Who Let Him Cultivate？

Chapter 31: Applying What One Has Learned

Yun Zhi pinched the fabric of Lu Yang’s collar between two slender fingers. She hoisted his newly three-inch-tall body to eye level, gave him a gentle, inquisitive shake, and stared. Finding no logical explanation for his current state, she simply set him back down on the dirt.

Lu Yang was just as baffled. He had followed his Senior Sister’s incantations to the letter. He had channeled his Spiritual Qi exactly as instructed. How had a high-tier spatial teleportation technique mutated into two entirely literal, separate functions?

“This makes no sense,” he muttered, his voice a tiny squeak.

“I will demonstrate again,” Yun Zhi said. She was a deeply responsible teacher. Her actual pedagogical skills were abysmal, but she made up for it with terrifying patience.

Yun Zhi produced a glass hourglass and set it upside down on the ground. She placed a hand on Lu Yang’s shoulder. Together, they initiated a spatial jump.

The world didn’t just blur; it tore open. Lu Yang found himself dragged into a bizarre, liminal void. On either side of them flowed rivers of blinding, multicolored light, twisting like ribbons in a hurricane.

Fascinated, Lu Yang instinctively reached out to touch the glowing streams. Yun Zhi swatted his hand down.

“That is a phenomenon born of pure spatial distortion,” she said, her tone perfectly flat. “Forget a novice like you—if a Soul Formation Cultivator brushed against that light, the sheer pressure would grind their bones to dust and scatter their soul to the winds.”

Lu Yang yanked his hand back, a cold sweat breaking out across his back.

They stepped out of the void and into a scene of primordial terror. A colossal white serpent, its body thick enough to crush a mountain peak, was coiled around a jagged summit. Its jaws were unhinged, actively swallowing the ambient essence of the sun and moon. Its massive, intelligent eyes locked onto them just as gravity took hold. The two of them dropped perfectly into the serpent’s cavernous maw, sliding smoothly down its throat and into its belly.

Just as a sizzling drop of gastric acid—large enough to melt a boulder—was about to fall on Lu Yang’s head, Yun Zhi took another casual step forward. The world tore open again. They were back in the multicolored void.

Following Yun Zhi’s unhurried footsteps, Lu Yang was dragged through a slideshow of bizarre, terrifying wonders. He saw a churning ocean composed entirely of liquid magma. He witnessed a supreme Cultivator floating in the sky, casually enduring an apocalyptic heavenly lightning tribulation. He saw a silent, solitary swordsman trekking through a wasteland, a massive, iron-black broadsword strapped to his back.

These were places and people Lu Yang couldn’t have conjured in his wildest dreams. It was staggering to realize such monstrous entities and breathtaking landscapes actually existed.

Finally, the spatial rift deposited them right back where they had started. Lu Yang collapsed to his knees, panting heavily, his heart hammering against his ribs.

“The locations I just showed you are all contained within the borders of the Dao Seeking Sect,” Yun Zhi said mildly. “In the future, when you have the capability, you may visit them on your own.”

Lu Yang stared at her. The Dao Seeking Sect was incomprehensibly vast. Outside of the nine core peaks he knew, the rest of the territory was clearly a terrifying, uncharted wilderness.

“Try casting the technique again,” Yun Zhi suggested, her eyes gleaming with a rare, earnest expectation. Surely, after seeing the true application of spatial magic, he would grasp the concept.

Meeting that expectant gaze, Lu Yang swallowed hard, steeled his nerves, and cast the technique.

After a grueling day of continuous practice, Lu Yang finally mastered something. He learned how to perfectly sense the density of underground soil, and he developed a keen instinct for avoiding getting stepped on while miniaturized.

He never once successfully cast Shrinking Earth to an Inch.

However, his grasp of Shrinking Earth (burrowing) and Becoming an Inch (shrinking) as two entirely separate techniques grew terrifyingly proficient. By sunset, he didn’t even need the incantation. A single thought was enough to trigger the transformation, making it look as though he had spent decades perfecting the art of turning into a tiny mole-man.

Lu Yang’s original goal in learning Shrinking Earth to an Inch was to find a faster way to travel. Now that he had mastered Shrinking Earth to travel underground, he supposed it technically aligned with his initial objective.

The method was just a bit… undignified. And significantly slower.

Yun Zhi watched Lu Yang freely shrink himself, dive into the dirt, and pop back up a few feet away, seemingly having the time of his life. “Junior Brother,” she asked casually, “I heard you were having difficulty finding suitable work at the Mission Hall?”

“Yeah,” Lu Yang sighed, brushing topsoil off his robes. “Most of the bounties require a Golden Core Cultivation base or higher. There’s barely anything a beginner can safely handle.” He had actually been planning to camp out at the Mission Hall for a few days just to snipe a low-level request.

“What a coincidence. I was in a meeting with the Elders a few days ago, and someone mentioned a minor issue over at the Medicine Garden. A task was posted to the Mission Hall, but no one has accepted it yet. Given your… current skill set, I believe you are the perfect candidate. You should go take a look.”

Lu Yang nodded. Ever since their Master had gone into Secluded Cultivation, his Senior Sister had been the one running the Sect’s administrative meetings.

“What kind of task?” Lu Yang asked, genuinely curious. He had no outstanding combat skills, no specialized trades, and he knew absolutely nothing about the Medicine Garden. He hadn’t even finished memorizing the basic encyclopedia of common herbs.

“You will know when you arrive,” Yun Zhi replied, her face an unreadable mask.

