Sun Yi stared at the jade slip, fighting the urge to smash his head against the table. Reading the Five Elements Art felt like trying to debug ten thousand lines of unannotated legacy code written in Assembly.

His previous cultivation manual was a lightweight script—maybe a thousand characters. This monstrosity was a ten-fold increase in data density, filled with obscure syntax and convoluted logic loops. It was the “War and Peace” of technical documentation, and it was putting him to sleep.

“I need a performance booster,” Sun Yi muttered.

He brewed a pot of Calming Tea. As the steam rose, carrying a scent sharper than espresso, he took a sip.

The effect was instantaneous. It was like upgrading his brain’s RAM. The fog cleared, the lethargy vanished, and his processing speed spiked.

“Nootropics of the cultivation world,” Sun Yi praised, feeling his neurons fire in sync. “Top-tier stuff.”

He glanced up. Luo An was staring at the teapot with naked longing. This was C-Suite exclusive beverage; even Inner Disciples rarely saw it. It was a productivity hack reserved for the Board.

Sun Yi didn’t hesitate. He grabbed a second cup, poured the glowing amber liquid, and slid it across the table along with a bottle of Second-Tier Spirit Water.

“Help yourself,” Sun Yi said.

Luo An pointed at his own nose, stunned. “Me? You’re letting me drink this?”

“Why not? It’s not poison,” Sun Yi shrugged, turning back to his work. “Consider it an employee perk. Drink up, then sit there and cultivate. I’m going to need a Subject Matter Expert for Q&A later, and I need you sharp.”

“Thank you…” Luo An stammered, his mercenary heart wavering slightly.

Sun Yi waved him off and re-engaged with the database. With the tea in his system, the text didn’t look like gibberish anymore. It looked like data.

He switched into “Exam Mode.” Back on Earth, surviving the Gaokao required a specific skill set: high-speed data ingestion and retention. Physics, Chemistry, History—it was all just information storage.

First pass: 10% retention. Second pass: 30% retention. Third pass: 50% retention.

He was a scanner. He didn’t just read; he downloaded.

Within two days, he had the entire source code of the Five Elements Art committed to memory. But memorization wasn’t comprehension. He hit a wall with the backend logic of the Qi Refining algorithms.

“Luo An,” Sun Yi called out. “Consultation time.”

Luo An, fueled by the premium tea, was more than willing to assist. He broke down the esoteric concepts into practical mechanics. With a high-level guide debugging the code, Sun Yi patched the holes in his understanding rapidly.

Phase One complete: Theory acquired. Phase Two: Execution.

Sun Yi sat cross-legged, attempting to sense the ambient Five Elements Qi as the manual instructed.

One hour passed. Five hours passed. Nothing. No connection. No signal.

Sun Yi opened his eyes and sighed. “Hardware limitations. My sensor sensitivity is garbage.”

Luo An offered a grim reality check. “With your Spirit Root specs, establishing a connection to ambient Qi will take six months of continuous scanning. The Five Elements Art is resource-heavy. It requires a massive accumulation of data before it executes. Patience is key.”

“Six months?” Sun Yi scoffed. “I don’t have six months. That’s two fiscal quarters.”

He reached into his storage bag and pulled out the Marrow Cleansing Fruits.

Luo An watched, confused. Then, his eyes bulged.

Sun Yi didn’t eat one. He ate them like popcorn. One after another, the priceless fruits disappeared into his mouth.

Crunch. Gulp. Crunch.

“What are you doing?!” Luo An nearly choked. “Those are Marrow Cleansing Fruits! Foundation Establishment level assets! One is worth five hundred Spirit Stones! The diminishing returns after the first one are massive—you’re wasting them!”

In ten seconds, Sun Yi had consumed twenty fruits. Ten thousand Spirit Stones. Gone.

Prodigal son, Luo An thought, horrified. He just ate the net worth of a small clan as a snack.

Sun Yi ignored the shock. He felt the bio-hacking take effect. The energy exploded in his gut, rushing through his meridians like a high-pressure hose. It wasn’t gentle; it was a brute-force system defrag.

An hour later, Sun Yi exhaled. He felt lighter, faster. Optimized.

Then the smell hit him.

A layer of black, tar-like sludge covered his skin—the “bloatware” and impurities expelled from his system.

“Performance improved, but the UX is terrible,” Sun Yi gagged, pinching his nose. “Luo An, hosedown. Now.”

Luo An sighed, suppressing the urge to lecture his boss on fiscal responsibility. He cast a simple Water Art. A sphere of water enveloped Sun Yi, scrubbing the filth away in seconds before vanishing.

Sun Yi stretched, his joints popping. He felt reborn. “That was worth every penny.”

“It was a waste,” Luo An muttered, closing his eyes to hide his pain. “Pure waste.”

“Time is money, Luo An. I just bought six months of time for ten thousand stones. That’s a bargain.”

Sun Yi sat back down. He grabbed two Top-Grade Spirit Stones—the nuclear batteries of the cultivation world.

“Now,” Sun Yi whispered. “Let’s overclock this system.”

“You’re using those for Qi Refining?!” Luo An cried out. “The energy density is too high! You can’t just—”

Sun Yi tuned him out. He initiated the Five Elements Art.

Usually, a cultivator acted like a solar panel, slowly trickling energy from the environment. Sun Yi plugged himself directly into the grid. The energy from the Top-Grade stones didn’t trickle; it flooded.

Because of the Marrow Cleansing, his channels were wide enough to handle the surge. Because of the Five Elements Art, he could process multiple energy types simultaneously.

He wasn’t just recovering his cultivation; he was refactoring it.

Two days later, Sun Yi opened his eyes.

He was back at Qi Refining Level 3. But it was different.

His internal energy reserves were five times larger than before. The quality of his Qi was dense, heavy, and pure. He hadn’t just recompiled the code; he had optimized the architecture.

Sun Yi clenched his fist, feeling the raw power hum beneath his skin.

“System upgrade successful.”