While Li Kong was racing with the time, in the village, in a house of a certain hunter, Ye Cheng suddenly sneezed and he rubbed his nose after that.
"So cold." Ye Cheng said while rubbing his hands.
"Oh, you're going out?" Feng Rouyi's head could be seen peeking a little at what his husband doing from the hallway.
"Yeah. I heard from Zheng that damned brat hadn't went back home yet since afternoon and knowing that little brat, heaven knows what he's doing right now."
Ye Cheng temper immediately flared out of the roof out of the mention of Li Kong's name.
'That brat was begging for his ass to be spanked. Did years gone by without spanking taught this child to be like this? Hmph, If Zheng didn't take any action, I'll be the one who would gladly take on his role.' Ye Cheng was itching to beat some sense into Li Kong.
While Ye Cheng was thinking about spanking Li Kong, his wife slid in his vision and wore him a leather jacket.
"You said it yourself that today is getting cold, right? So wear this jacket when you're going out." Feng Rouyi said, a little smile hanging up from her face as she tidied her husband's coat.
"I'm really blessed to have such a caring wife." All thoughts of Li Kong had been dispersed entirely from his mind and the only thing left was love for his wife.
"Flattery wouldn't get you anywhere, you know." She done the last part and met her husband's eyes with a smile.
"Oh, really?" Ye Cheng squinted his eyes and let out a little grin.
"Ye Cheng, I'm telling you, you c- Kyaa!" Feng Rouyi words was cut off short as Ye Cheng pulled her into his embrace and spin her a few times before stopping and looked at his wife with playful smile.
"What about now?" He looked at his wife with a playful gaze.
Feng Rouyi pouted a little at her husband antics. "Geez, how long you're going to act like this. You're acting like a child."
"Aren't you smiling too when we spin?"
Feng Rouyi refused to respond and only turned her head away from him, pouting.
Ye Cheng laughed loudly at his wife's response while Feng Rouyi looked at him with unhappy look.
"What are you waiting now? Aren't you going to find that boy, Li Kong? Shoo shoo." Feng Rouyi said with an unhappy tone.
Ye Cheng was heartbroken hearing his wife "shoo shoo" and made his way out dispiritedly.
After that, she stayed silent for a while as if pondering about something before leaving a last note to Ye Cheng.
"Don't go too hard on him, you hear me?" Then she disappeared into the living room.
"Alright, ma'am." Ye Cheng couldn't reject his wife's request and toned down the plan he had in mind as he opened the door.
...
"Huff, huff, huff..." Li Kong was sweating profusely right and his breath was all over anywhere.
"Finally.... I arrived..." Li Kong leaned on the nearby tree and tried to calm his breath.
"That was dangerous." Li Kong muttered under his breath as he looked at the now orange sky.
Li Kong looked around him and when he found nothing, he dropped down his caution and loudly sighed out a relief.
"It seemed uncle Ye hadn't come to find me yet."
"Hadn't found who yet?" A deep voice rang in his ear.
"Ahhhh!" Li Kong's heart jumped in unison with him.
"U-Uncle Ye?" Li Kong said while holding his beating heart tightly and maintaining a safe distance between him and his uncle.
"Oh? You smart enough to know the one talking is your uncle but not smart enough to know when to go home?" Ye Cheng's vein bulged as he closed the gap between him and Li Kong.
"Uncle! Have mercy please! I know I was wrong!" Li Kong was at the point of begging.
He kneeled in front his uncle and pleaded with both of his palms clapped in front of his forehead.
Seconds passed by but his uncle seemed to not responding so he peeked a little at his uncle's expression and it only needed a glance for tears formed on the corner of his eyes and streams started flowing out from his eyes.
'I'm done for.' Li Kong resigned to his fate.
Even though Li Kong couldn't exactly see his uncle's expression right now but the seething and bull-like breath was already a dead giveaway.
His legs gave up and gravity pulled his body to the ground. But unfortunately for Li Kong, his misery hadn't ended here yet.
As his body fell backwards, Ye Cheng thought he was running away and snatched one of his arm and then pulled him to his side.
