The serene lake reflected the vibrant colors of the setting sun while a gentle breeze swept across the grassy shore. The water rippled softly against the smooth stones lining the bank and the sounds of nature provided a comforting background melody. Zhan Tian sat on a sturdy wooden stool near the edge of the water and held a simple bamboo fishing pole in his hands. The Worldkeeper wore plain gray robes and looked like an ordinary elder enjoying a quiet afternoon of leisure.
Li Yu sat on a matching stool right beside his grandfather but he was struggling to find the same level of peace or patience.
He held an identical bamboo pole in his hands but his grip was rigid and overly cautious. His newly forged Heavenly Leviathan Physique possessed a staggering amount of raw physical strength and he was currently finding it very difficult to restrain it. Every small movement felt exaggerated and his muscles hummed with an endless supply of energy. He tried to shift his fingers to find a more comfortable hold on the handle but he applied just a fraction too much pressure.
A sharp crack echoed through the quiet air as the thick bamboo handle splintered into a dozen jagged pieces. Li Yu let out a long sigh and stared at the ruined fishing pole resting in his palms. The top half of the rod splashed into the shallow water and floated away while the fishing line tangled itself among the reeds.
"That was my third pole today," Li Yu said with a tone of heavy defeat. He carefully tossed the splintered remains onto the grass next to his stool. "I was barely squeezing it this time as well. I only wanted to adjust my thumb."
Zhan Tian let out a hearty laugh that carried across the tranquil water. He did not seem bothered by the broken equipment or his grandson’s issues at all as he reeled his own line in with a smooth motion.
"You are a Creation Lord now and have become one after the greatest tribulation test I have ever seen or know about." Zhan Tian reminded him with a warm smile. "Just about everything would be vastly superior to almost every other cultivator in the Myriad Realms within the same realm. Your physical body was rebuilt by the wrath of the heavens itself and your own unique foundation. You cannot expect a paper cup to hold a raging ocean back."
"It is incredibly frustrating," Li Yu admitted while looking down at his hands. "I feel like I need to calculate every single breath I take just to avoid blowing away the trees. I wanted to catch us a nice meal for tonight but I keep scaring all the fish away with my leaking aura as well."
It was a genuine problem that they had discovered earlier in the afternoon. Because Li Yu had leaped across four major realms in a single bound, he did not have the refined control needed to suppress his new power. His presence leaked out into the environment like a suffocating blanket of pressure which would have been okay but the two were currently trying to fish. He was acting like a light beacon of light right now and every fish in the surrounding area could see or feel him. Zhan Tian actually had to project a thin layer of his own domain just to mask his grandson so they could enjoy fishing anything at all.
"Do not rush the adjustment process," Zhan Tian advised as he cast his line back out into the center of the lake. "I experienced something similar to you, in a completely different situation though, many eras ago, I could not hold a simple teacup for three whole months. I shattered every single cup in the dining hall. Your grandmother was very close to banning me from the estate until I learned how to control my fingers. I wish you could have met her, Li Yu, she would have loved to have seen you."
Li Yu felt a moment of sadness that he would never get to meet her. From the stories that Zhan Tian had told him, she was quite the person. After a bit of time though, he chuckled at the mental image of his grandfather, the great Worldkeeper, fumbling with fragile teacups to try and control his strength. The story brought a comforting warmth to his chest and helped ease the tight frustration knotting his shoulders. It was good to know that even one of the most revered experts struggled with the mundane aspects of their own strength from time to time.
"I suppose I just need more practice with the small things," Li Yu noted while watching the gentle ripples on the water.
"Exactly," Zhan Tian agreed with a nod. "Which is why we are out here instead of practicing martial techniques in a reinforced arena. The wild requires patience and a delicate touch rather than brute strength oftentimes. Speaking of which, the sun is getting low and we should start setting up a proper camp for the night."
The Worldkeeper stood up and stretched his back before walking toward a wide rocky clearing situated just a few dozen paces away from the shore. Li Yu followed his grandfather and offered to gather some firewood from the nearby forest.
He walked into the dense tree line and searched for some fallen branches to use as kindling. Li Yu spotted a thick dead log resting near the roots of an ancient oak tree and crouched down to break it into smaller pieces. He raised his hand and executed a very basic martial strike to snap the wood in half so it would burn easier. Li Yu had done this countless times and intentionally held back as he had always done.
His palm struck the center of the log and a loud boom echoed through the forest.