***

To Lu Yang, the Dao Seeking Sect operated like a self-contained, miniature Cultivation world. A disciple never actually needed to leave the mountain gates to find an alchemist, a blacksmith, or an array master. The Sect was entirely self-sufficient.

Naturally, alchemy required a staggering volume of medicinal herbs. To meet this demand without relying on outside merchants, the Sect maintained a massive, sprawling Medicine Garden. Tending to it was a monumental effort, which was why the Mission Hall frequently posted requests for agricultural assistance.

Cultivating spirit herbs required deep, specialized knowledge. Lu Yang was completely ignorant of the subject. He still couldn’t even identify which specific spirit beasts or rare roots the dining hall served him for dinner every night.

Long before the Medicine Garden even came into view, Lu Yang caught its scent on the breeze. It was nothing like the chaotic, potentially lethal chemical odors that constantly wafted off Pill Cauldron Peak. This was a pure, vibrant aroma of life. A mortal who breathed this air for a month would likely add decades to their lifespan and cure themselves of any chronic disease.

At the entrance to the garden, an old man lay sprawled in a creaky rocking chair. A woven palm-leaf fan covered his face, rising and falling with his soft snores.

“Excuse me, Uncle,” Lu Yang called out politely. “Is this the Medicine Garden?”

The old man shifted the fan, his drooping eyelids cracking open to appraise the boy. “Who’re you?”

“Lu Yang.”

“Didn’t ask your name, kid. Asked your identity.”

“The Sect Leader’s fourth disciple. Junior Brother to Senior Sister Yun Zhi.”

The old man’s expression remained flat at the mention of the Sect Leader. That old ghost had been missing for ten years—who cared about him? The man needed to formally retire instead of hogging the title and dumping all the actual work on Yun Zhi’s shoulders.

But the second half of the sentence registered a moment later.

The Sect Leader’s disciple means he’s Yun Zhi’s Junior Brother!

The old man sprang from the rocking chair with a kinetic violence that put Lu Yang’s own agility to shame. He moved like a coiled spring snapping loose.

Lu Yang didn’t flinch. This was standard for the Cultivation world. You could never judge a person’s physical prowess or age by their appearance. If an eighty-year-old man and an eight-year-old child stood side by side, it was entirely possible the child was a reincarnated ancestor and the old man was his great-grandson.

Furthermore, the Cultivation world placed zero emphasis on “respecting the elderly and cherishing the young.” Why would they, when both the elderly and the young could likely punch a hole straight through your chest?

“Ah! So Yun Zhi sent you! You should have led with that, brother!” The old man threw a heavy arm around Lu Yang’s shoulders, suddenly acting as though they were lifelong comrades who had bled together in battle.

“We’re all family in the Dao Seeking Sect. Just call me Old Ba. What I say goes in this little acre of dirt.”

Lu Yang strongly suspected Old Ba was taking advantage of his seniority to act overly familiar, but he had no proof.

“So, what did Yun Zhi send you here for?” Old Ba asked, rubbing his chin. “Harvesting? How old do you need the roots? One thousand years? Two thousand?”

Hearing Old Ba throw around those numbers so casually, a sudden, horrifying thought struck Lu Yang. He remembered the rich, vibrant meals his Senior Sister cooked for him every day. Wait… has she been feeding me one- and two-thousand-year-old spirit herbs from the Sect’s private reserve?!

A thousand-year-old herb wasn’t a common cabbage. Even in a powerhouse like the Dao Seeking Sect, they were heavily guarded, precious resources.

No, no, Lu Yang reassured himself. Senior Sister is a deeply frugal person. She wouldn’t waste priceless Sect resources on my breakfast.

Pushing the panic aside, Lu Yang asked politely, “Senior Sister mentioned that a task was posted from the Medicine Garden a few days ago, but no one had accepted it. I came to inquire about the details.”

Old Ba slapped his thigh in sudden realization. “Ah! That task! Tell me, boy, do you know the first thing about cultivating spirit herbs?”

“I am completely clueless,” Lu Yang admitted without hesitation.

“Perfect. I’ll keep it simple, then. Growing these herbs is a tedious, multi-step process. One of the most critical steps is aerating the soil. The dirt needs to be loose so the roots can properly absorb the subterranean Spiritual Qi and exchange it with the ambient Qi in the air.”

Old Ba gestured toward the vast fields of glowing plants. “Historically, the soil aeration here has always been handled by a pair of Silver-Ring Heavenly King Earthworms. A married couple.”

Lu Yang nodded slowly, trying to follow along.

“Unfortunately,” Old Ba sighed, shaking his head, “they’ve been having some domestic disputes lately. Marital problems. They refuse to leave their nest, which means no one is working the fields. So, I posted a bounty for someone to come loosen the soil. It requires a solid grasp of the Earth Escape technique, one of the Five Elements Dao Arts. Plenty of the younger disciples know it, but they all think the work is beneath them. Too messy. But since Yun Zhi sent you, the timing is perfect!”

Lu Yang stared at the old man. A profound, weary silence stretched between them.

“So,” Lu Yang said, his voice dangerously calm. “What you are telling me is that my task is to…”

“Imitate an earthworm,” Old Ba said cheerfully. “Shrink down, burrow into the dirt, and aerate the Medicine Garden.”

Lu Yang: “…”

Lu Yang strongly suspected his Senior Sister was playing a massive, elaborate prank on him.

As usual, he had absolutely no proof.