"You're not going anywhere!"
Ye Cheng lifted Li Kong's arm like he was lifting a dead fish from the tail and he dragged his boneless body to the village's direction.
"If Zheng Liyang didn't beat some senses into you today, I would. You hear me? What you were actually thinking staying in the forest until this late? Did you took a nap or something in the forest, huh? I'm asking you! This is why you can't be soft on kids, Zheng! Especially if it was kid like you." At his last words, Ye Cheng glared at Li Kong.
'Actually I passed out.' Li Kong saved his reply only for himself in hope of seeing the light of the day tomorrow.
While Li Kong was kindly educated by his beloved uncle, White, who was safely stored in the pouch, nodded in agreement, fully supporting Ye Cheng's claim.
'Listen carefully to what your uncle said, Li Kong.' White sent a message directly to his mind.
Li Kong was dumbfounded and looked incredulously at his waist pouch, 'Aren't you the reason why I was this late?'
And just like that, Ye Cheng continued to drag the lifeless Li Kong.
After a few minute being dragged, Li Kong finally felt Ye Cheng's stopping.
They arrived at his own house and on the terrace, a well-built man was sipping his water calmly from a cup.
Ye Cheng dropped Li Kong in front of the man and Li Kong mustered his courage to lifted his chin up.
"Uncle Zheng..." Li Kong was unsure about what to do as his uncle was still sipping calmly.
Zheng Liyang put his cup away on the table and then looked at Li Kong while shoving something away from the youth line of sight.
"Do you know what are your mistakes, Li Kong?" Zheng Liyang asked in a low voice.
Li Kong immediately went to kneeling position and looked straight at his uncle then bowed deeply.
"I'm sorry, Uncle Zheng. I was wrong! I shouldn't wander in the forest until this late!" Li Kong replied as sincere as he could.
"Good. Make sure not to repeat it again, okay?"
Li Kong's sense picked something was wrong with the situation as he straightened his spine.
"Then, does that mean that you won't beat me?" Li Kong said hesitantly.
Ye Cheng, who was watching the scenes happening at distance, shook his head and snorted at Zheng Liyang's actions and thought to himself.
'Because you were like this that this kid grew up to be such a troublemaker. Sigh... It seems I have to do this myself.'
Right as Ye Cheng started to roll his sleeves up, Zheng Liyang smiled at Li Kong's question and silently reached out for something he had shoved before and replied.
"Of course... Not!" His tone immediately changed as fast as flipping a page from a book.
He then picked up Li Kong and placed him on top of the table, his butt facing outward.
Li Kong paled at the sudden change and in terror, he watched Zheng Liyang raised his hands up high, in his hand was a rod made out of bamboo.
Zheng Liyang swung the rod straight to Li Kong's butt. The impact hit Li Kong's butt and sent his nerves into frenzy as he screamed.
"You brat! How. Many. Times. Do. I. Have. To. Say. To. You! Don't play inside the forest!" The rhythm of his swing became more erratic as the rod continued to swing.
"If you really want to die that much, then let me be the one to kill you!" Zheng Liyang finally lost it all and went into wild frenzy.
Pa!
Pa!
Pa!
Each strike stronger than before and all of them directed to the bum of the now screaming youth as Li Kong continued to scream in agony and tears of pain flowed out.
On the other side of the situation, Ye Cheng was having a pleasant time watching Li Kong finally getting his punishment but as the time went on, his face slowly changed into pity and terror.
He saw the bamboo rod broke in half and right as Li Kong came to check what was going on, Zheng Liyang pulled out another bamboo rod and continued the whooping.
Seeing the heated scene, Ye Cheng took a giant step back and silently recited prayer to the youth, 'You brought this to yourself, Li Kong.'
'I don't think I've ever seen Zheng Liyang this furious.' Ye Cheng observed his friend who was spanking Li Kong with all of his might. He could even hear the sound of the air moving as the whooping continued.
To be honest, Zheng Liyang was never the one to easily lost his temper since he was a child but unfortunately, it seemed the years spent taking care of Li Kong had awakened something inside of him.