The heavy piece of dead wood did not simply snap in half, the force of his strike obliterated the log entirely and turned the solid wood into a cloud of fine brown dust. The shockwave of the impact tore through the surrounding grass and violently destroyed a large area of forest in the direction of the strike, surprising him greatly.
Li Yu stood up and coughed as the cloud of sawdust settled over his robes as he looked at the empty patch of dirt where the log used and then at the area the forest used to be and let out another long sigh. Gathering firewood was apparently just as difficult as holding a bamboo pole.
He spent the next hour carefully plucking dry branches from the ground using only two fingers to ensure he did not turn them to dust but even then he found himself breaking quite a few of them. Li Yu returned to the rocky clearing with a modest pile of wood and found his grandfather waiting near a circle of smooth stones.
Zhan Tian had ventured further down the shoreline and returned with their dinner. The elder tossed a large blue scaled beast onto the grass. It was a river serpent known for its tender meat and rich water aligned energy.
"Since your fishing attempts were unsuccessful, I decided to procure our meal myself," Zhan Tian said with a teasing glint in his eyes. "Why don't you prepare this serpent for us tonight?"
Li Yu smiled and eagerly accepted the challenge. He had not practiced his culinary arts since the intense events of the tribulation began and he was looking forward to testing how his flame was now. Cooking required a delicate balance of heat and spiritual focus so it felt like the perfect exercise to regain control over his chaotic self.
He walked over to the river serpent and prepared his ingredients. The beast possessed a water aligned nature so it dictated a very specific approach. The Culinary Sovereign taught that applying too much heat to a water type ingredient would cause the delicate spiritual energy to shatter, losing Qi and turn the meat sour. It required a gentle and simmering internal flame to slowly break down the tough connective tissues without ruining the flavor and energy.
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
Li Yu also needed to apply the Radiant Crust technique first, to unleash a sudden burst of intense heat over the exterior to fuse the natural sugars and the surface of the meat together. This crust would create a physical barrier to lock the internal juices and the ambient Qi safely inside the meat during the rest of the cooking process.
Li Yu closed his eyes and used his powerful divine sense to map the internal structure of the serpent. He located the primary veins, fat marbling and the thick blood vessels running along its spine. Once he had a clear mental image of the pathways, he raised his hand and summoned his natal flame.
A bright orange fire bloomed to life above his palm as usual.
However, it was no longer the simple and pure natal flame he was used to wielding. The tribulation had fundamentally altered the nature of his energy and the flame was impacted as well. The orange fire crackled violently with thick arcs of various different color lightning. The lethal energy whipped around the edges of the flame and emitted a terrifying aura of destruction. It snapped and hissed in the evening air like a caged beast demanding to be unleashed upon the world. The temperature in the surrounding area spiked drastically as well, threatening to melt everything around.
Li Yu frowned and tried to suppress the wild lightning that was now a part of the flame itself. He willed the destructive arcs to calm down and focus into a smooth heat source but the energy was incredibly stubborn. The lightning sparked louder and sent tiny scorch marks across the rocky ground beneath his boots.
'This is going to be difficult,' Li Yu thought as he carefully extended his hand toward the prepared serpent.
He focused his mind and attempted to execute the Radiant Crust technique that he had long since mastered. He pushed a short burst of his natal flame over the exterior of the beast to sear the meat and lock the juices inside.
The moment the lightning laced fire touched the meat, a loud crack echoed across the clearing. The destructive energy did not gently fuse the sugars together as it had once did. It violently spread across the surface and detonated the ambient Qi resting near the surface. A small explosion ripped through the outer layer of the serpent and blasted a shower of charred flesh across the grass in an explosion.
Li Yu cursed under his breath and quickly pulled his hand back. The exterior of the serpent was completely ruined and sported a jagged black layer instead of a flavorful crust.
"Keep trying," Zhan Tian called out from across the fire pit while leaning back against a large rock with a large smile on his face. The elder was watching the display with clear amusement written across his face.
Li Yu grit his teeth and decided to skip the crust and move directly to the Internal Heat Channeling technique. The Culinary Sovereign instructed chefs to thread several thin lines of fire directly into the internal meridians to cook the beast from the inside out. He needed a gentle simmering heat to match the water aligned nature of the ingredient.
He focused all of his immense soul power into his palm and forced the chaotic flame to compress into a thin glowing thread like strings. He slowly pushed the strings of fire into the exposed center of the ruined serpent and tried to guide it along the primary meridian.
The fierce heat of his evolved flame instantly clashed with the gentle water energy of the beast. The flames surged forward without his permission and traveled down the energy pathways like a ravenous predator. The lightning flame ignored his commands for a gentle simmer and unleashed its raw destructive payload deep inside the meat.
