He opened his eyes slightly.
"That was… complicated."
Then he began thinking.
The method itself wasn't impossible.
It was just extremely complex.
Li Mingfu suddenly tried something different.
Instead of imagining Qi like water, he visualized something else.
A network diagram.
His body became a three-dimensional map.
Dantain became a central hub.
Where Qi will gather.
Meridians were firewalls.
Acting like gatekeepers, permitting or denying any Qi from entering.
Qi threads like fiber optic cables.
Every route had a structure.
Every split had logic.
The amount of each Qi thread was adjusted and only passed through when the meridians allowed it to.
Li Mingfu tried circulating only one thread.
Testing the limit of how much his single thread of Qi could pass through the meridians before there was pain.
The result shocked him.
The thread moved faster.
And there was no pain.
He opened his eyes in surprise.
"…That worked?"
He spent a moment thinking about why.
Then realization struck.
Cultivators of this world treated Qi as intuitive, emotional, and instinctual.
They felt Qi and guided it by intuition.
Eventually, they created different kinds of manuals, and everyone just copied the technique.
But Li Mingfu approached it differently.
He used Earth logic.
Parallel processing.
Multichannel flow.
Structural mapping.
System regulation.
He wasn't forcing control.
He was organizing the system.
To simplify it further, he imagined something even easier.
His dantian was the main building where employees entered to work.
Qi became an employee.
Employees gathered in their departments and became Qi threads.
Meridians were managers.
Circulation paths were assigned to assistant managers.
Once everyone understood their job.
Everything flowed smoothly.
Li Mingfu laughed out loud.
"I finally found the right way to cultivate this technique!"
After a few hours, he stopped cultivating for a moment to rest his meridians.
Standing up, he stretched his legs and walked into the backyard.
The night air brushed against his skin.
Something felt different.
His perception had sharpened.
He could feel tiny air currents touching his body.
Even the faint rustling of leaves seemed clearer.
While walking, he muttered.
"This technique isn't actually difficult."
"It's systematic."
The real problem wasn't talent.
It was perspective.
Cultivators pursued power first.
Control came later.
But this technique demanded perfect control first.
Only after mastering control could power appear.
To most cultivators, that process felt like torture.
Too slow.
Too complicated.
Too frustrating.
But for Li Mingfu?
It was just running a successful business and being a CEO.
He smiled.
"This path might actually suit me perfectly."
Returning to his cultivation room, Li Mingfu resumed meditation.
One thread became two.
Two became three.
Three became four.
Five.
Six.
Seven.
When he tried creating the eighth thread—
A sharp headache struck his mind.
Li Mingfu immediately stopped.
"Seven is my limit for now."
Still, he was satisfied.
Most cultivators struggled with even two threads.
Yet he had already reached seven.
It might have something to do with the two souls his body had absorbed earlier.
His mental strength and focus were far beyond normal.
Even better, the Qi threads now followed the pathways he had mapped out earlier.
They no longer needed constant micromanagement.
His Qi circulated automatically.
Qi entered his body.
Split into threads.
Then went through his meridians.
And returned to the dantian.
If there was any Qi lost on the threads, the Qi would get more from his dantian when it passes through again.
All without him actively guiding it.
Li Mingfu opened his eyes and smiled.
"Perfect."
"Now I won't fall behind."
He could focus on other things while the threads cultivated on their own.
Each cycle strengthened his meridians.
Each cycle refined his Qi.
After some time, his meridians started to hurt.
Li Mingfu stopped cultivating.
He understood the importance of a stable foundation.
"Forcing more would only damage my meridians."
Although he hadn't officially reached Qi Refinement Stage One.
He was extremely close.
At this rate, it would only take a few more days.
Most cultivators rarely slept.
But Li Mingfu didn't care.
He lay down and prepared to take a short nap.
Before drifting to sleep, one final thought crossed his mind.
"If this technique is considered difficult in this world…"
A faint smile appeared on his face.
"…then this path was made for me."
Moments later, Li Mingfu quietly fell asleep.
(Read the information page to understand how Li Minful cultivates.)