Ye Cheng shuddered at the the severity of the situation before him. 'This brat really made me think twice before having a children.'
Even his well-tempered friend turned to be like this after taking care of a child, so what made he thought that when he had a child that the child won't grow up to be like Li Kong?
As he imagined that, shivers ran down through his spine and he quickly ceased all of the bad thoughts from his head.
Then, Ye Cheng decided he had done watching and turned back to his home.
Li Kong screams of pain continued to ring throughout the village for another ten minutes before gradually disappeared.
...
The moon had taken its turn and shining brightly in the night sky.
Inside of Li Kong's house, in the bedroom, Li Kong was on all four on the bed, pants down.
"Ouch!" Li Kong gasped in pain.
He bit his lip and readied himself as he rubbed the ointment on the surface of his cherry-red bum.
"Ouch! It hurts! It hurts!" Li Kong groaned at the stinging pain.
Tears started forming in the corner of his eyes as he mustered all of his strength to endure the pain.
As he rubbed the ointment, Li Kong recalled the memories of this evening.
Zheng Liyang furiously spanked Li Kong with the bamboo rod until he was couldn't contain his tears.
Each swing of Zheng Liyang's arm left a glaring red mark on the surface of Li Kong's butt and Li Kong felt that with each strike, the force behind it only increased more and more.
After an unknown amount of swings, the bamboo rod that Zheng Liyang wielded broke into two as it sent the last pang of pain to Li Kong.
When Li Kong saw Zheng Liyang watching his broken bamboo rod in silent, Li Kong's body immediately relaxed and with a tearful eyes, he looked at the distance in a trance, thinking the pain was over before he noticed an unusual thing was leaning beside the chair.
Li Kong's hope was broken in half just like the first bamboo rod as he watched Zheng Liyang unsheathed the second bamboo rod.
The second rod ended up snapping in half too and the beating was over with Zheng Liyang sending last words to Li Kong before going back to his home, leaving the butthurt Li Kong alone on the terrace.
While reminiscing of the not-so fun evening, he resentfully muttered. "Would it kill you to hold back just a little, uncle?"
After a few groans and misery, Li Kong finally done rubbing the ointment and listlessly dropped his body to sat on the bed.
But unfortunately, his body hadn't forget yet the state of his bum and sent a signals of pain straight to Li Kong's brain as he groaned once again and dropped completely to the bed while holding his bum.
While Li Kong was trying to desperately suppressed the pain, he suddenly heard a light voice rang in his head.
"May this occasion teaches you to be more thoughtful next time." White offered his blessing.
"Aren't you the cause of all of this, White?" Li Kong feeling wronged, he reached out for the white bead and glared.
"Well, um..." White was startled by Li Kong's response and struggled to gave a clear answer.
"Ahem." He cleared his nonexistent throat.
"Isn't this the right time to discuss from where we left before?" The bead shone repeatedly at each words.
"That's right! The cultivation manuals!" All of the scrutiny disappeared from his mind.
He immediately pushed his body with his left arm while slowly positioned his butt.
"Careful, careful."
Li Kong successfully took a seat without causing any major pain and after that, Li Kong grabbed out the manuals he received from White and spread the manuals in a curve line then he carefully placed the bead in front of the manuals.
"Tonight you will learn how to sense Qi." White declared.
Li Kong's eyes sparkled brightly as he nodded over and over.
"But before that... We need to check your talent first."
Li Kong tilted his head off to the side a bit.
"How will we do that?"
"Pick me up."
Li Kong picked up the bead and placed on top of his palm.
"A talent of a cultivator is usually classified based on their spirit root. If you wondering what spirit root is, think of it as a tree and the meridian in your body is the root of the tree to absorbs the water called Qi."
Li Kong expressed his amazement and signaled to White to continue.
"Without a spirit root, someone could never hope to sense Qi. Let alone dreaming of becoming cultivator."
At White's explanation, Li Kong gulped.
'What if I didn't have it? Did that meant I'm screwed?' Worries filled Li Kong's expression.
White looked at the worried Li Kong and couldn't help but smile a little in his heart.
