'Where did he go?'

Then he heard a distinctive sound.

Plop

Something dropped into the spirit water. Sensing no immediate threat, he relaxed his grip and waited for the grimy smoke to dissipate. He heard gurgling sounds as the smoke finally dissipated to reveal the rock placed between him and the buckets. The rock looked different: a smooth black substance had coated the surface. Kenja looked at his skin and clothes to see the same black coating. Even the sword was completed smudged.

"Congratulations! You're now a Qi Flouris.h.i.+ng cultivator," Kenja heard the familiar voice from behind the rock. He held the blade ready for a life-and-death struggle as he walked around the rock. To his surprise, he could see the snail dipping up and down into the water.

"Weren't you going to kill me?"

"What are you talking about? How could I kill my disciple?"

Kenja didn't respond to the disciple bit but continued questioning the snail.

"And what was the water for?"

"To clean myself. You didn't expect me to move around in your filth, did you?"

When cultivators surpa.s.sed their bottlenecks and reached their next stage, they often expelled much of the dirt and grime they had acc.u.mulated over their lives. As a result, their bodies and souls would reach a higher purity level, making their skin smoother and bodily features more divine.

"All this...was from me?"

"What? Do you think the tramp farted? Of course it was you! Don't worry though. It's not your fault. You can blame this on your gifts. A big home often creates a big mess."

Kenja nodded his head as he felt a murderous killing intent emanating from his weapon.

"What about the rock?"

"Well, the water would be pointless if your filth enveloped it. What's the point of cleaning yourself with dirty water?"

Kenja felt the headache coming back again which would be impressive since cultivators had very strong temperaments that made them immune or resistant to many common ailments. He walked to one of the buckets and poured water on his weapon first.

He felt a sense of grat.i.tude coming from the sword, and even though no words were said, he believed that they could hold a conversation with each other if they wanted to.

"Stop flirting and get cleaned up. Don't keep your sensei waiting," the snail harrumphed.

Kenja began cleaning the grime off his skin.

"Now that we're student and teacher, let us make introductions. What is your name?"

Kenja rolled his eyes when he heard this. He dipped his right elbow into the bucket and answered, "Kenja, no surname."

"Very well, Kenja, you may call me..."

He paused giving Kenja a sense of déjà vu.

"...Snail-sensei."

'If you can't remember your own name, don't just make one up.'

"I'll call you Servant or Snail, which do you prefer?" Kenja retorted indifferently. The snail's eyes swelled slightly before responding.

"Call me Elder Brother Snail."

"I understand, Younger Brother Snail."

"Fine, fine, call me Snail or Brother Snail," the snail surrendered angrily.

"It will be a joy to be travelling with you Brother Snail," Kenja clasped his hand and bowed. He knew that he shouldn't push his luck with the snail. Kenja had won the battle, but the war was ongoing.

"With you as well...Brother Kenja," the snail squeaked the last words out.

"Now tell me, Brother Kenja. What are your plans? Do you cultivate out of boredom, or are you trying to achieve something?" The snail asked sarcastically. He knew he had to serve Kenja but that did not mean he had to withhold his contempt.

Kenja ignored the sarcasm and placed the sword into the ground next to the snail. Since the sword seemed to be alive, he thought it would be rude to not include it as part of the conversation. He continued cleaning himself as he seemed to be pondering something. Then he paused what he was doing and turned to face them.

"I want to find where I came from?"

The snail's eyes closed and his tentacles sagged as if he heard the least-fulfilling goal there could ever be. He opened his eyes and looked at Kenja.

"You're a human. You came from a woman who probably got knocked up in a tavern by a man she didn't even know! Why does this matter?"

Kenja glared angrily in silence before reaching into his pocket and taking out a pendant with a circular medallion hanging from it. The circular medallion was pearly white with golden specks, and on the center of the medallion, there was an inscription.

Kenja

"I've been to every jeweler and blacksmith in Ryuga, and none of them have been able to identify what this pendant is made of nor its origins. The pendant doesn't rust or erode, and no artisan was capable of putting so much as a scratch on it."