The tough connective tissues did not render down softly, they vaporized instantly and dried out the meat. The internal juices began to boil with such chaotic ferocity that they produced a high pitched whistling sound as they escaped the meat itself. Li Yu tried to withdraw the flame but it was too late.
The intense heat and the volatile lightning caused the remaining moisture inside the serpent to expand rapidly. A muffled boom sounded from within the meat and the entire beast burst apart in a shower of steaming gray sludge and blackened bones. The spiritual energy shattered into pieces and a sour acrid smell filled the campsite.
Li Yu stared at the smoking crater of ruined flesh scattered across the rocks and realized there would be no resting phase tonight. There was hardly anything left to rest. He let out a loud groan of frustration and extinguished the crackling flame in his palm.
"I cannot do it," Li Yu complained while wiping a piece of charred scale off his robes. "The tribulation lightning fused with my natal flame and made it far too destructive. It refuses to simmer and it refuses to act gently. When I try to channel the heat into the meat, the lightning just obliterates the energy pathways and ruins the balance."
Zhan Tian let out a booming laugh that shook the leaves of the nearby trees. The Worldkeeper slapped his knee and found the entire situation incredibly hilarious at the cost of his grandson but he was actually happy that he got to still enjoy such moments with him. He was not worried that Li Yu wouldn’t be able to eventually control his strength. All that was truly needed was time and patience.
"Why is that funny?" Li Yu asked while pointing a frustrated finger at the ruined dinner. "I am trying to cook us a proper meal using my once superior techniques and my own fire is fighting against me. I cannot even roast a simple fish without turning it into ash now. How will I enjoy food now?"
"It is funny because you lack perspective," Zhan Tian explained while wiping a tear of mirth from his eye. "Do you know how many experts, especially those that specialize in fire techniques or flames, across the Myriad Realms would gladly trade their own souls to possess a flame that destructive? Cultivators spend thousands of years hunting for heavenly fires that can carry the laws of tribulation lightning. They would kill entire realms just to hold that power that you are complaining about that can’t cook your meal."
Zhan Tian pointed a finger at his grandson and continued his laughter.
"And here you are," Zhan Tian said with a wide grin. "A newly ascended Creation Lord blessed with that kind of power and destruction yet you are angry because it burns your dinner. It is the peak of irony that would cause many to roll over in their graves."
Li Yu listened to his grandfather and slowly lowered his hand. He looked at the scorch marks on the ground and realized how absurd his complaints truly sounded to someone else but they really were problems he now faced. He held a power capable of erasing his enemies from existence and he was whining about a ruined serpent steak. A reluctant smile crept onto his face and he finally let out a soft chuckle of his own as he relaxed some of his frustrations.
"I suppose it is a rather unique but blessed problem to have," Li Yu admitted while taking a seat on a nearby rock.
"It is a wonderful problem to have," Zhan Tian corrected him while standing up from his spot. "But your frustration is exactly why you must keep practicing it. Cooking like you do requires a high level of control and spiritual discipline. If you can learn to suppress that wild lightning and cook your meals like you once did, then you will have mastered the control over your new strength. Use the culinary arts you enjoy so much to help you to temper your new destructive nature."
"You want me to keep ruining our dinners until I figure it out?" Li Yu asked with a raised eyebrow.
"I want you to use every tool available to tame your strength," Zhan Tian replied while walking over to his spatial ring. "But I also want to eat tonight so I will handle the cooking for now. You might not realize this but I too am an amazing cook, it’s just that my meals are much more simple than yours. You just watch and focus on keeping your aura away from the food."
Zhan Tian pulled a large slab of premium spirit meat from his ring and used his Qi to start a fire and began to prepare a simple meal. Li Yu sat back and watched his grandfather work with practiced ease. The elder did not use complex internal channeling or radiant crust techniques but the food still smelled incredible as it roasted over the quiet fire.
They spent the rest of the evening sitting around the warm campfire and sharing stories of the past. Li Yu listened to tales of the ancient wars and learned more about the history of their family while enjoying the simple comfort of his grandfather's presence. He understood that his grandfather was taking time out of his busy life to be with him right now and ensure he was on the right path. That made him feel incredibly good as the warmth of familial love felt incredible to his body and soul.
Li Yu still struggled to limit his strength and he accidentally crushed his wooden cup twice during the meal but the frustration no longer clouded his mind. He understood that mastering his new power was a journey that required patience and grace.
Li Yu just needed a bit more time and a lot more practice before he could do the things he did before.
Comments