Strings of Creation

"Hold still and don't resist." Marina told him before putting two fingers near his shoulder blade.

Raul's heart was near bursting with excitement. They were finally starting combat training today.

"I said hold still." Marina scolded as his jolting threw her fingers off target. "I'll use the needles to keep you still if I have to." She warned coldly.

"Sorry, sorry. Complete stillness." Raul held his breath in an effort to stay motionless.

Marina concentrated on her fingers again until a tiny strand of string came out and entered Raul. Slowly, she drew circle after circle around the spot, letting the string coil within Raul.

She did the same to his other shoulder and then placed two hands on his back. "Strings of Creation, Body Guiding Technique." She whispered.

With that mutter, the coils within him immediately started to unravel and connect to various areas within him, including his meridians and dantian.

Raul's skin crawled with the wrongness and discomfort brought about by the technique, but he fought back against the instinctive urge to fight against it.

Marina stepped back from him slowly. She flipped her index finger up and Raul's hand immediately shot upwards. "Good, it seems to be working correctly." She muttered before going on to test other aspects.

Raul danced like a monkey to her whims while even his qi answered her beck and call, filling him with an existential dread he'd never experienced before.

Marina had explained the technique to him priorly, but even so, the feeling of his body moving to someone else's bidding was so unsettling that cold sweat was constantly pouring out.

The only reason Raul wasn't freaking out was that he could feel how flimsy the strings actually were, it'd take hardly any effort to snap them if he truly wished to.

"I've gotten the hang of it, ready yourself for the moves." Marina informed him through panting breaths. She'd only done a few light movements with his body, but sweat was already starting to form on her forehead.

Strings of Creation was a production and support type qi cultivation technique without any strong combat power. Likewise, the offshoot Body Guiding Technique was designed for teaching rather than forcefully controlling someone.

In other words, it was always meant to be used on people of a lower cultivation than the user. Their similar cultivation level and Raul's greater foundation made it difficult for Marina to keep the technique intact, even without Raul's resistance.

Yet still, she chose this method because the techniques she was teaching today were far more complex than any of the previous ones, and she felt this would play to Raul's learning ability better.

"I'm first going over some simple circulations for using qi before we move into some sword techniques." She informed him before manipulating his body.

They'd already tested his talent with qi, and he was accustomed to using it his own way, there was no point in keeping him floundering in the dark now.

A person talented enough to create a wheel while knowing nothing could create so much more if they knew of a wheel to begin with.

Of course, there was only so much Marina could directly teach him. He'd have to take an interest in learning on his own to become a true erudite.

She manipulated Raul's body to use his meridians in various circulations methods. Sometimes she'd have him hit one of the posts to demonstrate the effects, but a surprising number of them were internal effects. Like harden his body, making him not have to breath, clearing his mind, controlling his heart rate, making him lighter, speeding up his healing, and dispelling toxins.

What truly amazed him wasn't even the effects of the qi circulations, it was all the little tricks that decreased qi consumption or made circulation faster that truly impressed him.

Like having a meridian pulse multiple times before ejecting qi instead of making the qi pass through the meridian several times. Or running multiple strands of qi through different circulations to stack effects, or even fuse effects. These were possibilities Raul never even thought of.

Raul thought meridians had endless variations before, now he was absolutely daunted by the myriad of changes possible. It was truly an endless expanse.

After ten minutes, he felt the strings slacken and control return to him. He looked back curiously and found Marina gasping for air and completely drenched in sweat.

He'd never seen her like this, and it was concerning, yet oddly enticing, as her sweaty form and flushed face brought memories of their one night together.

"… Try out some of those circulations I just taught you." She ordered, completely unperturbed by her current messy state.

She didn't release the technique as it allowed her to feel his qi circulation and make quick fixes when necessary. She only had to help out a few times however, as after a couple tries Raul would perform the technique perfectly, albeit slowly.

'It was a good idea to choose Strings of Creation.' She told herself. Today cemented the fact that Raul was an extreme learn by doing type. The Body Guiding Technique would save them a lot of time.

"Slow, but not bad." She commented. "Work on refining them during your own time so they can actually be used for combat." She could practically feel his fighting intent boiling over as her words hit him.

She took an ordinary long sword out of her ring and tossed it over to Raul. It was a normal training sword she'd borrowed from Tai, but it could withstand a cultivator's strength.

"Next is weapon training, get ready." She took control of him again.

He really wanted to tell her to take a longer break first, but the technique was already taking hold and would snap if he resisted.

The circulation methods she demonstrated this time were much more forceful and destructive in nature compared to the previous ones.

Thankfully the sword was naturally sturdier than his body and could handle more violent energies within it.

After a few displays, the tattered strings inside him collapsed before getting swiftly ejected by his body's natural qi flow.

He worriedly turned to Marina and found her swaying where she stood. He ran up to help her, but stopped his outstretched hands when she leveled a glare at him.

She shook her hand slightly and a book appeared in empty space close to Raul, who instinctively caught it before it fell.

It had no special markings on it and had a bland brown cover. A curious glance at the front revealed the fresh and neat handwritten title. The Four Seasonal Winds Sword Technique.

"Go over this and practice what I showed you for the next four hours. I'll have lunch made by then and run you through the technique afterwards." She said in a forcefully even tone before slowly walking back to the house.

Raul sighed in exasperation. He'd lost count of the number of times she'd needed to help him get inside, yet she couldn't even let him reciprocate the favor.

It honestly stung that even after all this time she refused to show any weakness around him. He thought there were times when they were getting a bit closer, but that sentiment was obviously one-sided.

'Bah! If she wants to struggle pointlessly that's her business. It's got nothing to do with me.' Raul shook his head before turned to the book with a serious expression.

Qi Refining Realm Cultivators only needed to sleep once every three days, and Raul was made to study many things during the nights. While a few late-night study sessions weren't enough to fix years of neglect, Raul was at least a bit less ignorant of common cultivator knowledge now, and he understood the importance of techniques.

Techniques were blueprints that allowed cultivators to use high level attacks without endangering themselves much. So long as a cultivator was compatible and followed within the guidelines there was no danger of accidentally melting your arm off or cutting your own neck.

It didn't matter if you were the one who created it, qi was dangerous and could always harm the user. It's because of that danger that cultivators usually only practice combat attribute manipulation after reaching the Spirit Ascension Realm. Many even wait until they're in the Inner Pillar Realm, and even then, more than a few idiots destroyed themselves producing more power than they can control every year.

Techniques ensure that won't happen by having many caps and failsafes in place. They were more important for safety at the lower realms, but techniques were still created and used at the highest realms of cultivation.

Banishing all distracted thoughts from his mind, Raul focused his full attention on absorbing everything he could from the book.