The snail moved his eyes closer to the pendant to examine it. His eyes suddenly bulged and he leaped onto Kenja's fingers, bringing his eyes closer to the medallion. Kenja was a bit surprised, but he was elated to see the snail taking an interest in the pendant. As quickly as he had jumped onto Kenja, he fell off and began laughing hysterically.

"Hahahahaha, kid, you're so interesting, hahahaha."

The sudden change was a little shocking, but Kenja decided to raise a query in the midst of the snail's laughter.

"What's so interesting?"

The snail quickly suppressed his laughter. "You were right to become a cultivator. The material your pendant is made of is called Nirvanic Jade."

"Nirvanic Jade?"

"Must you keep repeating what I say? Yes, Nirvanic Jade. The material is so rare and expensive, just one kez of it can purchase several small kingdoms. It's used by very high-level cultivators for tools and equipment, and the only ones who could inscribe letters onto it are Soul Ascension stage at minimum."

"Soul Ascension?"

Kenja wasn't completely sure about the later stages, but he knew of the first few stages: Body Tempering, Qi Flouris.h.i.+ng, Foundation Establishment, Core Crystallization.

"That's too far for you to worry about now. But if you want to find where you came from, you're going to need to raise your cultivation quickly. And I'm not talking about small level ups. We need to get you every possible advantage. I'm talking cultivation techniques, expensive pills, top-of-the-line Immortal's cave...h.e.l.l, we probably need to find you a few Core Crystallization women to perform double cultivation with when you're resting."

The snail kept talking with no apparent end in sight.

"Why do I need all that?"

The snail paused to look at him as if he were a b.u.mbling fool.

"How else do you plan on raising your cultivation stage after stage?"

"Didn't you just help me get to the Qi Flouris.h.i.+ng stage in less than two breaths? Couldn't we continue going like this?"

The snail casually swung his head with his eyes closed.

"Tsk, tsk, tsk. What do you take cultivation for? How could it be that easy? This time was a one-time thing. Your body had been tempered to the point of an imminent breakthrough, but your const.i.tutions kept you from pus.h.i.+ng through the bottleneck. Even with my incredible a.s.sistance and all this dense Qi, you couldn't push through the bottleneck."

Kenja was puzzled. If he didn't pa.s.s through the bottleneck, then how could he be at the Qi Flouris.h.i.+ng stage right now?

"Then how did I break through the bottleneck?"

The snail looked at Kenja with an air of disappointment. "Must I explain everything to you?"

After verbally putting Kenja down, he continued with his explanation, "You experienced an adrenaline rush."

Kenja thought back to a few minutes ago when the snail told him that he fell into a trap and was about to die. His heart rate rose, thinking speed improved, and the Qi swiftly and cleanly cycled through his meridians and congregated in his dantian like never before.

"Actually, I am not surprised you don't know this. It isn't a widely-known fact that adrenaline helps with cultivation and pa.s.sing through bottlenecks. But the amount of adrenaline needed isn't easy to produce at will. Only when your life is in danger would your instinctual defense mechanisms produce the necessary amount to help you achieve a breakthrough in cultivation. If all cultivators learned of this, what do you think they would do?"

Kenja thought about it for a second before responding, "They would seek life-threatening situations."

"Precisely. Not only would cultivators become more aggressive towards one another, but sects would begin to seek conflict with each other as well. Even mortals would be threatened as some cultivators might begin performing crimes in order to involve themselves with danger or gather pursuers. The Immortal world would literally begin courting death in order to advance to Immortality," the snail chuckled at the irony.

"And that's why I made you think your life was in danger. You were stuck, and I helped you through the bottleneck. But will you believe my threat the next time? Of course not! Regardless of what we can or cannot do right now, you're going to need some outside a.s.sistance. So let's find us a sect and raise me an army of followers," the snail said happily.

"Raise you an army of followers?"

The snail froze flabbergasted. After a breath, he quickly corrected himself, "Of course, I meant 'raise you an army of followers.'"

Kenja's left eye twitched.

'This snail...' Kenja's headache had finally arrived.