"Silly child. Do you think that the great cultivator will choose someone without a spirit root?"
Li Kong thought about it for a moment and he found that the statement was reasonable and started nodding as if he was possessed by a woodpecker.
Seeing that there was no further problem, White continued his explanation.
"Continuing where we left, each spirit root brought elemental attributes with them. The examples are the five main elements such as fire, earth, metal, water, and wood. Beside that, there also spirit root that differed from the basic elements such as lightning, wind, ice, and many more.
"Now about talent. People usually categorized who was talented based on the purity of their spirit root. What I meant by this was how many elements did someone have on their spirit root and how strong their affinity to a certain element."
Li Kong, who was listening to the explanation closely, fell into deep thought and muttered under his breath.
"Then doesn't it mean the fewer element you have, the better it is?"
"Correct." White replied with a warm voice.
"The fewer element you have in your spirit root, the faster it is for you to progress through your cultivation. But... This wasn't always the case."
Li Kong frowned at White seemingly contradicting and fell into deep contemplation.
'Good. Always keep your thoughts running, Li Kong.' White thought as he watched Li Kong's complexion.
White was very satisfied with his current student. The student not only had a good sense and discipline but he also never stopped to use his brain.
What more could a teacher asked from a student than this?
White remembered the content of Zheng Liyang's speech while spanking Li Kong and in his speech, Zheng Liyang listed all of the pranks Li Kong had done.
As he recalled, White subconsciously made a gulp sound and thought to himself.
'Well... Maybe if he was less mischievous, he would be the perfect student.' White mused for a moment before continuing the explanation.
"Although I said before that talent was classified based on the spirit root, but that wasn't all of it and personally, the great cultivator bore a certain degree of rejection to this classification."
"Hmm?" Li Kong raised one of his eyebrows. "Why is that?"
"In the great cultivator's words, it was too limiting."
Limiting? Li Kong pondered about the choice of words.
"The great cultivator believed that there was an even more important point than your spirit root, the most important aspect you needed in cultivation and that is, understanding."
"Understanding?" Li Kong tilted his head.
"Well, enough chit-chat for now. You'll learn what I mean later." The bead glowed and dimmed.
"Now let's get to the chase and see what kind of spirit root that you have. Aren't you curious?"
Li Kong's eyes immediately brightened up and he nodded excitedly.
"There are special item that people used when testing for spirit root but because my entry to the spatial storage had been blocked, we'll figure out using another method. Remember that you will feel a warm and somewhat liquid sensation coursing through your veins. Do not reject this energy and let it flow freely in your body. Do you understand?"
Li Kong replied using nod and without further ado, White started the procedures.
"Let's start now."
Li Kong observed the bead closely, looking for a single change on the smooth surface before he suddenly felt a warm and foreign energy entering his body.
Li Kong was startled and subconsciously his body tensed in retaliation.
"Take a deep breath and breathe it out from the mouth. Relax your body."
Li Kong closed his eyes and draw in air to his nose then guided it to exit through his mouth.
As Li Kong's tense muscle finally relaxed, the warm energy started to coursing through his body again.
'It was a weird feeling. It's like I'm taking a warm bath but the water is inside of my body? What am I even saying...'
He focused all of his senses and followed the warm energy's path while controlling his muscles from contracting and finally the warm energy stopped right in the center of his lower body and gathered there, making a spherical shape as it fill Li Kong's dantian and in the process making he feeling a little bloated.
"Let's see what you got in here." White said calmly as he carefully guided the energy inside of Li Kong's body.
'A person who was chosen should at least have at least Heaven-grade spirit root, right?'
White guided his energy carefully, inspecting every nook and cranny before suddenly he sensed something touching his energy.
'Found you.'
White took a closer look at the tiny amount of energy that Li Kong's spirit root emitted.
"This..."
Tension filled Li Kong and he desperately held down his hand from coming together as the act would definitely disturbed the bead.
"This..." White muttered once again.
"What the actual fuck?"
The room fell silent as question marks formed on top of Li Kong's head and dropped on his head.